Happy Birthday, Man Cub!

How can it be a year?? How can you be 1 already? It seems like just yesterday I was racing the halls of the hospital praying and praying for labor to start. No, I didn’t mean to say ‘pacing’. I was racing. Clocking laps faster than an Andretti brother. But you had your own agenda, and your own time frame. One year later, not much has changed in that regard.

You are mommy’s boy (or as they say here peata [PA-tuh] mamai [MA-mee]) through and through. But don’t confuse that with a “momma’s boy.” They are two different things. 🙂 You and I have been inseparable from the beginning. Some of that out of necessity. However, you love your Daddy. You love to have him toss you in the air as high as he can, and you laugh uncontrollably when he makes silly faces, tickles you, sings songs, or wags and wiggles you all around. Your sisters are some of your favorite people in the world. You flap all appendages of your body as much as you can when you hear them coming down the stairs each morning and you giggle with glee when their bed-heads come around the corner. You love to have Flower Girl play peek-a-boo, sing, and tickle you. You love for Butterfly Girl to bring dolls and toys to you and do her little conversations and plays with them for you. You want desperately to do what they do, but you’re not quite there yet.

You can say/have said your name, Dada, Mama, Yes, This, All Done and baba. But your words of choice tend to be Dada (you say it for both me and Daddy unless you’re upset. Then it’s Maammmmaaaaaaaa) and All Done. You say All Done for everything involving food. That’s how you ask for food; tell us you see food; tell us you’re done with food. Just today you let out a man-sized belch and declared “All Done!!” You started crawling last week, and you can cruise the furniture like a pro. You are starting to pull up on everything, and have started pushing your toy box around the living room.

We are in awe of all of the wonderful developmental things you can do, nearly all of which have been in your own time, in your own way. If I had a dime for all the times I said, “When the girls were this age….” we’d have your college paid for!

But what we are most in awe of is you. How you fit in and complete this family. We never planned to have 3 children, but I never realized how badly I wanted you until you were here. It seems as though you’ve always been in this family, and yet you shouldn’t be a year yet. Aren’t you just a few months old?? My heart rejoices in the leaps and bounds you are making and how you are growing up so strong and healthy and big. It rejoices. And it breaks. It mourns from the reality that you, like your sisters, are going to grow up. You’re going to get big and strong and fight imaginary dragons; become a ninja; a cowboy; an astronaut; a zombie. You’re going to go to school before I know it, and I can’t bear to think of it.

So, Happy Birthday little man cub. Today is truly a celebration of something that by all accounts was never meant to be. And oh how grateful we are that it did! If anyone doubts the existence or occurrence of miracles today, just ask us. There are special plans in store for you, Little Man. And this mother’s heart is bursting with excitement to see what they hold for you; who you will become. But not yet, Buddy. You are loved more than you could know by all of us. Your first year has been a whirlwind and we pray your second year is full of excitement, fun, and more blessings than you could count. If. You could count….