Letter to my mini-me at 4 years old

My Dearest Baby Hannah,

You are my firstborn by one minute and my, how I have watched you grow into lovely little person the last 4 years.

You will read this blog at some point when you can read and when you actually care to learn what kind of person your mom was like when she was parenting you as a young child.

And so, I want to make sure to capture this snapshot of you exactly as you are...so here goes.

There are two sides of the continuum of your personality that I have grown to appreciate and love: the "I'm-just-getting-to-know-you" Hannah all the way to the "I-now-feel-comfortable-with-you-so-I'll-now-open-up" Hannah.

First, let's start with the "getting to know you" part of you.

I have always described you to many who don't know you as having the personality of a cat: You are very independent, cautious, shy and don't like to draw attention to yourself. You like to sit on the sidelines and watch before you jump in, and you are careful to observe your surroundings and absorb every little detail, even the most amazing of minutia. While it may not look like you are engaging as you sit on the sidelines, you really are - more than any of us ever realize.

When meeting you for the first time, you are polite (mostly because you know I expect it of you) but you can also be a little ice queen. I can tell you are skeptical of a person or situation from this very defining and SO-signature Hannah action you would take: You would cock your head to the side to carefully observe the said new person as if to say "I really don't know about you. I need to check you out a bit before I determine that you're OK." You've been doing this since you were 7 months old and could sit up.

A case in point:


When you realize said new person has surpassed your bar and has earned your trust (toy gifts and chocolate usually help), then I see the ice wall slowly start to melt. From there, you form a connection that, once established, is a difficult bond to break. Once trust is cemented with you, you are incredibly loyal and loving.
You are one of the most articulate and most absorbant sponges I've ever met. Your careful and detailed observations from first having sat back and taken in the scenery vs. jumping right in come out in the funniest and most pleasantly surprising of ways. And my how amused I am to see how you the application of your observations to many situations -- appropriately so. Which leads me to believe that you have deep capacity for problem solving and analytical thinking...which is a good thing. And I'm not sure where you get it from but there is a certain goofiness and playfulness to your personality. You are a character and constantly make me, your daddy and Luke chuckle.
And when you decide to be serious and focused, oh boy. When you decide you are really in to something, there's no taking your eye off the ball - whether it's coloring, playing with your dolls and figurines or building something with your legos or finding your lost blankie and revered dalmatian Puppy or baby Monkey.

Then I see a little mini-me come out. Yes, even when you were 3 years old, I already started to see traits of me in you. And now at 4, they couldn't be more pronounced. And of course, I see in you some of my very best and some of my very worst traits. My best I see in you: you are persistent, focused, aggressive, detail-oriented. My worst: you become obsessive, you are sometimes indecisive, you divert accountability and begin making your problem others' problem. Hannah, you are a mini-me in so many ways and often provide a mirror into things about myself that I am now learning to not take so seriously, or to change.

You are definitely your mother's daughter, for better or for worse.

All of this said, you are undoubtedly one of the three brightest beacons in my life. And even at 4 years old, I see so much inner and outer beauty in you and what I know you will become.  I only hope to be a role model for you to help you truly reach your God-given potential.

I have no doubt in my mind that you will succeed in whatever you decide to do. You wouldn't dream of anything else.