Love Letters

My baby girl is almost four.  Two weeks from tomorrow, she will no longer whisper "three" as she hides her head in my leg when a stranger asks her how old she is.  We have been talking about her birthday for weeks.  She wants a "Frozen" cake (referring to the movie of course) and she wants to wear a "pincess" dress for her special day.

I have had a little dream this spring that Bereket would be able to write her name by her birthday.  The last few months, before she could pick out a treat from her special goodie bucket or play with my new phone, we asked that she write a few letters first. She could pick any letters she wanted, on any paper, with any pen or marker.

Of course, she started with the letter "B".  Bereket wrote B after B after B. And I must say she can write the most beautiful B's you've ever seen!

To Bereket, the letter B was her signature. She put them over all of the worksheets and art projects she made at daycare.  When I picked her up in the afternoons, she would point to her B's and say, "Look Mama! I wrote my name! My name is on my project!"

Gradually, we moved onto other letters. T's, E's, O's..they've all been interesting.  But those K's are THE WORST.  Who came up with that letter anyway? We've spent several days on the letter K and it can drive Bereket to tears of frustration. But MY CHILD IS DETERMINED. When I suggest we forget K for the afternoon and try another letter or put the notebook away, she insists on keeping at it.  And the next day when I ask her what letter she would like to write, she goes back to that dreaded K.  It is her Mount Everest and she is going to conquer it.

On Sunday morning, Bereket proudly presented me with my Mother's Day card.  Jason had helped her write "Mom" in crayon on some construction paper.

On Monday, I was talking on the phone during Bereket's writing time when she tried to get my attention. "Mommy, I write your name!" My mouth flew open a bit when I saw the letters at the top of her paper.

I was so excited to show Jason her writing when he walked through the door that night.  He proudly smiled and said, "Oh, I taught her that."

Tonight as I was tidying up the kitchen, I looked over Bereket's worksheets from "school" today.  I was looking at what a nice job she had done connecting the dots on a picture, when I noticed the letters "MOM" toward the top of the page.

My goal was for Bereket to write her own name by her birthday. She chose instead for her first written word..to be my name.  And that has this mom blinking back a few tears tonight.