Lily's Night Out

Lily is getting to be so much more muchier. She helps more, she talks more, she does more. Everything is so much more.

Every week she and I take an art class together. This one on one time has been great for us, so much so that we decided that one other night each week we should take a walk together or take the boat out at dusk. We have had lovely talks. This week she asked if I could help her create a vlog for her to narrate and demonstrate certain tasks for other kids. She wants to start with how to tie a hook on a line, choose a worm, and fish for catfish. Cool idea, eh? Look for that soon.

With responsibility comes privilege and slowly we are figuring this part out too.

I am so glad I get to spend my days with her. She is such a neat kid with big ideas and dreams and imagination! At art class we were asked to make dessert sculptures. Everyone made cupcakes, pies, cake slices, cookies......Lily made a bowl of pudding and added snails to it. That's my girl.

She's always thinking and doing her own thing. She's got that spark and does not see the need to conform to what the other kids at the table are doing. How do I preserve and protect that gift? Nurture it? That question keeps me up at night.

She also asked to take over washing lunch dishes. Yes! Score! However, she'll only do them on her terms. She has to sit on the counter and she wants to use the sink full of soapy water method, not the always running hot water method I use. She says that I am wasting water. True.

Lily is a complicated girl though, she feels so much more love and passion and so much more anger when she's mad. She is a five alarm fire, like this song goes.

Soon she will be nine. I have had her in my heart nearly all my life. She is my dream come true, my prayers answered. Lily is the child that taught me to be a mother and continues to teach me everyday.

I look forward to celebrating nine with her, baking her a peach pie and making soup for dinner. I look forward to reading books, making art, and singing loudly in the car. This year she wants to learn cartography and navigation. Easy enough!

 I still have not figured out the special gift from mama that I give her every year. Suggestions welcome!