All About Clara: Age 6

 Clara was ecstatic to turn 6!  She is a cheerful, silly, creative girl, though she is much more quiet and reserved at school and church.  She is helpful, kind, sweet, playful, and has a soft heart. At home she plays hard and adores time playing with both of her brothers.

Clara is growing fast!  She is so tall for her age (something she feels very proud of), and is already up to Eli's forehead!  She will completely pass him up before long!  (Her stats at her check-up were 48 1/4 in.--90th%, and 44 lbs.--50th%.)  A few months after her 6th birthday she finally stopped using a pacifier.  What?!! She has been attached to that thing like it was another limb of her body since she was born.  I figured she would never separate from it unless it was her choice.  And I was starting to think that day would never come!  She liked to joke that she'd be the only grandma with a paci.  Haha!

Clara at her kindergarten preview night, getting to take a bus ride around the school!

Makesmith shop at Conner Prairie

Doggie Ikea is a favorite pal to have around!

Ikea is beloved, but since being home on quarantine Clara chooses one different stuffed animal per day to be her special companion.  She has cat Trixie, dog Patch, unicorn Wish, bunny Squeaky, bunny Cottontail, the list goes on!  I'm glad to see all of the stuffies getting their time to shine!

These blue sneakers that she has on in this picture were picked out and bought by David (who's often the shoe-buyer).  She LOVED to showcase her blue sneakers and proudly tell people, "My dad bought these for me!"

She and Ezra spend lots of time playing together.  She can be a bit bossy at times, but he is very good at going with the flow and letting her make the decisions.

Joining in on Eli's Field Day at the end of 2nd grade (May 2019)

Preschool graduation!  Clara attended the developmental preschool at our elementary school.  She received Speech Therapy there.  Her teachers were Miss Jenny and Miss Kim.

She and Jolie Gehen are great friends who go to church together, were in preschool together, and are in the same kindergarten class!

Easy to bond over books!

Clara went through a phase where she wanted to sit in her room and "read" every.single.book in her bookshelf.  I couldn't put any of them away until she had finished or she would freak out about getting out of order!

Park times are some of the best times!

I don't even know the story about how this began, but David plays a little ditty on the guitar that Clara dances to.  He calls it the "forbidden dance."

Cutie Clara finding her groove at a festival.

Kindergarten orientation.  Clara was placed in Mrs. Smith's class.  David took the kids to school on his way to work, and I picked them up after.  School times changed this past year and we went from a start time of 9:10 to 7:50!  It was a huge change, but Clara did really well at getting up in the morning, and I loved that they came home earlier in the day!

Here's Clara's picture on the way to her 1st day of kindergarten.  She was up sooo late the night before.  Too wound up to sleep!  So she was pretty dazed when I woke her in the morning.  I was so worried about her the whole day, that she'd be way too tired, but she had an awesome day!

After-school picture, everyone all smiles!

Clara received Speech therapy at school with Mrs. Crowder.  She went twice a week and did really well when it was just the two of them (she is sooo much quieter with other kids).  Clara works really hard at school.  She has a perfectionist mentality and gets absorbed in what she's working on.  She doesn't always listen super well but as her teacher said, she doesn't intentionally break any rules.  :)  She became best buddies with Jolie Gehen and Olive Lindermen, both girls who I think are terrific and great choices in friends.

Around October Clara started really struggling.  She was getting very upset before school, often in tears and saying that she didn't want to go.  She would usually be fine when she was there, but getting out of the house was hard.  She was so concerned and anxious about throwing up that she wouldn't eat breakfast, and she also stopped eating lunch at school.  (She's not a picky eater, she just developed so many anxieties about it).  She began having TERRIBLE temper tantrums at home, lasting hours and being completely unable to be talked/worked through it.  The littlest things would set her off.  That was NOT like her at all.  It was a very upsetting and challenging time.  She would beg me every day to come have lunch with her.  If I was there she would eat her lunch.  I came often, sometimes multiple times a week, but her lunch was at 10:40 which was a time I often had other commitments with Ezra.  When Clara went back to school after Christmas break her teacher gave her a special assignment to be the helper for a new student.  This made Clara very proud and she and the girl became good friends (before she had to move again a few weeks later).  I was able to get Clara to eat breakfast every day, and while she still wouldn't eat at school unless I was there, her teacher noticed she was much more smiley and her tantrums at home have mostly stopped!  (Being overly tired or past due for a meal can definitely be triggers for them still, though I can calm her down much more easily now.)

Clara very much enjoys writing her numbers and letters, coloring, cutting (she can often be found asking me if I have something that she can cut.  Thank goodness she has never cut her hair!) She loves numbers and counting and can often be heard counting while she's looking at books or even when she wakes up in the morning.

At her school fall party

Clara has such a terrific memory!  She loved reenacting the story of the "Three Billy Goats Gruff" that they read and made a craft for at school.

One day after having the sister missionaries over for dinner, they stuck sticky notes all over our door with kind things about us and thanking us for dinner.  Clara apparently thought it was the best thing ever.  She took out a piece of paper and brought over one sticky note at a time, and wrote on her paper what each sticky note said!  She even included the little artwork they had as well, haha!

On an afternoon in December I happened to see that some scenes from the Nutcracker ballet were going to be performed at our library THAT evening!  Even though it was super last-minute and right during what should have been dinner-time, I brought the kids to see it because I knew how much a certain lady would love it!  And she did!  I didn't know beforehand that kids were welcome to come dressed as ballerinas (many of them did).  But all of the children were invited to come and do a warm-up with the dancers.  Clara was in heaven!  I could tell that she was unsure of herself and nervous, but she still very much enjoyed it.

Candyland with Grandma Hayes

Digging in to the Valentine's treats at the Metheny grandparents.

Clara is a big-time baby-lover!  She was over-the-moon excited when a family in our ward asked me to watch their kids because one of the kids was a baby!  She was lucky that the baby enjoyed being held so much because that's all she wanted to do!  She talks about when she grows up and becomes a mom (and a veterenarian).  She wants to name her kids Tom and Rosabelle.  :)



Clara doesn't seem to mind quarantine life amid COVID-19.  She is almost always immersed in play and acts like she couldn't care less about school.  I am really grateful that she can have so much time to play at her own pace.  Clara definitely inherited my slowness.  She hates to be rushed and hates having to stop when she's in the middle of something.  Since being stuck at home her creativity has really blossomed and it has been delightful watching her do her best work--play!

Making sure her twins are buckled in tight!

Tea party for her stuffies.

Card-making is one of her favorite hobbies.  She delights in making cards for people.

She is still a music-lover, too!  One of her favorite times is having evening dance parties with Dad!  I was hoping to sign her up for a dance class this spring, but with COVID-19 it will be postponed to a later time. I have begun teaching her some piano lessons and she thinks it's very fun to learn and is just a tad impatient at moving along quicker to other songs!

Clara is our kid with the most nicknames!  She also goes by Claire, Clary, Clarence, Rose, Rosie (after middle name Rosalie), and C.

Clara lost her first tooth in October!  She is very funny about wiggly teeth.  She is terrified of them falling out so she won't ever wiggle them herself, she just lets them stay wiggly in her mouth as long as they can.  We were eating corn on the cob at dinner and the tooth came out in the cob!  That was a fun surprise!  That was one of her bottom middle.  She lost the second bottom middle not long after.  Just this past month in March she lost the top middle two.  She is a cute gap-toothed girl!

I'm not very good at writing down funny phrases and mispronunciations that the kids say, but here are a few from Clara.  After trying to read one of her Valentine conversation hearts, Clara brought it to me and she said questioningly, "This one says 50 nicka!"  I let her know it actually said 'So Nice."  Hahaha!  Once when we were out for a scooter ride near a park with people playing frisbee golf, Clara exclaimed, "Look how far he frizzed it!"

She is great at imagining and playing pretend!  Some of her favorite scenarios to act out are: school, camping, astronauts, store, doctor, etc.  Yesterday she spent hours with all of our toy animals playing circus!  Today she was inspired by a tornado drill to have her and Ezra gather their blankets, pillows, books, and stuffed animals and seek safety in the bathroom, where they "weathered the storm" for hours.  There's never much time that passes until she's thought up the next grand make-believe adventure!  Clara also loves her baby dolls and can often be found to have a baby in her tummy!  What cracks me up is that a second after delivering her baby it's headed to preschool!  Haha!

Clara's 6-year-old interview!  This part of the blog really did happen right around her birthday.  She made sure to remind me it was time to ask her some questions on video!  😀

It is enjoyable for us to watch Clara grow and witness how much she is learning, and that her heart is still as big as ever!  We are so grateful to have her loving spirit in our home and family.