6 1/2 Years Old!

Today is Nadia's half birthday! She gets to celebrate it with eleven of her cousins! My sweet girl is continuing to grow up a little more each day right before my eyes. I am SO glad that she is here with me during the day and not at school. What a blessing to have more time with her during these fleeting years before she flaps her wings and leaves the nest. I have noticed that she is becoming more independent. For example, she recently started making her own oatmeal for breakfast. This is not an easy task because it takes great ingenuity on her part for her to reach a bowl in our cabinet. She also is becoming more and more of a help to me. For example, she sometimes takes the initiative to buckle Oliver into his carseat for me. What a sweetheart! She is getting better at using a vacuum, but she still has room to grow before I'd say she's mastered that skill.

She wears size 6 pants, size 7 skirts (presuming the skirts have adjustable waistbands that I can tighten to the max otherwise the skirt won't stay up), size 6 tops (she does wear some size 7 ones but generally the sleeves are a little too long in size 7), size 12.5 shoes, and mostly size 7 when it comes to dresses.

 In terms of schoolwork, right now she is more than half way through the fourth grade reading textbook. It took that long to finally hit a section that was a little bit difficult for her so our pace has slowed down a lot recently in that subject. She's on lesson three of her third grade spelling book, is almost done with the second grade handwriting book, and is in the third chapter of her second grade math book. In the last several weeks she really has gotten back into listening to books on CD in her bedroom that I check out from the library. She's listened to quite a few including the Magician's Nephew, several Flat Stanley books, Charlie and the Glass Elevator, The Best Christmas Pageant Ever, etc. She finished her second Sparks book and is in the process of going back through the book a second time. Recently she learned all the books of the Old Testament for Sparks. She also learned how to tie her own shoes this fall! Four months ago she was promoted to Level 2 at gymnastics and U8 for soccer. Over the past couple of months she lost three more teeth. Yvonne pulled #5 yesterday! Altogether she has lost four teeth on the bottom (all four permanent teeth have already come in) and one tooth on the top (that permanent tooth hasn't come down yet).

Here are some of a few of her current favorite things:

Breakfast - Raisin Bran Crunch cereal, Cinnamon Toast Crunch cereal, or apple and cinnamon oatmeal

Lunch - ham and cheese hot pocket, egg salad sandwich, and tuna noodle casserole

Fruits and veggies - baby carrots with ranch dressing, grapes, corn on the cob, and cuties

TV show - Sofia the First

Movie - Frozen (she said the t-shirt pictured at left here was her favorite gift that she got from us on Sunday)

Dinner - pizza, scrambled eggs, chocolate chip pancakes, spaghetti, tuna noodle casserole, pulled pork, hot dogs, hamburgers, pierogies, macaroni and cheese, chicken nuggets, french fries, fish sticks, stuffed shells, lasagna, cornbread, biscuits with apple butter

Snacks/Desserts - I can't really think of a dessert that this child doesn't like. She definitely has a sweet tooth! Some of her favorites though would include brownies, chocolate chip cookies, pretzels, cookies and cream ice cream, chocolate chip cookie dough ice cream, chocolate pudding, chips, popcorn, and candy.

Books - She really loves the Imagination Station books. She can read them independently, and she also likes it when I read them aloud. 

Toys - Anna and Elsa dolls, Legos, Etch a sketch, etc.

Clothes - Her favorite pajamas would definitely be a penguin nightgown. She still loves getting dressed up for church on Sundays, but during the week she has actually switched to wearing pants for the first time. In the past she would hardly ever wear jeans to the point that I stopped buying them for her. I actually went and bought her a pair of jeans recently, and she definitely likes wearing them for the first time in her life. As you can see above, she LOVES her new slippers we gave her for Christmas. She was wearing them ALL the time until we left for Maryland. She even wanted to wear them in bed, ha ha!