My loves

Plain and simple.

Five

Dearest Meredith, 

Today you are five.  FIVE.  five?  I know... when did you get so big?  This has been a big birthday for you.  You could not wait for this day to come.  You birthday is one of the last amongst your little friends and it has been hard.  Just last month as we were getting ready for another birthday party, you put your hands on your hips and said "this is it, I'm done.  I'm not going to anymore birthday parties until I am 5!"  Thankfully we weren't invited to anymore, because I am pretty sure you would've stood by your word.

Your fifth birthday celebration was so memorable.  It started by us getting not one but two birthday cakes.  One to serve and one for you to blow candles out on.  Why?  Oh because you got mono two weeks before your 5th birthday.  The joys of big school and turning five.  But you were determined to feel better by your party.  You told me that all week.  "Don't worry mom I will feel better for my party."

In the past five years it is amazing how big you have gotten and how fast that has happened.  I know it is cliche' but it passed in the blink of an eye.  I still remember five years ago, being wheeled to my room in the hospital after coming out of recovery.  It was about 3am and the nurse was going over a few things.  I had been awake for 21 hours at this point, 17 of those hours in labor and had just undergoing a major abdominal surgery to meet you.  After her five minute spiel she looked at me and asked "Any questions?"  I remember looking back at her in my exhaustion and simply asking "Can you repeat all that to my husband when he gets here?" and then asking "Are you just going to leave this baby in here with me?"  Becoming your mom was surreal, like no other thing in the world.  I had no clue how awesome it would be, how amazing.  You changed me.

The night before you birthday party as we tucked you in, you looked at your dad and I and said "Well tomorrow a lot of things are going to change now that I'm five....Oh mom I just can't wait I'm going to start fixing my own food and my own drinks...and I'm going to be tall enough to go outside and get my own cokes out of the refrigerator."  It tickled me to death to see how excited you were for this day. 

Every year for your birthday, your dad and I go all out to throw the best celebration we can, to celebrate your five years here on earth.  To celebrate another year of you.  To celebrate getting the wonderful privilege to be your parents.  To celebrate you.  We love you so much.  We love who you are and who you strive to be.  We love you.  Happy Birthday to my five year old.

Love,

your momma

And so it begins...

Tonight my sweet friend Allison brought me a birthday dinner.  She made homemade lasagna, salad, bread and a bottle of pinot grigio.  And as much as I would love to say I put that dinner in the fridge for tomorrow and went out on the town to celebrate, sadly I did not.  With one child home with mono.....yes I said it....MONO....and a DIFFERENT child home covered in large red welts over most of her body due to an allergic reaction to penicillin, we are home bound.

So Allison's dinner was exactly what we needed and it went fabulously with the birthday cake my husband picked up for me.  Meredith and Noah gobbled down some lasagna, that and spaghetti are some of their favorites. Josh and I also enjoyed some with a glass of wine. Margot sat in her chair watching everyone eat as Josh opened up her very expensive organic baby food.....*note the child with allergies.  It took one spoon to the mouth for her to start yelling in protest.  She then knocked the spoon full of organic baby food away and all over the floor, repeatedly.  Josh was feeding her.  Me I wouldn't have let that happen....at least not repeatedly.  After several more failed attempts and an almost overturned bowl of baby food.  Josh cut up some lasagna and placed it on her tray.

She inhaled it.  Then did the sign for more.  So we gave her more and she inhaled that as well.  We asked her to look up and say cheese and her look is exactly what I would be thinking....I'm trying to eat here people.

Margot ate an entire meal of lasagna tonight and no baby food.  Meredith and Noah had stopped eating baby food by 9 months old.  Margot is right on target.  Well a little early.  Again she likes to be first.

Thanks so much Allison for a great birthday meal.  I really appreciate it and love the gesture.  I think I may start giving my friends a night off from cooking for their birthday too! 

Being the first

Margot was not the first born, in fact she will be our last.  The caboose.  However, she will not let a title like "the caboose" get her down.  No sir-ree, in fact she is determined to be the first at several things.  She was the first of my babies to sit up at 5 1/2 months.  And now she is the first to get up and crawl on all fours at 8 months.  She's been on all fours for a while and inching forward little by little, but last Monday is what I am calling her  official crawling day.  It was the day she crawled all day and proudly showed she could get wherever she wanted.  Although she did do quite a bit of crawling on Saturday And Sunday as well.

But Monday is our day.  In fact when Josh got home Monday evening, she crawled right over to him and landed at his feet with her arms up.  It was very sweet.  He was amazed and finally believed my proclamation of her crawling abilities. 

I'm betting she is also going to be my first to walk, since she is already starting to pull up.  She just has to do it by her first birthday.