Letters to Jack: SIX.

Jack, 

Happy sixth birthday (over a month late, because, life) my little love. 

I say this every year, but you are absolutely everything. You are everything good in this world. You are everything right. I have no freaking idea what I did to get lucky enough for you to be mine, but I will spend every day for the rest of eternity being thankful for that. 

A few things about you, right now at six:

You talk to yourself all day long. It’s my favorite thing to stop and listen to.

You are exhaustingly clingy. I hear “I just want to be with you” no less than 97 times per day. It is very sweet and I know I’ll look back on it fondly, but WHEW does mama need some alone time. Don’t worry, I’ll return the favor when you’re a teenager. 

You are very self aware, very sure of yourself, and very confident in what you like. Just last week I told you that you’d been invited to a birthday party and you replied, “I do not want to be there. I would rather be at home.” You got it, bubs.

Your teachers go on and on about how kind you are. How you care for others. Whenever you get report cards (you’re old enough for those now!) there’s always a note about how you’re empathetic, how you cheer your classmates on, how you ask if you’re allowed to help others when you finish your own work. This, to me, is more important than any educational accomplishment they could tell me about. 

You are FUN. So dang fun. Seriously my favorite person to hang out with. Your imagination is so big and you’re so creative. You’ll set up obstacle courses and trick shots all around the house for us to do together.

You are hilarious. You’re very into pranks lately, and I cry laughing every time I hear your little voice yell “PRANKED YA!” Over something small, like putting a fork in the wrong place. You are obsessed with the YouTube channel Unspeakables, a bunch of young guys playing pranks on each other. This has resulted in you running through the house saying things like, “dude, bro, totally” and it kills me dead every single time. 

Your laugh is my favorite sound in the entire world. 

I love you. The greatest gift in my whole life is hearing those three words from you while you hold up the “I love you” ESL sign. You are so generous with your love and I hope that never changes. 

Thank you for growing up with me. You’ve never had a mom who knows what she’s doing, but you’ve always had a mom that loves you more than anything else in the universe. And you always will. 

Love you, bubs. 

xo, mama