Today is our Claire’s Birthday.  She is 21.  An Adult now.  Oh My.  How did that happen? Below are Claire’s first words, which started when she was 20 months old.  These words pretty much give you a feel for Claire at 21.  She is bright and strong and good and we love her like crazy.  Always have.  Always will.

Claire’s Words

First Sentence: “Ead book Mom.” (20 mos. 10/95)

“I do it.”

In every prayer: “cose yer eyes, Adum”

“Where’s my bink?”

“Snow’s making house wet.”

Age 2

“Here ‘y go”

“Anku” “Yer welcome”

“Dad, you hurt my tails.” (Pulling seat belt over pig tails.)

“That tickles my fingernails!” (Hot food)

“Piget is my favorite.” (Piglet)

“I beesy right now. I go shopping (puts purse on shoulder). I just go a one more store.”

At church: “Adam’s sitting on my booful dress.”

 

Still at church, putting purse on shoulder: “I gun go far away. I gun go on a missionary. (Walks to back aisle) I come back from my missionary. I gun go on one more missionary.” Later: “I’m not a missionary–I’m just a teeny girl.” “Where’s my booful binkie. I need it.”

Adam: “Claire, come help me.”
Claire: “I can’t. I’m just a teeny girl. (Her favorite excuse.)

At the pool: “Mom, I need lotion. The sun is falling down on my shoulders.”

Coming into the room of friends: “Guys- it’s me!”

Hiding: “Mommy, where are me?”

Most often used phrase: “Yet Me Do It MYSELF!”

“I’m growing into a beeg girl.”

“I hope dey call me on a missionary.”

“Mom, please take the side-ies off my apple.” (Peel it)

Loves to sing: “Book of Mormon Stories” and “Adam was a Prophet.”
(The thought makes her giggle.)

“Wight on schedule.”

 

“This diaper is dwiving me cwazy!”

Turned on the gas fireplace for the first time: “Wook Mom! It’s working! The batteries are not dead!”

“I’m plugging my nose because the world is stinky.”

Watching General Conference at Barb’s: “We have the same video on at our house!”

“I can do that by myself.” But still likes to be carried. “Mom, carry me. I can’t carry myself. I’m too heavy.”

Favorite color: Pink

During power outage: “It’s pinch bwack in here.”

Claire, what do you want for Christmas? “Widdow pink things.”

Dad sings: “The Primary Colors are 1-2-3, Red, Yellow and Blue. . . ”
Claire adds: “And PINK!”

Taking the video tape out and putting it in the rewinder: “I’m kinda gettin’ the hang
of it.”

“It’s vey-ee vey-ee cold.”

Suitcase = ku sake

Favorite movie: Bambi (she can recite every word)

Age 3

For her 3rd birthday, Claire wanted “Pink” for dinner. We had pizza and pink heart-shaped cake with pink sprinkles.

“Mom, am I still 3? Can I be 2 again?”

“I have 3 favorite colors: Pink, Dark Pink, and Light Pink.”

“Pink is on the edge of red.”

“I like red and white too because they make pink.”

“Don’t, Adam. You’re messing up this mess.”

“I’m huge now. I’m almost as huge as you are. I’m growing huger.”

“I’m saving my donut for last week.”

“That was not how it was at all. Look at ‘em- open your glasses and see ‘em.”

“I like the very colorous one.”

Mom: “How did you get that owie on your nose?”
Claire: “A piece of glass was on the floor and my nose fell on it.”

Dad: “Pooh doesn’t go to the bathroom. Why?”
Claire: “Because he has no pee or bum.”

“Mom- you are as Big as the Couch!”

“Mom, do you wish you weared little underwear like me?”

“Mom, I can’t believe how Huge I am!”

Holding her tickling nose: “I think I’m gonna do a ‘Bless You!’”

Age 4

“I can’t handle it anymore!” (Too tired to get to bed from the bathroom.)

Mom to Claire in bed: “Lie still, Claire.”
Claire: “I can’t. My feelings make me move and I do what my feelings ask me to do.”

“The pillow fell off my bed in the night before this night.”

“Can we get small again?”

“How do we grow?”

“What if we had no bones in our bodies?”

“When do our feet stop growing?”

“How does our skin stick to us?”

Talking gibberish: “I’m just saying that so my mouth is busy doing something.”

Sitting on the porch rocker, Claire asked if the cushion was the chair’s tummy.
“Cause these are the arms, those are the legs, and that’s the back.”

“Why do we have to have houses? Can’t we just live in tents?”

“What does this mean: I’m afraid not?”

“I used to not know how to make cereal.”

Mom: “Run to get your socks very fast.”
Claire: “Was I just like a dot?”

“I don’t see any much cars.”

“Why do we have a chin? To hold our teeth?”

“Skin gets dry really fast, doesn’t it?”

“Worms eat dirt for dessert!”

Mom: “You have a few more dance lessons.”
Claire: “Ten? Or Three?”

German Pancakes = “Cinnamon Hotdogs”

Every night before bed: “Spell with me Mommy.” She could spell before she could read. She spells any 3-letter word, many longer.

“I didn’t go in your bed last night. I was thinking of it, but I didn’t listen to my brain.”

 

Trimming toenails: “Agh, Mom- stop! You’re deeping in.”

“Rememberies”

Tight Shoes: “This is like giving my feet a headache.”

“My teeth are frozen stiff- feel them.”

“All the lick is off of it.” (Stickers)

“Today Haley’s room was Totally like a tornado hit it- it was even messier than mine -like you had to step on toys to even get to her bed!”

“If somebody is really bad and mean, is their brain black?”
“I know what color brains are -Blue.”

Rock ‘n Roll Music playing in car stopped at a light beside us:
“That’s up and down music.”

Sam’s Club = “the cement store with food in it”

“My arm hurts. It feels like a broken muscle.”

“When Adam did that, it felt like there was blood dripping out of a bone.”
(Adam bumped her chin.)

Crying because she bit her tongue:
Mom: “How did you bite it?”
Claire: “I was walking and my teeth fell down on it.”

“Mom, there’s too much mail for my little hands to get it out.”

“That was a yawn. At the end of yawns, I close my mouth fast to get all the
air back in.”

Mom: “Claire, do you smell the roast beef?”
Clarie: “No, I have a too small nose.”

“Stop talking and be quiet. I hear something -like air.”

     

Age 5

And today is Claire’s 5th birthday. Last night, near midnight, I was in bed with her putting her to sleep. I said, “Claire, today is the day we say good bye to Bonny [Aunt Bonny died], and today is the day we say good by to 4-year-old Claire. She’s been so excited to turn 5. But in that context–that of good byes, she got real sad and said, “I don’t want to say good bye to Bonny, and I don’t want to say good by to 4. I want to stay just the way I am. Can’t I have my birthday party and all the presents and all that stuff and still be the same number? Can’t I be 4 all the rest of my life?”