How a Pre-School Craft for the Holiday Brought Out the Sap in Me…

As much as I love both my girls equally, I realize lately I have been talking more about Lily than Emma even though I do definitely have more than one kid.  I find the reason for this is quite simple, she is my child who is going to give me the most run for my money and the one who seems to give me the most amount of blog fonder as of late.

If you would have asked me this question days after I brought Emma home from the hospital and Lily wasn’t in the picture at this point, Emma would have won this one hands down.

I make no qualms about admitting that Emma had colic and screamed for nights on end for the first year of her life. Hell, no one was more surprised that I got pregnant so quickly after having Emma than me.  Most of the reasons were quite simple and straight forward, because quite frankly I don’t have to educate the masses on how a baby is conceived.

Needless to say, Emma was high maintenance and left little time for Kevin and I to actually do anything to help conceive another child.  Simply put, with Lily when my OB asked what was the date of conception, I knew the date like the back of my hand (March 5th, 2010), because that was the one and only time Kevin and I actually had time to have any alone time to create Lily.

Lily, bless her heart, was a quiet baby.  She squeaked when she she needed to be fed or changed (this was pretty much the only time we did hear a peep out of her for the first few months).  She even started smiling at 6 weeks old, laughter followed right around the 3 month mark.  I couldn’t have had two different babies if I tried.

But make no mistake, as Emma was growing, so was Lily. By toddler time for Lily, she could talk circles around kids her age.  Hell, she could talk me out and that is a feat.  But all with the chattiness came a temper the size of Texas.  If this kid gets ticked off, we know and so do the neighbors around the block.  She has some set of lungs on her. and the mouth of a truck driver!  No one gets anything over on her either (she is observant just like her father).

Emma, on the other hand, is more delicate, dainty and quiet.  Don’t get me wrong, Emma can have her moments too, but she is a bit more even tempered in nature.  Believe it or not, she actually will think before she acts (which at 3 years old amazes me at times).

But for all I went through with Emma as an infant and even early toddler stage, too.  She has truly grown into a wonderful little girl, who amazes me more and more each day.  Especially since she started pre-school.

Recently. Emma came out of school in the afternoon, as proud as can be.  We got to the car and she opened her backpack and handed me this pretty package wrapped in red tissue paper.  She told me, “I made this for you and Daddy.”

I was in shock and told her that we would open it at home when her father got home from work.  But when we got home and in the house, she told me, “No you need to open this now and just call Daddy while you do.”

She was too excited to wait and not even sure how she waited the car ride home for me to open it.  I tried to reason with her that, because I really wanted to Kevin to open it with me, but she wasn’t having it.  So I called Kevin, put him on speaker phone and let Emma tell him.  She said, “Daddy I made you something, but Mommy is going to open it.

I proceeded to explain that she couldn’t wait and Kevin, of course, told us to open it.  So right then and there I opened the red tissue paper very carefully and smiling back at me was Emma’s little face from her third birthday party on a wooden popsicle stick back all decorated with green paint and sparkly glitter with a ribbon hanger for the tree.

Apparently Emma and the kids in Emma’s class created a Christmas Ornament for their tree as their holiday pre-school craft.  We were not told and it was to be a surprise.  I even had supplied that photo back at the beginning of school, but didn’t realize this was what it was for.

I have to admit looking at her smiling beaming face and hearing her say, “You are proud of me Mama, I made this for you,” I cried a bit, because I was just so happy and overjoyed, especially from where we had started three years ago with that little baby, who was just so unhappy from colic.

We have truly come along way in those 3 years and this holiday season, I am so very thankful for so very much including Emma now being such a warm and sweet little girl.  That said, I am sure after I write this, she will do something to drive me bonkers, but then again she is still just a kid, but she is mine and I love just love her!

And by the way, Merry Christmas Eve. to all!!!  Have a wonderful holiday!!!

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