Monkey

I'm tired and covered in sugar. I keep finding yet more streaks of dried pink icing on my cheek, or wrist or elbow. The Monkey is having her 4th birthday party tomorrow and I've made her a rainbow cake which I can't wait to slice into as well as pink cupcakes, dragonfly cookies and I'm about to start piping the wing detail on the butterfly cookies. There comes a point with every birthday preparation that I feel tired and cranky and tonight I've reached saturation, so I'm lying in bed for a little bit until I can summon the energy to wield a piping bag.

There are fireworks outside, I'm not sure where or why, but the sound carries up here and I love it.

It seems so weird to be thinking of my baby girl as 4. I was shocked the other night at dinner, as she sat up at the table making herself a burrito, at just how old she looked. Her arms and legs have got gangly all of a sudden and her riotous curls are now so long that they touch her shoulders, a halo of auburn around her pixie face.

She's so articulate it's scary and she's hilariously funny when she uses that articulation. Mood swings getting the better of her at times, and her temper occasionally exploding like a mini snub nosed fire cracker. She loves to snuggle and she's every appreciative. While making her cake this afternoon she kept talking about how it was the most amazing cake she had ever seen and thanking me profusely for all of her birthday preparations.

She's best friends with the Elfling when they're not screaming at each other and she loves her baby brother to bits. She loves to be read stories and to watch Dora the Explorer and to climb trees and swing on the monkey bars. She's started to write her own name, but only the first 2 and the last 2 letters. The 2 in the middle being a bit confusing at the moment, even though she can recognise them well enough.

It's amazing to think that under the old school system that she would be starting pre-school next year, she still seems far too tiny and inexperienced, and yet she's wise as well. So much more adept than her sister at reading social situations and knowing how to manipulate rather than meltdown when she wants something. There's such a spark of life about her. A beautiful light that is not just a very proud mother talking. A beautiful something that no one can quite put their finger on but feel compelled to tell me exists. That something extraordinary.

And now I have to go and finish my extraordinary preparations for a Monkey that has climbed her way up into my heart and nestled in so determinedly that I will never own it again.