As children grow...

Erez's arrival has reinforced for me how time flies when kids grow. I look Calanit and think about how big she is now. We were on a walk last night and ran into a couple whose son had just gotten married. Naturally, the conversation turned as parents to the major lifecycle milestones.

Last night, I got very emotional thinking about the day when Calanit will be all grown up or when the time will come when she doesn't run to me saying "Abba" at every possible moment. "Abba," which is father in Hebrew, is her answer to most things. It makes me feel great.

The last couple of nights, she's been having some difficulty sleeping and when I walk in her room in the middle of the night, she reaches over the bar of her crib, wraps her arms around me and just holds on. I pull her out of the crib and she clutches on to me for safety.

Make no mistake about it, I don't enjoy getting up at 2.30am, but somehow, the feeling of your daughter looking to you for comfort makes it worthwhile. It's tough to cherish htose moments when you're exhausted, but as I think about how time will fly, I work harder to appreciate how much she needs me and unconditionally loves me right now.

It's these little things that I try to remember. On our walk, I must have sung the alphabet for her about 100 times (she kept saying 'again') and towards the end, she was picking it up (not entirely of course), but these are the little moments that make up a life, I suppose.