My girl

• I didn't bring suits to my friend Morre's house so... we improvised.
  

weeeee!

• My girl says a lot of funny things like: "I'll throw all this nonsense away!"



• and... "That would be really funny if you named-ed me meatball French."



• and.."I can't understand them because their voices are all jacked up."
  


• and..."Is this movie approp-piate for me daddy? Because I'm in the room."



• and... "That looks like a marmadoodle." (armadillo)



• and... "This is totally the same one."
  

• She also learns valuable lessons about feeling the spirit like:



• I threw my back out and Brian gave me a blessing. Afterwards Xiana asked if she could have one too. Seeing this as a great teaching experience Brian agreed. A few minutes after her blessing she was suddenly crying. I asked her what was wrong and it took a few tries before I could understand what she was saying. Finally she choked out the words, "I feel the holy Ghost." I talked to her about how it was kind of overwhelming but didn't it feel good? She agreed that it did. What an important lesson for her to be able to recognize at such a young age what the spirit feels like.



• My girl lied to me. It was so disappointing. I mean truly, I felt crushed. I understand she's still very young, but my feelings were completely hurt. She went to the bathroom and when she came out she told me that she had washed her hands and dried them on her shorts causing them to get wet. I didn't really pay attention until she turned around and I saw that the back of her shorts were really wet. I asked again what happened and she repeated that she dried her hands on them. I told her to come here and smelled her shorts to discover that actually, she hadn't pulled them down far enough and had peed on them. My initial instinct was to freak. I yelled at her about how she wasn't in trouble for peeing on her shorts, but for lying and sent her to her room. After I had calmed down a bit I went in to her room and explained to her that honesty was the most important thing. I told her that if people didn't trust her or believe her then she would never find happiness in this life. I explained to her that it made me sad, her sad, and her Heavenly Father sad to hear her lie. I told her that she wouldn't be in trouble for that, but that even if she did get in trouble it is still better to be honest than to avoid consequences. I told her that she needed to pray to her Heavenly Father and ask for His forgiveness and tell Him sorry and that she wouldn't do it again and then to come out of her room and do the same for me. I stood outside her door and my heart broke as I saw her knelt in prayer sobbing. A few minutes later she came out, still crying and told me she was sorry and asked for my forgiveness. I wrapped my arms around her and told her she was forgiven and that her Father in Heaven forgives her too. Then I explained what an amazing thing that was to be able to make mistakes, but still be forgiven for them. She hugged me for a few minutes and then later was dancing around the room singing, "I'm forgiven!" That night in her prayers she thanked God for forgiving others. I beamed with pride as I realized that she connected the relationship between being forgiven and forgiving others. This was such a beautiful learning experience... even if there were a lot of tears.
  

• As ever she continues to be a funny little girl. She has gone from drawing scribbles to actual figures, to full on episodes... influenced greatly by her big sister. She thrives on praise and loves to be the center of attention. She loves to tell story and takes giant gasps of breath at the beginning of each sentence, perhaps due to knee jerk reaction or maybe to enhance the drama. One night I told her not to do something because if she did then her friends would too. She asked, "Do they listen to my heart?" Another day I kissed Kolton and said, "eww, he french kissed me." She asked what that meant and I told her an open mouthed kiss. Later I heard her explaining to her 4 friends what a french kiss was and deemed it appropriate to from then forward call it a baby kiss.