Mia turned 9 two weeks ago. She takes her birthday very seriously and was trying to plan her party before we even finished Christmas. I told her I needed to get Christmas over with before I could even think about planning her party. So boxing day rolls around and she breaks out her notebook, plans her entire party down to the last minute, and presents me with the intinerary.
She requested a "beach" party and we went over how many friends she could invite (8-10). We printed some extra invitations just in case, and she put all of them in her backpack for school. She was inviting both friends from school and church, so I reminded her to save some for her friends from church. Somehow that reminder didn't quite sink in, as she gave away nearly all her invitations at school and I ended up texting a picture of the one invitation she had left to the mothers of her friends from church. Every day Mia would tell me who thought they could come and who couldn't, but there were new names every time we had this conversation. When I asked her to write out a list of who she'd invited there were 15 names... I then began mentally preparing myself for maybe a bigger party than I had previously anticipated.
We had to modify some of her previous plans to accommodate nearly double the guests, but I made her a "race to the beach" boardgame kind of modeled after cranium and minute to win it. We did a scavenger hunt for a "treasure chest" which was a box I had filled with candy for their goodie bags and wrapped it in copious amounts of wrapping paper, packing tape, and seran wrap. They played pass the parcel (my substitution for a pinata) with oven mitts and a knife and fork. They ate SO much junk food and we finished the night off with our beach movie "Lilo and Stitch".
Since Mia's birthday was on Sunday this year, and we try and keep Sunday set apart for church/family and try and avoid shopping or big recreational outings, we made Saturday our "day out". She got to spend an hour at the archery range for "try it day" and I took her to BPs for lunch. Afterwards, she went for a mani/pedi at the kids spa here. I had taken her for a pedicure for her birthday before COVID and she always wanted to go again, but COVID had killed the place we had gone in Edmonton. When I found out there was a spa here for kids I knew I had to take her. No birthday for Mia is complete without McDs to share with everyone.
On her actual birthday (this is like day 3 if you're keeping up), she wanted waffles for breakfast and crepes for supper. Despite my attempt to vary the menu a bit, she was adamant that was what she was going to eat. We opened presents, went to church, played board games, and watched a movie.
Now this may seem like a lot for one birthday. Maybe even on the verge of spoiling. The way I see it is when you are part of a big family, sometimes those moments where you get to be singled out and feel special are harder to come by. No matter how much we try as parents to have that one on one time, it's just not as easy to split your time into 5. So for me their birthday is one time that I can make sure they feel unequivocally special.
Mia's 9 year old birthday interview
Favourite food: tacos, McDonalds, cherries
Favourite subject: math/gym
Favourite book: "I love every book", but the Thea Stilton series is one of her favourites
Favourite movie: Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Mulan, Princess Diaries
Favourite TV show: "I don't have one"
Favourite animal: "I like all animals" (are you sensing the theme here...)
Favourite colour: teal
What do you want to be when you grow up: a chef or a teacher
What are you scared of: black monster and clowns, creepy girls
Describe yourself in 3 words: cook, sports (this is not a word I would choose haha), and helping
Favourite thing to do: read books and cook
Favourite memories from being 8: board games with my family and having playdates
Looking forward to about being 9: being tall enough to go on more rides at Calaway park
If you couldn't tell from the birthday planning, Mia needs to know everything about everything that is going to happen months before it happens. She is always checking the calendar and counting down days to this, that, or the other. We are planning on going to Edmonton for a few days in March and she has already written out the complete itinerary, right down the us brushing our teeth every night.
One of the biggest things that happened the last year for Mia was her baptism. We were lucky enough to be able to do it in Calgary on the same weekend that my brother in law and his wife were sealed in the Calgary temple. So for that reason she was able to have almost all her aunts and uncles there which was really special for Mia, as her extended family means a lot to her. She was even baptized in the same dress her aunts wore for their baptisms. It was a fairly chilly weekend, but everything went smoothly, and we had a big lunch after with everyone. Family pictures are hard...
Mia is a great big sister. Lily just loves her and will sometimes only let Mia do things like brush her teeth or wash her hands. Normally when she gets home from school, Lily will yell "MIA!!!" and run down the stairs as quickly as her toddler legs can to give Mia a hug. There have been times when Lily has been inconsolable until Mia comes along and becomes the baby whisperer. Mia's great in general with young kids and love taking care of her little cousins when we get to visit them.
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Mia is also a great friend. She's very skilled at reading people emotionally and has a great capacity for empathy. She has stood up for people that others make fun of, even if her friends are the ones doing the teasing. She is good at including others, and has helped a new girl in her class, from out of country, be welcomed into her group of friends at school.
She loves to read and we often catching her reading past bedtime in her room (100% me as a kid/teenager). She has 3 or 4 small novel series on the go right now, including Sophie Mouse, Thea Stilton and the Unicorn Diaries. We're hoping to start The Babysitters Club soon.
Mia is 100% my pickiest eater. She would live off PB and J sandwiches and cereal if I let her. She likes random things like tacos, italian sausages, and a love hate relationship with feta cheese. She HATES cheese on the surface (like wants me to wash my hands if I touch it when I'm making other kids' lunches, must also not be orange), but one of her favourite dinners is my homemade mac and cheese. Although once I made the mistake of baking it (instead of just pouring the sauce over the noodles like I normally do), which I now know is a no-no for her. She looked at me deadpan after having a bite and said "not your best work".
Mia likes to cut things, pick things, pluck things... She's always trying to find stray gray hairs on my head and yank them. When we would kill flies or wasps in the house I would find them dissected when I went to vacuum them up. She actually asked me to pop one of my pimples the other day. I told her she'd have her own soon enough haha.
She has a sense of fashion that's all her own. Some days it's bright and loud, some days it's dark and teen angst. Some days it's mono colour and some days it's patterns on patterns. She wears whatever floats her boat and I love that about her. She doesn't seem to feel the cold as much, and will only leave the house, in winter, with a coat because I force her to more than half the time.
She is our biggest adventurer and thrill seeker. When we went tubing this summer she kept wanting to go faster and wanted the tube to flip. She basically lived on the tube for the entire time we rented it. She loves all the crazy rides and spinning things. Unfortunately she does have a bit of an accident prone side and all outings usually involve her falling into some body of water or getting inexplicably dirty (like the time she stepped in the biggest puddle of thick thick mud after "cliff jumping" at Red Willow Falls).
Mia started piano in September at her request. When I mentioned I had her registered she asked what would happen if she wanted to learn to play something else. Me "Like what?" Mia "Didgeridoo?". I just sat blinking, as I often do when I'm talking to her haha. She has caught on quickly to piano, and had her first recital last month. She played perfectly and with confidence, and has a goal to learn a simple primary (church) song this year.
Mia is always up for a girly rom-com with me, but also has a weird obsession with horror (100% Gordon).
For someone who was slow to talk at a toddler, she has no shortage of things to say as a 9 year old. She can talk without ceasing for a very long time. Sometimes we'll be out on a drive picking something up, and we'll go there and back, maybe 20-30 minutes. I'll get home and realize she did not stop talking the entire time. Occasionally you do have to tell her to slow down because her brain is moving faster than her mouth. At the beginning of school she had to be reminded to use periods, because she would write an entire page as one sentence. I told her teacher that was unsurprising since that's pretty much the way she speaks. No pauses, no breaths. The next assignment she made up for it by putting in a period every second or third word haha.
Mia is always asking questions to try and understand things. I was trying to explain to her that a kg was 2.2 lbs. She says "oh so 4", me "no a little bit more than 2", Mia says "oh so 3?".
