Dearest Kiki

Dearest Kiki,

You will be two years old in one month and one day! Time has passed so quickly, and you are doing so many things. I'm keeping a running list, and I will write you a letter on your birthday to brag about all of them. I'm so tempted to do it now, but in another month, who knows how much more you'll be doing!

I've been thinking a lot lately about how much you've grown as your birthday gets closer and closer. It's hard to believe I watched you grow up day by day and still somehow missed when you changed from a small, sleeping infant into a mile-a-minute child, into everything, giving us the giggles every time you laugh.

I feel like I have grown with you as well. Over the last two years you have taught me so many valuable lessons. Some days I practice them better than others; some days I mess them all up completely. But we are all works in progress, my darling, and just as you are so much more grown up than when you first came home -- because of you, so am I.

Here are the top ten things I have learned from you over the last two years. And here's to getting better and better every day at living them!

1. What may at first be difficult beyond bearing could well turn into a gift that surpasses your wildest dreams.

2. Patience.

3. To stop comparing one individual to another in an attempt to gauge the success of one of them.

4. To live not day by day, but moment by moment.

5. To put aside the whole picture and appreciate the beauty and intricacy of the pieces of the puzzle.

6. Running may get you there faster, but crawling gives you time to change your mind about your destination.

7. To be exuberant about the smallest victories.

8. To let go of the looming defeats.

9. To hope without desperation.

10. To stop thinking about what if and celebrate what is.

I love you, Kiki, so much.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxo
your mama