High Five

Hey, baby girl.

For weeks (WEEKS) now, you’ve asked me if I can believe that you are turning five. No, I can’t. I can’t believe it because I remember the details of your birth like it was just last week. I remember having my membranes stripped (TMI) and heading to the hospital that night because I’d started contracting. I remember how your nurse thought that we were having a boy and how our Doctor hoped we could have a girl and how your Daddy saw a bouquet of flowers at the nurses’ station that was congratulating someone on the birth of a boy and he thought that was a sign that you were a boy. I remember walking the halls of the hospital, trying to move labor along, and wondering who you might be.

I remember wondering if you might possibly be a girl. I love your brothers, as much as you love them, if not more, but having a baby girl would be kind of fun. My pregnant body was different with you. It grew in different ways and I had [redacted] and [redacted] and thought that female hormones might be the reason for all of the chaos going on with my body. I played the diplomat and just shrugged my shoulders when people asked me if I thought you might be a girl. Your Daddy and I went into that pregnancy wishing for a healthy third baby, be it boy or girl.

When it was time for you to emerge, you came out and both the Doctor and the nurse yelled, “It’s a GIRL!!!”

I burst into tears. I hadn’t realized how much I had hoped for a girl until those words were exclaimed.

You are a girl. You are my girl. You are a fan of pink and of orange and of hair clips. You love to dance (You just switched from ballet to jazz) and you love to sing (you sing everything from Top 40 songs to the details of your day) and you love to laugh. You love to fart (and then laugh) and you love tell silly knock-knock jokes. You love to jump on the trampoline with your brothers and you love to crawl in with me in the mornings for a snuggle before we get on with our day. You love your brothers and you love your cousins and you love your friends.

You love having me at the bus stop every morning and you love to have me hug you and to kiss the top of your head and you love to blow me a kiss goodbye.

You are a beautiful girl with big blue eyes and a smile that lights up the world. You are a fiery spirit with a golden heart and you strike the balance perfectly between the two. You have an adorable accent/lisp on certain words that make me smile and fear the day that you get them “right.” You have regular conversations with God that make me equal parts amazed and chilled.

You are my best girl. Forever and ever, Amen.

I love you the most.

Love, Mommy

P.S. Daddy left “before the butt-crack of dawn” to go hunting, so he left you this note for when you wake up.

He loves you very, very much.

*A birthday post would not be complete without including some of my favorite photos of you.