Happy Birthday Huirou

 

This year, we decided to buy a real birthday cake for Huirou’s birthday. When I ask her about it she told me: I want strawberries on my cake.

So we bought a chocolate mousse cake with strawberries on top.

At three years old, Huirou is: We sang and she blew her own candles.

• 12 kg. Jumps, skips, run and play throughout the day.
• only wearing diapers at night; one night we forgot and she manage to stay dry; so I let her choose every night. So far, she still find comfort in being able to put on her diaper at night though.
• eating her own meals; occasionally we are impatient and will feed her. Otherwise she very much prefer to feed herself.
• putting on and taking off her own clothes. Other than shirts, she can reliably wear her pants and shoes the right way. Speaking of which, she insists on choosing her clothes in the mornings too.
• speaks in complete sentences. She can carry a conversation with me with surprising accuracy about her day.
• able to recognize familiar roads.
• able to name many many objects. You only have to tell her once.
• “reads” by looking at picture books. I tried a reader program with her but she does not have the patience yet. (Okaaay, maybe it’s me)
• is still rigid with regards to the way we do things. (must fold clothes a certain way, pray a certain way, go to certain restaurants on weekends etc..)

Some days, she exhausts me with her un-ending demands and her boundless energy. Some days, she plays on her own, happily having conversations with her imaginary friend. At the beginning of the weekends, I often feel like I must go into “battle-mode” but at the end of the weekends, I feel like I already miss her.