A Letter to My Girls

Dear Annelise and Baby Girl #2–

I’ve been meaning to write each of you for a while now.  Your own separate letters with all my thoughts and feelings and all the details of your little worlds right now.  Instead, I’m finally sitting down less than a week before my due date and writing a combined letter because luckily your daddy reminded me that I needed to do it.  So much for setting the bar high for you girls, huh?  I guess it’s probably best that you get used to an imperfect world now since I am certainly not a perfect mother.

Annelise, you are a little fireball.  I love it.  You are 19 months old, and you are so much fun on most days.  Although your non-stop energy and desire to explore wear me out on most days, I wouldn’t trade it for anything.

You love to climb things.  Anything.  You are constantly being told, “Annelise, no climb.”  The thing is that you’re actually pretty good at it and rarely fall.  You climb up the side of your high chair, lay sprawled out across the top of it before somehow getting your legs down into the right spot.  I picked you up from the nursery at MOPS the other day, and you were standing on top of a tricycle.  You scale the tall stools at the Berg’s house as if they’re nothing.  You are fearless.

You talk and sing a lot although Mommy and Daddy still can’t understand most of it.  You understand us though.  We can say almost anything to you, and you know exactly what we’re talking about.  You follow directions really well, and you love to help us with things.  The things you say the most right now are “Hi–eeee”, “Thank you”, “Here you go”, and “Mama”.  You also sing the tune to the ABCs a lot, and you sort of say “One, two, three”.  Okay, you make the noises for “One, two, three” even though the sounds aren’t quite right.

Mommy made Daddy a book for his 30th birthday, asking people to write him letters.  In one of the letters, his aunt described him as the “sweetest but busiest kid” she knew.  That. Is. You.  You are your father’s daughter in so many ways.  You love to go, go, go.  If you are awake, you are on the move.  You do not snuggle with us.  You would much rather fill your Little Tikes grocery cart with toys, move them across the house, take them all out, and then put them back in the cart to tote off to another location.  But you are as sweet as can be.  In the mornings, Daddy gets you out of bed and brings you to our room where you always greet me with an enthusiastic “Hi–eeee” before walking over to Sunny’s crate, letting him out, and giving him a hug/tackle.

Mommy is really excited for you to become a big sister.  You love babies, even though you can still get a little rough with them.  You especially like pointing at their eyes and saying, “Eye”.  That makes you very proud and Mommy very nervous.  Even though I’m really excited, I’m a little sad that I’m going to lose the one-on-one time we’ve had together.  You’re just my little buddy who runs errands with me, eats lunch with me and just tags along wherever I go.  I know that our outings and time together will get a little more complicated once your little sister arrives.  I’m beyond thankful for the quality time that we’ve had together, sweet one.  You made me a mommy, and I am forever grateful for that.

Baby Girl #2, little sister, we are so beyond ready to meet you.  We already know you are part of our family, and we just can’t wait to get you out in the world to snuggle and love.  I’m dying to see what you look like.  No pressure, but I really, really, really want you to have hair.  We had to deal with a LOT of “What a cute little boy” comments with your sister.  And there is no non-awkward way to correct that.  I also can’t wait to see what your personality is like.

The last trimester of this pregnancy with you has been hard, and I am anxious for it to be over.  The circumstances were just not ideal…we were in Chicago and then had to drive to Colorado and were sleeping on uncomfortable beds all summer long.  And the heat of the summer combined with the non-stop motion of your sister wore me out.  The last month, every day has felt like I was running a marathon.  I’ve cried a lot.  You have been slightly unkind to my bladder.

But, I think the hardest thing about waiting this time versus with your sister is that this time I know everything is so much better when you’re on the outside instead of the inside.  Sure, we won’t get to sleep much and will probably be slightly shocked at all the work that comes with having a newborn AND a toddler.  But none of that will really matter because we’ll also get to have you.  Every single day since I hit the 38 week mark (the point where you officially became a freeloader), I’ve been praying that I would go into labor.  I keep expecting my water to break (mostly because that is how labor started with your sister).  Every day that it doesn’t is a little disappointing, but we are trusting God that He will bring you at just the right time.

I hope you know how much we love you.  I am in awe that we get to have another daughter.  Every time I see a baby, I pray to the Lord, “I can’t believe we get to have another one.”  You are a gift.  I don’t deserve you.  I am humbled that I get to be your mom.

Now, please come soon so I can pat that little butt you keep sticking out my right side in person instead of through my uterus.

I love you girls more than you will ever know.

Your momma

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