Happy Birthday Little One,
You are two today, bright eyed and full of laughter. When you woke up this morning, you called for Daddy, and he brought you to bed between us, where you snoozed dreamily for another hour, content in a cocoon of love and warm breath between us. When you woke for the second time, we sang happy birthday to you, and you grinned your sunny grin, your bottom incisors just cutting through your gums, and said, “Make birthday cake?â€
Birthday cake is what turning two is all about for you. Especially when it’s made with chocolate frosting. You call it “Chocit iting,†and tonight the three of us made your cake together: your great grandmother’s pound cake recipe with chocolate cream cheese frosting and fresh strawberries. You licked the batter off the whisk, and the icing from your fingers, and when it came time to blow out your candles—two, and one to grow on, you took the job quite seriously. Your eyes were so large, in the semi dark. Your breath so full with two year old wonder.
You have become such an incredible person this year, full of inquisitiveness and delight. You want to understand how everything works, you can use a real screwdriver correctly, and reprogram every possible item in our house with buttons (the thermostat, by climbing up onto the back of the chair; my laptop; daddy’s computer; the answering machine...) You are a nature lover, a collector of small quartz rocks and tiny acorns. You are tender, and you hate see me sad. You reach out for us now, saying “Hug!†when you want to be wrapped tightly in our arms, and you gather up your stuffed animals and cars and trucks and even picture books, to give them hugs as well.
It would be okay to have you stay this way for another year: so sweet and rosy and full of wonder, despite your temper tantrums which mostly leave Daddy and I hysterically laughing. You delight at the world. “So pretty,†you say, noticing the moon, the setting sun, the rising stars, with your arms outstretched, and eyes wide. We love you so much, your daddy and I, despite the fact that having you has stretched the fabric of our love for each other in a hundred new directions. You make us laugh a zillion times a day, and make us stop and ponder too, how great a gift our life is.
Love, Mommy
Birthday photoset here.