Reyes Family Time: Our sweet girl is 5 years old!

Just over a week ago, on March 11, Miriam turned 5. For some reason, as a parent, having a child turn 5 seems like a huge milestone; she's half a decade old! She's old enough to start kindergarten. I admit, I cried a little bit on her birthday. She's such a joy and we are enjoying this age a lot, but gosh, I still wish I could slow down time.

At her doctor's appointment, we learned she continues to be tall (45", which puts her in the 91st percentile) and lean (39 pounds, which puts her in the 40th percentile). I think it could be hard to find clothes to fit her, but she leans towards loving dresses and leggings, both of which are very flexible and stretchy. She still wears some 3T leggings and dresses - she just calls them her "capri leggings" and "shirts that used to be dresses." She loves to pick out her own clothes, often choosing bright colors, patterns and stripes. She LOVES shoes and although she usually wants to wear the same pair 2 weeks in a row, she can't help eyeing new shoes every time we go to a store and saying "Oh, I love these! They are so _______ (sparkly/warm/fuzzy/pretty, etc.)." I think she got her love of shoes from her Aunt Katie, because neither Mario or I are particularly into shoes.

Personality wise, it is such a wonder to watch the girl she is becoming. She's still got a fiery streak and sometimes can be stubborn, but most of the time she is loving, kind, empathetic, thoughtful, funny, and busy being a helper and caretaker to others. She's extremely polite, well-behaved, and goes out of her way to make her family and friends feel special and loved. Whenever Mathias is crying, she's the first to run up to him and give him a hug and make him feel better. If one of her classmates is upset or hurt, she tells me she sits by them and gives them hugs to make them feel better. One of her classmates got extremely sick and ended up in the hospital, and she came home and announced she wanted to make him a "feel better soon" picture. She loves to do art and draw pictures, and is constantly handing out pictures to her friends or putting surprise pictures under our pillows. She has a friend with a food allergy at school and whenever it is Miriam's turn to take snack, she always double checks that we have something her friend can eat as well. It makes us so proud that she is such a thoughtful and caring little girl. She's still a bit timid and shy in new situations and around new people, but has grown a lot and will now ask for her meal at restaurants, talk to the parents of her friends, and even initiate conversation with kids in our neighborhood who are already playing outside together. She's a great helper at home and is always asking what "jobs" we have for her to do; she loves to set the table for dinner, help me with laundry, help me bake cookies and muffins, and get mail from the mailbox.

It is so fun to observe Miriam's mind at work and where her interests are these days. She's still taking violin lessons once a week; I wouldn't say she loves it, but she does enjoy playing and especially enjoys listening to her violin teacher play while Miriam either draws (in response to the music) or dances. Miriam LOVES art and anything to do with drawing or any type of art project. Our house is filled with tubs and drawers and desks full of paper, stickers, markers, glue, beads, crayons, paint, etc. that she's always wanting to use. She draws or colors something on a daily basis, and we also try to do a more involved art project at least once a week. She's just started getting comfortable using scissors and now all of her "drawings" also involve pictures that are cut out (and many, many little pieces of cut paper falling on the floor!).

In addition to art, she loves to build and create things. She is always building towers and houses and castles with wooden blocks, magna tiles, and even large legos. Her room is constantly in a state of chaos because she gets so many toys out to play with at the same time - she uses blocks to build a tower for her Paw Patrol pups, then brings the ponies along as their friends, then gets out "brain flakes" (plastic building discs) to use as their food, then gets her plates and bowls for them to eat from, then gets out beads to build them jewelry and decorate them....and it goes on and on. We do a deep clean of her room about once a week and put everything away, but if we give her 30 minutes to play, it goes back to looking almost exactly the same. The mess is hard to handle, but at the same time we love that she's so imaginative and playful!

Speaking of playful, she has also recently become very interested in playing both board and card games. Her current favorites are UNO, Sequence for Kids, and Sushi Go. It is fun to see her so interested in games, as Mario and I both enjoy playing games. That's definitely something we hope we can continue doing with her (and Mathias) as they both get older! In addition to playing indoor games, she really loves to spend time outside. She likes to ride her bike and her scooter, run around and play chase, dig in the dirt, help me weed the garden (although she tires of that rather quickly), and play basketball and soccer. We are looking forward to spending more and more time outside as the rain slowly subsides and the weather starts to get nicer.

Here are some pictures of Miriam from her 5th birthday, as well as a few random pictures from recent weeks: