Nan is EIGHT

 

Dear Nan, 

Your GOLDEN birthday is upon us and it seems appropriate as you are the most golden of all children right now—you sparkle and shine wherever you go.  You are light and joy, humor and heart. 

 

You’ve grown a lot this year, not just in inches, but in maturity as well. It’s always a mixed bag for parents, to see their kids slowly but surely marching away from being a little kid and moving towards the horizon of the big kid years more steadily and surely. There is a certain sadness that comes for us in watching your childish ways recede—we will miss the pudgy cheeks and tea parties and puddle-stomping. But there is so much joy that comes from seeing you step with a little more confidence and independence. However, one of the best parts about watching you grow older, Nan, is that you are retaining all the very best parts of little-kidness—you are still silly and curious in all the very best ways. I hope even when you’re thirty I can still say that is true of you. 

 

This year you’ve tried some new things and found some new hobbies. In the fall you did your very first triathlon and boy did you push yourself. You are a competitor at heart, but you were also a little nervous about trying something new and in a big crowd. But when the horn sounded you splashed right into the water and never looked back. You’ve always been a strong swimmer, and you completed the biking portion on a bike with no gears! You ran the entire mile at the end too and I was so impressed. This is when we realized that you have a bit of a knack for running. Your dad was excited to see you interested in running, and so he asked if you wanted to go for a little run with him one night. He had planned on just going about a mile, but at the end of that you were still chatting away, totally full of more energy… so he kept going. Mile two, still chatting… He decided you could probably just run a little 5k with him. You bounded up the hill towards our house at the end of it, and both you and your dad were beaming. You’re a runner, Nan Louise! On Thanksgiving we decided to go to the local track and run a family “turkey trot.” You kept up with Dad and completed your 5k way ahead of the rest of us… and then ran a few more laps with your sisters to encourage them. We just signed you up for your first official 5k tandem run with Dad next month, and I have a feeling we’ve found a little hobby you’re going to enjoy for years and years. 

 

Another fun thing has been watching you fall in love with your cat, Skipper. You got him last year for your seventh birthday, and you have proven the best of pet owners. You always make sure he has food and clean litter, but more than that, you take time each day to find him and sit with him. I joked with you the other day that he was giving you a hug, but I think it’s true! Only with you will he hop on your lap, nestle in, and then throw his arm around your arm. It reminds me a little bit of how your Great Grandpa AJ is with cats (and all animals!), as they seem to be drawn to him by some magic thread. You have a certain gentleness and love inside of you that most animals seem to be aware of and respond to. That’s a gift, because I sure don’t have it ;) ! I am not a cat person, but we’ve all grown to like seeing Skipper around the yard, appreciate his mice-catching abilities, and more than anything, love to see you love him. We even had a little one-year birthday celebration for him where he got milk and chicken, and while you maybe thought it was because we love Skipper, it’s because we love you so much, Nan. And that Skipper-party made you so happy. 

 

Speaking of what makes you happy: you are a people magnet! And your friends are some of your favorite things in all the world. You have some truly great ones in your life, but the common denominator is you—YOU are a good friend, Nan. You know what your friends like and don’t like, what makes them happy when they’re feeling sad, and you just bring life to every circle of people you walk into. Being a good friend is one of the best things you can bring into this world, so keep loving well and freely, my girl. 

 

Another thing you do well? BRINGING THE FUN! You are a goofball through and through and it is one of my favorite things about you. You are always down for good time, whether that’s a silly dance, a joke session, laughing at something nonsensical, or just making funny faces to get people laughing. Your friends at school have had fun with your obsession and jokes about candy candy candy this year, and you caught on that it was funny, so you have really played the part. You even write your name “Nan Candy” on your papers. 

You are a really great big sister to Sloan, and I love overhearing all your conversations with him when you are imparting all your "wisdom" :). One day you two were eating lunch and for 15 minutes you told him the entire Gospel story, pausing to answer his questions. I remember you saying, about Jesus, "He didn't say 'I better fight them, so then I don't die.' He said, 'Okay. It's time.'" Later you were explaining him on the cross and said, "No food. No water. And he died. But Sloan! After three days, he rose from the dead. He come alive again! Cause you know what, God was like, he died for their sins. That's amazing. He helped our people. God was like, 'I'll make him alive again.'... God is everywhere." Sloan said, "I know: He's fire at night, and clouds at day." 

 

You are the most fun to surprise/scare too, because you react with your entire body, almost in tears, screaming, and then bursting into laughter! You’ve been like this since you were little—you could vacillate between tears and laughter in a matter of seconds, and it is still true. Your dad often says that you have a plug in from the world straight to your heart, and you respond in emotional ways to everything. Whether that is a swell of music in a movie, or your friend falling and bleeding, or someone talking about something difficult, you get tears in your eyes and feel it with them. The same is true when it’s something happy or joyful, your whole body will just wiggle in an almost dance response. I’m sure there will be times in your life that this doesn’t feel like a good trait to have—it may feel cumbersome or exhausting to feel in such big ways—but I think it’s such an incredible way in which the Lord has made you, to be able to relate emotionally to what is happening around you and I pray you never lose it. 

 

You are still a wonderful helper, seeing needs before I have to ask. And if I do ask you and your siblings to do a job like pick up sticks around the yard, you are the first to jump in and the last to finish until the task is complete. You have what I would refer to as “stick-to-itivness.” You still often find yourself anxious or nervous about things, but I’ve seen you grow a lot in this area as well this year, finding ways to work through it or ask questions before something becomes too much for you. When your dad and I went to visit Aunt Kali on the other side of the world, it really made your little heart worried. That’s okay. Keep leaving those worries with Jesus. Your little mind is just always whirring on, and I encourage you to keep asking questions and seeking answers, of those around you and of God. This process will help you over and over again in your life. I really think one of the best gifts for our faith is our curiosity. 

I could write an entirely separate letter of all the things you’ve said and ways you’ve said them that have made us laugh and laugh. You tend to just say whatever pops in your head (something we’re actually working on ;) ), but it can result in the funniest of things. One day you and I had been running errands, and when we pulled into the garage the door squeaked. Your eyes got big and you said, “What was that?! Did they buy a cow or something while we were gone?!” Once while driving you piped up from the backseat, apropos of nothing: “Who was the first dog in the world? You should type that up on Facebook” (meaning I should Google it ;) ). Once you’d been struggling in the bathroom department for a few days and finally had some success. You came down the hall and said, “Whew! I’ve needed to do that for two days! I couldn’t even run around at recess—it’s really been holding me down!”  Once you were getting ready for school and shared with me, “I’m wearing a black shirt so that the bees leave me alone. Then they will think I’m a squirrel… or a racoon! And not a flower and they won’t bother me.” One of my favorites though was when I overheard you telling Sloan what it meant to marry someone: “You have to find a girl and kiss them. Well, you have to have a tea party, with cake too. And she will wear a flowy dress and you have to wear a black suit.” 

 

Like I said, I could write an entire book, but there are a few more I don’t want to forget from this year. I was trying to get a bike down off its hanger in the garage one day. It almost fell and would have crashed on top of Sloan and you ran off. When I successfully had it down you said, “Oh man. That was a horribility!” You do this a lot, mashing words together and creating new ones that make even better sense. A the possibility of something horrible happening became “horribility,” and I think they should add it to the dictionary! Once, at bedtime when I leaned over to kiss you goodnight, you grabbed my face in my hands and said, “When you crink your ice cream to the side and it squishes up like a grandpa skin… that’s what your eyes look like on the side when you smile.” Oh sweet Nan, those laugh and smile lines are in large part due to YOU—who keeps me laughing and smiling all of my days. The most recent was when you went off for a run with Brent and shouted, “We’ll be back in 100 hours and 70 cents!” I want to be like you when I grow up… full of joy and laughter and never at a loss for words to describe something! 

 

You finally have all your front teeth, after 4 years with none after you knocked two out. Your hair is still a wild mane of beauty. You always use at least one if not two of your library book check-out limits to get books for Sloan. I think you would survive solely on sourdough bread if I let you (me too, girl, me too). You love to listen to audio books on your Yoto while curled up with Skipper on the trampoline, and you ride your bike as fast as you can down our street. You still grab my hand when we’re walking from time to time (please don’t ever stop), and you wanted your birthday party with friends this year to be at our favorite spot at the river. You’re never low on energy and spice and fun. Oh Nan Louise, I truly truly truly cannot imagine our days without you in them. 

 

And like I have ended every birthday letter: We hope you understand the why behind our no-s. We hope you feel safe in the boundaries we set. We hope you feel freedom in the wide-open places we leave for you. We hope you see God in our actions and in our words. We hope when you leave our little home for good and go out on your own that you’ll look back on this simple little life we had together—chaos and mistakes and messes and all—and see that it was grace that held us together; that you see that it was God’s daily bread that provided it all. 

 

Nan Louise, happy EIGHTH birthday! We will always come for you, and there is nothing you could ever do that could make us stop loving you.