Happy Birthday Faire!

Seven Things About Faire:

1. She is an amazing Big Sister. Seriously. She helps me more than anyone else in the family, and she is rarely asked to. She just busies herself taking care of her baby sister like she is her own. What a Mama she will be one day.

2. She is a wonderful artist. There are works of art all over this house. Anyone have any ideas how we contain it all? I'm all ears!

3. She loves tradition. Baking "mama's bread", bringing us breakfast on Santa Lucia day, advent calendars...these are the things I also love and want to nuture in her.

4. She is a good friend. She has made lovely friends at school, and gets along so well with them. No mean-spirited talk. I hope that never comes...

5. She likes to take photos. She's pretty good too! We have some framed in our kitchen.

6. She likes to bake and knit. A future Domestic Goddess? In this house, you just wouldn't fit in if you didn't love hanging out with the butter and sugar in the kitchen. She makes great Mama's Bread (a Swedish cardamom bread). And she's been knitting a scarf for herself (or maybe just a neckwarmer - she can't decide)

7. She is a sensitive thinker. She hates to hear anything sad. In fact, as she was helping to make cookies for part of the Out Of The Cold project this past December, she was in tears thinking about those less fortunate who have no homes to go to, or families to spend Christmas with. It broke my heart. And after learning a little about African-American history (after questioning why "Obama was such a big deal") she was in total shock at the concept of slavery. And racism. Her most favourite relative, her cousin Maya, is half Jamaican. The thought of Maya or anyone else not being respected (or worse) because of the colour of their skin just seemed so "stupid" to her (and she was worried because she wanted to say it was stupid but knew that saying things were stupid was not nice. What a girl.)

Happy Happy Birthday to You, Seven Year Old! We hope you get what you wished for (we certainly did when we got you!)

xoxoxoxo

Mama and the crazy bunch