Guess Who

Guess who has been gluten-free for a whole year?

This girl.

What a star.  Yeah, she has a lot of sass.  I think you have to have sass to pull of pink cowgirl boots.  I just cannot believe how grown up she is.  The past year has been a great change in our family's health.  It  is astounding how something so hard became something so easy in only a year.  I guess that is what happens with habits.  Do you think keeping my house tidy would be the same way?  I may never know. But I do know how to make gluten-free crepes, gluten-free chili relleno, gluten-free sweet and sour chicken, gluten-free cookies and homemade corn tortillas.  I've done more math and chemistry in the last year than I did in college (and I was a chem minor!) and I have watched my underweight, withering, sickly, migrane-suffering daughter flourish, grow and heal.  What a year.  What a girl.

Here are a few quirky things I love about my sassy cowgirl:

On Thursday, Lily got to go to a real high school science class to decorate heart (as in human heart) shaped cookies.  The HS student paired with Lily was adorable and in an attempt to bond with Lily said "I really love princesses, who is your favorite princess?"  To which Lily answered honestly:
"I don't really like princesses.  I like dinosaurs.  And you left off that valve, there."

Last week I made pancakes for breakfast.  This might not sound like a grand gesture but when making gluten-free pancakes that 1. don't taste like sawdust and 2. have any nutritional value it is.  There are weight conversions and multiple specialty flours involved.  I knew Lily would love the treat.  She did. . .and then she said:  "Thank you for these pancakes, Mom, but could I have some vegetables. . .like celery?"
(Don't worry, though, while she is a pretty good eater, she once told my mom that her favorite vegetable was french fries, so. . .yeah)

She will play princesses with her friends. . .if she can be the cat. . .or the chameleon. . .or the royal bat-eared fox (only for African Savannah Princesses).

She sang her talk in Primary two weeks ago.   I was not expecting that.  But it was adorable.

She is currently writing her first book.  A first in a series, she tells me.  The title is "the big Bager"  BYe LiLY  (The Big Badger).  The illustrations are adorable (I would post pictures but I can't even take a picture of my own daughter, let alone her book.  I had to steal the above pic from my Mom's blog)  and this is the first chapter (I will type it how it is  written):

The Big(backwards g) BADger (spelled right this time and with right-ways g)
ONce a UpoN a TiMe Thaere was a BADger he live iN a forest wiht a raBBit and a Skunk
One Day a Skquierl came to visit hes freid
hes fred was the skunk.

The friends go on to have problems of not enough food, hunters coming to the forest etc.  It is so adorable I want to cry every time I read it.  All the chapters have names like "The Problem" or "The Berthday".  Look out J.K., Lily is on the horizon.

Lily loves words.  She likes to learn new words and phrases and use them (mostly correctly) later in casual conversation.  This cracks me up all the time.
Yesterday:
L:  Did you make me a GF cookie to take to the party?
Me:  No, I am sorry you will just have to take the store-bought (aka disgusting) ones.  You can just lick off the frosting if you want.  I am sorry.  I didn't have time to make the GF Chinese New Year food AND the cookies.  I just didn't have enough time.  I wish I did, sweetie.
L:  Maybe if there was a way you could be nocturnal, then you could stay up at night and do it.
Me:  But then I would sleep during the day and I would miss you.
L:  Maybe if you could find a way to be nocturnal AND diurnal.  That would work.
Me (in my head):  So. . .like a vampire????

One of Lily's biggest irritations is a messy room.  She loves to organize her stuff (but she is a hoarder so it is hard) and keep her room tidy.  She often nags me about my neglect of the rest of the house and tries to motivate me to clean up more or suggests family organization activities.  It is both amusing and embarrassing that my 5-year-old is neater than I.

Lily loves to dance.  She dances around the house all day long.  Recently we have been watching Singin' in the Rain and she tries to mimic all the dances.  The funny part is. . .for all of her talents and gifts, dancing ain't one of them.  She tries, oh, the girl tries but natural grace is not hers.  She flails around, mostly kicking and jumping and falling on the floor and spinning.  It is. . .a sight.  Perhaps grace can be learned?  We will see.  Either way, I am not going to tell her she looks like a broken marionette.

Lily loves her sister and is very protective of her.  She is personally offended if someone even hints at Noli being annoying, troublesome, bad or anything negative.  I love this because I feel like Noli may need an advocate later on as I am guilty of calling her all of those offending names. . .and more.  And I am her mother.

Lily asks deep questions like:
How did God make the sun if there is no solids there?  Where did he get the gases to make it?
If people from Russia came to America to escape a war, why didn't they all come?
How many layers of sky are there?

And deep statements:

Even when there are no people around you, you are never alone.  The Earth is always with you.


Lily loves stuffed animals.  Ugly ones.  Ones that look like they were made by a one-armed orphan in China.  And if it were, she would love it even more.  Lily is obsessed with China.

Lily has a pet spider.  It lives in her room.  It is named, Purple.  She loves him.

There are many more amazing and quirky things I love about Lily.  I wish I had the brain space to remember them. . .or even to remember to write them down.  But, as she will tell you, I am not the most organized person.  So, I will just end with this:  Man, I love that girl.  I bet you would, too.