Three Years: Happy Birthday, Henry!

Dearest Henry,

I can't believe how much you've changed in one short year. At the start of last year, you had just spoken your first sentence: "Hoss loves peanut butter." Now you get into lengthy and compelling debates with us that usually start with, "Well, actually..."

You are the most amazing little independent creature. You generate ideas ("How about if we put healthy candy in my birthday piñata? or "Can we do research to see if I'm ready for a pedal bike?). You write your own jokes ("Poop on the floor!"). You dance. You cook eggs. You run. You build lots and lots and lots of "airplanes" with all of the blankets around the house. You are such a good big brother.

At this time last year, we lived in our rental house off Garrison Park and we were watching my belly grow with your little brother. We spent every afternoon at the park. As spring turned into summer, we spent every afternoon at the swimming pool. Tate was born in July at home. You slept through his birth and awoke to meet your new brother in the morning. We celebrated his birthday with cake and a present. Then we had lots of family in town. In August we moved into our new house.

The summer turned into Fall. For Halloween, you decided to dress up like your favorite animal: an elephant. We decided to build our family costume around yours, so we turned it into a circus theme. I dressed up like a clown, Tater was a little strongman, and your dad dressed up like popcorn.

Thanksgiving came and you declared, "Lions eat meat, and I eat meat." You loved eating turkey with Uncle Mike. At Christmas we traveled to Florida to see my family, and then your dad's family came to Austin to see us.

You love reading books, and picking up chickens. You are hankering for the world map lesson at school. You talk about the Atlantic Ocean and Asia. You moved from the Youngest Children's Community to the Primary class in November.

You display the most amazing emotional intelligence. I pick you up from school every afternoon and our conversation goes like this:

Me: "How was your day, Henry?"

You: "It was great! How was your day, Mom?"

You are able to articulate the way you feel ("Mom, I didn't like it when you snatched the ______ from me. That was mean."

Every morning, you wake up at 7 on the dot (we're still not sure how you do it) and you climb into bed with us. I love being close to you.

You are simply pure light. We are so fortunate that you are in our family.You brighten our lives every day. I look forward to another year of watching your true self unfold.

With gratitude, 

Your mama

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