Seven days ago, we began a countdown to your birthday. Every morning I would ask you how many days until you turned four, and you'd enjoy figuring out how to subtract one from the previous count and announce the number with excitement. It's amazing to me how quickly the number changed from "seven" to "one". Here we are, on the eve of your fourth birthday, and I just had my last hug and kiss from my three-year-old. In the morning, you will be my four-year-old.
I have seen you grow so much over the last year. Not only have you gained about 6 inches and 6 pounds this year, you have changed from being more like a toddler to more like a kid. I can see you starting to sprout that kid-like enjoyment of the goofy, the funny, the weird. You like to make funny voices and faces and put your body in funny positions. You ask if we think something is funny; you are much more interested in humor.
Your stories are also becoming more kid-like. You have more complex plots when you talk about what happened to you or your make-believe stories. In fact, yesterday you were pretending to be Rapunzel who was pretending to be Peter Pan. (I was "Mama Gothel" who was playing Captain Hook.)
You have learned all of your letters and numbers, and can even identify compound words. You enjoy singing the song you use at school for compound words ("I have a little turtle, he lives in a box, he swam in the puddles, he climbed on the rocks, he snapped at "meat", he snapped at "ball", put them together and you get "meatball".) You know several words in Chinese, several art techniques, and plenty of gymnastics moves. You have soaked up so much information at school and in your extracurricular activities.
You still amaze me with your memory. It is truly one of your unique gifts. Just a few days ago, you were able to recount in perfect order the things we saw, characters we met, and rides we went on during our first morning at Disneyland. You can walk into someplace where you have only been once before, like a store, or someone's house, and immediately ask about something that happened the one time you were there previously, like when you asked to go see the dog at one of my professors' houses which you had only been to once, a whole year before.
You remain incredibly sweet and loving. Every day, at some point in the day, you'll ask me, "You know what, Mama?" "What?" I'll say. "I love you," is your reply. You asked me just a couple of days ago, "Mama, are you sure about anything?" I thought about it for a moment because, as you'll discover, the older you get, the less sure you are about anything. I said, "Yeah, I'm sure of a few things. Are you sure about anything?" You said, "Yes." I said, "Like what?" You said, "I'm sure that you're glad you have me." I started tearing up and said, "You're absolutely right. What else are you sure about?" "I"m sure that you're happy to love me."
Truer words were never spoken.
I think about this time four years ago, when we didn't know who you were. We knew we were having a baby girl, but we didn't know how incredible you would be, how endearing, how charming, how sweet, how creative, how good-natured, how sensitive, how lovely... We didn't know how you would change our lives, how you would make us laugh every day, smile every day, experience our own childhoods all over again every day.
You told me today, unprovoked, "When I'm a grown-up, you can still be my Mom." I'm glad that you know that I will always be your mom, that you know that I'm glad to have you and happy to love you. I can't imagine my life any other way. I don't want to. You are my sunshine, my joy, my precious girl. Thank you for sharing your smiles and laughter with me. Thank you for loving me, and for letting me love you.
All my love,
Mama
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