Your fourth Birthday

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Audrey,

You’re 4 today. I cannot believe I’ve managed to keep a tiny human alive for 4 whole years with the help of your father.. so "we." You are everything we didn’t ask for but certainly what we needed.

You’ve had quite the year. You switched from Lamb of God Lutheran school to NCA Baby University - Las Vegas Chinese School, you’ve learned to write your name in English and Chinese, you can tell basic time (the time is 6:23pm and you just said 6 and a 3 and a 2), can use mental math for basic addition, you recognize all of your letters and numbers and your hand writing when tracing specifically is better than most adults. You now know North, South, East & West and most recently learned how to snap your fingers when you dance. You can say many simple phrases in Chinese and many songs, Your dad loves how when you get to school you speak mandarin almost the entire day until we pick you up and then you switch back to English. You also learned a little about computers this year, and sometimes at school you earned short increments of time on them. Proud to see you growing in the area of technology something I’ve tried my best to keep you away from.

You grew very  tall this year, at 3.5 and 40 lbs we flipped you forward facing in our cars and you loved it, we moved into a new home this year and changed your bed to a toddler bed after a week in Atlanta sleeping in your cousins room at your Grammy and Papa’s house. You hosted a few sleepovers this year so after a few months we gifted your crib to another baby and bought you a beautiful silver trundle bed, so the sleepovers can continue in your room instead of on the big couch.

Speaking of Atlanta, you also went to Florida and Utah this year. For the first time you were able to put your feet in the Atlantic Ocean and you loved the temperature but couldn’t stand the seaweed. You also fell in love with learning about new ways of transportation, boats, trains, planes, and trolleys! You loved them all. You went to your first Broadway musical at the Smith Center at 3 years & 10 months to see Wicked and you LOVED it, we believe you're a budding thespian in the making. Shortly before Wicked your best friend & his family invited you to watch a Golden Knights Game in our company Suite and you LOVED that too, but earlier this year your Aunt B, Daddy & I took you to your first Knights game and that game they won, you could not have been happier.

Your appetite hasn’t changed much, you eat very well. You have always been willing to try a lot of new foods and still eat vegetables without hesitation, we’ve never had to bribe you to eat. Usually we do have to remind you to chew with your mouth closed and talk less while you’re at the table. You have the gift of gab, you got that from me. You’ll sometimes miss lunch at school because you’re so busy talking sometimes.

At home you still nap in your bed, I couldn’t tell you the last time you tried to come in our room at night but the nightlight is completely gone and you’ve reverted back to your fantastic sleeping habits as a small baby. At school you don’t nap, so I’m sure by next year at this time you won’t be taking any naps. Which will make me sad but you’re growing, so that’s ok.

This year you’ve been asking for a sibling at every chance you get. Not only a sibling, a sister, and if you got a brother, you’d also like a sister in the future. We know you believe you’re ready for the opportunity and we look forward to seeing that happen for you; maybe by the time you’re 5 it may be a closer reality than it is right now. For now, you enjoy spending time with all of your friends baby siblings especially Jemma, Joey's sister. You’re a sweet caregiver of small babies and you can be trusted to help in many ways with them!

You began dance class this year, you took a ballet, jazz, tap, and Acro class and loved it. Though being a social butterfly you played around quite often... you were very cute and similar to gymnastics you did the best in Acro. You’re very flexible and LOVE gymnastics so maybe you’ll do more of that next year. You also fell in love with slime, so we taught you how to clean your bathroom and maintain the cleanliness of your room and playroom to earn money from chores to go towards buying new slime. It’s a fantastic system and you’re a generally a less messy girl because of it.

You love having friends over, your current best friends at school are Hunter, Raina, London, & Gemini. Your best friends outside of school are Joey, Ariel, Skyler, Scarlett, Harper & Wexi (Lexi) and newly, Everly. They are your people & you’d beg for a play date with any of them. You spend a lot of holidays with Skyler still, they’re more like family but you and him can’t get enough of one another. You’ve gotten much better at being a good friend and less sassy and harsh since being separated from Reagan. May that friendship be a testament of your future, sometimes growth comes when we cut off dead ends my girl.

Your hair has gotten lighter as your sun exposure has increased and much thicker curls develop than ever before. In Florida on a beach day you earned a tan that mirrors the coppertone girl and it’s been 7 months and it hasn’t completely faded from your leg line. You still can’t swim without floaters but the first time you ever did you were in a pool in Ft, Lauderdale Florida and I remember being so shocked and proud at the same time but also so sad, you were growing right in front of me & I couldn’t help but ask time to slow down. You do tan; though it fades as I mentioned and you’re still very pale in complexion. Your eyes are more light green than they are blue now, some days they’re a powder blue and some days they’re blue green, sometimes they’re even grey. Still beautiful. Even so.

Your favorite color is still pink and all shades of glitter & you love bath bombs, raspberry yogurt,   chicken, edamame, and French fries. You like watching Creative Galaxy because you’re a crafter and an imagineer at heart. You discovered Barbie this year and LOVE them and their movies. You don't have a favorite "show" you request... Disney+ came out recently so you've been watching your favorite princess movies - your current favorite Disney princess is Elsa and for your birthday earlier this week your Bama, Papi, Aunt B, Dad & I took you to see Frozen II your second time seeing a movie in theaters and you LOVED it, I think 2.5 was a good age for your first movie (The Incredibles II) but 4 was much better! 

You question everything, and I try to stay away from telling you the blunt truth but I share what I can when I can. Your most surprising questions have been about homelessness, death, natural disasters, and car accidents. You always want the answers to the next big thing and I don’t always have them. You’re becoming more sneaky and resilient and while one is clearly better than the other, neither are appropriate for your age. I want you to always challenge things that cause others harm but stop challenging your parents, grandparents & teachers. I can;t wait to see if and how you grow in that last sentence, I'm still learning at 28 years old.

When you grow up, you want to be a decorator you say, something like your Bama someone who designs weddings parties and fun. You’ve replayed the details of your wedding multiple times to me. The cake the shoes the dress for the wedding and the dress for the reception, his shoes his bow tie, how his hair will look what food you’ll eat. You’re a planner like your mama... and though I never dreamed that far in advance, I’m thankful you share your life out loud because your dreams are not bigger than my heart and my heart loves all of them and all of you. Thank you for being ours, this year was fantastic and I can’t wait to see what 4 brings. Happy Birthday our darling girl.


love, your mama.

This year we will introduce the toddler birthday interviews.

 Audrey age 4

  1. What is your name? Audrey
  2. How old are you? 4
  3. What makes you happy? Laughs and says making miss Abbie laugh
  4. What is your favorite animal? A horse
  5. What is your favorite color? Pink
  6. What is your favorite thing to eat? Crab
  7. What is your favorite thing to do? Paint
  8. What is your favorite TV show/ movie? Barbie
  9. What are you really good at? Doing back flips
  10. What do you want to do when you grow up? Be a swimming teacher
  11. What is your favorite song? “Let it go”
  12. What do you and your mom do together? Cook and Watch beautiful movies in her bed eating candy canes
  13. What do you and your dad do together? Make smoothies and bake cookies
  14. What is your favorite book? Fairytales
  15. What’s the best thing about being you? Laughs and then says ... not doing boy stuff I can wear dresses
  16. What is something that makes your family special? We make her laugh
  17. What do you love doing? I love to horseback ride
  18. What do you know enough about that you could teach others? Chinese
  19. What is the best thing that has happened to you? Laughs. I get to clean the house and that’s fun
  20. If you had three wishes what would they be?
  1. I'd be in a princess fairy tale
  2. I’d be a ballerina
  3. I would want a princess birthday party

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