My sweet Junie.
Today, you are six years old. It feels like you have really turned a corner lately from a preschooler/toddler to a little girl. I think it is a mixture of you learning how to read a little bit, your vocabulary exploding, the way you are so independent, and seeing you get so much bigger!
You have grown a lot this year- you are about 42 lbs and comfortably fitting in size 6 clothing. This is the first year that you have been ahead of your age in clothing size, but just barely ;) You very much have your own style. You are still enamored by fancy dresses and most often choose a fancy dress when we go anywhere. When we stay home, you love to stay cozied up in your jammies all day. You are still pretty messy and so a lot... maybe most of your clothes have some decent stains on them and won't be able to be passed down to Ellie, but you still love them and they are just so you. It also makes me happy seeing you wear things Jo used to wear. I'm sorry you are such the middle child- getting all the hand-me-downs haha but I promise you don't mind yet and when you do start to mind, of course we will get you some special things just for you. You love to be barefoot, but when we leave the house you mostly wear your pink uggs that Ita got you for Christmas. They're so cozy and cute- you are a lucky little girl to have them! We had to have a nice long talk about not leaving them (or any shoes) by the trampoline where they get all wet and gross ha.
You are still kind of my messy girl, but you are getting SO much better. You have moved into your own room upstairs and you have actually kept it pretty much sparkling clean for a whole month. I do occasionally find crumpled up paper stuffed behind your bed, but such an improvement from even a few months ago. I can't let you have any sort of writing instruments up in your room though after finding a few drawings on the carpet and walls...
You started homeschooling this year and you have just recently started reading a little bit. I asked you to spell the words "hug" and "cat" yesterday and you totally did! You haven't really been too excited about school and much prefer to spend your days carefree playing outside or Barbies or imagination with your brother or sister. We studied the Oregon Trail at the beginning of this year and it was so fun watching you get excited. You and Jo played covered wagon together for weeks.. and you got to wear the little bonnet that my Oma made for me and looked SO adorable in it. We also filtered water, used tape to show the actual size of a wagon and talked about what was nice to have vs. a necessity and read many great books. You absolutely love snuggling up to read together- and now are really enjoying audio books and chapter books with no pictures- so that is one of my favorite ways to learn with you.
You really wanted a proper party this year, so we are having a winter themed party next weekend. You chose blue and white and silver streamers and decor. We are having a snowflake cake. and you insist that i put up the Christmas tree for people to put their gifts under ha. We are still searching Pinterest for game and activity ideas, but you are SO excited! I believe your Ita is buying you a new white dress (whyyyy white?!) for the party too so you will be thrilled!
You say the best part of your 5th year was our trip to Mexico a few weeks ago. You were so happy playing in the sand at the beach, swimming in the pool, eating all the yummy treat foods, spending so much time with your grandparents, etc. but you were sad because you loooove to sleep in and you weren't getting great sleep the whole trip sleeping in close proximity with your early rising siblings. You also got a weird rash in between your toes and a bit of a tummy bug haha so easy to forget how hard things are and just remember the best parts. it was a really great trip though! You loved to sit up on Ita's lap in the car and you hated any time it was even slightly chilly haha i'm not sure if you're going to make it in Oregon long term..but I sure hope I get to live close to you forever!
You have had a bit of a rough year health wise- at your well check we were told you are beyond constipated and we have to get you on some form of laxative ha. oof. and you had FIVE cavities when we took you to the dentist. part of that was that we skipped your last appointment and the other part was that i was alone for bedtime most of the summer trying to get a baby, a toddler, and you and Jo to bed and get the house clean and then play catch up on office work and so i picked my battles and I didn't pick teeth brushing so you did it yourself most nights and well...here we are. I wish I could go back and do better, but we had such a hard year with toddler Z and baby E and I feel like we are just coming out of the fog. But anyway, we are trying ozone therapy and then flossing with ozone and remineralizing toothpaste each night and *hoping* to avoid fillings. It is rough and takes like four minutes each night to brush your teeth. and you get so many canker sores so you scream about it a lot.. not my fav, but at least dad is around to tackle it some nights. hope you don't have trauma from it down the road.
Let's see... you are still my little artist and spend lots of time coloring and working on art projects. Your creativity has been stifled a lot this year by babies and toddlers restricting your use of choking hazard art objects. I am excited to get you back into the thick of it and to have more time to work with you on your passion of art! You love all things art- beads, coloring, painting, play-doh. and you are so creative. it is so fun to watch you!! we just picked up a bunch of fairy garden stuff and are making some white play-doh to go along with your red leftover from Christmas to make a valentine's-ish play-doh kit. You still love that kind of stuff and I am going to encourage it all for as long as I can.
You love to play alone and are very independent, so sometimes I have to be very intentional about spending enough time with you. You are the type that will just hole up and not share until you can't contain anymore and then you are begging to connect- and I don't always have the capacity to fill your love tank back up when you're desperately low so I try hard to connect little by little each day and make sure you never run empty. You really enjoy one on one mommy time. We are learning that your love language is physical touch and you LOVE to be touching- sitting on a lap is always a favorite. You love to hold hands and sit next to me. You love to snuggle. You love to have your back scratched and have your hair done and your nails painted. You are just the best. I love knowing how you work and being able to communicate my love in the way that you best receive it. because you are so loved, little girl. so so loved.
You love TV and movies and audiobooks and just consuming content in general. I am excited to get you fully reading so we can move some of that consuming over to reading. As I mentioned above, it has been a hard year with the two littles so you got lots of audiobook at rest time and bedtime and an hour of tv most days... too much for sure. I want to make sure you have more time to be bored and have to engage your imagination or just make space for you to think or be creative or whatever that looks like. It is hard when it is cold outside, so I am really excited to watch you bloom this spring and summer as the baby load gets easier for me and we have more capacity to do things together. You loooved the garden this last year and spent so much time back there with me. You would help me pick cherries and pit them, pick all the veggies and freeze them, and were very involved in the planting and watering and weeding. It is really fun to watch! You helped me save a bunch of sunflower seeds from our flowers and you are gifting some to Ita for her birthday! You are so thoughtful and give such wonderful gifts..I sure love that about you! You are also working on a cat coloring book to give to Johanna for her birthday, but I haven't made time to help you print all the pages yet ha. This little paragraph got rambly fast ha..let me wrap this up!
Precious girl- I am so thankful for your life! I am so thankful that the Lord chose me to be your mama! I am so thankful that i got my blond haired, green eyed girl that looks like me! I am so thankful for your big heart and to get to be loved by you. I pray that I do right by you and above all teach you to love the Lord and honor him with your life. I pray that you will always know my unconditional love for you- that I will always be a safe place for you to land- and that I am always ready to hold you while you cry, pick you up when you fall down, or just to be a listening ear. And that I will always be your biggest cheerleader. I know you are going to go so far in life. Your generous kindness, creativity, and joy and zest for life are contagious and will serve you well. I pray for health over your life- that you get to be an old lady, maybe even a great-grandma! I pray for your relationships- that you and I will always be so close, that you and your siblings and dad will always be so close, that you will marry a Godly man who loves the Lord more than he loves you and that you will have a long and happy marriage, and that you will have children who bring you so much joy. Junie girl, I love you so much. Thank you for being my little friend, for making me laugh, and for forcing me to see beauty in parts of life I might otherwise overlook. Thank you for putting up with my bad days and for loving me always. Thank you for always forgiving and always wanting to snuggle. I pray your kindness and heart never change as you grow- stay sensitive and generous! You are perfect just the way you are. We talked last night about how God formed you in my womb and how God never makes mistakes. You are unique and perfect in your own way. You have a specific purpose over your life that the Lord planned out for you that no one else can do. And you are worthy of love always, simply because you are a child of God! Know that, dear girl, you are worthy! Ok blabbered on enough- love you baby. Happy birthday <3
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