I think in some ways you never expect your kids to grow up. Part of you can't wait for them to be adults and have families of their own, but another part of you is genuinely surprised when they start to walk, or learn to read or whatever.

So, when Anya came to me after flipping through the DVR listings and asked,
"Mom, can I watch Dirty Jobs, the episode is called 'Sexing Chicks' but I don't think it's about human females..." it was hilarious, but it was also just more proof that she's starting to pay attention with an adult eye to the things in her world. She's starting to be the kid in the background snickering at the inside jokes adults make, when the younger kids are still clueless. She's starting to ask questions, and wonder about what it means to be a woman in our world. And, again, I'm caught off guard, even though I know it's coming, and she's certainly old enough and mature enough to know these things. Where does the time go?

In case you're interested, she was right, it wasn't about human females at all, it was about the high stakes world of baby chicken genders. My kids, of course, were most entertained by the "squeezing the poop out of the of chicks to check inside the vent" method of determining if they're girls or boys. TV doesn't get much more educational than that, does it?