Lizzie update

Lizzie is eight years old now. I can't believe my baby is so big. Well, really she's not that big. At her annual checkup I learned that she is 25% for height and 30% for weight, so she's a small fry. Not surprising since she can still fit into some of her size six clothes and most size eight's are too big. We went shoe shopping yesterday and I was surprised to find that she fits into size 13 and 1.Lizzie loves to read. Right now she's excited about the Geronimo and Thea Stilton series (though she sometimes also reads the Little House on the Praire and A Series of Unfortunate Events series). Toy-wise she likes Legos, American Girls Dolls, My Little Pony, and Polly Pocket (she claims she likes Barbies, but almost never plays with hers). I'm really glad Liz still feels young enough to play with toys. I want her transition to tween and teenager to be postponed and gradual.Elizabeth still mispronounces lots of words (which I find this charming because it reminds me of how young she still is): decisioned, haded, lie-berry (library). She knows about the tooth fairy, but still believes in Santa and the Easter Bunny which I hope lasts through at least one more holiday season. She is starting to learn about more grown up topics. During a recent trip to Costco she noticed and asked about the packages of tampons and pads. I did my best to explain menstration whilst grocery shopping and wrangling the two little ones. I thought I did alright, but later, as we had pizza dinner at Costco Liz announced that she didn't want to be a teenager. I asked Lizzie why not and she said, "well, you know that thing where you bleed out your butt?" So, I explained it all over again and tried to address her concerns. Lizzie recently started attending Activity Day girls. She has gone to one activity so far and when I asked her how it was, she said, "wonderful." She made a cute fringed fleece scarf that she proudly showed all her school teachers the next day. Liz is also involved in Brownie Girl Scouts, chess club, girls basketball, and soccer. The last three will end in the next month or so and then we'll give her a break from activities and classes (well, a break until we buy a piano and start those lessons).The other night, Alaina was being especially loud and Andrew was especially fed up with her bedtime antics. He told Laines if she made another noise he was going to take away her stuffed pig. When I checked on the girls a few minutes later, Lainey was quiet and Liz was crying. She said that she couldn't fall asleep without the noise her little sister usually made and complained of feeling "all alone."

Liz remains sweet, inquisitive, and sensitive. She has been asking a lot of religious questions lately (Who created God? What is the spirit world like?). I occasionally find her crying (particularly late at night) about her stillborn brother and deceased paternal grandparents, saying that she really wants to see them all, but she doesn't want to die yet. She also worries (and sometimes cries) about non-member friends and wants to know where they will go when they die. Yesterday I talked to Lizzie about diversity and tried to explain how we usually use the term in regards to variety amongst races, religions, cultures, and so on. Somehow that led to me telling her about crazy white supremists. This really upset her and she talked at length about how wrong they were and about how smart and pretty her friend Kayla is.