My oldest girl turned 9 last week. It was another tough one to take, especially when I realized she is now half-way to adulthood. You'll have to excuse some more nostalgia...
What happened to this smiley 3 year-old?
It doesn't feel like it was that long ago.
Now I have this tall, long-legged, beautiful 9 year old.
Seriously--she's already almost grown out of pants I bought her last fall!
It was a fun birthday with all the usual. Decorating the house early with Natalie. German pancakes for breakfast. Brownies for her class at school. Popcorn for her friends in our park day group. She requested beef stew and cornbread for her birthday dinner, followed by cake and ice cream for dessert. So basically, junk food all day. What else are birthdays for? ;)
Her cake was a team effort this time. I frosted it with red frosting (her favorite color) and wrote the lettering:
I'm actually quite proud of free-handing that from a picture off the internet.
It's supposed to be a Harry Potter font.
Then she went to town decorating the rest:
It's got hearts, flowers, books, a rainbow, and a wand.
She got some fun gifts, too...
Nate was so excited to give her this horse puzzle:
Natalie got her a chocolate frog:
Checking out the wizard trading card:
One thing she asked for this year was a quilt. I decided that we could make one together, with Grandma's help, and that we'd just give her a cozy blanket she could snuggle up in.
She also got the snow cone maker she was hoping for from Grandma and Grandpa Allen:
We've already been enjoying that one.
And some shoes....
And books from the Utah Allens.
She's loved them!
Natalie hamming it up with the snow cone syrup:
Cake time!
One of her birthdays requests was going ice skating. We did that two days later.
Nate was not a fan:
He lasted about 2 minutes.
Natalie was shaky but she got better. She lasted for a little while.
Elizabeth was out on the ice basically the whole time. I was so impressed with her stamina and how much she improved while she was out there. She loved it.
Elizabeth continues to amaze and impress me. Just last Sunday, she gave her first talk in Primary that she had written herself. It was on God's plan for his children. I helped only slightly with finding scriptures but she wrote everything out. Not only that, but she paused twice during her talk to look up and speak from her heart. I was sitting there watching her and feeling that she really is growing up. I'm so proud of the person she's becoming.
We do have our struggles, she and I. She's been known to whine, talk back and argue things to death. I try hard not to engage in her arguing or we spiral down, down, down to no place good. It's a hard balance to strike sometimes--explaining the reasoning for things but not allowing her to question and question and never obey.
One funny thing happened months ago back before we moved and I've been wanting to post about it ever since. I started this new job jar when I saw the idea on the internet here and then followed the link to here. (I guess she charges for the complete list, now?) I liked the idea of a slightly more light-hearted job jar. It really does seem to work when we use it, which is rarely, sadly.
Anyway, Elizabeth drew this out of the jar one day
This time she wasn't feeling so light-hearted and she angrily handed me this:
I just laughed and laughed.
The other day we got a much nicer note from her taped to our wall:
I don't know if you can read that but basically she gave us a free nap! It was the first time where I thought: Wow--she is so thoughtful and mature! She gets that we don't want her to destroy the house making an art project for us to show that she loves us. We just want her to help out. We responded so enthusiastically about this that she changed it to one nap per week. We've already enjoyed our first nap on a Sunday afternoon. Of course I was having scary daydreams/dreams about Elijah somehow getting outside and falling in the pool so I bolted upright and the nap was over. But, everything was fine. She did great. I'm getting excited for when we can let her babysit for real someday.
Elizabeth still loves Harry Potter with all of her heart. We finished off her birthday by watching the first movie again. She loves to read anything and everything. Her reading level is crazy high so I try to get books that will challenge her a little more. Mostly I just wander around the library looking for Newberry award winners. We've found a lot of goods ones this way. She's doing great in school but really detests doing homework. She doesn't think it's fair that Natalie doesn't have nearly as much homework. She has struggled a bit learning her multiplication facts and that has been frustrating. Still, she always does great on her actual tests and worksheets.
She still loves arts and crafts, too. She made this really creative shadow puppet nativity with a flashlight attached to it all on her own for Grandma Lorna and Grandpa Tom for Christmas. She always has great ideas. The trouble is actually finishing the projects she starts. I suppose she gets that from me. She's doing great in piano. Her hands are getting stronger. She had a hard time with a difficult chord recently but just said to me that it's not so hard anymore. She loves the pogo stick she got for Christmas and can now do 80 jumps in a row!
Elizabeth is bright, bubbly, excitable, kind, soft-hearted, thoughtful, smart, funny, a questioner, a learner, and such a wonderful daughter. We are so blessed to have her. We love you, Lizzy!
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