Better Late Than Never--Birthday Party Photos

The annual birthday party pictures are in--with a few July 4th thrown in. Click here to see more.

Rosie at Six

Rosie at six is very different than she was at five, yet is still very much herself.

Over the school year, she took leaps and bounds in her learning. She can write, do basic math and has begun to read in earnest--her current favorite is the elephant and piggie series by Mo Willems. She is also more able to engage in two-way conversations, ask probing questions and make thoughtful observations about her world. On the way home from dinner last night, she and I had a lengthy discussion about the concept of "percent chance" when it comes to the forecast. Once she caught on to what 0% and 100% were, she wanted to know what was more certain than 100%. ,She then decided she was 200% sure if was going to rain before we got home--and it turned out she was right!

Being right has become important to Rosie. In fact, it's nearly impossible to convince her she is wrong (even when I am 200% sure that she is.) I have very clear memories of arguing with my dad in a similar way, so I guess I can't fault her too much. She is also very focused on winning. When we were visiting my parents, Rosie and my mom were playing a card game. When my mom suggested a different game, Rosie said, "First let me finish winning this game, and then we can try the other one."

She is still very social and places great importance on her friends and play dates. A larger school seems to suit her in this way. When I walk through the building with her, it seems like every teacher, support staff and student knows her and excitedly says hello. When we go to neighborhood playgrounds, stores, public transportation or just walking down the street, some kid I've never seen before will say hello to her.

She remains unwavering in her optimism. We were once making a joke about her cutting off my thumb (I have no idea how that came to be) and when I told her I wouldn't like that, her response was, "That's ok, you'd still have nine other fingers!"

Peanut butter and jelly continues to be approximately 50% of her daily food intake, but there have been some signs of change in her willingness to expand her palate. She added tomato soup to her repertoire this year and has, on a rare occasion, tried a bite of new food.

Rosie is incredibly protective of, loyal to (and a little bossy around), her ""little brother Sam". Their current favorite game is to pretend that Sam is Rosie's puppy named "Hivey". He barks, crawls around and generally does whatever Rosie tells her puppy to do. One of Rosie's weekly chores is to put her and Sam's laundry away. She often employees Hivey to help her. Sam gets down on his hands and knees, Rosie puts a pile of clothes on his back, and then walks him to the appropriate place to complete the task.

Now that summer is here, Rosie wants to spend all of her days in the swimming pool. She can jump in, do cannon balls, dive under to get things at the bottom of the pool and do a number of strokes.

Six feel like the beginning of a new stage--Big Kid--and Rosie seems more than ready to embrace the adventure.