The New England Toronto Clan: Maddie is SIX years old

September 10, 2011

Maddie is SIX years old

It finally happened....I officially have a SIX year old. Maddie thinks it is incredibly cool and completely normal to now be six and somehow I still can't wrap my mind around it all. So many thoughts swirl through my head. I remember her at 2 weeks old with eyes wide open refusing to sleep at 1am, at 9 months old and already walking around the house with a huge grin on her face, 15 months old and climbing counters to get to the bowl of Christmas candy while I innocently slept in the bedroom down the hall {to my credit I was 9 months pregnant with R}, at 22 months and in the ER in Hawaii with croup after suddenly developing a scary cough, at 2 years old and changing clothes every 2 minutes and crying big alligator tears when I had to leave her in nursery at church, at 3 years old and so excited to be a big sister again to another brother, at 3.5 years old and so excited to finally be going to Miss Tanya's preschool with all of her playgroup buddies, at 4 years old always planning the next play date with friends and sitting on the couch next to our front window watching for when Abby got home from school, and at 5 years old starting kindergarten and as sassy as can be about me walking with her to her classroom. Oh how the time flies....I wish I could just bottle her up right now and preserve this age. It is such a precious, innocent age where fantasy still exists, life is full of endless possibilities and life almost seems magical. I love hearing all of her latest adventures out catching butterflies, caterpillars, frogs, toads, and other bugs. I love how she is very grounded and understands real life from fairy tale, but at the same instant carries this "anything is possible" attitude. It is truly refreshing at times. I also love how she thinks of rules in a very black and white frame of mind. She will accept my simple explanations and completely accept them right then and there. I know this will change soon :) I love how she wants to be so grown up and independent, but still needs me to love her and reassure her. I love some things she owns as her own responsibility {baths, dressing, brushing teeth} but completely leans on me for assistance with other things {packing lunch, doing her hair}.

Due to moving so close to Maddie's birthday, we elected to do a rather small celebration this year {off year} and had decided next year will be her bigger friend party. On her actual birthday, the boys and I brought balloons and doughnuts to the school at the very end of the day. Maddie's eyes lit up as she saw us walk in the room and she ran over at full speed yelling "Mommy!" I don't think I could ever get tired of that :)

After school, we went to our favorite berry picking farm, "Riverview", and spent a few hours picking raspberries, blueberries and a bag of apples. For dinner we stopped at Pizza Hut and had some yummy cheese pizza per Miss M's request. We opened a few presents on her real birthday and then she decided to open the rest at her small party the next day (Saturday).

On Saturday we had a few families in our neighborhood over for a barbeque lunch. Our menu included:

Teriyaki Bacon wrapped chicken and pineapple kabobs on the grill

Corn on the Cob

Barbeque Baked Beans

Fresh Fruit

Capri Suns

Veggie Tray

After eating, the kids decorated cupcakes with all sorts of yummy frosting courtesy of Maren and then we opened presents. It was a super easy and relaxing party this year. Maddie thoroughly enjoyed the two day celebration, other than her special mylar birthday balloon accidentally escaping into the heavens above {she seriously sobbed about this for about 5 minutes}.