Happy fourth birthday!
On Saturday, our miracle child celebrated her fourth birthday. I will always remember the incredible support from my LJ friends while we were waiting for her to arrive, and the comments on the post where I announced the pregnancy.
And now she's been here for longer than we had to wait for her, and she's got a little brother, too. It is a privilege to be her Mama. She is very affectionate and often tells her Dad and me that she misses us when we're at work and she's at nursery.
In company, she's quiet, but she can be boisterous, opinionated, and wild. She loves cuddling and being cuddled, carried, and being pushed in her buggy (still, at four!). She still needs a rest or downtime most days, and will sometimes fall asleep on her way home from nursery.
Her play is highly imaginative, often reenacting situations from home or from nursery. She enjoys games, has started singing longish songs to herself. Although she loves princesses, in particular princess Belle, clothes, and shoes with heels that go "clack-clack", she will also happily play with trains and cars. She treasures her toy dinosaurs and her favourite current film is "Monsters vs. Aliens". Her favourite monster is the Missing Link, and she's on an "Incredibles" trip at the moment, too. She plays with dolls, too, having become more maternal in the past couple of months. She has a wide range of favourite books, and goes through phases of insisting on a certain book at bed time. She's not ready for chapter books yet, but she enjoys a wide variety of picture books and short fairy-tales.
She has also become strongly attached to friends, in particular a little girl at nursery and a little girl at German school. We have been on quite a few playdates.
She loves her little brother (her "baby"). She will tell him off when he misbehaves and cuddle him when she sees him. She adores collecting him from nursery, where she will spend at least five minutes playing with all the baby toys.
Her dominant language is still German, but English is catching up fast. She plays in English, and talks to her brother a lot in English. I will need to start playing with her more to give her German play vocabulary, and will need to start reminding her that she can/should speak German with her little brother. She can count to 20 in English and German and Gaelic and is starting to move beyond 20. She knows her letters, and can spell a few words, including her name. At the moment, she is entranced by an iPhone app called "PocketPhonics", where she spells words that are sounded out to her. She also enjoys playing FlightControl on "her" iPod Touch.
Next year, it'll be time for school, and she'll have to pay her own way on the bus. How time flies ...
And now she's been here for longer than we had to wait for her, and she's got a little brother, too. It is a privilege to be her Mama. She is very affectionate and often tells her Dad and me that she misses us when we're at work and she's at nursery.
In company, she's quiet, but she can be boisterous, opinionated, and wild. She loves cuddling and being cuddled, carried, and being pushed in her buggy (still, at four!). She still needs a rest or downtime most days, and will sometimes fall asleep on her way home from nursery.
Her play is highly imaginative, often reenacting situations from home or from nursery. She enjoys games, has started singing longish songs to herself. Although she loves princesses, in particular princess Belle, clothes, and shoes with heels that go "clack-clack", she will also happily play with trains and cars. She treasures her toy dinosaurs and her favourite current film is "Monsters vs. Aliens". Her favourite monster is the Missing Link, and she's on an "Incredibles" trip at the moment, too. She plays with dolls, too, having become more maternal in the past couple of months. She has a wide range of favourite books, and goes through phases of insisting on a certain book at bed time. She's not ready for chapter books yet, but she enjoys a wide variety of picture books and short fairy-tales.
She has also become strongly attached to friends, in particular a little girl at nursery and a little girl at German school. We have been on quite a few playdates.
She loves her little brother (her "baby"). She will tell him off when he misbehaves and cuddle him when she sees him. She adores collecting him from nursery, where she will spend at least five minutes playing with all the baby toys.
Her dominant language is still German, but English is catching up fast. She plays in English, and talks to her brother a lot in English. I will need to start playing with her more to give her German play vocabulary, and will need to start reminding her that she can/should speak German with her little brother. She can count to 20 in English and German and Gaelic and is starting to move beyond 20. She knows her letters, and can spell a few words, including her name. At the moment, she is entranced by an iPhone app called "PocketPhonics", where she spells words that are sounded out to her. She also enjoys playing FlightControl on "her" iPod Touch.
Next year, it'll be time for school, and she'll have to pay her own way on the bus. How time flies ...