Happy 4 1/2, Emma!

Emma turned 4 1/2 this week too! And now she is already counting down the days until she turns 5! She CAN'T WAIT to start Kindergarten in the fall and she is registered for FULL DAY which fills me with great excitement and trepidation. She loves school and is disappointed on the two days every week when she doesn't have it. Boy am I ever going to miss her though!

 Emma's half birthday comes quickly on the tails of Isla's and so quite often "her" menu ideas share a striking resemblance to what was served at Isla's celebration a few days prior. Emma did select an individualized dinner menu of pasta with red meat sauce and raw carrots sticks (and that was it!) but she mimicked Isla's breakfast of sprinkle pancakes. Well. With the exciting addition of raw carrot sticks to make it truly her own. Yum!

 Thank goodness she changed her mind and decided at the 11th hour that she wanted a rainbow cake. Her prior request was for a tiger and I fear I was about to sorely disappoint her with my lack of decorating skills. She of course wanted "chocolate cake with strawberry frosting, " just like her sister, and maybe I should have made it easy on myself and served the leftovers like I've done in the past. But when she changed her tune and asked for a rainbow cake, I knew I'd have to introduce her to the novelty that is funfetti. She. Was. Thrilled.

 And she said my cake turned out "just exactly the way she wanted" (phew!!!) which is amazing since I used ziplock bags with holes cut out in the corners to pipe out the rainbow. She definitely is my little encourager and know how to make a girl feel good, even when I feel like she might be stretching the truth a little. ;)

 I think this one has a little bit of athlete in her blood. She is so excited to begin a gymnastic course next week and still asks me regularly for ballet classes. Last week we were at a park and happened upon a soccer ball and discovered she is a natural! That made her half birthday present shopping easy and she is now the proud owner of an orange soccer ball (her favorite color). I'm hoping to get her on some sort of soccer team in the spring to see what she really thinks.

Emma asks a lot of really good questions. Like if it hurts Jesus when our heart pumps the blood through (since he is residing there, she wants to make sure he doesn't get squished!) When she's not saying funny stuff to make us laugh, she's snuggling up to us to make us smile. She is more or less easy going except when it comes to getting dressed or buckling into her carseat...

She loves babies and gravitates toward any little one who she can take under her wings. She also LOVES dogs and is so sweet and tender with them. Happy 4 1/2, Emma!

Happy 6 1/2, Isla!

 Our sweet girl has aged another 1/2 year!

She is beautiful and strong and a force to be reckoned with, both inside and out. She wasted no time in planning an elaborate half birthday dinner for herself and the Crozier side of the family. Her menu included cheese and crackers for an appetizer, mandarin oranges, "dumplings" (pot stickers), Sort of Thai Noodles and Chocolate Chip Zucchini Cupcakes with Fresh Strawberry Frosting. Of course we made breakfast special too with sprinkle pancakes, balloons and a song.

 Isla is growing up in leaps and bounds. She comes home from school every day with new tidbits to share with us. Last month was a choreographed dance she and her classmates had put together to the song "Timber" by the artists Pitbull and Kei$ha. If you aren't familiar with it, save yourself the heart attack and DON'T Google it. As Graham reassures me, "She does go to public school after all..." THANKFULLY there is an edited version that I later learned was the one she was dancing to. It eliminates some of the questionable lyrics but not all of them...She and Emma can still be found belting out the following at random times: 

"It's going down, I'm yelling timber

You better move, you better dance

Let's make a night, you won't remember

I'll be the one, you won't forget

wooooo oooooh

Swing your partner round and round

End of the night, it's going down

One more shot, another round

End of the night, it's going down"

Oh. My. Word. Never judge a parent by what their kids say, right?

Isla is always always busy, a skill I'm afraid she learned from me. She runs a mile a minute at all times and is impossible to slow down. I am on my own personal quest to learn to relax and slow down and so I'm trying to teach the same to my daughter who needs it just as much as me. The other day we were reading about the story of creation and I was doing my best to hone in on the importance of the 7th day, when God rested. Isla, ever so incredulously asked me, "Why did he need to rest??! It's not like it was hard for him to create the whole world. He just had to say the words and point and it magically happened." 

Oh, my child. We have our work cut out for us.

On the flip side, we were also discussing why God created humans and without a moment's pause, she piped up "To glorify God!" That, my girl, is exactly right. Live into it my child.

 Isla's teacher reminds us frequently that her favorite part of the school day is WRITER'S WORKSHOP. She adores writing stories both at school and at home and recently coordinated a story-writing contest with all of her friends. She mailed letters inviting each of her selected friends to participate, complete with a yes or no check box tear-off portion so they could indicate whether they would take part. Of course she also included a return envelope. And she made individual prize ribbons and promised that everyone who submitted a story would be a winner. Oh. And did I mention that she did all this before 7 AM one morning??? She has become rather self sufficient at writing out her return address.

She making slow but steady progress with her reading too. Her favorite books right now are the Magic Tree House series and anything by Mo Willems. We bought her four of the "Jack and Annie books" (Magic Tree House) for her half birthday gift and she was thrilled. Typically I read them to her but I had her read me a couple pages the other day and she did it! She needs a lot of positive affirmation as she doesn't like to make mistakes (told you she's my kid!!) but she's doing great.

Isla is also an incredibly perceptive kid. She picks up on ALL of my cues and can tell when I'm upset or on edge. She sure keeps me in check, especially when she says things like "Sorry I'm stressing you out, Mom." You can't pull anything past this one, that's for sure.

  

She love, love, LOVES sticker charts and systems. Or at least the idea of them. She'll think of an idea in the middle of breakfast and then I blink and the next thing I know, she's run away from the table to the office to make a sticker chart to keep her (or her siblings) accountable to her new revolutionary idea. I wish I could say sticker charts the making of sticker charts translated into the following of them...but unfortunately it isn't the case. They help provide accountability but also result in a LOT of complaining.

We are working on our "morning routine" this month which involves room cleaning, much to her dismay. She's a lover of rules and order, except of course when it comes to her belongings. I would describe her as "explosive" when it comes to her stuff. She comes home from school and instantaneously, socks, shoes, beads, books. papers and pens spew from her in all directions into Every. Single. Room. Often times I feel like I'm try to plug a volcano.

This girl is definitely a maker and a doer and a lover of people and we love her. Happy half sweet Isla!