Raising an adult five year old

One week from today, Anna will turn 5. It's totally weird to me, the thought of being the mother of a five year old. I don't know why 5 is so different from 4, maybe it's the milestones involved and all that (kindergarten, losing teeth, etc.), but 5 seems old. I feel like someone older should be the mother of a five year old . . . even though I'm plenty old. But 5 seems like a big deal. So to celebrate, I thought I would make this "Birthday Week" and do some fun posts about Anna. I'm not committing to post every day, because who knows what will happen, but you can at least expect a couple/few/handful more between now and then.

(As a disclaimer, if I start to sound too sappy or too much like a show-off, forgive me. If I can't do it one time a week year, when can I? And I will also try to limit the number of times I say she's delightful. It will be hard, because there are few words that truly capture the Anna magic, but I will do my best.)

To start off, here's a post I started a while ago about how Anna is so adult for her age. I'm kind of used to it, because it's been 5 years of this and I don't have anything else to compare it to, but sometimes when I interact with other kids her age, I'm like, "Really? You're really going to throw a fit about that? How childish . . . " Not to say that she doesn't throw fits, but I kind of feel like she doesn't about the usual kid things sometimes.

Here are a few reasons why she seems so adult to me:

• I can totally reason with her about a lot of things. But one thing in particular is eating her vegetables. If she is hesitant to eat them, I will tell her how good they are for her, how many vitamins and nutrients are in them, and she will most often relent. And afterward she'll say things like, "I don't like them, but I can handle them." Are you kidding me? There are two foods that she flat-out refuses to eat (asparagus and avocados), but even then, she'll try them on occasion, of her own volition, to see if she likes them yet.
• Anna loves giving talks in church, be it Primary or bearing her testimony. She's not nervous at all, I hardly have to coach her, and she blows us all out of the water with her wisdom and sincerity.
• She eats salad—and not just ones smothered in ranch dressing, either. She'll eat caesar salad, ones with a vinaigrette, or whatever.
• She used to not be able to say her Rs. She would talk about my "sistuhs" and when we were going to eat "dinnuh." But then on the morning of her third birthday, I heard her practicing her Rs in her bed. "Chairrr. Chairrr. Deerrrr." And she never turned back. I just loved that it was on her birthday and that she pretty much decided to learn how to do it on her own.
• I have taken her to the ballet and a play and she can handle sitting quietly for that long and she totally enjoys the performance. (Okay, so it was The Nutcracker and Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, respectively, so maybe I'll have to try her with Shakespeare before I have anything to write home about.)
• She always wants to make the phone calls to her friends' parents — by herself — to schedule a play date. I remember being scared for years of talking to adults on the phone.
• Anna told me last night that she liked her room but that she might be kind of spoiled. I asked her why and she said, "Because I have a lot of stuff." At this point, I'm starting to regret some of the birthday presents I already bought her, and then she says, "Maybe I should take some out . . ." and donate them? I think, ". . . and put them in your room so I can come play with them in the morning while you try to sleep." It wasn't the best idea, but props to her for not being such a greedy little thing.

Or she'll say things like this, which she came out with over breakfast recently: "Mom, I think we should eat less candy." (I was a little surprised, as she is a total sucker for treats. She can normally have one a day, but we let that rule slide a little around Easter.) Anyway, she continued, "Yeah, I think we should go for a while without candy." What kid says this voluntarily?

"Um, okay," I said. "Great. I'm in. Starting today?"

"Well . . . maybe tomorrow. That way we can have extra today," she said.

So she IS still a child some of the time, which is a good thing. But she was serious about this and something I will wholly support. When she puts her mind to it, she's totally better at policing sugar than I am. Maybe I should put her in charge of my writing deadlines . . .