5th Birthday: the day

After just barely escaping the bluebonnet plague, we celebrated Josephine's actual birthday with some frozen yogurt.

Clement had strawberries and practiced his non-sippy cup form (disastrously).

Then we headed home to relive the cake and candle...

 ...open a couple gifts, and then face time with Sean's parents.

Happy 5th birthday to our delightful and sweet Josephine!

It's hard to believe we're in the final stretch before kindergarten-- she's getting to be a bona fide big kid!

Personally, I can't get over the idea of sending her for a full day of school every day, but I think once she's adjusted, she will love it, and I'm excited on her behalf.  Her creativity and intelligence continue to blossom, and she has quite the vivid imagination.  She'll love having these fed and developed full-time, I think, based off how she has responded to the bits of home education stuff I've done with her.

Socially, I expect things to go well.  From what I've seen, she relishes playing with other kids, but also breaks away happily to do her own thing, regardless of whether she can entice anyone else into it.

I'm constantly amazed at how well she plays with Clement.  She has great nurturing instincts, and I like watching these develop into skills of teaching, patience, responsibility, and attentiveness to others.  I even enjoy watching her figure out exactly where her big-sibling coercion meets his breaking point, despite the intervention it demands of me at times.
The entire sibling dynamic tickles me.  Their exchanges when they are supposed to be falling asleep at night or as they wait for the alarm to go off in the morning are pretty hilarious.  And for the most part, they play well during the day together, too.

Josephine still has an impeccable memory and observation skills that regularly floor us.  The details she can recall from one little time/place a year ago are impressive!
Her ability to soak in her surroundings sometimes translates into being easily overwhelmed, especially in unstructured, highly active, populated environments.  Being an easily saturated sponge, this can result in a spell of waterworks when everything she has absorbed gets wrung back out... But I think, on whole, that this sensitivity is a strength.  Just one that takes a little guarding and accommodating.

Anyway, we have kindergarten round-up next week!  I'm eager to hear about the schedule, evaluate the environment, and hopefully put to rest some of my nerves, prepare her mind, and stoke our excitement.

Turning 5 is BIG.  You can hear it in her voice when she answers strangers who inquire about her age. She makes me smile; I'm proud of her sense of self, her accomplishments, her strengths.  It's a total honor to watch different layers of her unfold.  With every week that passes she's deeper, smarter, quicker, more compassionate, more complicated.  It's lovely.
Kisses to my big kid!
 

5th Birthday: the party

So we celebrated Josephine's 5th birthday the weekend before the actual event.  For simplicity's sake, we kept it to family and a couple of her life-long friends.   It was a special day, enjoyed by all.

little girls in their party dresses absolutely slay me.

Per request, a chocolate cake with blueberry icing.
Done, My Lovely.

Hey!  Why's she getting all this new stuff?? Let me at it!

yeehaw.

Josephine consults her elders on the functioning of a gift.  

Meanwhile, Clement has found the batteries:

this is where the true power is, friends.  right here.  these little thingamabobs.

As all good parties should, this one ended decked out in a wedding gown, consumed by spontaneous crafting needs.

We are grateful to everyone who came down to help make the day special!! 

come hail or hot weather

Or both.  

From the Friday before Josephine's 5th birthday party:

cooling off after a warm afternoon outside.
dramatically.

The heat was broken by a storm.  It brought hail, some the size of golf balls, so Josephine ramped up her Easter egg hunting skills by collecting the big ones.  (hey, when life gives you lemons...)

 Just your typical grandmother-granddaughter bonding in central Texas...

sometimes I wonder...

Is it good parenting or bad parenting that drives a child to pray this much?

catch up from January

After watching our arborist friend, Tim Brosnan, work on our trees, Josephine began tying herself off as she did projects around the house.  (Projects like hammering on perfectly good walls while standing flat-footed on the hard floor, but hey, better safe than sorry.  Never know when a wall might stop being perfectly good or a floor might suddenly drop out from under you.)

My folks came to town with Janell for a weekend in January, as my aunt and uncle were visiting from Maryland, because their son was in Austin from Hawaii for a wedding in which both he and his wife were key participants... something like that... but the point is:  Grandparents.  Hooray for grandparents.  Always, always, always, hooray for grandparents!

Here, I'll be honest.  The following two pictures are only being posted because I love this sweater that Mama Jo found for Josephine in Scotland over Christmas.  Uberfuzzy pink hedgehogs.  I'm all for cuddly hedgehogs-- especially those on the tummy of my four year old! 

Clement and his hat.  He's got a knack for looking dapper, though he isn't the most gentlemanly about the manner in which he insists on wearing button-down shirts and such.  Maybe the external refinement will eventually seep inwards...

busy little fellow

I shouldn't complain about the flare ups, though, because the vast majority of the time he is incredibly studious for a one year old... persistent and adept with his fine motor undertakings.  A good attention span, no doubt aided by his slowness to walk.  Silver lining.