My darling baby Grae is two years old.
Two years ago, she came into our life in the sweetest chapter we had ever experienced, and has been blessing us each day since.
She turned two on Easter weekend, which ended up being just perfect for a two year old.
Easter egg hunts, arts festival, beautiful park weather.. she was in heaven!
Grae is so full of spunk these days.
She is SO full of life and color and I really can’t imagine our life without her gigantic spirit.
I tease often how naughty Grae is – and she is, don’t get me wrong – but my goodness she has enough cute and sweet in her to balance every last bit of it, if you can imagine such a thing!
Grae loves.  She loves big and she loves hard, and she is pretty selective of who she gives her love to.
Grae loves her daddy especially.
Girls! I tell you.  I have watched each one of our girls fall head-over-heels for their father.  It will go down as one of my biggest blessings in this life – such a sweet type of love to see blossom.
Grae is by far the most demanding child I have ever had.
She needs my absolute, undivided attention almost every second of every day.
Being so pregnant, I find myself needing to sit and rest a lot more often, and I rarely can get a good 2 minutes down without Grae needing me for something or other – and insisting I get it now.
Oh mercy.  She has been one of the tougher aspects of this pregnancy, and I expect wont ease up much in newborn-hood.
Each time I find worry creep up inside me for how she’ll handle life with the new baby, I am immediately put at ease knowing how much she is going to enjoy that tiny human.
Grae was made to be a big sister, I just know it.  I felt the exact same way about Harlo.
Every time she wakes up for the day, or naptime she immediately asks for “brepast”.
She MUST eat “breakfast” after every nap.
Grae is very particular, and everything must be done just so.
She loves walking me through any process.  Getting her milk for the day, always goes like this:
“mom, come here.” I come. “drink?” she walks to the fridge. “Mik?” I get the milk out, pour the milk. “Chock-it mik?” as she points to the canister of ovaltine. I scoop the ovaltine into the milk. “shake it?” I shake it and hand it over. “thank you mama”. She scurries off.
Grae always scurries.  She never walks slowly anywhere, always in a little shuffled run, scurrying from one place to the next.  I can always hear her coming by her little shuffle.
She continues to nervously say “mom” over and over, all day long.  To get my attention, it’s never just one “mom” it’s always “mom-mom, mama, mom”.
She’ll say “mom” over and over until a thought comes into her mind to tell me.
“Mom-mom, mama,” “what Grae?” “mama, mom.” “what baby?” “…….mom.” “what?” “mom, I ceyals (cereal) in a cup?” Sometimes I count how many times she says “mom” before she tells me what she needs.  Last week one time it was 17 times.
It drives Brady crazy in the car when she does it, and he’s amazed by my ability to tune it out – or for the endless of amount of patience I show for having my name called 92,404 times in an hour sitting.
Some evenings, I am left feeling frazzled and needing some serious time to myself with a quiet minute where no one says the M-word…. but mostly I just smile because this precious chapter will surely not last forever.  She needs me all the time, she wants me all the time.  Our lives are absolutely wrapped up into each other’s and I’ve heartbreakingly learned that it doesn’t stay that way forever.  I will soak in every last drop of love she can give me, and I’m so lucky to be the one that gets her love all day long.
Grae is absolutely a little chatter-box.
She is talking SO well.  Carrying on full conversations, able to ask for anything she wants or needs (which is a lot), keep up with the big girls…
She will copy anything and everything you say.  Whatever you say to her, she’ll mimic the last word of the sentence.
She is also very observant.
I got my nails done two days ago, and the first thing she noticed when I went to get her out of her crib afterwards was my nails.  “Cute noles! I like your noles.” she said as she carefully observed them.  She’s told me at least 10 times since, every time they catch her attention.  I just die every single time.
Grae has her daddy absolutely wrapped around her little finger.
All day, she’ll do the cutest, most precious things and he’ll just look at me stunned saying “oh my hell.” and I just totally know.  Your mind can’t comprehend the level of cuteness.
I always say Grae is so cute, it almost hurts to look her straight in the face.  It’s so true.  I can’t tell you what her little face does to my insides.  Squeeeeee!
She has the face of a baby cartoon lamb.
Some days, when the toddler rage is to full capacity, that cute face saves her.
When I’m defeated and sigh “Grae…..” she always says “what mom?!”
Sass.
Her big sisters are just as smitten as we are.
Grae is and will always be the most exciting thing that happened to our little family.
We are thrilled beyond measure she belongs to us – forever. 

Happiest Birthday, my precious Grae Golden.  May you always know how loved you are.

  ♥