Lilabear Hugs

Dear Lila,

When I drop you off at school, I always kiss and hug you and tell you that I love you before you line up with your classmates. Today, you started walking into the building but then ran out of the line to give me one more hug. Your teacher smiled and said, "She wanted one more squeeze!"

Then at night, when you were standing on the step stool next to me in the bathroom and I was about to brush your teeth, you said, "Wait, Mama! Hug!" So we hugged and when I looked in the mirror, I could see your sweet face. Your cheek was pressed right against my chest and you were smiling while squeezing your eyes shut so tightly. Your face was so full of happiness and love and I wanted to burn that image into my brain so that I could always pull it up and feel how wonderful I felt in that moment, when I was holding my little girl in my arms and she was so content just to be hugging her mama.

Thank you, sweetie, for always giving me the best hugs.

Love,
Mom

Gender Issues

Dear Lila,

I totally burst your bubble when you told me that you want to grow up and have three daughters and I told you that you don't get to pick your children's gender. The look on your face--confusion, then surprise, then dismay. Haha! Sorry, sweetie!

Love,
Mom

Perfect 10

Dear Lila,

You love dresses and I love dressing you up in dresses, so you have a lot of dresses in your closet! You definitely don't need anymore but I keep finding cute ones on sale, so I recently bought a few from Gap and Tea Collection all in size 10, thinking that you will just grow into them next year. Surprise! You are already outgrowing your size 8 clothes and the size 10 dresses fit you perfectly. *sigh* You are getting too big too fast!

Love,
Mom

P.S. Now that you are wearing size 10 clothes and GuhGaw still wears size 7/8, that means you can pass all of your clothes down to your older brother! Do you think he would like to wear your cotton-candy pink tutu dress to school? :-P

Seeing Red

Dear Lila,

The weather was crazy this week. It was 55 degrees and cold on Monday (you wore a winter hat and gloves to school in the morning) and then it swung up to 90 degrees yesterday. We didn't even stay out that long after school yesterday because it was so hot but I wonder if the extreme temperature change contributed to the EPIC nosebleed you got.

I am still learning that as a mom, there will always be something new with my kids that I've never encountered before. You and your brother have gotten nosebleeds here and there over the years and they have never been a big deal. A little blood trickles out, we grab some tissues and that's it. Your nosebleed yesterday was NOTHING like that. After we got home, I went upstairs with your brothers and you stayed downstairs to read on the foyer bench. You called out for me but I was in the middle of changing out of my sweaty tank top so I said I'd be down in a minute. You started whimpering, though, so I got concerned and ran over to the top of the stairs (with no shirt on and covering by chest with my arms). I looked down the staircase and saw that the front of your shirt was entirely covered in blood! Daddy was in his office so I screamed for him to go to you and I ran back to my room to throw on a shirt. You had just been sitting and reading so I don't know why your nose suddenly started bleeding but it was bleeding so much and it didn't stop for nearly five minutes. We put ice on it and went through an entire roll of paper towels but the blood kept coming. It was all over your front and you kept looking up, so it kept dribbling into your mouth, which I know must have been so awful for you. The bleeding stopped briefly after five minutes but then it started again and continued for several more minutes, so I wanted to call 911. I called your pediatrician first and while I was on hold, the bleeding stopped, for good this time.

The nurse I talked to said sometimes a trauma to the nose causes delayed bleeding hours later. She also said that you might have been picking your nose. Neither explanation seemed to make sense in your case--you said you hadn't hit your nose on anything that day and insisted that you hadn't been picking your nose (and even if you had, you would had to have done some crazy deep nose picking with like a razor blade to have caused such a large gush of blood). So I don't think we'll ever know what caused such a horrible nose bleed but thankfully, you didn't have anymore nose bleeds last night or at all today. Whew! I'm so glad you are okay now!

Love,
Mom

Way Back When

Dear Lila,

We were playing Barbies together (your favorite activity as of late) and when I was changing Ariel's dress, I noticed that someone had scribbled all over her stomach with a pen. I asked you if you had done that and you replied, "Yeah, I did that when I was a little kid. I didn't know better." Haha! That long time ago when you were just a little kid, huh? Good thing you are so much older and wiser now!

Love,
Mom

Trophy Wife

Dear Lila,

You are so sweet and always telling me that you love me the most and that I am your favorite person in the whole world. That makes me feel so great but it makes Daddy feel not-so-great (awww!) and he often pretends to be upset about it. Yesterday, you were drawing and he told you to draw a picture about how you love him more than anyone. You said, "No! I love Mama the most!" Then I teased Daddy and said, "I will always be the favorite! You will never win!" Daddy replied, "You're my wife. I already won!" #smooth

Love,
Mom

Girl Pride

Dear Lila,

You got your latest math test back today and your grade was 100 percent! Nice! I told you that I'm proud of you and you replied, "I'm proud of me, too." Woo!

Love,
Mom