Jane

Eight months without blogging! To think of the memories that have faded away for ever, never recorded is too much for me to bear! Hank, the sweetest one year old ever.  Jack, the jokester and teaser and early morning hugger.  I MUST remember! But what has finally forced me to crack open this old, slow laptop is six and half year old Jane.  I just have to remember her as she was this year.  She has stolen my heart in a big way.

She carries a lot of emotion in her tiny, long, lanky body.  She is becoming quite a thinker.  It is so fun to see who she is becoming.

She is a nature lover and a budding activist.  When we passed a factory with a big smoke stack we talked a bit about pollution.  She was fascinated and had a million questions.  She came up with excellent questions like, "Why don't they find a way to make those products that doesn't use as much pollution?"  Or, "If the companies could find a way to make money without hurting the earth why wouldn't they?"  After all of her questions were answered she said, "I'm realizing it's a lot harder to fight for good than I originally thought."

She loves animal shows.  PBS Wild Kratts is a hit but she's also branched out to Jeff Corwin.  She told me all about her plans to have her own nature show and exactly how she wanted the DVD cover to look.  It included her having captured a snake right behind it's jaws like Jeff Corwin does, and the snakes mouth would be open right to the front and she would be in the background looking to the side.

Here she is as Jane, the amazing scientist.

We went out to see the movie Epic at the dollar theater.  It's about tiny nature people and good triumphing over evil.  She loved it of course.  After we got home I couldn't find her for awhile.  Eventually I found her in her room laying on her bed with her arms behind her head staring at the ceiling.  She told me she was just thinking about the movie.

She always talks about saving the world.  Her plans are to live with her best friend Abby and save the world by picking up trash and planting trees.  For now she'd like to start a club with her other friends that want to save the world.  She says that if she could just teach people about how they shouldn't litter or cut down trees that they would stop.  A trip to the park usually includes a few proud moments of litter pick up.

When I asked her what she wanted for her birthday she said she wants to plant a hundred redwood trees in California to help the redwood forests.  I believe she heard they were endangered.  I have no idea.

Jane is starting to take her thinking skills to church.  She comes up with good questions and I love that she is actually thinking about things.  We read a devotional thought about being happy with what we have.  Afterwards she said, "I don't even know if I believe that.  There are kids who don't have any food to eat or even a house, and we're supposed to be happy about that?"

She told me she likes to think about God in nature but that at church, "everyone is always talking and I can never just sit and think about God and Jesus and love."  Here she is thinking about theology.

She's always waxing poetic about love.  I find little notes around like, "The gift I want to give my friends is love. It is a gift that will never end."

When she found out our fourth (and final) baby was another brother I saw a moment of sadness cross her face.  She fought it off, as her Grandma and Grandpa Griner were there, but we talked about it later. She was sad not to have someone to do makeovers with, etc.  We decided that we would do a lot of girl things together and that I would set aside more time to do those things with her.  After a bit she decided that it was very special to be the only girl.  A week or so later she told me, "I'm glad I'm not having a sister.  I might get distracted playing with her that I forget to teach my brothers how to love."  I mean, seriously?  I just LOVE her.

She was asked to give a talk at church for her children's group.  She wanted to write it all by herself.  It went like this: "God sent us in families so that we can learn to think about other people and learn to be nice.  In my family I only have brothers and no sisters and sometimes I get bored but I still know my brothers can play with me.  In our family we take turns choosing places to go on Fridays.  When we get together on Fridays I feel really happy and close to my family.  Families are one of the most special things that God has sent to earth.  I love my family and when I hear beautiful songs it makes me think about them."  Nailed it. :)

She still loves ducky fiercely.  She still worries about how she might not want or love ducky anymore when she grows up.  But the most recent cry-fest was about how she wouldn't have ducky in heaven.  How could she live forever without ducky?  It was tragic and the tears lasted forever.

The night before Valentine's day this year she came out of her room late at night and was very excited to tell me, "Mom, I have the best idea.  I have to think about it all night so I won't forget.  I'm going to make tomorrow the best Valentine's Day ever.  Like, if Jack wants a toy that I want I'll give it to him.  And I'll be really good when you ask me to do something. Because Valentine's Day is about love."

But what makes me most proud of Jane are things like when at a soccer game a teammate said that a girl on the other team was fat.  Jane spoke up and said, "You shouldn't say that."  First, to recognize that she shouldn't say that, then to have the courage to say something?  Be still my heart.  I told her that I was more proud of that moment than if she had scored a hundred goals.  During kindergarten she told me about how, at school, two girls had told another girl that they didn't like her hair.  She said, "I told the girl that I liked her hair, even though I didn't."

And starting first grade: