THE EVANS FAMILY: Ember

Ember turns 9!!

This hurts my heart to think about but our baby girl turned 9 this year - which is halfway to being 18 and possibly out of the house. It seems like just yesterday, we were new parents holding our precious little girl and now she is growing up so quickly. But at the same time - oh! how we love watching her grow up and mature.

At 9, Ember is about 50 inches tall and weighs about ___ lbs. She still enjoys her own room which is decorated with lots of pink, sparkles, and homemade creations. Ember is more of a night owl and likes to unwind some at night after we put her to bed. She most often reads but sometimes does other crafts or sings aloud. She still calls her Daddy up every night to "touch her fingers" and say one last goodnight. She enjoys falling asleep to music. She has still kept her childlike innocence and loves her silkie bear, Tickle, and still will play with dolls at the park.

Ember loves to learn and she loves to socialize. She absolutely loves going to school to learn and do new things and be able to hang out and play with friends her age. She easily excels at school and is a great teacher helper in her class. She is kind to her friends and just likes to have a good time. She truly is a born leader and often needs to be reminded that being a leader is good but being prideful or bossy aren't good qualities of a leader. Ember can be super silly and goofy. She can also be very dramatic about small things. She is a perfectionist and gets frustrated when things don't come easy to her - like being kind to her brothers. She desires to do the right thing and gets upset at herself when she doesn't make the right choice. But she seems to be growing to understand that all of life is a process and every success is a step forward. Ember is self motivated and a hard worker which has been a big help around the house as she is able to help out more with chores. She is a good saver and is just about to have saved $100 in her save fund.

As already mentioned, school and friends are some of Ember's favorite things. She loves all her specials at school as well - art, music, PE, and Spanish. Ember still really enjoys playing soccer. She is an aggressive player who is always trying her best. Although not as much as last year, Ember still loves gymnastics and will often be found cartwheeling or working on her headstands. Ember loves to read and goes through books much faster than I can pick them up from the library. She loves special time with mom and/or dad. She has a great imagination and comes up with crafts and games to play on her own or with her brothers. Just recently she decided to decorate her Barbie house for Christmas and found a way to make real live pine tree branches into a Christmas tree and string and beads into Christmas lights. Ember still adores trips and activities that we do with her favorites being Mexico, theme parks, ice skating and The Great Wolf Lodge. Ember is still our best eater overall. Her current favorites are an over-easy egg on bread with avocado and everything bagel seasoning, angel hair pasta noodles with butter, hamburgers, pizza, apple, most other fruits, and raw vegetables such as carrots, cucumber, tomato, and lettuce.

The past time that Ember does the most is definitely reading. But she also plays with her Barbie's alot. She uses her craft supplies often to make something. She really likes making bracelets with her Rainbow Loom kit. She is frequently playing school with her stuffed animals or with her brothers. They also play "family" which usually turns into "bad baby" where one person is the caretaker and the other two are babies trying to get into trouble. Ember enjoys doing Lego Friends sets. She still enjoys being outside and riding her bike or scooter or just walking. She also loves to climb and hang upside down on the gates around the yard. She is a really good and strong climber and is often found high up in a tree or at the very highest place of a playground that she can safely get to.

There are some things that Ember dislikes as well. She can get frustrated with her brothers noise volume and speed level running back and forth over and over. As mentioned earlier, Ember gets frustrated when things don't come as easily to her or if it takes her a little while to understand. She isn't a fan of plans changing and, of course, doesn't enjoy being sick.

Ember still continues to grow and mature in so many aspects of life. Physically, she is proficient at a one handed cartwheel and working on an aerial cartwheel and a headstand. She is a good runner and ran 2.5 miles the other day almost straight (leaving her Mommy in the dust). Ember has gotten better and better at ball control in soccer and is understanding the strategy more and more. As far as academics are concerned, Ember is continuing to grow in her writing of different types of papers and poems. She also writes songs here and there. She is starting to memorize many multiplication facts and is able to do most addition, subtraction, and multiplication problem set in front of her. We have seen maturity in Ember emotionally as well. Although she still struggles at times with being more dramatic than necessary, we have seen her respond to her brothers or others with her words instead of reacting. She is really good about writing us a very sincere apology note if she does something or says something that she shouldn't have. Most importantly, Ember is still growing spiritually as well. She doesn't read her Bible every day but reads it often. She also does a devotion book we got her multiple times a week. She is consistently talking about spiritual issues to us or her brothers and we are loving the excitement she has towards the things of God. We pray daily that she continues to grow and mature in her Savior.

We are so blessed and thankful to have had Ember as our daughter for 9 years. She has taught us so much through the years and challenges me to be better many times a week. Although she is similar to Dustin and I both in certain ways, it is clear that God has made her unique as well. It is exciting to watch her grow into a young lady and we are eager for at least the next 9 years of Ember living under our roof.

BIRTHDAY ACTIVITIES:

A few presents