Brooke's Birthday

 Brooke turned 12 this week!! What a goon that child is. I both love and hate seeing her grow up. But it's starting to become painful seeing pictures of her when she's a baby. When she's 3. When she's 6. When she's 8. 😭 

Brooke was quite disappointed that she had to go to school on her birthday (one of the downsides of going to public school, of course). She really just wanted to stay home and do fun things that day. But Daniel and I decorated the night before, and I made pancakes for breakfast for her before school. She also opened her presents: new earrings for when she can wear different earrings; a scripture study journal; a stuffed dog (though she wanted a real one 😂); a bunch of books that I love, but that she didn't show much interest in, haha. 

After school, she chose going to the farm for her activity. They finally opened the playground that's been under construction for months, and the kids loved exploring and playing on it. And of course, they loved seeing all the animals. 

When we got home, I worked on dinner and putting the cake together while the kids watched a movie. Brooke did the finishing touches on her cake decorations. She had fun with it. She requested chocolate chocolate cake, but I jazzed it up a little with a chocolate cream cheese frosting, which was delish. 

Brooke wanted alredo pasta with chicken, carrot sticks and garlic bread for her dinner. 

I think it was a good birthday. 

Things about Brooke: 

• She loves her friends. She wants to spend much of her free time with her friends, and she loves it when we do things with her friends. 
• She likes playing soccer. She's asked to be signed up for soccer again this year, and we have her on the same team as last year with the same coach, which will be great for her I think. Every year she gets a little better at soccer. 
• She loves playing the piano, and she's getting pretty good at it. I don't have to bug her to practice much, only every one in a while. She likes playing church music in particular, especially songs she knows. 
• She's a great big sister. She loves playing with her siblings. They have a few games they get really into: Trey and Rey animal game; Lego game; dolls (which they call "sllod" 😆), though she hasn't done dolls much in recent months. She does tease her siblings quite a lot, which they don't like. But she spends time with them, which I love. She's not cool to play with them yet. 
• She is a cheerful and happy kid, almost all of the time. I love how positive she is. It brings such a great spirit into our home. 
• She loves movie nights with the family. 
• She is self motivated and responsible. I do sometimes have to encourage her to get her things done. But mostly she wants to work hard and improve herself. She sets goals for herself. We've been way more comfortable leaving the kids with her and have her babysit. She's just trustworthy and reliable. 
• Lately she's started getting more serious about her spiritual growth as well, reading her scriptures more and wanting that scripture study journal for her birthday. She also asked me to print off all of President Nelson's conference talks to study them. She came with me to the "words of the prophet" class at the stake overnight campout, and she was really inspired. 
• She still loves reading, but she's found other interests too. She likes language arts in school, but not math, although I think she's pretty decent at both. 
• Brooke is helpful, and she is almost always willing to babysit or clean up. It's cute that every once in a while, she and Camille will banish me to my room so that they can surprise me by cleaning up the main floor or making dinner for everyone. 
• She loves being outside and goes out anytime she can when the weather is good (and sometimes when it's not, haha). She likes mountain biking with Daniel, camping and hiking, and exploring outside wherever we go. She's the one that's taken the most interest and care of our garden this year. She loves going out to check on it, to see how things are growing and if they are producing.