'Kayla Bugs.

Happy 3rd Birthday, my sweet Makayla!!

Makayla,

You are my firstborn. You will forever be the girl that changed my life forever. You made me a mommy and I will forever be grateful to you for that.

You came into this world on Christmas Day 3 years ago and I wouldn't have it any other way.

You're amazing. The funniest things come out of your mouth every single day.

Today, while we were opening your Christmas presents, you would tear open the paper, say 'Thank you!' and then go, 'What is it?' So cute. You also would say, 'I don't know what that is. We better open it and find out what it is.'

You handed out all the presents to everyone and then proceeded to help them open their gifts.

You are such a blast to hang out with every day. You constantly make me laugh, with your silly dances and the adorable way you say things, like 'dance party'. I can't even write it how you say it because I don't know how to spell it, but it is beautiful and so you.

You love your sister so very much. You are always looking out for her and you always tell her when she can't play with something of yours. Not because you're being mean (most of the time), but because you don't want her to hurt herself. When she cries, you always say, 'It's okay Addi. Mommy's coming to get you!'

I love listening to you play with your toys. The stories you come up with are too cute. I can't remember each and every word, but I just love to listen to you make them talk to each other.

You got tons and tons of Littlest 'Ketchops' (Pet Shops) for Christmas and you LOVE them. You played with them from the moment we opened the boxes until it was time to eat Christmas dinner.

You are totally over napping. Like so over it. You nap for maybe 50 minutes a day, maybe. And that's on a good day! Then you wake up screaming your head off, which totally sucks. You also wake up for the day screaming your head off. But you're still the greatest thing in the world, so there's that. :)

Every night before Addison goes to bed, I ask you to come turn on her sound machine, because that's your thing. If I turn it on, you'll come running in and say, 'Hey! I need to turn that on!' And if you're not in the room, I'll call for you and you come running saying, 'I'm coming! I'm coming!'

You got a kitchen for Christmas from Nana and Papa and you love it!! Earlier this week, you saw the side of it (we had it covered up) and you said, 'That's my kitchen!' so then Daddy had to make up a story about how it wasn't a kitchen to throw you off. You knew all along that we were fibbing. But you were so excited when you got to open it and you started cooking bacon for us right away.

I am constantly telling you I love you throughout the day and now you say, 'I love you, too!'. Melts my heart.

Whenever I ask you, 'How's that sound?' you always respond with, 'That sounds great.' You are such a grown up and sometimes when I look at you, it breaks my heart how stinking fast you are growing. I still can't believe you're three years old!!!

You love to play Hide And Seek. I mean, LOVE. You will come running to us and say, 'Count when I'm hiding!' So then we count to 10 and come 'look' for you. Your favorite hiding spots are in your closet and behind the shower curtain. You think it's hilarious when we pretend we don't know where you're hiding and we can hear you giggling from your spot. So we usually look about 3 or 4 places before finding you and you just love it!

You do this laughing thing when someone else laughs at something...it's like you lean your head forward, put it down and start laughing this silly little laugh. I love it.

Whenever you're not in the same room as us and we call for you, you'll come running in the room saying, 'Here I'm are!'

You act like such a little adult. It kills me. I just can't believe how fast these three years have gone by. Save the first 8 months of your life. ;)

After Christmas festivities were over today, we celebrated your birthday with a few more presents and cupcakes! I put three candles in a cupcake for you and then we all sang Happy Birthday to you and you started crying. It was so funny and so sad at the same time.

Days like today are days I never want to forget. Your birthday isn't all about presents, but I love to see your face light up because you make mine light up each and every day. You are my world, my firstborn. Always remember how very, very much I adore you and cherish your life. Know that even though everyone gets to open gifts on your birthday, you share it with the most special baby to ever be born. Jesus. He loves you so much, Makayla.

Happy 3rd Birthday, my sweet doll.

Love,
Mommy