Good Gifts

My girl is eight-years-old.  Eight.  Somehow I don't really have a category for all of these years that have passed in my life now.  Eight years sounds like a long time, and it is.  When I'm parenting Ella I look at her, and this is the face I see.

It's kind of like that scene in Father of the Bride where the daughter comes home and tells her dad she's getting married, and all he can see is a little girl in pigtails delivering such startling news.  I suspect every parent does this? 

But when I'm tempted to parent her from the perspective that she's 6 months old, I remember that she's not 6 months old anymore.  I "marked the moments" of every single one of those days, treasured them in my heart even through the misery of sleepless nights, and there was so much joy.  And today is really joyful, too.  I want to parent her and love her as the 8-year-old she is today.  She's a fantastic 8-year-old.

She has partied hard for several days now, starting her birthday celebrations early with a visit to B.P. and Debbo's last Thursday.  All weekend she's had lots of playtime with friends, swimming, a visit to the McWane Center, and her very own cake made by Debbo.

We're having a joint birthday party with cousin Claire in a couple of weeks so yesterday was pretty relaxing, and I let Ella pick out what she wanted to do.  She had a birthday breakfast date with KJ, picked up an American Girl movie at the Redbox, then picked out treats to take to T's house for the afternoon.  She then got to go shopping with T and Claire.  She had a really good day.  

We cut it down to the wire ordering her birthday gift; FedEx delivered it yesterday morning.  She was thrilled, saying last night that it was her birthday wish, and she hadn't been sure it would happen.  It made my heart happy to give her something that made her heart so happy, and I got a little teary putting her to bed last night thinking that if we "who are evil, know how to give good gifts to your children, how much more will your Father who is in heaven give good things to those who ask him!"  He is so good to us.

I keep watching Ella's birthday video over and over because there's nothing like going through a year's worth of memories and putting them to music that make you say with Clarence, "George Bailey, you really had a wonderful life."

  8 Years of Eleanor Lynn from KJ Pugh on Vimeo.