My first thought was of the poor painter who spent some of the longest days of his life tracing and taping and painting a teal and coral chevron pattern on those walls years ago.

My second thought was, “This request has come too quickly.”

Last weekend, I finally caved to her pleas for a new bedroom. We went shopping. She passed the kid’s bedding section– passed the My Little Pony sheets and the pastel butterfly comforters and went straight to the grown folks aisle.

“I want it to be simple. White. Peach. Gold accents. Some throw pillows. Maybe a chair in the corner.”

A chair in the corner? Kids don’t need a chair in the corner unless they are in time-out. But she wanted a chair. To sit in. Quietly. To read. To work on her computer. No longer sprawled out on the floor on her belly with her long ponytail draped over her shoulder and her legs kicking in the air– but a chair. Like grown-ups use.

She wanted a vintage world map to hang on the wall, too. Why? So she can look at it while she sits in her grown-up chair and thinks of all the places she wants to go? Places she wants to go without her mama. With her college friends. Or, gasp, her future husband.

I hate painting, but I adore her. So I painted over that girly-colored chevron pattern and every time a coral zig-zag disappeared, I died a little inside. I put the huge world map on the wall. She filled Goodwill bags with the juvenile knick-knacks that sat on her piano-a kitty cat pencil holder and stuffed animals. She took photos out of the picture frames that are better suited for a baby girl’s nursery.

She replaced the “babyish” things with mini topiaries, a stylish gold lamp, a letterboard that she decorated with a Michael Scott quote.

While she was at school yesterday, I painted her babyish furniture a more sophisticated color. I put the throw pillows on her bed. I sat down in that grown-up chair and looked around the new room.

It’s no longer a little girl’s room. It better resembles a dorm room. It’s not a “cute” room. It’s a “nice” room. It’s a room where you watch “Grey’s Anatomy” instead of “Doc McStuffins”.

I nearly cried in that grown-up chair. My firstborn is no longer a baby. The drawer where I kept all her hairbows now holds ripped jeans and vintage t-shirts. Kidz Bop doesn’t blast from a CD player in here anymore. Now it’s some guy named Capaldi wailing about lost love through the speaker of her iPhone.

Love. Oh gracious. That’s coming, too, isn’t it? Some boy asking her to a football game. Watching them drive away by themselves. Watching her face glow- watching her twist strands of her hair, as she does when she’s nervous, while he eats spaghetti with us at our dinner table. Watching her sit in that grown-up chair and cry over him when Capaldi’s lyrics become her truth.

Or watching them fall more in love each year as the epitome of the “high-school sweetheart” story. Watching her try on a wedding dress in some boutique downtown. Watching her walk down an aisle on her daddy’s arm as I twist snotty Kleenex in my hands.

I sat in that chair and thought of her future. And our past. And how quickly these years have flown, and are continuing, to fly by.

All of these thoughts, these emotions, started with, “Mama, I really want to redo my room. It’s too babyish.”

But, my love, you will always be your mama’s baby. I’ll always see you as that little girl in a smocked dress with an oversized bow in your hair- overcome with excitement at the thought of having a chevron pattern painted on your wall and a kitty cat pencil holder on your table.