Our little girl is three today! Thankful for birthdays today, which help me to reflect on the person being celebrated. As I reflect on the past three years of getting to know our daughter, I am full of thoughts, giggles and prayers. To sum Joanna up in a few words: expressive, emotional, unpredictable, cute as a button, creative and funny. By expressive, I mean that she is a word sponge who then strings together idioms and individual words in sometimes logical, sometimes amusingly illogical ways. At times you think you are talking to a seven year old, and then she'll say something that reminds you that she's just turned three. By unpredictable, I mean this: she can be full of joy or full of almost-rage, full of willingness or full of obstinance, totally out-going or completely unwilling to leave my side. Her unpredictable nature causes me to study her more closely and pray for her more frequently. And by funny...nearly every hour of Joanna wakefulness produces in us a giggle, a big smile or a laugh out loud.
Joanna loves the character June from "The Little Einsteins" DVDs we watch, so we had a June birthday in January. Ironically, it was an unusually warm day, which was perfect for the first ride of her new bike. Joanna has also assumed the identity of Marta from "The Sound of Music" (and Phoebe is Liesl), so my Mom made them both "curtain/drape clothes" and "traveling clothes". Please go watch the movie if you are not familiar with these terms. Soon, if possible! She also loves Belle. I look forward to the day when I actually let her watch the movie, so that she can see that Belle's character is also a lover of books and words!
Another theme in Joanna's life currently is the anticipation of Baby Brother's arrival. She received some "Big Sister" books, which she is really relating to. She will walk around with one of her dolls in her shirt, talk to the baby in my belly, and yesterday she and Phoebe even pretended to go to the hospital for her to deliver June. How their little minds process things!
Her cake...
The party people all seated around my
great aunt Mamie's table...
Opening presents...
Opening her Marta curtain dress...
Phoebe opening her Liesl dresses...
Marta Savage...
The girls giving a free "Sound of Music" concert for us...
Ready to ride!
Out for her first try...
Complete with June and chapstick in her basket...
Her Little Einstein's matching game...
A birthday package from Nonnie and Papa!
Winding down from all of the excitement with Belle...
Chocolate chip pancakes for her birthday breakfast!
One of her new "Big sister" books...auf Deutsch!
With Daddy at Chick-Fil-A!
Our outdoor photo shoot...
My favorite...
Of course Joanna's birthday has two very special people connected with it...her Deeda's birthday is the day before her's, and her Great Grandmother Cleola (my Grandma Tyo) had the same birthday as Jo. She would have been 92 today.
Enjoy the pictures! Happy Birthday, Jojo! Or Marta. May God use your emotions and love for words to bring Him much glory. We are really looking forward to how He wants to use these gifts to show His love to the world through you.
For Joanna's
1st and
2nd birthdays, click on the numbers. For Phoebe at 3, see
this post and
this one.
No comments:
Post a Comment