A Love Letter to Clover On His 3rd Birthday

Clover, my baby, or as you like to remind me now, my big boy, though I still catch myself calling you that softer name, the one I whispered when you fit so easily into the crook of my arm, when carrying you felt like carrying breath itself. You are a big boy now, so tall and solid and sure, so heavy I can barely lift you anymore, and oh how that pains me, not because of the weight in my arms, but because of what that weight means. You are growing away from the tiny, innocent baby I once held so close, the one who needed nothing but me and the world I wrapped around you.

Today you are three. Three whole years of lighting up my life in a way I didn’t know was possible. Three years of joy so loud and love so deep it has rearranged everything I thought I knew about myself. You are a special soul, Clover William, a bright, unmistakable light. Your smile feels like sunshine, your eyes are dreamy and curious and full of wonder, and your laugh, that laugh, it spills into rooms and fills them completely, leaving no space untouched.

It is the greatest privilege of my life to be your Mother and watch you grow. To witness your mind at work, the way you pause before choosing your words, the way you think and feel so deeply for someone so small. You are courageous and kind, wild and free, endlessly strong-willed, always testing the edges of the world. You push boundaries the way only brave hearts do. You do dangerous things carefully, with intention, and so I sit back and watch, my heart racing, my breath caught, trusting you even as it feels like my chest might split open.

I love you, my glorious boy.

And still, loving you like this hurts in a way I never anticipated. I love watching you become who you are, but I ache for the versions of you that already live only in memory, the you from yesterday, from last week, from last month. I find myself constantly looking back, scrolling through photos of you from just last year, from the day you were born, from moments that feel impossibly close and impossibly far away all at once. I burn those images into my memory, clutch them tightly, afraid that if I don’t hold on hard enough they might slip away forever.

It feels like only yesterday that you arrived into this world, a day I will carry with me for the rest of my life. You came breech, feet first and fearless, as if announcing from the very beginning that you would do things your own way. I think that set the tone for everything that followed.

I don’t know how I will ever be okay with you growing up. I don’t know how to make peace with time moving so quickly when my heart begs it to slow down. But I promise you this: I will find the strength. I will take each coming day as the blessing it is, even when loving you feels so big it breaks me open. Even when part of me is quietly grieving who you were while celebrating who you are becoming.

I love you more than words could ever hold. I love you so much it hurts.

Happy third birthday, my sweet Clover boy.