To My Almost 3 Year Old

Sweet Averi Kate, you will be three years old tomorrow! Here is just a snapshot of wonderful life with you as you turn three...

You whisper at least 50% of the things that you say. You love to sit on the couch and read books together. Last night you forgot to take your clothes off before you got in the bathtub.

You love to dress up like Anna from Frozen and sing "Let it Go." You dance every time music is playing. Your very favorite songs to sing are "Away in a Manger" and "Hark the Herald Angels Sing." Only a lot of times for "Away in a Manger" you change the words...(Away in the baby no crib for a baby...or Away in the sister no crib for a sister...or Away in the carseat no crib for a carseat...) And by the way, you already have pretty amazing pitch. We can start singing a song and then stop halfway through and you will pick up the melody in the right key with no problem.

You are usually the first one up in the morning and you are always ready for breakfast the moment you get out of your bed. You love to "help" me make muffins (aka, you love to eat spoonfuls of batter while I try to get them in the muffin tin).

Your favorite Bible story is the birth of Christ. You want to read "Baby Jesus" from at least 3 different Bible storybooks every.single.morning. You often pretend that your doll is baby Jesus and that you are Mary.

Your favorite things, according to you...

Book: Baby Jesus book (see, I told you)
Show: Barney (this is actually "Wee Sing in Sillyville" but you call it "Barney" because that's the dog's name on the movie)
Color: Purple and Pink
Thing to Play Inside: A rainy toy
Thing to Play Outside: Slide down my slide when I'm in my tree house
Place to Go: To Johnny G's
Snack: Grola (granola) bars
Supper: Snack-y supper

You are an awesome little sister and an awesome big sister. I am a middle child too, you know. I think it is the best place to be. You love your sissy and your O-bo and make their lives better just by being you.

I love that you are not pretentious. You are so genuine. You are not a performer who is motivated by an audience. You do love to sing and dance and pretend, but you do it whether anyone is watching or not. And many times when I say, "AK, sing a song or do this or that for so-and-so," this is one of those genuine looks that I get...

At night, when I put you to bed, you don't usually ask for a song. This is interesting because when your sister was a baby, the one thing I could always do to calm her down if she was crying was to sing a song to her. But that never worked with you, even as an infant. I found that the trick with baby AK was to simply speak softly to you or to pray over you out loud. So now, when I put you to bed, as I said, you don't ask for a song - instead you whisper, "Tell me some things." And so I do. I tell you that you are my precious gift from God, that you are beautiful and wanted and important and loved, that you are created so carefully by God, that He has a wonderful plan for your life. And then you say, "Tell me something big." And so I do. I quote Psalm 23 or Psalm 1 or Psalm 121 to you, and you lie there with your thumb in your mouth and take it all in as you drift off to sleep. It is so sweet and precious and meaningful.

And then there was the other night, when I finished one Psalm and you whispered, "Tell me another big one." And I started, "I lift up my eyes to the mountains, from where does my help come?" And you shook your head and said, "No, the chicken one."

The chicken one?

"Yes. The chicken one."

And I remembered that when we were in the car the other day I taught you guys a song I used to sing at youth camp that goes, "I am a C, I am a C-H, I am a C-H-R-I-S-T-I-A-N..." and then we would put silly word endings on it like "I am a cong, I am a cong hong..." or "I am a chicken, I am a chicken-hicken..."

Really? The chicken one?

So I leaned over you tenderly and whispered, "I am a chicken. I am a chicken-hicken - "

And you interrupted with your hand on my arm and whispered, "Turn it up, Mommy."

And so, in that sweet, quiet bedtime moment, I turned it up and sang loudly, "I am a chicken. I am a chicken hicken. I am a chicken hicken ricken I sicken ticken I A nicken."

And you drifted off to sleep, content once more.

You will always bring a smile to my heart, AK. You are my precious almost three year old and I love every day of life with you. Happy birthday, sweet girl.