Livia officially turns nine on Tuesday, but we began the grand celebrations of All Things Liv today. It was hilarious to see her dressed in my robe and a birthday tiara, happily cleaning off the spatulas and cake beaters. (I’ll admit, it’s 5:00 in the evening and I, too, am sitting in that very robe because it’s so chilly out.) The cake was a work of art itself. It’s not terribly hard to make a rainbow cake, but not terribly easy either. It got admired properly though and, even more importantly, Livia declared the cake “her dream come true.” Doesn’t get better than that for a mom! We love our Liv incredibly much and are so proud of who God has made her to be. We pray for her heart to belong to him and for her to grow as a woman of courage and great character.

Happy 9th birthday, Toots! We sure love you.

A few friends have inquired why Livia chose to study yeast for her science experiment, because clearly most people don’t ponder the how’s and why’s of yeast. What’s worse is that “yeast” is typically followed by “infection” and that’s pretty gross to the average mind. No, Livia chose the topic based purely on the fact that she could use a balloon in her experiment. Yeast, when fed with sugar and kept warm and moist, produces carbon dioxide as a by-product. To test this fact, you can do what we did: add yeast and sugar to a bottle with a balloon placed over the bottle’s mouth, place bottle in a bowl of warm water, and 20 minutes later the balloon will be inflated. Cool!

In addition to the balloon experiment, our science experiment book gave instructions for bread-making. Again, you give the yeast the right conditions for growth (food, warmth and moisture—Livia could tell you all this) and it’ll produce carbon dioxide. The elastic dough traps the gas, which essentially creates little bubbles, which causes the dough to rise. Again, pretty cool! What gave me a bit of pause was the instructions for making the dough. They were very hands-on, as in, the child mixed and kneaded the ingredients entirely by hand. Perfect for Liv and pretty messy for the kitchen. Have I mentioned Livia likes to eat flour and puff out clouds like a dragon? Who wouldn’t really? Making bread is also a lengthy process. After the dough was kneaded it was left alone to rise. By the time we could make rolls with it, we were off to another activity and I placed the dough bowl in the refrigerator to be dealt with the next day. Perhaps this is why Livia told her first science fair judge, who asked how long the bread took to make, that she really didn’t know—her mommy did that part. The bread was a side experiment, not Livia’s main feature, and I bet our young judge wasn’t aware of the in’s and out’s of bread-making either.

In the end, despite the flour that dominated my kitchen for a brief time, I loved watching Livia in her element. Up to her elbows in ingredients, absorbing new concepts, sharing this learning with others. In the process of literally forcing her to write observations on her display board, I was reminded that for some kids, the experiment will always be the fun part and writing it down isn’t as interesting. Liv came home with a shiny red ribbon for her efforts though. And that’s something to be proud of.

(Title sung to Bill Nye’s theme music.)

Our school’s science fair is optional, but I long knew the experience would be a great one for Livia. She’s got a natural passion for science. I thought she’d create a presentation on animals and gently tried to nudge her towards learning more about how dogs sense of smell works, but nope. We opened an Usborne book on science experiments, she saw one that used a balloon and she was sold. So yeast it was! If you want to find out how yeast and a balloon work together, you’ll need to ask Livia. She can tell you more than you’d want to know about yeast now.

I wrestled with towing the line between walking Livia through this learning experience and doing too much of it for her. Clearly this optional science fair involves parental guidance and aid—everyone understands a second grader doesn’t know how to find resources or walk through the steps of the scientific method. There was a real balance to be found, and I think we did a good job in the end. As I looked around Livia’s school last night and observed the other students at work, I felt proud of all these parent and children working together to learn something more about science. What a cool thing! It inspired me to consider all the new ideas and experiments Livia and I can do together this summer. Now for the execution part…

One afternoon during the December Photo Project Livia grabbed my camera and disappeared for a time. I discovered the following Liv’s Classroom Photos series after downloading the files. I’m pretty tickled at how she set up a seat and a background for photographing her babies and I like to imagine her going back and forth, setting up pupils for their moment in front of the camera. After the babies are a few bonus images. Enjoy!

… when I looked through the front windows this morning. One bright cheerful face, happy her mom was watching. One inquisitive fur-face, wondering when he’ll be let back in. Here we are, Snow Day #2.

Livia and I both really enjoy making valentines together. I say this as an explanation because a lot of moms feel that they are somehow “less than” when they don’t enjoy activities like this. If you are one of those moms, take a deep breath, admire the things you do well (if you actually make dinner for your family on a regular basis you can feel superior to me already, I give you full permission), and don’t feel like I’m sharing my life in order to make you personally feel like a failure. So we like markers and glue and glitter at our house. That’s all.

One lesson of making valentines is to not wait until the night before the Valentine’s Day Party. Because the afternoon/evening before probably involves an appointment with the pediatrician and a child who really isn’t in the mood to write out her name and her classmates’ names on 27 cards. You might find yourself giving permission for skipping homework and counting this exercise as homework enough (not that I’d do that, this is purely hypothetical), and you will for sure find yourself in moments where you, the mother and non-class-participant, is still gluing and cutting while the actual class-participant is nowhere to be found.

The moral of the story is this: don’t wait until the night before the party.

Livia received tons and tons—27 perhaps?—of adorable little valentines from her classmates. She’s still polishing off suckers and pixie sticks. One valentine in particular charmed the socks off me, though. It was a simple construction paper heart absolutely plastered with girlie stickers like Tinker Bell and unicorns. On the other side of the blue heart were five little tic-tac-toe boards handwritten by a 2nd grader. You could feel the sweetness and generosity and creativity of one little girl oozing from this one piece of paper.

I think sometimes we make life too complicated for our kids when maybe all they need is a ream of construction paper and a few stickers.

“Achoo!” Livia sneezes.
“Bless you,” says the mom behind us on the walk to school.
“Oh, that was a fake one,” I counter. “But thank you anyway!”

Liv proceeds to explain, loudly, that her little brother, who is holding her hand, sneezed. In our world—the material one, that is—her left hand holds mine and her right hand dangles in the cold morning air. The mom and son part ways with us, no doubt questioning our sanity.

I wait on the sidewalk until Livia has passed her principal. This is my safety check—passing him surely means she won’t accidentally wander the wrong way and end up at a grocery store instead of her second grade classroom. Even after she’s passed the principal, she slows down while the other kids, more goal-oriented perhaps, are racing to their rooms.

Liv has a rich inner world one might say.

While the majority of children around her are pulling off coats and backpacks, Livia is meandering behind them, deep in imagination. Sometimes I wonder what it’s like to be in her mind. What is she thinking about? Are her pretend thoughts like the claymation or video bits done on Community? But way more innocent?

The snowman deal originated with me. Because I know my daughter and I know that while she may not be motivated to walk fast in order to get to people school, I do know that she will walk fast if we pretend we are snowmen on our way to snow school. Snow Mama and Snow Girl, to be exact. Apparently there was a Snow Brother in there I didn’t know about.

Pretending to be a Snow Mom for a four minute walk to school is easy stuff. I love that my kid is incredibly creative and hilarious and fun-loving. Sometimes I wonder when she’s going to mature, when she’s going to be more concerned with what her parents and teachers and classmates expect from her. But honestly, I don’t want her to grow up too quickly. Since when does an eight-year-old need to be overly concerned about pleasing others? There are a lot of issues in this world that Livia is not yet prepared for. Today I’m glad she’s eight and full of ideas and images and goodness knows what else exists in her imagination. I pray she can hang on to this gift of hers until adulthood in some sort of way. The world, the “real” one, will be a better place with her creative spirit in it.

Sometimes I look at my daughter and I’m amazed by what a beautiful little person she is. Her hair breaks free from it’s ponytail and curls around her face. Her eyes and hair are unique color combination and her cheeks are still flushed from playing outside in the snow.

This is my girl, this tall eight-year-old who laughs with reckless abandon and cries with an equal amount of passion. She awoke this morning, asked, “Do I have school today?” and went straight from bed to the frigid outdoors, not even stopping for a bowl of cereal.

This is my daughter. And I thank God for her.

“Sweet-cheeks” as Papa calls her, standing in the firelight, radiating love and warmth and joy.