Time to Be Proud of Ginger Girl aka Her Birthday

Ginger Girl turned 11 yesterday.

Tuesday night Blondie, Ginger Girl, and I made cupcakes with these tulip cup cupcake/muffin holders for her to take to school. They turned out so cute!

Source

Early yesterday morning, Ginger Girl woke me up with, "Mom, I'm eleven!!" I opened my eyes to see the happiest, biggest smile on her face. It's not a normal day when I see a smile on her face in the morning. It's not a normal day when I have a smile on my face in the morning, but seeing her, I couldn't help but smile too.

She told me that hubby was the first one to say Happy Birthday to her, waking her up before he went to work. Then she got a big surprise when he came home early from work just for her Birthday. He's been working very long hours lately--going to work early, working in his office at home from the second he gets home at night until well past 10 each night, and working all weekend long. When he took the time off just for Ginger Girl, it made her feel even more special because she's really been missing him. It meant so much to her that he did that, choosing to put in extra work later to make up for it, just for her. First she was confused, "Why are you home early?" He told her, "Because it's your Birthday" and I said, "Surprise!" My heart about melted seeing the look on her face.  

A few years ago on hubby's Birthday we started what has become a Birthday Tradition. We surprise the Birthday person with silly string, in all the colors they make. We chase the Birthday person around, especially focused on their hair, getting silly string all over the place.

Blondie got to Ginger Girl
before she could
get up & run.

"Are you done yet?"
"Nope, this is too fun."

Amazing Grace, Blondie, and Ginger Girl all wore the same colors without planning it, so all the pictures look like I dressed them. When the 3 girls came out after getting dressed, it was humorous to see that they all had chosen the exact same color tops, especially that color. Out of all the colors they each own, they all grabbed the neon.

Helping her pull strings of
goop out of her hair.

That pile of silly string in her lap
all came out of her hair.
She's looking at Blondie & the
look on her face says it all.

Ginger Girl with a ball
of silly string. Right
before she opened Amazing
Grace's bedroom door,
threw it on her, & ran away.

A piece of silly
string that Ginger
Girl didn't realize
was still in her hair.

Silly String Remains.
The entire living room, including TV
& curtains looked like this.

I spent yesterday running errands to pick up fun stuff, at physical therapy, a doctor's appointment, more errands, and chugging coffee. Then I came home, decorated with monkey, polka dots, blue, and pink Mylar balloons and decorations, and then did research to crank out 2 papers and 1 report so that I could enjoy the afternoon and night with my Birthday girl. Talk about busy day.

It was all worth it (and the coffee was much needed), because when Ginger Girl walked in the door, she was all smiles. "Mom, it's my favorite colors! And polka dots! And there's monkeys on the balloons!"  She threw her arms around me and gave me a huge "Thank you, Mommy!"  She's always so appreciative of everything anyone does for her.

Ginger Girl couldn't decide what she wanted for her Birthday Dinner and for months--she's been talking about her Birthday since Christmas--she'd had her choices narrowed down to a few things. Tuesday night she decided on Subway because it's Blondie's favorite. She had only 2 requests for her cake: polka dots and no chocolate because she wanted Amazing Grace to be able to eat it since Amazing Grace gave up chocolate for Lent. Ginger Girl thought about others' enjoyment on the day when she's allowed to be selfish and have what she wants. This shows just one of the many traits that makes Ginger Girl such an amazing person. She is so thoughtful of other people all the time.

When hubby brought out the cake that he had ordered for her, and was a surprise even to me, she about exploded with excitement.

"Pink and blue polka
dots AND a monkey!"

I'm enjoying watching the emerging young lady that used to be my little red headed baby. I guess little is relative here, because she was 24" and 9#3oz. when she was born. She was my only baby not born at home and went on record as the longest baby born at that hospital. When I was pregnant with her, I didn't care if I had a boy or girl, I just wanted a red head. When she was born, the first thing I noticed was that she was the size of 2 Subway subs, and the second was that she had red hair. Everyone comments on what beautiful hair she has.

11 years went so fast. She went from my little baby that didn't fit in newborn clothes...to the walking 6 month old...to the baby known in my mother's group as the one whose first word was "boobie"...to the feisty toddler stripping out of everything and running naked through church...to the 3 year old dancing through the house in her britches...to the 5 year old telling her Kindergarten teacher she had to go home because she had angina while clutching her chest...to the 8 year old declaring she needed Kleenex because she had rhinorrhea...to this 11 year old who continues to amaze me every day...too quickly.

I love seeing what a thoughtful, sensitive, intelligent, beautiful, caring, empathetic, happy, deep thinker she is. She cares so deeply about people she's close to that she cries when they're in pain and gets worried when they're sick. She is so in love with her boy Zipper and takes such good care of him, even the gross stuff like when he gets sick or needs help ridding himself of dingle berries.

I adore this little girl and enjoy every minute I get to be with her. I'm extremely lucky that I get to be her Mommy.