We ask the same questions every year. Okay, we haven't done it every year. I'm not a good Pinterest mom. Anyway, here's the list this year:
Age 8
Favorite song: Better in Stereo (theme from Liv and Maddie on Disney channel)
Favorite food: Chocolate
Favorite color: black
Favorite subject at school: writing
Best Friend: Serenity
When I Grow Up, I want to be: a songwriter
Favorite Book: Fantastic Mr. Fox by Roald Dahl.
Favorite Sport: Basketball
Favorite game: Uno
Favorite TV show: Wander Over Yonder
Quote:
Never give up. Never surrender."
Saturday, December 14, 2013
Thursday, December 12, 2013
Blast from the past, November 8, 2007: I want 4
Heh, a few weeks shy of her 2nd birthday, I asked her how old she'd be (another livejournal post):
In E news, she's still as cute as she's ever been. She's going to be 2 in a month, which is awesome and freakishly scary for me, but apparently she's got other plans. We were talking about her birthday today in the car. I asked her how old she'd be, and she said she'd be one.
Then I said, "No, E, you're going to be 2."
She thought about it a minute and said, "I want 4."
Sort of sums up my child in so many ways, it's hilarious.
In E news, she's still as cute as she's ever been. She's going to be 2 in a month, which is awesome and freakishly scary for me, but apparently she's got other plans. We were talking about her birthday today in the car. I asked her how old she'd be, and she said she'd be one.
Then I said, "No, E, you're going to be 2."
She thought about it a minute and said, "I want 4."
Sort of sums up my child in so many ways, it's hilarious.
Blast from the past, July 15, 2008: I see a clue
Another old gem from Livejournal. E would have been 2 and a half:
The point is this: my kid loves her some Blues Clues. If you are familiar with it,you will find this story amusing; if you're not, I'll catch you up to speed. Basically Blue is a dog who plays this game called Blue's Clues. She puts a blue pawprint on clues, there are three of them, when you get the three clues, Steve puts them in his notebook and you have to guess what Blue is thinking about (what game she wants to play, what book she wants to read, what she wants for snack, etc). Anyway, Steve goes traipsing around looking for clues, which are blue paw prints on various things.
So yesterday, I'm driving in the car and the car ahead of us is apparently owned by a Clemson fan. The car has one of those orange paw print magnets on the back. As we're sitting at the red light, E looks up and says "Look, mommy! I see a clue!"
The point is this: my kid loves her some Blues Clues. If you are familiar with it,you will find this story amusing; if you're not, I'll catch you up to speed. Basically Blue is a dog who plays this game called Blue's Clues. She puts a blue pawprint on clues, there are three of them, when you get the three clues, Steve puts them in his notebook and you have to guess what Blue is thinking about (what game she wants to play, what book she wants to read, what she wants for snack, etc). Anyway, Steve goes traipsing around looking for clues, which are blue paw prints on various things.
So yesterday, I'm driving in the car and the car ahead of us is apparently owned by a Clemson fan. The car has one of those orange paw print magnets on the back. As we're sitting at the red light, E looks up and says "Look, mommy! I see a clue!"
Blast from the past, January 22, 2009: I know it's trouble
Another gem, mined from Livejournal. E would have been 4 at the time she did this:
So tonight, we put her in her bed with the usual fight: I have to get some water, I need medicine for my cough (I say "you're not coughing" and she fakes a cough), I need to go potty, I need you to read me one more book (followed by reading the book up until the penultimate page where she says "I don't like this book" and gets another--she doesn't think I've caught on to that trick yet).
So after reading the last book (If You Give a Moose a Muffin), she gets in bed and I come out to the living room to play wow with my husband and with some friends of ours. Soon, I see the child standing on the steps to the living room with her duck costume hat on (from when she was 10 months old for Halloween 06) and she says she has to go potty. I take her potty, she does her thing and as I'm putting her back into her bed, her face lights up and she says, "I totally sneaked out of bed and into your room. And no one saw me."
I laugh and say "yes, you totally did." And then I realize what she's said. She sneaked into my room.
She then says "I put my money in your room." At that point she gets up, we go into my room and she has hidden a couple of play coins from her toy piggy bank in a slipper on my nightstand. And she shows them to me. Then she shows me a real quarter and says, "I put this in my mouth. I know it's trouble."
At that point, she walks back into her bedroom, climbs in her bed and lies down.
So tonight, we put her in her bed with the usual fight: I have to get some water, I need medicine for my cough (I say "you're not coughing" and she fakes a cough), I need to go potty, I need you to read me one more book (followed by reading the book up until the penultimate page where she says "I don't like this book" and gets another--she doesn't think I've caught on to that trick yet).
So after reading the last book (If You Give a Moose a Muffin), she gets in bed and I come out to the living room to play wow with my husband and with some friends of ours. Soon, I see the child standing on the steps to the living room with her duck costume hat on (from when she was 10 months old for Halloween 06) and she says she has to go potty. I take her potty, she does her thing and as I'm putting her back into her bed, her face lights up and she says, "I totally sneaked out of bed and into your room. And no one saw me."
I laugh and say "yes, you totally did." And then I realize what she's said. She sneaked into my room.
She then says "I put my money in your room." At that point she gets up, we go into my room and she has hidden a couple of play coins from her toy piggy bank in a slipper on my nightstand. And she shows them to me. Then she shows me a real quarter and says, "I put this in my mouth. I know it's trouble."
At that point, she walks back into her bedroom, climbs in her bed and lies down.
blast from the past, October 25th, 2009: I don't have a couch!
Back in the day, I used to use Livejournal to blog. I got a bit reminiscent, and was scrolling through some old posts over there (mostly I was looking for a recipe), and found some old E quotes.
So my kid has made the transfer from Noggin, now Nick Jr with a stupidly bad website that sucks, to PBS kids. One of her PBS kids shows she loves is Kid Fitness. it's not a bad show, they exercise a lot. I mean, he is Kid fitness.
Anyway, he always says "come on, kids, get off that couch and movewith us." Ella is concerned about this for several reasons: 1--she always gets up to exercise with him and 2) we don't have a couch.
E: Stop telling me to get off the couch! We don't have one!!
So my kid has made the transfer from Noggin, now Nick Jr with a stupidly bad website that sucks, to PBS kids. One of her PBS kids shows she loves is Kid Fitness. it's not a bad show, they exercise a lot. I mean, he is Kid fitness.
Anyway, he always says "come on, kids, get off that couch and move
E: Stop telling me to get off the couch! We don't have one!!
December 11, 2013: who's poor (forgot to post this on time)
We spent the better part of the night before E's birthday trying to get her to go to bed. Because, much like Christmas, we had to have presents ready to be out on the table for her when she gets up. We started doing this when she turned 3 and we were trying to get rid of the pacifier. She came out into the dining room to see presents assembled the morning of her birthday and she had to make a choice between getting the birthday presents and being a big girl or keeping the pacifier. She begrudgingly gave up the pacifier once she saw that there were presents from grandma there, too (and grandma gives the BEST presents).
Anyway, this year, she was bored waiting for bedtime to come, and we had turned off the tv for the night, so she was spending her time pontificating on what she might get off of her birthday list. This is part of the conversation that took place:
E: If I get birthday money from grandma, I think I'm going to keep 1 dollar and give the other 9 dollars to someone else. Maybe someone who is poor.
Me: That's very kind of you, kid.
E: Okay, so who's poor?
I realize in the typing that it does lose something as a written conversation.
Also, we convinced her to give her money to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
And, ironically, she's not getting birthday money from grandma, because grandma was here and they ordered an American Girl doll for birthday/Christmas 2 weeks ago.
Anyway, this year, she was bored waiting for bedtime to come, and we had turned off the tv for the night, so she was spending her time pontificating on what she might get off of her birthday list. This is part of the conversation that took place:
E: If I get birthday money from grandma, I think I'm going to keep 1 dollar and give the other 9 dollars to someone else. Maybe someone who is poor.
Me: That's very kind of you, kid.
E: Okay, so who's poor?
I realize in the typing that it does lose something as a written conversation.
Also, we convinced her to give her money to the Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation.
And, ironically, she's not getting birthday money from grandma, because grandma was here and they ordered an American Girl doll for birthday/Christmas 2 weeks ago.
December 12, 2013: happy birthday, kid
Today, my precocious one is 8. She's quickly moving out of baby and little girl things and into girl things. She watches shows designed for teens and tweens. She has a voice-activated password journal. Although, let's be honest, I want one of those.
She still wants things like Barbie dream houses (which she got), but she also wants to dance and listen to music. There are still glimpses of the sweetness of her toddler years, but so much of the sass that comes with being a girl in conflict with her parents about who she is and what she wants.
Every year, obviously, she becomes a little taller and more grown up looking physically. But every year, so, too, changes can be seen in her expressions, her choices, her tone of voice.
So, today, she had her birthday pancakes and tonight we'll get her birthday BBQ (another sign she's growing up: we've gone from mac and cheese to ribs, well, and mac and cheese, too).
Parenting is always about choosing your battles. Usually those battles are with the child herself and involve which shirt or socks to wear or how often to brush her hair or whether it's actually a viable choice to only brush your teeth once a day for less than 30 seconds (it's not, by the way). I don't care if her socks match, nor if they match the ensemble she's chosen for the day. I just want her to understand when it's time to get dressed and, for the love of all that is holy, to change into clean underwear every day. Every day, kid. Every. Day. *
Now, as she moves into this new stage, the battle feels like it's on such a larger scale. I'm battling against high heels and make up, even in 2nd grade. I'm battling against kids who put her down at school and the friends who don't stand up for her. I'm battling against her inclination to talk back, her proclaimed boredom while doing homework, her preference to watch TV for 12 hours a day rather than to play or read. I'm battling her inability to understand why we can't have oatmeal or macaroni and cheese for every meal, and her preference not to eat green beans or spinach.
My parents had the same battles, all of them did. Thank God so many chose to fight them on our behalf. Some are straightforward wars of attrition, some of them feel Quixotic in their nature. Limiting exposure to the hypersexualized body image destroying crap that's spewed out of televisions, magazines and computer screens for girls and boys alike often feels overwhelming and unwinnable. But they're all battles worth fighting. More importantly, they're worth her knowing that we're fighting them. Because one day, she'll be the one fighting. My best hope is that she'll remember us on our horses, charging those windmills, and she'll be willing to do the same for her own children. Or for someone else's. Or, even better, on her own behalf.
So, happy birthday, kid. Thanks for bringing us on this wonderful, terrifying, beautiful journey. Thanks for making us grow up and protect you, but also for bringing back the wonder of childhood and joy and allowing us to do it all over again through your eyes. Thanks for being independent and sassy enough to remind us that it's YOUR childhood, not ours. Most of all, thanks for being you, and in so doing, being ours.
And now that you're 8, I need to see videos of you when you were 2. It's the way moms work.
**PS: she does change her underwear daily at this point. But there was a time when I had to explain why it was important. I'm sure she still has her doubts, but she gets it that we're not budging on this particular rule.
She still wants things like Barbie dream houses (which she got), but she also wants to dance and listen to music. There are still glimpses of the sweetness of her toddler years, but so much of the sass that comes with being a girl in conflict with her parents about who she is and what she wants.
Every year, obviously, she becomes a little taller and more grown up looking physically. But every year, so, too, changes can be seen in her expressions, her choices, her tone of voice.
So, today, she had her birthday pancakes and tonight we'll get her birthday BBQ (another sign she's growing up: we've gone from mac and cheese to ribs, well, and mac and cheese, too).
Parenting is always about choosing your battles. Usually those battles are with the child herself and involve which shirt or socks to wear or how often to brush her hair or whether it's actually a viable choice to only brush your teeth once a day for less than 30 seconds (it's not, by the way). I don't care if her socks match, nor if they match the ensemble she's chosen for the day. I just want her to understand when it's time to get dressed and, for the love of all that is holy, to change into clean underwear every day. Every day, kid. Every. Day. *
Now, as she moves into this new stage, the battle feels like it's on such a larger scale. I'm battling against high heels and make up, even in 2nd grade. I'm battling against kids who put her down at school and the friends who don't stand up for her. I'm battling against her inclination to talk back, her proclaimed boredom while doing homework, her preference to watch TV for 12 hours a day rather than to play or read. I'm battling her inability to understand why we can't have oatmeal or macaroni and cheese for every meal, and her preference not to eat green beans or spinach.
My parents had the same battles, all of them did. Thank God so many chose to fight them on our behalf. Some are straightforward wars of attrition, some of them feel Quixotic in their nature. Limiting exposure to the hypersexualized body image destroying crap that's spewed out of televisions, magazines and computer screens for girls and boys alike often feels overwhelming and unwinnable. But they're all battles worth fighting. More importantly, they're worth her knowing that we're fighting them. Because one day, she'll be the one fighting. My best hope is that she'll remember us on our horses, charging those windmills, and she'll be willing to do the same for her own children. Or for someone else's. Or, even better, on her own behalf.
So, happy birthday, kid. Thanks for bringing us on this wonderful, terrifying, beautiful journey. Thanks for making us grow up and protect you, but also for bringing back the wonder of childhood and joy and allowing us to do it all over again through your eyes. Thanks for being independent and sassy enough to remind us that it's YOUR childhood, not ours. Most of all, thanks for being you, and in so doing, being ours.
And now that you're 8, I need to see videos of you when you were 2. It's the way moms work.
**PS: she does change her underwear daily at this point. But there was a time when I had to explain why it was important. I'm sure she still has her doubts, but she gets it that we're not budging on this particular rule.
Thursday, December 05, 2013
December 3, 2013: Photo post, the birthday wish list.
So, not only do we get to deal with E's Christmas list, her birthday is also coming up. So we got the second list. I love finding lists all over the place. Here's the birthday list. Somehow, it's the perfect balance after all of the foam weapons she requested for Christmas.
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| A leather hat? |
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