Emma is NINE!!

 Emma is nine years old! This girl is a gift to us every day. She hit a big growth spurt this year and has also developed her strengths and skills, which are apparent when she does gymnastics, climbs trees, and tries new things. She's creative and makes up great stories and songs. Her artwork and attention to detail is fantastic, and she spends lots of time drawing intricate scenes on paper or a white board. She's crazy about lists and writes down her thoughts and ideas in a very organized list format. She loves to read - I'll come home with huge stack of books from the library, and she'll blaze through them in a couple of days. Some of her favorite books this year were "The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe," and "Black Beauty."  She also loves watching TV - especially funny shows. She's got a great sense of humor and is always making us laugh.

We love our beautiful Emma with all our hearts, and we pray that God will grow her closer to him this year.

This is such a classic example of Emma's creativeness and organization, I had to share. Right after Dan and I voted in Virginia's gubernatorial election, Emma created a voter's booth like the one she saw us use. 

We were voting on the "cutest animal" in her room.

We checked in at her table and had to sign our name to prove our identity.  Then we were given a pencil and ballot.

The ballot

She even labeled each animal for us. I'm not sure how you could vote wrong in this case!

Emma did several projects for school this year. This was her diorama for her biome book report on the Savannah. 

She got a first-place ribbon for her killer whale in art class!

She's such an animal lover, and regularly checks out books with facts about animals. Her favorites to read about are dogs, cats, and horses, but she enjoys most books about animals - even bugs! (ewww)

She's attended classmates' birthday parties, where she ice skated and went bowling. They had "walkers" to help the beginner skaters. I wish they had them in my size!

It was Emma's first time bowling at her friend's birthday party, and she was a rock star!

When we're out anywhere, she's always looking for something to climb. You'll usually find her at the tops of trees, rocks, statues, and playground climbing structures.

She's a terrific big sister to Hallie. She's listening to Hallie read to her and helping her with any words she doesn't know.

She keeps us laughing with her funny expressions and silly stories and jokes. She decided to use this balloon as a "tail" at her birthday party, and had the whole family giggling.  She recently made up a trivia game for our family to play and there were "penalty cards" we had to draw if we guessed incorrectly (she handmade all the cards, of course). Penalties for wrong answers included things like barking like a dog, doing pushups, and sitting on the toilet backwards. (I don't know where that idea came from!)

It's been a joy to watch this pretty girl grow and develop this year! We love you with all our hearts, Emma!