my baby

In a mint-green taffeta dress and a tiara in her hair, dear Keona glowed from the moment she opened her eyes to celebrate her 6th birthday yesterday.

She's been counting down since January 1st...her birthday year, her birthday month, and finally, the big day.

After church she prepared to receive her friends for the party. She greeted each one with a big hug and immediately swooped up their gifts--presents are my dear daughter's love language.

I learned a bit during the party...(1) I should never open one of those port-a-party small businesses, (2) structured games (which didn't happen, please see #1) help kids keep playing as a group instead of two here, three there, one alone by themselves, (3) Keona's gift of influence is extraordinary, and it comes with responsibility.

She's still my little girl, but she's growing up fast. Keona decided years ago that she was going to build a house next to our house: "You'll have to cut a hole in this house and we'll make a hall to my house! Then we'll always be together and you can help me with my children and I can do your hair."

We dream about it together, make plans for her rainbow-colored home, her barn and horses, the 11 children (6 girls and 5 boys) that she plans to adopt, and we talk about how wonderful it will be to play together forever...

Forever...

streamers on birthdays

One of our birthday traditions is to tape streamers all across the birthday girl or boy's room so that when they wake up they have to "burst through" to their new year amidst cheers and round of "Happy Birthday."

Louie's birthday was December 28th and the night before Bear and I were talking about whether or not he might be too young to "streamer" his doorway. "Would he know what to do?" I asked. Bear thought we should find out. So in the morning, Bear went into Louie's room to change his diaper while Jonathan, Keona, and I taped streamers across his door.

Louie's face lit up like the sun! With a running start he burst through the door giggling his fabulous laugh. And then what happened next was a revealing picture of how wonderfully different each of our three children are.

When Jonathan bursts through the streamers on his birthdays, he leaves the streamers dangling in the breeze.

When Keona bursts through the streamers on her birthdays, she excitedly twirls all the streamers into a ball and declares with tears that she will keep her birthday streamers for the rest of her life.

When Louie burst through the door this year, he first relished all the singing, and then quietly picked up each streamer, crunched them into small balls...and put them into the trash can!