Thursday 23 April 2015

A Letter To My Daughter


Dear Ebony,

It finally feels like summer has arrived. We’ve spent the past few weeks knee deep in mud in the garden. I’ve been doing a lot of gardening, and you’ve been helping me. You have a gardening set, and can often be found, squatting over a pile of mud, exclaiming “A worm, mummy! Be careful of him, he’s very precious!” Together we have gently relocated hundreds of worms over the past few weeks. You love finding new creatures in the garden. Every ladybird, centipede and bee gets your full attention.

We’ve been spending full days out there, and the hours have flown by. You have the most wonderful imagination and I love hearing the stories you come up with as you play beside me. Most of your toys have to go to hospital, and some of them even end up ‘deaded’.

You have recently developed a love of playing Pirates, and I stumble out of my office on a weekend to find you and Laurie huddled over a treasure map. You do the best pirate voice I have ever heard, and say things like, “Ahoy mateys, yeah mate, yeah” like some kind of mancunian/pirate hybrid. You love digging for treasure, especially in the bit of garden that is definitely finished and absolutely not a random digging site.

You don’t let anybody tell you what to do, which I love but also secretly wish you would let me tell you what to do. You get very cross and shout at anybody who tries to boss you about, which the woman from the charity found out very recently. The next time we went in, totally unprompted, you apologised to her for shouting and my heart melted. She also told you she deserved it which you smugly nodded along to.

You love your daddy so much and always ask whether it’s the weekend so you can play with him. Your weekends together are filled with adventure, make believe and laughter. You often tell me you miss him during the week, and always hope he’ll get home before bedtime so that you can tell him about your day.

You wake up early and, much to our annoyance, demand breakfast right away. After that, you’re happy to read to yourself in your bedroom, quietly looking at the pictures in your books. Every morning I find a carpet of story books sprawled across your bedroom floor. This morning I found you in your teepee having a picnic with all of your toys.

You have recently developed a love of dressing up, and often walk into the room dressed as ‘Elsa’. In actual fact, you are dressed as Cinderella but because the dress is blue you think it is Elsa’s dress. I haven’t told you otherwise but dread the day when an older child breaks the news to you. Hopefully you won’t believe them and will simply think them a fool.

You have lots of dolls and refer to them all as your babies. You also spend a lot of time talking about your eggs, and telling me that one day you will have babies of your own. Girls, of course, two of them. Both called Ebony. You think it’s very unfair that you have to wait until you’re older to have babies of your own, and would really much prefer to have them right now so you could make them sleep in your wellies and throw them up trees.

You seem so old and wise now at three. You are still calm and observant, though can kick up a fuss when you think it’s necessary. You love your friends, and are always excited to see your grandparents. You can often be heard randomly saying life-completing sentences like, “Mummy, I just love you so much.”

You are going to be a bridesmaid next week, something I am secretly very terrified about, but which you are hugely excited for. You play weddings most days, and tell me about how you can’t wait to marry Emma. You are excited for dancing at the reception, but a little bit worried about what who will hold your flowers whilst you do that.

You are kind and caring and compassionate. You are fierce and strong and brave. You are independent, funny and sassy. You are everything.

xx

fb com

ShareThis

Related Posts Plugin for WordPress, Blogger...