I haven’t written about Nia in awhile and I know she’s one of your favorite subjects so today I’m devoting an entire post to her!
Nia is 8 now and continues to evolve as a little person. The top words I’d use to describe her at this stage in life are: curious, stubborn, sensitive, dramatic, talkative and joy-filled. She’s also big on fairness lately – as long as it’s “most fair” to her. She also wants to be the parent and likes to declare things like, “I’m going to sleep with Mom tonight, Dad. You take my bed.” to which we reply, “Nice try Missy…”. She is testing, a lot.
She tried doing some door slamming but abandoned it when she couldn’t get the door to make a loud enough noise due to the fact that all the doors in our place have hydraulic door-closing mechanisms that make them close slowly. She is also quite dramatic. We have had many “worst day of her life” days as of late. But there are also lots of joy-filled moments too which never fail to bring smiles to our faces. Probably the best way to describe it is high highs and low lows. In fact, it feels like we’re getting some teenager-y behavior already, which terrifies me a bit.
A Couple of My Favorite Stories
You’ll like this one. She was upset at Nick for something and came to me for consolation. She ran up to me, threw herself against my body, and declared in her most dramatic voice, “Dad came THIS CLOSE (holding two fingers very close together) to breaking my heart in two. In fact, I don’t think I would feel right giving him a Father’s Day gift this year.” No joke. I had a hard time not laughing my head off in the moment.
Oh, and then there was this priceless gem. As I mentioned before, we’ve been talking openly about body parts & sex ed stuff. I can’t remember what prompted this comment but all of a sudden she blurts out, “I am never going to get married because then I have to sleep in bed with my husband and his penis will end up in my vagina and I’ll get pregnant and have to born a baby. And I don’t want to born a baby because that will hurt too much. So better I never get married.” I was astounded by this logic chain. First, that she had been thinking about this so thoroughly. Second, how many assumptions had been made (time for another conversation on consent!). And third, that she still thinks you “born a baby” instead of birth a baby (we have had this conversation sooooo many times). Suffice to say, it was amusing. You never know what’s gonna come out of that mouth.
Nia’s Favorite Things
The topics that get talked about in our house the most right now are Harry Potter, Star Wars and Dragons. She is obsessed with all three and is always reading a book on one of these topics. She is a VORACIOUS reader and gets through a chapter book in 1-2 days. Her favorite series of the moment are: Wings of Fire (about dragons), Harry Potter (she’s on book 6 of 8), Diary of a Wimpy Kid and How to Train Your Dragon.
Nick introduced her to Star Wars recently and they binge watched 1, 2, 4, 5 and 6 when I was off at a weekend planning retreat for the School Board. She’s been obsessed ever since and has been begging me to buy her a Darth Vader costume for Halloween 2020. I tried to make the case that she might get sick of Star Wars and want something else by then but she stood firm, saying, “That won’t happen. I have a crush on him.” Oye. Haven’t caved yet but she’s wearing me down with her daily ask.
She has also come up with some very creative expressions to celebrate her current obsessions. For example, one weekend she decided to make dragon talons for herself.
She was absolutely ENAMORED and wore them for the entire weekend (which made eating very difficult). And then it dawned on her that her friends would love them too (oh how it would enhance their recess dragon game!) so she made another 20 talons for them. She was a very focused little talon-maker! I was shocked she stayed with it so long.
We occasionally see her old loves come out – the American Girl Dolls, My Little Ponies and the Littlest Pet Shop characters. But what’s changed is that now there is always at least one dragon in the imaginative play scenario.
Not everything has changed though. She still loves to dress up. The bright colors and shiny baubles that characterize Indian wear continue to delight her. And you can just imagine how much attention she gets when she’s all decked out in traditional Indian clothing…
These are pics from a recent wedding we went too. It was fancy-pants, so we even pulled out the head beads! And then some sweet young woman gave her a ring made out of real flowers. She was in heaven….
Well hopefully that gives you a glimpse of what we’re experiencing with Nia these days. She never fails to surprise us . . . . Ciao for now!
