Dear Kennel

I know this letter to you is a little late. I have wanted to start one since your birthday, but I just don't know how to put your crazy personality into words. Over the last month I have been thinking daily about what to tell you. So, now that I know what I want to say, here it goes.

You just turned three and three is a magical age around here. I have noticed that things change with a 3 year old. You have become a tester of the rules. At dinner time, you like to not eat your meal. The usual encouragement for us is to tell you that if you don't at least try to eat, you will go to bed. Well, when we say this to you, you tell us that you are ready for bed. When it is raining outside and you want to play out there, I tell you to put a coat on because you will be cold and wet, you tell me you want to be cold and wet...that you like it. When I make you a sandwich you tell me that you are done and "full" after only a few bites. You L-O-V-E your purple pillow. You would lay on it all day sucking your "fumb" if I let you. You love to wear fancy shoes and hate wearing sweaters or jackets.

I want you to know that I LOVE you! You came out as our most snuggly baby, and have remained that way. You have just a little bit of fluff around your bones and it just makes you so squishy. You sneak out of your room after bedtime and ask to snuggle me about every 10 minutes.  I want you to know that you have amazing olive toned skin and always look a little suntanned. I want you to know that you have a lighter spot on your wrist from a blister that you gave yourself (from sucking on it in my tummy) before I had you. I want you to know that when you smile, you scrunch up your whole face. I want you to know that you have little "bucks" from sucking your thumb and you love to show them to everyone! All we have to do is say "show us your bucks" and you smile your hugest buckiest smile we have ever seen. I want you to know that your huge brown eyes stare into my soul. You have the longest darkest eye lashes that surround your brown eyes and one puppy dog look is all it takes to make me smitten. I want you to know that I have been smitten since the day you were born.

I want you to know that you are funny. I want you to know that you are capable of making everyone laugh. The other day we had the missionaries over for dinner. You were prancing around being goofy, not really saying anything and they just kept laughing at you, not even knowing why. They just said you are funny. I want you to know that we all knew you were funny from the beginning. Something about the way you looked at me made me laugh. I want you to know that I remember telling your Grandmas how funny you were and you could barely even smile.

I want you to know that you are a vital part to our family. I want you to know that you look up to your big sister. You love to play with her, and she loves to play with you. I want you to know that you two are seldom apart from each other. You will stay in your room and play dolls for 3 hours straight on some days. I want you to know that she needs you. You make her happy. I want you to know that there are many times when she is just relaxing and you walk into the room and instantly she lights up. You do something goofy, then she will look at me and chuckle. She knows that you make her happy. I want you to know that Your baby brother needs you. He needs to know that when you came to see him in the hospital, you just stared at him and did nothing but calmly wonder and worry about him. I want you to know that you said prayers for him. I want you to know that you are going to help him find funny things as he gets older. You are going to show him how to be naughty!

I want you to know that you will brighten peoples days for the rest of your life. I want you to always remember you are capable of doing so.

Love you,
Mom