Our Baby is Three

Yes, we already celebrated her birthday, but today makes it truly official. My baby, Elsa, is three years old. Three years ago today (about 30 minutes from the time I am writing this), we were blessed with this little one.

Today, she runs circles around us on a daily basis. She talks our ears off and exudes more energy than I knew could even exist within one little being. She sings. She dances. Oh how she sings and dances. She loves to read. And memorize. The girl has a memory like a steel trap, for sure. She loves being outside. In fact, it pains us sometimes that we cannot let her just have free reign more in the yard because of man-eating mosquitoes (we are looking forward to cooler temps and hopefully less of them). The girl prefers to be barefoot at all times. Even if at the ice cream parlor (see below).

I feel it is impossible to list all of her accomplishments over the past year here. One of her favorite times of day right now is when her daddy gets home from work. It is a race between her and Merckx to get to the door (and often outside of it before Daddy even makes it inside), give a big hug, and most excitedly exclaim whatever is most new in her mind from the day. And then it is quickly on to their favorite pastime, tickling. Their game of "I'm going to get you..." and then racing into the back room for a tickle match is one of my favorite times of day. Hearing those giggles and that laughter makes our evenings that much more full.

She is officially attached to her blankee. And though she knows she has two (one for backup purposes), she seems to be more attached to one over the other.

Elsa loves playing with Legos, her dollhouse, cookie cutters and Play-Doh, making cupcakes and tea and other fine (and maybe somewhat strange) tasty treats for us in her play kitchen. She has started in on a love of puzzles. She loves to pretend to change her baby doll's diaper.

And this year is going to bring big changes for this little one. She is going to be a big sister any day now. It will certainly be interesting to see how she adapts to this and takes on this most important role. It will be a big change for all of us, but especially for her.

Today was made special with a birthday celebration at playgroup. I contacted Gabriela via email to find out the protocol for birthday celebrations, and she asked that I make a cake and bring some flowers, and to arrive around 12:30 p.m. to take part in the celebration. It was lovely. Gabriela had the chairs arranged in a circle, as is typical for storytime, but at the head of the circle there were silks draped behind one wooden chair and one white wicker rocker, with a "happy birthday" banner hung above it all. I sat in the wooden chair and Elsa sat in the special white chair. While Elsa was adorned with a birthday crown and silk cape, I passed out cut flowers to each child, who then stuck them in the cake, which was set on a small table in front of me and Elsa, along with one big lit candle. Gabriela proceeded to weave a very enchanted, beautiful story about how Elsa came into the world and would pause at certain intervals (when Elsa was a baby, when she was one, when she was two, and today with her turning three) and let me insert little pieces of the story as to what she was doing at each age. Then I would take a small candle, light it from the big candle, and place it on the cake, saying "And Elsa was one," and so forth. At the baby stage, she was able to choose a person to hold hands with and walk around the room (she chose a boy, Rocket). At the one year stage, she walked around the small table with Rocket, and after that she walked (pranced) around on her own. At the end of the story, we all joined hands and walked around the table. Then we took our seats and clapped while we sang "Happy Birthday" to her, and she proceeded to blow out the candles on the cake. I could tell throughout the entire process that Elsa felt truly special, and she seemed to know exactly what to do, likely because of taking part in the celebration of others. I joined the children for their vegetable soup lunch and then the cake was served. The cake, which was a flourless (re: gluten-free) honey-almond cake, was a huge hit -- a relief to me since I had never made it before. Elsa ate three small pieces herself, which was pretty amazing. And during our lunch, Elsa was presented with a book of drawings that Gabriela and each of the children had done earlier in the morning. Very sweet.

Later in the afternoon I decided to take Elsa over to Morelli's for her first ice cream cone. We had actually been to Morelli's once before, on my birthday, and Elsa was upset that day because I had ordered her a cup instead of a cone (which she saw another little girl eating). So she was very excited to get her chocolate (of course) ice cream on a sugar cone. Of course, when she actually took a bite of the cone at some point she made gagging noises and said she did not like it, so she only ended up eating the ice cream out of it anyway. She was delighted nonetheless.

Happy birthday to our sweet girl, the big three-year-old! We love you so much!!!