Maddie

Dear Maddie,

*Thank you for being such a great sister to your two younger brothers.  I love what pride you take in helping Eli take baths and get dressed.  I love how you will sit and read stories to Robby at bedtime while I put Eli to bed.  He snuggles right up to you with a look of contentment as you bring the stories alive with your animated voice.
*Thank you for being so confident in yourself, I love how you can proudly proclaim "I pretty much look like the cutest thing ever today".  I actually envy the way you think you are such a good artist, gymnast, bug-catcher, princess, or whatever else you come up with. I sincerely hope you continue to carry yourself with such high esteem as you grow older.

*Thank you for helping me make dinner tonight.  You kept asking me "is there anything else I can do?", which filled me with love to see how much you enjoyed helping out.  You take such pride in cooking and always quick to point out "wow, we made this food ALL by ourselves!"

*Thank you for snuggling up with me tonight during our "kid movie night".  I so enjoy your cuddle sessions you have with me.  I especially love when you ask me to snuggle with you at bedtime.  Sometimes I fall asleep and wake up several hours later with you tucked right against my body= LOVE IT.  You also give the greatest morning hugs right when you wake up and are quick to point out how well you slept.

*Thank you for always wanting to learn and grow.  I love how inquisitive you are and your love for learning.  You are always excited to tell me what you learned at school and are very good at getting your homework done.  I love being able to teach you about your body, emotions, and spiritual topics.  You are very good about listening and asking thoughtful questions.

*Thank you for still having an innocence about you!  I was so worried that now you are in 1st grade certain aspects of childhood would be taken from you.  I am happy so say that this has not happened yet.  We haven't had to deal with the Santa Claus/tooth fairy/etc issues or any "naughty" language problems.  Please continue to have that aura of innocence, Mom is not up to the challenge to delve into these subjects.

*Thank you for your kindness with other children around you.  There are many kids in our neighborhood right now that are much younger than you.  You are always willing to play with them and treat them kindly.  I never hear you tell one of them they are too young to play with you. I love how you will play princess with Natalia (our 2 yr old neighbor girl) and then go hunting for bugs with Damon (6yr old boy) in the same day and never think twice.

*Thank you for being a great helper with the laundry.  I love how carefully you sort your pajamas with their matching piece and then fold and put them away.  You will always ask me if you cannot remember which goes with which.  Even if you grumble about doing this chore, by the time you have finished your clothes you always ask if you can fold and put away your brothers as well.  Someday you will understand what a huge help this is for your Mommy.

*Thank you for being such a great reader.  I love how you proudly announce you finished another chapter book.  I think that this fall you have read a new chapter book nearly every other day.  It just blows my mind how quickly you picked up reading.  Last year at this time you had barely learning 50 sight words and now you are reading book after book.  Many days you will lay on your bed and spend at least an hour of the day reading about Fancy Nancy, Junie B. Jones, Spiderwick Chronicles or any other book you can get your hands on.  I also love how attentive you are to the fact that Junie B. Jones "sometimes forgets to use nice words". You will bring me the book and point out the No-No words and we quickly scribble it out and substitute a more appropriate word.  {relax, nothing too naughty,  mainly just 'dumb' and 'stupid'}

*Thank you for all the drawings and notes you give to me.  I love how you will spend an entire afternoon making your own "My Friend Frog" book.  You write the best notes about how you love our forever family, about shopping with Daddy, and even being scared for Halloween.  The other part that is so amazing, is how particular you are about spelling the words correctly.  Once you learn how to spell something, you rarely forget and consequently you have a pretty amazing list of words that you know how to spell correctly.  Some of your best notes to date include:

"Me and Dad are going shopping with my brothers.  I am going to Walmart.  I'm going to buy some ice cream and buy some Apple siter (cider). The end"  {complete with a picture of the four of them)

"Get tape off before you open it. From Maddie. For Mom and Dad" {outside of a taped note}
"Dear Mom and Dad. I think I'm scared of Halloween and you know before I wasn't but now I'm scared of it.  From Maddie. For Parents Tiffany and Jesse. Love Maddie" {inside of taped note}

---Maddie had the funniest paper that for the life of me, I cannot find.  It was about her friend Damon.  It went something like this "Me and Damon are best friends and I love him.  I know that he loves me too.  Someday Damon and I will be married.  I will be his wife.  He will be my husband.  We will be married and have a family together. The end."  Maddie makes so many stories, that most of the time I throw them away with hardly a glance.  I was going through a spiral notebook and ripping out all of the used pages.  For some reason I glanced down and started reading this note.  I got a good laugh when I read it.  I ripped it out and took it over to my friend Michelle's house the next day so she could read it as well (Damon is her son).  I meant to take a picture of it and now cannot figure out where it might be sitting.

*Thank you for your childlike Faith.  I love how reverent you are in Sacrament meeting at church.  You love to look through the hymn book and have even gotten good at following along and singing during the hymns. One of your favorite songs we sing in church is "Praise to the Man", you also like "We Thank Thee O God for a Prophet".  I also like the notes you write during church.  A few Sundays ago, during someones talk you wrote this: "Going to church is when we Learn about Jesus and when I go to church I feel good inside and someday I want to return with him and I no {know} the church is true in the name of Jesus Christ Amen."  I love to see how easy it is for you to believe in the goodness of God and that Jesus Christ atoned for our sins.  Although I know that someday you will have to stand alone and gain your own personal testimony, I love the childlike hope that you possess.

*Thank you for your good heart.  Today while watching the movie "A Little Princess" you touched me in several ways.  First off, you really truly cried when Sarah finds out her Father has died at war.  You couldn't believe how sad it was that Sarah no longer had a Mommy or Daddy.  You then cried again when Miss Minchin (sp) accused Sarah of stealing and called the police.  You were so upset that someone would be so mean to a little girl.  I could hardly console you until she finally found out that her Dad was alive and she was safe from Miss Minchin at last.  I was particularly shocked by how upset this movie made you, because you have never reacted to a movie so intensely.  I was glad there was a happy ending to nail onto it.  Although I don't particularly suggest upsetting your child like this, we had a pretty in depth discussion afterwards about the movie.  We discussed how blessed we are to have a Mommy and Daddy at our house, food always in our cupboards and on the table at meals, warm clothes as it's getting colder, and love in our home.  We also discussed how important it is to share with other less fortunate than us.  One thing Maddie asked me was "if I keep feeling crabby and sassy, will I act like mean Miss Minchin when I get older?"  I had to smile a little and then quickly reassured her that my job is to help her learn how to grow and be a kind person.  I also told her that she is a very nice girl and would never turn out like that.

*More than anything else, thank you for loving me unconditionally Miss Maddie, even when I probably don't always deserve it.  I feel so blessed to have you continually willing to forgive me of my wrongdoings and accept my weaknesses.  I am so glad that you were chosen to come to our home and I feel blessed to be able to be your Mother.  You know just when to boost up my confidence by telling me how pretty my shoes are, or how nice I did my makeup or thanking me for cleaning up your room, etc.  You also allow me to stumble and fall as I parent you and still look at me like I'm the smartest person in the world.

xoxo,
Mom