Amaia's birthday

Three years ago today I learned I was able to give birth to a baby who was just shy of ten pounds, drugfree and without any help (and still walk afterwards!) That's great for the self esteem - but I blogged it at the time, so I won't go there. I still don't know why she was two pounds heavier than my boys and two and a half heavier than my other girls. Now she's just a dainty, dinky little thing. Maybe it happened to show me what I was capable of! In any case, she's a delight. She's shy, and yet funny, a real actress. She feels safe and happy surrounded by her huge network of siblings. This tends to manifest itself in the way she assigns names to everything - show her five kittens, she names them Marcel. 'Yotsie', Léon, Anna and 'Maia', the same if you give her five teddies - I know most kids do this, but she takes it to extremes - five peas on her plate will also be assigned the same names, as will her fingers, the stars in the sky and the flowers in a vase. She loves the security of her family. She's a gentle soul, a bright and cuddly girl. She loves to do funny voices and make dramatic faces. Her hugs are so tight. I can't imagine if we'd stopped before her. She lights up my life every day I wake up. Deep down there is a slight sadness knowing that when you are nearly 42 when you have a child, you will spend less time with that child than with the one you had at thirty, so I will compensate her with extra hugs and hope that those will someday make up the deficit.

I love my Bopster.