Dear Lucy –

I missed your 4th birthday letter, so I’m going to try to make up for it now!

You have changed so much since since my last “Lucy Update”. Here are some things I want to remember:

• You LOVE arts and crafts – it is your favorite thing to do. We now have a craft bin in the dining room so that you can color any time you want to. I’m surprised at how often you prefer to color than to play with toys

• Your imagination has really grown recently. I hear you doing a lot more imaginative play by yourself and with Bridget than you used to. 
• You love helping me cook or really anything we let you “help” with. You are an eager and fast learner.

• You still love being read to. You have a very long attention span and can pay attention to long books. I wish I had more opportunities to read with you – life is pretty crazy with Bridget and Josiah thrown in! I can’t wait for you to learn to read. During your rest times, I let you look at books – you look at them for a lot of the 1 hour you are required to be quiet for. You also do a lot of soft humming, talking, singing, to yourself during this time. I have to remind you a lot to “be quiet” during “quiet time”. 
• You have a really good memory. You like to recollect experiences from your past in detail. You also like to look at family photos and videos on the ipad. 

• You love to dance and sing. Your favorite CD is Frozen. You and Bridget love to run in circles around the room singing along. You know a lot of the words by heart. You did ballet at the YMCA this winter. 

• You started preschool (4K) this year. You go on Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday from 9:30-1:30. You have done awesome academically, even though you are probably the youngest one in your class. You do a great job tracing and drawing your letters and numbers. You did great at first and didn’t seem to have any adjustment issues – but a few months after you started school, I found out you had been asking your teachers to take you to the bathroom around 10 times per day! After being confused for a few days (since you didn’t go to the bathroom that may times at home), we came to the conclusion that you just liked the attention you got from your teachers taking you (since at home you have to go by yourself). After talking to you and your teachers about it, and praying together about it on the way to school (almost every day) – you are doing a lot better in this area and are only asking the teachers to go about 1x per day. This was also a clue to me that you may appreciate more one on one time with me! 🙂 

• You are extremely brave, assertive, and like to set the rules and play by the rules. You see things in black and white and like to “tell it like it is” – which is often really funny….. We have been working with you on being kind, saying kind things, saying things in a kind way, “kindness” is our parenting key word for you. We pray that you will come to know Jesus as your personal Savior and that his love and kindness will flow through you. 
• You haven’t napped consistently since you were three years old. You have set your mind to the fact that four year olds don’t nap or need to nap – so you never do. As a result, from about 5:00pm you start to get really tired. Most mornings you do so well. You listen, obey, set a good example, play nice with your sister, etc. But when you start to get tired, you find it much harder to listen, obey, be kind, etc. I bought the book – The Power of a Praying Parent and have found so much comfort praying specific prayers over you. I desire so much that you come to love, obey, and follow Jesus – that you would choose to surrender your entire life to him. 

• Because you don’t nap, our latest strategy has been to put you to bed at 7:00pm! This is so early and often it is tough for us to get dinner done and our night time routine accomplished in time to get you to bed at this time. You normally wake up on your own at 7:30am, and when you have gone to bed early, you are in great spirits the whole day. 
• You LOVE TV – we kinda laugh about the fact that you are a TV addict even though (or maybe because) we don’t let you watch very much (no more than 1 hour a day). We are trying to cut back your amount of TV because it seems to have put a damper on all other activities (nothings seems quite as appealing to you as watching TV). 

• A lot of my thoughts these days are taken up with Kindergarten for you. There are so many options – it is daunting! We feel like God has called us to eventually homeschool our family – we just aren’t sure if we should start while Bridget and Josiah are still so young and need my time and attention so much. Right now the options we are considering are: 4 day a week preschool at Abilene Baptist, Homeschool, Public School, or a new Public Charter School. We are praying through all the options. 
• You are so brave it is a little scary! You haven’t cried at all the last few times you got shots and you have lots of guts to disobey us even when you know punishment will follow….. We pray that God will give us the guidance we need to not crush you strong will but direct it to positive areas- so that you can shine in your natural given strengths! 

• You remind me (and Jason) of ME so much! We share so many little weird idiosyncrasies. One in particular is our keen temperature perception. We each easily get too hot or cold, want to change the temperature in the house or car, like to change our outfits multiple times a day so we are the perfect temperature, etc.! Lucy (like me), also likes to know the overall plan of the day – what is going to happen throughout the day, what day of the week it is, what time it is, she wants to know it all! 

• We have been trying to be more diligent about family bible time and singing each evening. It has been amazing to see and hear how much you understand about the Bible. 
• In the fall, I started helping with the new preschool choir program called “Musical Melodies” which you were in! You got to sing at a Baby Dedication Service (the one Josiah was dedicated at), All Family Night (where Operation Christmas Child and other gifts are given), the Ladies Christmas Tea, and at a Nursing Home. It was so much fun to help in this area and watch you sing so well and bring joy to so many!