The Threenage Year(s)

My baby turned four this week. Not my baby baby, I guess I don't have one of those right now, but my first baby.

I woke her up by singing the birthday song. She smiled, then asked if she could sleep longer (despite the lure of sprinkle pancakes). While I went to do some small odd job, her little brother came in and succeeded in what I could not do: awaken the dragon. (I can say dragon, because she was born in the year of the dragon, so it makes it okay to refer to her as my dragon child, right?) Pretty soon I heard screaming and crying from her and silence from him, which means that he had given her the first birthday gift of the day: the gift of sharing things you don't want to share with people you don't want to share with.

Aside from our morning screamings and non-existent snuggles, we managed to have a most beautiful, happy day. Those are rare around here. Three has not been kind--is three ever kind? I though three was supposed to be a magic number. Well, magically, the Year of Three made me question everything I thought I knew about myself, mothering, and humanity.

But we survived. And today my little girl put on her fake pearls and headed off to preschool with curls bouncing, dressed to the nines in her favorite outfit and polka-dot tennis shoes.

Today, I caught that glimpse of the little girl that I have always known is in there: kind, brave, friendly, joyful, courageous. She said thank you and played independently and asked if she could help make cupcakes. Aside from decorating several of our nicest children's books with Berenstain Bears stickers, she was an angel today.

Or maybe she was an angel today because I wanted her to be one--because I spent the whole day for her and about her, minus the twenty minutes I spent holding teething Sly while we watched Daniel Tiger, but she was at school during that time.

I am brought back to her first birthday--the one where her pigtails were barely an inch long, and her thighs still had baby chub, and she couldn't walk so she crawled everywhere. She dug into her cake without worrying about sticky fingers, barely cared that there were presents, and was mostly just overjoyed at the sheer amount of grandparents in our apartment. There were dozens of balloons, alluding to her "UP!" theme. Happy Birthday Kevin.

Her second birthday was a little different. By then, much had changed in our family. This was our first birthday in our new home. There were leftover balloons from the year before and everything was decorated in turquoise and pink--leftover from my sister-in-law's baby shower two months before. I spent weeks trying to find the perfect baby doll; one with real hair and eyes that opened and closed and a soft body, so Kevin could cuddle her. We had only a small dinner party, as that was about all my pregnant body could handle, and we were all looking forward to Kevin's promotion. Happy Birthday Big Sister. 

And although it was only a year ago, I don't remember much about her third birthday except the vast amounts of purple. That's the only theme we had that year. Purple, purple, purple. At the last minute I ordered some Daniel Tiger figurines off Amazon to decorate her cake with. Her cake was purple, her dress was purple, her presents were all purple. I suspected then, and know for certain now, that her demand for purple was merely the beginning of my daughter becoming her own person. Happy Birthday Little Girl.

This year, I was given a theme: Rapunzel and Fancy Nancy. I planned the party, but she made the requests. I think it was the first time this whole year that we collaborated without having to negotiate. There was no sass and no impractical demands, just my imagination and her imagination working together to create something both of us loved. I didn't even actually go birthday shopping for presents--I have so many "extra" things that I bought for her at Christmas that I simply chose four things out of the stack in the closet. One thing I've learned about my daughter in the past year: she's about as easy to buy for as she is hard to put up with. Yes, the Year of the Threenager just about did me in.

For the past week, we've been commenting to her about how fast she is growing up and how big she is getting. Her response has always been: "My body is just letting me."

For this, I am grateful. I want her to learn and to grow. I was sad to leave her babyhood and toddlerhood behind, but her to threehood I am more than happy to say "adieu!" (that's fancy for GET OUT OF HERE!)

I was so optimistic that today would be end of the threenager that I forgot one important law of childhood: children don't grow and develop on a rigid time schedule. They do their own thing in their own time and, as a parent, it is my job to hurry up, to slow down, to hurry along, and to coach her to her milestones, but I cannot get her there. She must do it on her own.

When I tucked her in, surrounded by her favorite doll, five soft toy "friends", a stack of books, her brother's forgotten Pete the Cat doll, and twenty glow sticks leftover from the paper lantern "floating lights", I kissed her forehead, looked into her eyes, and said, "I love you sweetheart."

Her response?
"I know. Bye."

And thus the threenage years continue.
Happy Birthday, my girl.