In five years, there’s an insane amount of things we did together.
We played hundreds of games, read books together a thousand times. We pushed you on the swing, we went on trains and planes, we splashed at the beach. We travelled to other cities and one other country, we packed your lunch box a hundred times, we made your favourite and least favourite breakfasts, we ate together every single day.
We learnt and grew in leaps and bounds. We realised that it’s okay for you to cry, we learnt that small children have big emotions. We learnt not to get scared when you climbed to the top of the monkey bar and swung upside down on two legs. We learnt what kind of restaurants are most conducive to your energy, what food doesn’t cause tummy aches, which nail-cutter you prefer, which shampoo irritates your eyes the least. We learnt not to rush to the doctor for every sniffle, learnt to pack medicines for an overnight trip in under 5 minutes, learnt to stay awake when you are sick at night.
We saw you develop your own friendships, bond with your companions outside of family. We saw that other kids may adore you, may also be rude to you, that you may refuse to say sorry to another kid, you may fight and make up, sort out your own battles, or come to mom and dad to sort things out. You can be both outgoing and shy, both brave and scared, both adventurous and cautious.
We watched you learn to read. To sit with a book on your own as if you were a child and not a baby. We watched you spell your favourite colour as b-l-o-o and change to b-l-u-e. We watched you already develop your own handwriting.
We heard you recall your dreams and nightmares in the morning, we saw you draw hundreds of unicorns and little stars and rainbows. We know you are obsessed with magic now and will outgrow it eventually. Or not, for there is always magic in life, magic that will remain with our family for the rest of our lifetime.
