It is late, but I want to post briefly about Lizzie's birthday to capture a couple elements before I forget.
Lizzie has known the phrase "Happy Birthday" for a little while and knows that it means cake. And she uses the phrase "Happy Birthday, [name]" as a description the way other people use "birthday." So it was a "Happy Birthday Grandma cake" and the gift bag from Connor's birthday party was "Happy Birthday Connor." And so when Nicholas started talking to her about her birthday the week before he used her speech mechanism and so telling her, "It's going to be Happy Birthday, Lizzie on Sunday." And so we all adopted it all day yesterday (and today), saying things like, "We're going to have a happy birthday Lizzie dinner" or "It's time to open happy birthday Lizzie presents."
While Lizzie understood that birthdays are special days and mean cake, she apparently didn't understand until about 6:30 yesterday evening that they were individual holidays. So whenever one of us said happy birthday to her, she responded by saying it back. "Happy Birthday, Lizzie." "Happy Birthday, Mommy." And we just couldn't help laughing. I took a video of her and Nicholas doing it but I haven't gotten around to cutting it and putting it in the album yet. It was upon opening her second present that it clicked in that this was something special just for her. And then we saw a whole new side of Lizzie. She opened an Anna doll from Nicholas and demanded that it needed to be opened right that second. I opened it and gave it to her and about a minute later Nicholas asked to see it. Her response? "No! Lizzie Anna doll! Mine!" Accompanied by hugging the doll tightly to her chest. And the rest of the presents were similarly claimed as hers and hers alone. So much for wishing everyone else a happy birthday.
Nicholas struggled some with Lizzie getting all the presents even though he is old enough that he does rationally understand. He did much better once he had big brother roles. He was okay not having presents as long as he could help Lizzie get packaging open or help her figure them out. The problems arose when he wanted to help her and she wanted to do it herself. And that I think is the big difference from last year, when he still got to open everything for her. He was fine with it being Lizzie's special day as long as he still had a special role as her big brother. And he is such a good big brother to her.
Happy birthday, our little Lizzie-beth. We are so very grateful to have you in our lives!
