Dear Teddy

HAPPY BIRTHDAY!!!!

Here we are - one year later. A whole year of growing and learning and crying and changing and laughing and loving. For you, for me, for Dad, for our little family. It feels like so long ago that you were a scrawny-legged, wide-eyed newborn who barely fit into newborn pjs. It feels like you've always been a mobile baby, but I fondly remember the days when would just lay on your playmat and bat at the jingly pig and bunny rattle.

This last month has been a big one. You are now sleeping better at night (but naps are hit and miss). You now have 1.5 top teeth and 3 bottom teeth. You point at everything, seemingly asking, "dat?" You know the words "doggie" and "deer." (I thank our wildlife-filled backyard for that latter one.) The biggest change? You can now walk. Right now it's still a game to you; a fun trick you like to pull out at parties do to impress Dad and I. But there is no doubt you can walk halfway across the room. Arms stretched out straight to the side, huge grin, and giggles in your wake, you come barreling towards the open arms of Dad, then me, then Dad again, then me again.

You are barreling towards toddlerhood at record pace. Or maybe that's just me having more and more moments of disbelief. I can't believe you can walk. I can't believe it's been a year since you were born. I can't believe we've all survived. I can't believe how hard this is. I can't believe how much I love you. I can't believe how much has changed.

I've been thinking back often to a conversation I had with my mom while I was pregnant with you. "All a baby really needs is love. You just have to love them," I remember stating, but really wanting to make a question. My mom agreed, (unknowingly?) reassuring me in my moments of pre-parenthood uncertainty. There have been even more uncertain moments since. But in moments when I really don't know what to do, when I just want to be able to reason with you, I go back to what I know (because my parents taught me, and Dad's parents taught him).
That all a child needs is love, unconditional. And arms, wide open.
You will always have both.

Love,
Mom