Clara turns 4!

Today is Clara's 4th birthday. I don't know how she can be four, it seems like she was just born. She keeps us entertained and on our toes. She is wild and  funny, you never know what she is going to say or what crazy face she is going to make. We are always laughing when she is around and it makes it very hard to discipline her when she is making you laugh at the same time.

Some updates on Clara:

• She loves to color, draw, make art projects, and cut lots of tiny pieces of paper.
• She loves to sing. She knows the words to lots of songs from school and church. She also makes up songs, so she is always singing. We recently got a piano, so she likes for me to play songs and she sings along. 
• She is a true farm girl. She loves to be outside, playing and exploring. When there is a choice of what to do she almost always chooses to go outside and play. If there is dirt or water, she will find it.
• She knows all her letters and numbers. She likes to write things, so is constantly asking us how to spell things. She loves school and her teachers love her. She loves to help and is eager to learn.
• She is still big for her age which has always been the case since she was born.  She is now wearing the same size shoe as Esther and can wear her clothes. It won't be long before she passes Esther in size. 

We celebrated her birthday yesterday with a few friends. It was a nice day, so the kids were able to play outside and see the animals. Clara requested chocolate and vanilla swirl cake, with white icing and Dora decorations.

Today we celebrated by taking the girls to a performance at the Walton Arts Center. The Symphony of Northwest Arkansas had a family performance where they played some Christmas music. Then they played the film The Snowman, and the symphony played the score to the film. They love the book and have seen the film before, and Clara has been learning about instruments at school, so it was a great opportunity to introduce the girls to the theatre/symphony. We all enjoyed it.

Clara has requested homemade "chicklin" (chicken) and dumplings, corn off the cob, and black beans for her birthday supper!  This makes Josh happy because chicken and dumplings has always been his favorite and his request on his birthdays, and it is something his grandmothers always made for him growing up because of how much he loved it.

Spectacles

About a month into school Esther came home with a note from the school nurse saying she had failed part of her eye exam and needed to see an eye doctor. We were quite surprised by this, as we have never noticed any problems with her vision. We thought maybe Esther just wasn't being cooperative with the eye exam. We made an appointment with an eye doctor and expected everything to check out just fine. Esther is not a very compliant patient, so the appointment was interesting. The results are that one of her eyes is "lazy" and does not see things well at a distance. Her other eye has compensated, which is why we haven't noticed any problems. So she needed glasses which was kind of a shock. Before we got them, Esther said she did not want to look different with glasses. We asked her what she meant and she said she did not want her looks to change which was kind of sad to hear. But we explained how much they would help her and we let her pick them out and she mostly went with it. The doctor is hopeful that her brain will respond and start using that eye more and maybe not have to wear them forever. Her prescription in the one eye ended up being quite strong. The first day she said "things look so huge!" The first couple of days were a bit tough getting her used to wearing them but we are all getting used to them and I think Esther sees the benefit in wearing them. After just a couple weeks of wearing her glasses they have become a normal part of her looks and now she looks different to us without them.