How old is my baby girl?

7?! That's so nuts! How did she get so old?? Not to mention long and lanky! J was beyond thrilled when the big day finally arrived after she'd been counting down for months! The last month in particular was really hard to wait. Here she is the night before, her last night ever being only 6. And here she is, happy as can be to open presents before daddy left for work. We had french toast as she requested, but nobody could wait and had to have a bowl of cereal to tide them over. My kids don't think the day has started if they don't eat some cereal, no matter what else they do have to eat. Weirdos.

Trying on one of her favoritest presents - a dress-up that actually fits her:

Opening up Nana and Bopa's presents with them on Skype to see. Nice family picture, right? Even baby G has her head down there, though I couldn't convince her to look. She was still trying to figure out why the computer was talking.

The dressed-up gang (I cannot look at this picture too many times. Cracks me up. Oh, and dude is wearing J's boots. He kept trying to walk up the stairs in them, one would slip off, he'd pull the other off, run back down to me for me to put them back on and try it again. Which he repeated for like a half hour straight. Kid has perserverance, I'll give him that.):

But back to J. We feel like she's done a lot of maturing this year. Something that really struck me was when she was opening her presents at her friends birthday party. She was so gracious and delighted with each little gift. Genuinely acted like and said each was the best present she'd ever got, which I noticed made each of the little kids feel pretty cool. There was no disappointment. No asking for more. No ripping through them to get to the next before properly acknowledging and thanking for even the smallest present. And then, M ran upstairs to get a present she had worked really hard on by herself to make for J. It was just a piece of paper that she'd folded in a unique way and decorated with jewels and coloring. She was SO proud of it. And when she pulled it out from behind her back in front of all J's friends, J acted like it was the coolest thing ever. M beamed. J even took the time to make sure all of her friends saw it properly and explained how long and hard M had worked on it and how beautiful it was. J could've said that it was just a silly piece of paper or not a real gift or whatever. She could've been embarrassed or embarrassed M in front of her friends. Instead she gushed and M loved every second of it. I was so proud. Can't believe she's 7 but we love the spunky, sensitive, darling, happy, giggly, helpful girl she's become!