June has been a month filled with both grief and celebration over the past 11 years. In June 2005 I saw two lines on a pregnancy test for the very first time in my life. At that point we had been trying to conceive for three years so to say I was very excited was to put it mildly. Sadly that pregnancy ended in early July because it was determined to be ectopic. My final pregnancy (in 2013) had a due date in June. I never held those little ones who would be 10 years old and 2 years old at this point, but thankfully, on June 24, 2008 I gave birth to Nadia Renee whose name means "hope reborn." Although I would rather if she had waited until closer to her due date (July 20) to arrive on the scene (and thus have avoided the NICU stay), June has become a month that we eagerly anticipate in this house because birthdays are VERY important to Nadia. I must admit the frequent discussion of the upcoming special day does stress me out a little because I get worried that I won't do enough to make it special, and it won't live up to my precious girl's expectations, but hopefully she will have a fabulous day today. I had longed to be a mom since I was a child myself, and although I was technically a mom since June 2005, I didn't really feel like I was a mom until 2008 when I was 36 years old. I will never take any of my children for granted. They are such precious gifts from the Lord. I am so thankful that He works through shots, egg retrievals, embryo transfers, etc. to bring little miracles into this world.
As I looked through the post I wrote last year about her, I realized that she hasn't changed as much between the ages of seven and eight as she did between six and seven (and every other year prior to that). If I had to pick the three biggest ways she's changed I would say they are: her height (she loves the fact that she is now over 48 inches tall because this means she can ride more rides and go down more water slides at amusement parks!), learning to write in cursive, and she really made huge strides with playing the piano. Otherwise I would say she's still....
*our friendly little social butterfly. Just this week an older woman at the swimming pool commented to me on how easy it was to have a conversation with Nadia (and they had just met). She is very excited that Grandma, Pop Pop, Olivia, Claire, and Grace (the last three are three girls from church who are also going into third grade this fall) are joining us at the swimming pool today.
*a very obedient and helpful child for which I am very grateful. She's not perfect by any means, but she is rather compliant. She rarely complains when I ask her to help me, and many times she volunteers to help. Sometimes I pay her a little money to "babysit" Oliver while I am doing something like mowing the lawn (I pay her about $1/hr).
*very brave. She will ride any ride that an amusement park says she is tall enough to ride. She doesn't show any fear when singing a solo or having a speaking part in a play, even when there are more than 800 people in the congregation. She is really looking forward to spending seven nights at Camp Susque this summer for the first time (she spent 3 nights at camp last year).
*enjoying a wide variety of activities. She wants to do just about every extracurricular activity out there! She enjoys being on a soccer and a basketball team, taking gymnastics, swimming lessons, ice skating lessons, tennis lessons, art camp, and horseback riding camp. She loves singing in the kids' choir at church, participating in musicals, going to VBS, etc. Every time I ask her if she wants to try some new activity or class, the answer is always "YES!". She loved playing the part of Pepper in Annie last summer and is looking forward to being in a production of A Little Mermaid, Jr. next month. She's also looking forward to taking diving lessons for the first time in August.
*enjoying her dolls. Although she plays with a variety of toys such as Legos, costumes, and the Wii, I would say her four favorites are Disney princess Barbie dolls, stuffed animals, Melissa and Doug magnetic dolls, and her Little House on the Prairie paper dolls. Although she still loves princesses, she has veered from her usual princess party theme and asked for a Minion birthday party this year.
I hope she has a super special day today. Yesterday we picked up the donuts for her breakfast this morning, and we bought the gallon of chocolate milk I get three times a year on Wednesday. Last night I put up some decorations and blew up some yellow Minion balloons. She was very happy to see them when she came home from VBS. During the closing program last night they sang Happy Birthday to Jack (whose birthday was yesterday) and Nadia, which was very sweet. I tried to pack her an extra special lunch (including string cheese I bought just for her birthday, which I almost never buy). I promised her that we would stop at Wendy's for chocolate frosties on the way home from art camp, and then we'll be swimming, eating pizza, and having a minion birthday cake at the pool. She'll have to wait until bed time to open her presents because Paul leaves for work long before any of the rest of us get up. He is going to come home 3 hours than earlier to meet us at the pool at 5pm. I did let her have the two books I got her for the Kindle this morning since I couldn't exactly wrap that. She said she's going to start one of them today! Hopefully she'll love all the gifts I got her! Words cannot describe how much I love this girl. She is an answer to the prayers of many!
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