three times around the sun

There are a lot of things I could say right now--about how exhausted, and braindead I am from the kids crazy sleeping (or lack there-of) that's been going on for days and days, or having my husband working long hours and extra days, and basically doing the single parenting thing, or how busy things are this summer, and how I can't seem to check even one thing off my to-do list without at least three new ones cropping up, but looking at these pictures of Sadie... gosh.

Amidst all this chaos somehow my baby turned three.

 

This girl melts my heart.  

She is so sweet, and independent, and curious

and messy, and bossy

and profound.

Sometimes the conversations I have with her just blow me away.

Sometimes they are hilarious, like when she says out of the blue,

"Mom, I think when I grow up I'm going to find a nice man who likes cats and have a wedding."

or asks me to turn off the radio in the car because "the guy sounds like he's crying."  

(It was John Denver, and she's right)

Then there's all the questions about death and the afterlife.  

"Mom... I'm going to brush my teeth, and eat healthy food, and get lots of sleep and then I wont need to die. I don't want to die."

 This one offers me much to ponder, 

and yet she is also so spontaneous and bubbling over with joy.

Even on the hardest, most tiring days when she is a demanding tyrant, "NO. my door needs to be open all the way so it touches the wall" or "I don't want these stirred up eggs, I want the cracked kind" she still has this great sense of humor.  

I guess, what I'm trying to say in way too many words is that every moment spent with Sadie is truly a gift.  I feel so incredibly rich to get to watch her finding her wings...  to glimpse who she is and how she looks at the world.  

I don't know what she wished for when she blew out those candles, but my wish is the simple one that every mother wishes in these moments--the gift of time, 

of many, many happy birthdays to spend with this sweet girl of mine.

{and that someday, in the very distant future, she finds that nice man who likes cats, and he is kind and smart enough to know what a treasure she is.}