Eight Years Old
Tomorrow is Hannah’s birthday. She will turn eight years old! Somehow it’s harder for me to wrap my mind around “eight” than it was “seven” last year. “Eight” seems so “big girl”-ish. We’re thinking she’s progressed to about three years old socially. The “why”s are continuing, but she’s getting more sophisticated in her interaction with her sisters:
Hannah - “Can you play with me?”
Sister - “I can’t right now.”
Hannah - “Why?”
Sister - “I have to finish my school work.”
Hannah - “Then can you play with me?”
OR
Hannah - “I thought we could play together.”
Sister - “Not right now.”
Hannah - “Why?”
Sister - “I’m reading a book.”
Hannah - “Will you play with me at 2:00?”
Sister - “We’ll see then.”
Hannah - “I thought we could play together.”
Her latest fascination is with stains. She spots them (no pun intended) and points them out everywhere and on everything. She seems to be able to handle the fact that some stains won’t come out, however, which is a big step in the right direction.
I would appreciate your prayers as I try a new idea this week. We’ve read the story of Jesus’ life, death, and resurrection many times, but she doesn’t seem to grasp the salvation message yet. A couple of weeks ago the idea came to me that she might “connect” with a Wordless Book. Hannah is always quite focused on colors and remembers them vividly. Words are more confusing. So last night I put together a Wordless Book out of construction paper, and I’m planning to show her one colored page each day and tell her briefly what it reminds us of.
This morning I showed her the first page: a piece of brown construction paper with a big black stain spot on it. I told her that the black stain (remember, she’s into stains right now) reminds us of the wrong things we do. I gave her a couple of examples of wrong things she had done, and her head started to bow. Then I told her that we all do wrong things; they’re called “sin.” And I assured her that tomorrow we would talk about a way to get rid of the sin. Hmmm, maybe we’ll need to do both the red and white pages tomorrow. We’ll see.
Some of you are aware that I ended up making an unexpected trip to the hospital in the middle of the night a couple of weeks ago. It was tough for Hannah to wake up and find Mommy gone for a few days, but she has settled back in now that I’m home. The girls have been such a help during this recovery from my surgery, and this week I’m feeling strong enough to take over Hannah’s school work again.
Thanks for your prayers for my recovery and Hannah’s salvation!
