Livia is becoming surprisingly efficient at applying face paint. I’m trying not to plan her future career based on the whims of Liv-at-five, but still. Wouldn’t it be cool if she worked in the movies someday? She could get her mom onto the set to watch the action. She might win an Oscar for makeup. You never know.

These are the ramblings of a tired woman on a Friday night. I can hear car doors slamming for a movie and game night next door (no, not there, a tired woman lives at that house too). I feel very unhip and old and boring at the moment. Blogging on a Friday night. BLOGGING. Oh well. Hope these shots entertain you on a Friday as well.

I present: The Many Faces of Livia.

Oooo. Scary.

And sweet.

Super silly.

And serious.

We went for a walk in the park. In knee-deep snowdrifts. Hip-deep for Liv. It took an hour to make a very small loop in which I could see my house the whole time. Still, in a desperate moment, I recalled the doomed flight that landed in the Andes Mountains. And I decided Liv and I would eat the dog first before making more, shall we say, difficult decisions. Fortunately I had my cell phone. Even more fortunately, my child chose to be brave when she felt like giving up.

This series is from the more light-hearted moments of our almost ill-fated journey. And even though I wanted so badly to catch a shot of a snowball in the air, I wanted even more badly to keep my camera dry and functioning. : )

Give my kid a coloring book and a brand new box of Crayolas and… nothing. Girlfriend does not like to color paper.

Give her a mirror and a brand new box of facepaints and… hello, Sweet Cheeks! (Papa calls her “Sweet Cheeks.”) Livia is all about physical art. She’ll pass on the 2-D, but anything with a bit of texture under her fingers excites her.

Part of the challenge of parenting—and I think this is universal—is figuring out your child’s unique, God-given personality. What makes her tick? What excites her, frustrates her, encourages her, pleases her? I could sit and color for hours on end, even as an adult, but when I press my child to do it, it’s a challenging endeavor for both of us. I want Livia to glorify God in all things. I want her to be the very best Livia Tredway she can be. I want her to grow up knowing that I am proud of her, that I enjoy her, that I will stand behind her and encourage her—even if she’s pursuing activities that I have very little natural interest in.

For today, though, Liv is into face paint. And that’s something I can get into.

It’s been a heck of a day with my five year old. Personal apologies go out to the patrons of the Coffee House this evening who were witnesses to, first, the screaming fit of my child, then second, the lugging of the aforementioned child’s body out the door by one p’oed mama.

Apologies also to anyone in the downtown parking garage who may or may not have heard me say something like, “If you don’t start walking now, I will leave you behind.” I wouldn’t have done that, I promise. But only because they, too, wouldn’t have known what to do with a 5 year old tantrum-thrower either. Kidding. I’d never leave her behind and darn it, I shouldn’t have said something like that. Argh.

We get home—finally!—and the behavior improves only marginally. She sits on the antique coffeetable, feeds the dog her prime rib dinner and tells me more than once, “No way, Jose.”

Many time-outs, scoldings, and toy removals later, and it’s bedtime. At one time during the bedtime routine, I have to walk away in order to gather my wits and not lose control of myself. Upon returning to her room, she sees that I am nearly crying in exhaustion and sadness and thus commences a conversation about the softness of one’s heart. She is sensitive. She is sad that mommy is so sad.

She tells me that the top parts of her heart (I imagine she’s envisioning a literal heart shape) are soft, but that the bottom grew hard and broke off. It fell off somewhere inside her, but Jesus went in through her nose, took some snot and put her heart back together. With snot. Then wiped the snot off after her heart was repaired. Problem solved. The whole heart is soft now.

That’s not all.

After I pray my somewhat brief bedtime prayer, I hear this:

Dear God, thank you for sending Jesus to go up my nose and fix my heart with snot. Amen.

Now my daughter is asleep. My heart is soft. And I’m still not sure whether I need a stiff drink, a bunch of kleenexes for a hardy cry, or just a good night’s rest. I, too, thank God for sending Jesus to redeem my heart from hardness. I need Him, moment by moment, to fix my brokenness.

Five going on fifteen.

Liv’s groovin’ to those rad Jesus Sunday School tunes, with fingers in her mouth, during breakfast on December 14.

DPP Reject #3. Category: Makes Her Mama Smile.

We were done with prayer time. We had been through several songs and I had perhaps one more tune before departing her bedside when she made a peep. I was one breath away from issuing the line in my sternest Mommy voice, “No more talking. It’s time to go to sleep,” when I heard this from my daughter:

Dear Jesus, thank you for the tent. It’s beautiful. Amen.

The tent is a frothy princess mosquito net device that we hung in Liv’s room today. It came all the way from the Free Store at seminary (where Jeremy and I used to shop in our basement after he had locked up the campus) via Brook who brought it to the Welsteads’ white elephant party last weekend. I was the only one in the room who even wanted the thing. And I’ll admit Brook told me, this is verbatim, that Liv would pee herself with excitement at this particular gift. So I picked it up, put it in the backseat of the car, and Livia found it today.

Brook was right. My kiddo LOVES it so much it merited an extra shout out to Jesus tonight at bedtime.

My heart is full.

Pajamas, check. Advent display to rearrange, check. Lollipop, check. Bandaid deliberately yet mysteriously placed on forehead, check.

On Monday, Livia wanted to bake gingerbread men. We didn’t do it.

On Tuesday, Livia wanted to bake gingerbread men. Knowing she wouldn’t like the spicy cookies, we convinced her we’d make sugar cookies in little gingerbread men shapes. But still, we didn’t do it.

On Wednesday—that would be today—Livia wanted to bake sugar cookie gingerbread men, but got distracted by Bolt on Netflix online. I pulled out the ingredients, took a few photos for the December Photo Project, actually made the dough, and that was it.

Will all Livia’s cookie wishes be fulfilled on Thursday? Stay tuned. It doesn’t get more exciting than this, folks.

**You are very welcome to join the DPP at any point! We’ll continue updating our participants list through the weekend.

Our children’s zoo opens it’s doors for two weekends in the winter. I never want to go because, let’s face it, who likes to walk around in the winter winds of Nebraska when you don’t have to? But Thanksgiving weekend here was amazing weather-wise, so off we went. I like this shot of Livia and my niece Madeleine because they were entirely engrossed in a completely empty turtle exhibit. Muddy leaves were all that covered the concrete basin, but they found it quite interesting. We had a fun afternoon together, complete with vanilla ice cream cones and a walk with Shiloh through the park. The girls were really sweet to one another—not one squabble over a toy. Praise God for cousins!

It’s the last day of November, peeps. Stretch those fingers, squint those eyes, do a few laps around the yard to wake up your brain in preparation for the December Photo Project! Twenty-five days straight of photography fun in one of the most beautiful seasons of the year. Our list of participants is growing and I get more excited each time someone signs up. Grab a badge and join the challenge of the 2009 DPP!

What are you doing for fun??