Love, Love, Love Part 2

Cadence Faith Pate

Oh my darling daughter.  You are every color of the rainbow and then some. Here's some things I love about you:

I love your blue eyes.  Nobody else in our family has them.  Deep as the sea.

I love your quirkiness.  The older you are getting, the more zaniness comes out of you daily.  You say things all day long that make me and Daddy look at each other and just laugh. 

I love your curls.  You are about to be five, and you have still never had a haircut.  It's about time for a trim, but we just haven't even wanted to touch it.  You worked hard to get those curls (took you forever to get hair), so now those long, bouncing locks are so precious.

I love how affectionate you are. There is not a hug, tickle, or kiss that happens in our home that doesn't involve you. You will come running across the room if you see us hugging just to get in on it. Literally.

I love your imagination.  Your creativity knows no bounds.  From your hand coming to life to a balloon to a stick, you bring inanimate things to life with sparkle and usually song.  The world is your playground, and I know this will be a tremendous gift that God grows and develops in you as you get older.  I look forward to being crafty and creative with you as something we can enjoy together for the rest of our lives. 

I love your fire. There are times that being a passionate little thing can bring it's challenges for us, but I know this will be something that will mark your life.  You love big, and your spunkiness keeps things interesting!  Plus, it's hard to blame you for that too much because you come by that one honestly, dear :)

I love that you are musical.  You love to move to music, you love to sing music, you just love music.  Your name being a musical term is very fitting for you.  You even sing along to the background music of your video games as you play, but an octave higher.  We don't even know if you realize you're doing it, and we're amazed that you hit those notes.  (We're talking like Mariah Carey here, people.)  And who could forget the song you made up about our dog, Mac.

I love that right now you have the cutest little lisp, due to the knocking out removal of your front teeth before their time.  Which reminds me of another thing I love about you: you are as girly as the day is long, but you are tough as nails.  You can throw down like nobody and more than hold your own!

There's so much about you still coming to light and more we will come to know and love as you grow, but you are already such a beautiful person, inside and out.  I could keep listing until I've filled the cyber pages into chapters. I look forward to the privilege, honor, and challenge of partaking in your shaping and morphing into a young woman.  I look forward to being your best friend one day when I'm old and I watch you raise your own family. I hope you will share those juicy secrets and desires of your heart during the late night talks of the tumultuous and confusing mess known as adolescence, because I want to be there to walk with you in it.  

I'm so glad that God blessed me with a daughter.  You bring me great joy, and you are a ray of sunshine in our home.  I love you, sweet Cadence.