The Heathen Housewife

I can’t believe my Julie is five years old today. But it’s true. These last five years have been some of the hardest but definitely the most rewarding of my life. Some days I look at her and still see the baby in her – when she comes and sits in my lap and lets me read a book to her, or when she hops out of the tub and lets me wrap her in a froggy towel and my big bear hug. Other days, she seems so grown up with her own little life, teasing me with scant details of her day at pre-school. “I’ll tell you about it after dinner, Mama.”

This year has been such a dramatic one for us – I think I have learned to accept and appreciate her unique little personality – so much like my own, I’m afraid – so that we are more relaxed together and have more happy days. I think she has grown not just in height – although she is definitely sprouting up at an amazing pace – but in emotional maturity. She sometimes actually volunteers to help her sister, or to share a toy (definitely not always). She has learned to introduce herself to strangers and reach out to new friends. She is much more likely to try something new and find that she can enjoy it even if it is different from what she knows.

I’m not sure why Julie requested carrot cake for her birthday, but I went ahead and made it for her. I did cupcakes so that we could have some tonight for her birthday, and take the rest to her party tomorrow, along with the chocolate ones with pink frosting that I baked up after bedtime. I’m sure not all in the pre-school set can be happy with chunky orange treats.

Julie oh-so-wanted to help peel the carrots. So I let her, and to my somewhat surprise she did a pretty good job of it, never mind the shavings all over the kitchen walls and floors. We had fun baking the cake together.

I let Julie pick the restaurant for dinner out with Grandma and Grandpa, and Auntie Krista (Joe’s cousin) who is in town from New York to perform at a concert this weekend. She chose Yum!, which has been one of our favorites lately – the girls love the macaroni and cheese, and we all love their handcut french fries.

Nobody had to ask her how old she was today, she was volunteering the information from the moment she woke up this morning.

Both of the girls were in fantastic moods this evening. Sophie had a bit of a hard time this morning after Julie opened her presents, because she didn’t understand where hers were. But overall, it was a fine day.

The in-laws had to drive Krista off for a rehearsal, so it was just the four of us at home with the cupcakes and the candles.

Happy Birthday, little love. Sweet dreams and sleep well – tomorrow is the big party with the friends.

Oh, and a little funny – when it comes to party planning in our house, it is my job to decide the time and place, to book the venue and pick out the food. I bake the cake(s), buy the juice boxes, pick out the party favors and write out the invitations. Joe? His job is apparently to burn CDs for all of his friends that are coming with their kids. That’s okay. We each do what we’re good at.

This entry was posted on Saturday, September 13th, 2008 at 2:59 am and is filed under Uncategorized. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.