You are 5 years old!

My love Echo,

You are 5! Yesterday we celebrated your birthday with your favorite cake - the purple cheese cake, made of purple yams, and gifts.

You asked for a Fluttershy pony, from the My Little Pony show, and a book where she is the main character. Your favorite pony is Twilight Sparkle, but you like them all, you have plenty of Twilight Sparkle dolls. Papa brought a huge calculator from work, with big friendly keys.

I also got you a doll, that looks just like you. She has curly brown hair, and "huge puppy eyes," as Zoe describes your eyes. It came with a little oven, a molding tray and some play dough so you can prepare food for her, feed her, and then she poops! So you get to change her diapers. Both you and Zoe really loved the doll. I loved her too. Playing with her made me realize that stopping after two babies was a good idea:-).

The week prior, we had a birthday party for your classmates at Seattle Gymnastics Academy. You all ran and bounced around, and then we had snacks and an amazing two-tier cake, with My Little Pony theme. Your friends brought you gifts, and everyone had a great time being active.

Now that you are 5, it's your time to start kindergarten. You recently had preschool graduation ceremony which was amazing. You all made your own graduation caps and your own tie-dye shirts. Yours looked like it was made professionally. So much so that Zoe borrowed it to wear as a sleeping gown at a sleepover.

Since I haven't been writing frequently, let's capture a few other things that have been going on lately.

-You are spicy and feisty, also sweet and so loving. You are our number one fan - mine, papa's, Zoe's. Sometimes you say things that utterly melt us. You always tell us that we are the best, and you give us hugs and kisses

-When papa went to Canada, he asked you over the phone what you'd like him to bring you:
-"Anything you bring me is special enough" you said with your sweet musical voice.

I was holding you in my arms, as I often do:
-"Your arms are my safe place" you said.

-You are always ready to help us with anything we do. When papa was working in the yard, you asked "do you need help with that?" when you saw Zoe do her homework, you asked "do you need help with that?"

You have been secretly eating from the stash of chocolates I keep separately, and give a piece to you and Zoe after your bath. A practice I learned from my grandmother. My mom once told me that my grandma used to put a piece of candy in the pocket of her bath robe. So I've been doing the same for years. I started with Zoe, and continued the practice with you. Well the stash has been disappearing. Zoe also knows about the stash, but she doesn't sneak up into the kitchen and eat the chocolates. So I moved it to a higher shelf, hidden from the eye.

You've been sucking your thumb less and less. We told you that we'd take you to Disneyland if you stopped sucking - we would take you either way, but just to give you a bit more motivation. But I think we have Zoe to thank for. She established a reward system where she gave you one of her stuffies if you went a day, 2 days, 3 days without sucking. We let you suck at night when you were trying to fall asleep. Looking around Zoe's room, I noticed that she barely had any stuffies. "Echo's effort to quit thumb sucking has been draining my stuffies," she said jokingly. Zoe is an amazing sister.

I love you my baby Echo. Can't wait to celebrate your next birthdays.

Mommy