Let's talk about Madi for a minute. Madison has reached an age where she is starting to really become her own person. Obviously we've seen her personality develop for her whole life. And, funny enough, some of the characteristics she had as an infant she still has: she's a spastic eater, she's finicky, she doesn't need a lot of sleep, she likes everything just SO, she wants to be constantly entertained and always busy. However, in the last few months I've started to see her focus on things that she's passionate about. I've seen her really develop some of her talents and learn to work hard to get better at things.
Here are a few things I've noticed:
- Madison is insanely competitive. She takes after Chris in this area. Madison's school has a jump rope team. This jump rope team is nuts. They perform insane routines at basketball half time shows at colleges all around the area. Jump rope is a HUGE deal at Madison's school. They start learning to jump in kindergarten and in second grade they can start jump rope club. Out of all the kids that participate in the club in 2nd grade a few are chosen to be on JV in third and then perform with the team in 4th and 5th. Most kids don't make JV until 4th and then just perform in 5th. The team is very selective. There were 90 kids in jump rope club last year. Madison decided she wanted to make JV in 2nd. I honestly think she wanted to do this to beat everyone else and to prove to herself she could do it. She worked hard and she was determined and she made it! Only 4 out of 90 kids made the JV team in 2nd grade. What's more is that they had an end of the year party and Madison beat everyone, even the older kids at criss cross contest. She is competitive and she is determined.
- Madison is passionate and focused. If there is one thing this girl loves it's swimming. She seriously started swimming at 14 months. And she loves swimming more than anything else in the whole world. She does swim team for an hour every day. Then she comes home and begs to go swimming. One evening this summer she and I ended up at the pool alone. The boys were home with dad and didn't want to go (probably because they had already been 5 times that week). Madison and I spent an hour doing time trials to see which stroke techniques made her faster (i.e. flip turns or touch turns). She loved it. Swim team has been over for less than a month and she is already asking when it starts again.
- Madison is a hard worker. I'm not going to pretend that her room is spotless and her homework is flawless. But when it's something she loves she's willing to put in the time. Madi decided at the beginning of swim team that instead of practicing with the 7-8 year olds she wanted to be moved up to practice with the 9-10 year olds. (Let's remember that Madi is a tiny little girl. Most of the 8 year olds are bigger than her, so the 9-10 year olds literally tower over her.) She spent the first couple weeks of practice pushing herself so that she could swim faster than all of the kids in her lane. And the work paid off. She got moved up with the 9-10 year olds! Not only did her hard work pay off at practice, but she did really well at her meets. She worked hard every week and focused on her strokes and ended up at her last regular meet placing 6, 6, and 4 (out of 40-50 girls) in her events. She also qualified for "A" regionals in 3 events (you have to get below a certain time in your events to qualify for this meet). "A" regionals wasn't her best meet, she had a couple hiccups, but she did place 12 in 50 meter freestyle (out of the 21 girls who even qualified for the meet from the 14 teams in our region).
- Madi is fearless. For her baptism I asked Madison if she wanted a special musical number. She told me she wanted to sing "When I am Baptized." I asked her if she wanted to sing with anyone. Nope. With grandma? Nope. With a friend? Nope. That girl insisted on singing a solo at her own baptism. I tried to get her to change her mind. She didn't. She went up there and sang that song and did beautifully and was not scared a bit.
- Madi loves to read. She has gotten really, really into books lately. She doesn't like to sleep either, so she stays up reading every night. She's gone through a lot of books this summer. Probably 7-8, including three of the Harry Potter books which are 400-500 pages each. She's a little book worm. To encourage that habit we did a little book club this summer. We got a group of her friends together every two weeks to do a little book club at our house.
For Charlotte's Web we had spider cookies and watched the movie.
For Sarah Plain and Tall we made butter and rag dolls
And for Indian in the Cupboard we had dirt and "book worms" and watched the movie. We also did Number the Stars, but I didn't get any pictures of that one.
- Madison is helpful and responsible. She doesn't always help with a smile, but she is very capable and does do a lot for me. I regularly pay her $1 to clean my downstairs bathroom. Right now Uncle Steve lives with us so Madison and Hudson are sharing a room. Madi wakes up and plays with Hudson every morning before bringing him downstairs. I can leave Madison in charge of Hudson for a few minutes while I shower and she does a great job!
Don't get me wrong. Madison is not perfect. We struggle, quite frequently actually. She's very stubborn and headstrong and dramatic and we butt heads a lot. But she's a great, talented, sweet girl and I'm so lucky to have her!
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