You're Eleven Years Old!

Dear Lila,

Well, it has happened. At your annual check-up last week, the nurse measured your height and said that you are now 5 feet, 4 inches tall. I am 5 feet, 2 inches tall. You are officially taller than me. At the young age of 11! And wait, you are 11!!! Happiest of birthdays to my crazy tall Lilabear!!!

Every year, you make me prouder and prouder to be your mom. You are so kind, thoughtful and generous. You help Daddy and me so much with our daily tasks (you always ask me if I need help with anything). You take care of your siblings and always look out for them (at your school Halloween party, you made sure to grab extra bags of chips and candy to share with your DiDi and MuiMui). You are respectful and appreciative (you thank me for making dinner every single night). And you are one of the most hard-working kids I know. Your work load this semester was a lot heavier than it was in 5th grade and you had a lot of late nights where you didn't go to bed until after 10pm because you were working on social studies questions or math sets. Then you had to wake up at 6am the next morning to help get breakfast for your brothers, eat your own breakfast and get ready for the bus. And while you often complained that you were tired, you always woke up on your own and did what you needed to do in order to be ready before the bus pulled up in front of our house.

You always do your schoolwork and it has paid off--your ELA teacher said you have the second highest grade in your class and your social studies teacher said you are one of the strongest students. You struggled in math a bit this semester but you are in honors math learning 7th- and 8th-grade concepts and I am so proud of you for sticking with the class and taking on the challenges, especially when three of your classmates decided to drop the class within the first week of school because it was difficult for them.

I am also proud of your growing confidence. You have always been shy; at the Garden New Student Orientation back in August, you were literally hiding behind me while I was trying to initiate conversations between you and the other new students! You didn't know anyone at Garden before you started but the other 6th graders have been so welcoming and you are very comfortable being amongst them. You have already gotten close to a couple of the other girls and you seem very happy at your new school. Whenever you come home, you are full of stories about funny things that happened between you and your classmates that day.

You have grown so much but you are still my Lila who devours books (you're currently into fantasy series like Keeper of the Lost Cities, The Land of Stories and The Hunger Games) and likes stories inspired by fairy tales. You also like playing Wordle, Connections and Sudoku and you spend a lot of time listening to songs by Taylor Swift and Olivia Rodrigo. Your preferred outfit is a sweatshirt, crop top and flared leggings and you love shopping for new earrings, especially dangly ones. And most importantly, you still like spending time with me! I am grateful that when you come home from school, you can't wait to tell me those aforementioned stories, instead of just reporting to me that your day was "fine." I am grateful that you still want to give me hugs and kisses and that you make sure to kiss me on the cheek every day before you go outside to wait for your bus. I am grateful that you don't want to go to sleep until we do our nightly bedtime mantra and secret handshake. I am grateful that when I ask if you want to do something together, you always eagerly say yes.

We had a chance to do two special somethings together this week for your birthday. The first one was yesterday when I took you to your very first Broadway show, Wicked! Given your interest in reimagined fairy tales, it was the perfect show for you--and you loved it! I had already seen Wicked twice before and it was still amazing a third time, but I actually spent a majority of the show watching you watch the show--it was really special to see what you smiled and laughed at and how you reacted to certain parts. After the show, I took you to the stage door and you got to meet the actor who plays the prince! He was so incredibly nice and stopped to talk to you for awhile, asking you if you also want to perform on Broadway and wishing you a happy birthday when I told him we were there to celebrate!

Today, I took you and your friends out for pizza and then to see the new Wonka movie. It was actually the first time you'd been able to celebrate with friends on your actual birthday because most people are usually away for the winter break, but it worked out this year and you got to spend your big 1-1 with a couple of your old elementary school friends and couple of your new Garden School friends. Happy birthday, sweetheart! I love you so so much! You said you had a lot of fun for your birthday this year and I'm so glad--you deserve it!

Love,

Mom

Happy Camper

Dear Lila,

Every year at your school, the 5th and 6th graders go on a trip to Camp Herrlich in Putnam County. The kids do outdoorsy activities like go on hikes, study plants and soil, examine creatures that live in the pond and learn survival skills (how to build an outdoor shelter, what to do if someone breaks a bone, etc.). It's a fun, educational trip . . . and it's overnight. Three days and two nights, actually. And before the trip, you had never been away from home for more than a night, when you'd done sleepovers at friends' houses, where I am friends with the parents and you weren't that far away. So letting you go on this overnight trip was a big step for the both of us! And it was kind of sudden for me. Your school emailed the permission slip two weeks before the trip and I barely had time to process the details before I had to turn in the slip. I wasn't sure I was ready but you said that most of your classmates were going and I didn't want you to miss out, so off to Putnam County you went!

I was unexpectedly emotional watching you pack your clothes and toiletries the night before the trip. As you placed items in your duffel bag, you suddenly seemed so big and my mind flash-forwarded to when you will be packing for college. Eeek! The next morning, I watched you from the living window as you carried your overstuffed bag to the bus--and then promptly fell forward because the bag was so heavy. Oh my god! You actually ripped your pants and scraped your knees but luckily, that was the worst injury you sustained over the next three days--even when you and your classmates went on a somewhat scary nighttime hike with no lighting!

While you were away, I constantly checked your tracker location and anxiously awaited texts and calls from you. It was weird not having you at home for so many nights and things definitely felt off. But I'm glad you went on the trip and glad that you had such an amazing time! You enjoyed all of the activities (except touching the slimy fish in the pond), loved the surprisingly good camp food (they made bacon for breakfast, which you were very excited about because I never cook bacon for you at home!) and had so much fun staying up late and bonding with the girls in your bunk. What a great first school trip!

Love,

Mom

Study Session

Dear Lila,

After what seemed like five months of cold, rainy weather (which was actually just a week, I'm a bit dramatic when it comes to crappy weather), it was finally sunny and warm enough for your class to go swimming at school today--but you opted to not go swimming so that you could use the period to study for the math test you had afterward. You. Are. Amazing! Your sense of responsibility surpasses that of many people much older than you and it always blows me away. Thank you for being such an awesome you!

Love,

Mom

Welcome to Middle School!

Dear Lila,

I blinked and you became an official middle schooler! Today was your fifth day of sixth grade! I know you had your reservations about going to a brand-new school where you didn't know anyone, especially while most of your classmates enrolled in one of the two zoned middle schools in our neighborhood, but so far, you say you like going to Garden! You told me that you like that it's a smaller school that's easy to navigate and that the kids are nice. You also get to go swimming every day until it gets too cold, and I know that is one of the main reasons you wanted to go to Garden, haha!

There are so many firsts for you this year: your first year of middle school, first time taking a bus to and from school (and it picks you up at 7am, yeesh--but at least it literally stops right in front of our house), first time having a watch phone (we text each other every morning after you get on the bus, although you mostly just send me monster emojis), first time having a locker and combination lock, first time having to go to a different classroom for each subject. It must be daunting but you seem to have acclimated very quickly. You are one of the new kids in your grade but there are only about 16 kids in your entire grade so everyone will get to know each other quickly and the students we met at orientation last week were very friendly. I hope you make some wonderful friends! I am so proud of how well you have handled so much uncharted territory. And I am also so proud of you for making it into the honors math class! Only seven kids in your year have high enough grades to put them in honors math and you are one of them! So amazing!

In other news, you didn't expressly ask me to do it but I knew you wanted me to--I "de-unicorned" your wardrobe. You, a girl who has loved and been obsessed with unicorns for as long as I can remember, are officially too grown-up to wear any shirts with sparkly pink unicorns on them. But you do still sleep with your beloved stuffed unicorn Uni every night, so my little Lila is still in there!

Love,

Mom

Questions & Answers

Dear Lila,

I asked you some questions for fun and here are your answers:

How old am I? 42.

What is my favorite color? Purple.

What is my job? Mama.

What do I cook the best? Mushroom pasta.

What do you like to do with me? Everything.

Why do you love me? Because you're special.

What is something I say a lot? Clean up your room.
What makes me happy? Us not fighting.
What makes me sad? GuhGaw.
How tall am I? You're shorter than me.

What am I really good at? Baking.
What is my favorite thing to do? Watch TV in peace.
What is my favorite food? Fish tacos.
What is my favorite drink? Water, because you drink so much of it.
If I could go anywhere, where would I go? Japan.
How do I annoy you? You make me do things I don't want to do, like go to Mathnasium.
What is my favorite TV show? Cooking shows.
What is my favorite music to listen to? Pop.
How much do you love me? A lot.

Love,

Mom

Gracious Girl

Dear Lila,

As you get older, I worry about the world of "mean girls" that you will inevitably encounter. People can be so cruel and I worry about how someone as sweet, kind and soft-spoken as you would handle them. Sadly, you have already experienced some mean-girl behavior in 5th grade this year, and from a girl who was supposedly one of your best friends since the 1st grade no less. She started saying rude things to you and icing you out and she has done the same to several of the other girls in your class, so she has actually become a bit of the class pariah. But instead of saying rude things back to her and icing her out, you told me that when you see her sitting by herself in class or at lunch, you wave to her and gesture for her to join you. She doesn't but, Lila, I am immensely proud of you for being so gracious. Bestowing kindness on someone who has wronged you many times in the past takes an incredible amount of strength and you do it without even thinking about it. You are amazing. On this Mother's Day, I am so grateful that you are my daughter.

Love,

Mom

Egg-stra Special Girl

Dear Lila,

Yesterday, I set up an Easter egg hunt in the yard for you, DiDi and MuiMui. When I said "go," you and DiDi raced ahead and gathered eggs quickly but then I noticed that you were throwing your eggs on the ground. When I asked you about it afterward, you confirmed what I had suspected: After you found eggs, you threw them down so that MuiMui--who was obviously much slower--could find them. I love you so much for always being so kind and thoughtful! Your siblings (and I!) are so lucky to have you!

Love,

Mom

Garden Path

Dear Lila,

When researching middle schools for you, I came across one called Garden School that sounded really good. We went to an information session and toured the school and came away thinking that it would be a great environment for you, so we started the application process last October. Daddy and I assumed we would just have to fill out an application with your basic info (name, date of birth, previous schools, etc.) and pay a deposit. But oh no, it is not that easy to get into Garden! As a prospective student, you were required to write four essays, interview with the admissions director, get letter of recommendations from your principal and two teachers AND take a merit exam. And as the parent of a prospective student, I had to write three essays myself! You worked so hard for months, writing and rewriting the essays (you even wrote an optional fifth essay on top of the mandatory four!), practicing for the interview and studying for the merit exam. Whenever you had free time, you worked on your essays and rehearsed your answers for three dozen possible interview questions that you might have to answer. You spent so much time on your Garden application that MuiMui often copied you, typing on a pretend laptop and telling us, "I working on my Garden School essay" or holding a piece of paper (like the one you had printed out interview questions and answers on) and saying to herself, "I want to go to Garden School because I want to go to Garden School." (Btw, that was not your rehearsed response to the question "Why do you want to attend Garden School?" but I don't think MuiMui could remember the actual one!")

We submitted your application in December and anxiously waited for today, when admissions decisions were announced. We were told decisions would be posted in the afternoon and it was the. Longest. Day. Ever. You told me that when you got off the bus today, you ran home as fast as you could and indeed, you burst through the door and asked me all out-of-breath, "Did I get in???" At that point, I hadn't heard anything yet. But at 4pm, I received an email with the subject line "Garden School Admissions Decision" and when I opened it, it said:

Dear Chan Family,

Good afternoon. I wanted to let you know that we are thrilled to offer admission to Lila for our Sixth Grade Program as a Merit Scholar!

OMG OMG OMG OMGEEEEEE!!!!!! You got in!!!!!! And you got a scholarship!!!!! I was so so so happy and excited for you but I had to play it cool because I wanted to wait until Daddy came home so that we could tell you the good news together! I told him to pick up flowers and your favorite sushi and earlier that day, MuiMui and I had cut up blue and white construction paper to make confetti in the Garden School colors.

After Daddy came home, we told you to sit on the couch and handed you a printout of your acceptance letter. We watched you read the letter--and then jump up exuberantly when you read that you had been accepted!!! Daddy threw the confetti (along with the small tin bucket it had been in, oops) and we started chanting, "Lila! Lila! Lila!" Your siblings were so excited for you and MuiMui was literally rolling around the floor in the confetti and shouting "Yay yay yay yay!"

You were so happy that you actually started crying! I am so proud of you, Lilabear! You worked so hard and you deserve this! I am so thrilled for your future at Garden!

Love,

Mom

Stepping Up Soon

Dear Lila,

Your parent coordinator just sent an email this morning about your upcoming 5th grade graduation and I actually started crying while reading about the details! My little girl is graduating from elementary school! Already!

Love,

Mom

Daily Rituals

Dear Lila,

I woke up at 5am this morning to bake homemade cinnamon rolls for your breakfast (anything for my kids!) so by the time 9pm rolled around, I was more than ready to go to bed. You were studying for your math test and wanted to stay up a little longer to finish your practice questions (always the dedicated student!). I told you to keep studying and that I was going to bed but you jumped up and rushed to the bathroom to wash your hands (since you'd been touching your school book) so that you could hug me goodnight. I love that hugging me goodnight still means a lot to you--and we still do our "heart" goodbye every morning when you go to school and our secret handshake every night when you go to bed. Our little rituals mean a lot to me, too. I love you so much!

Love,

Mom

Sob Story

Dear Lila,

You have given all of your Barbie dolls names and backstories, so when I sat down to play Barbies with you this afternoon, you held up one that was dressed in a sparkly pink evening dress and fancy high heels and told me her deal: "She is the town outcast. No one ever talks to her because she was mean to the mayor in high school. She sits at home all day because no one wants to hang out with her but she is always dressed up because if anyone decides to invite her to a party, she will be ready to go."

Whoa. Dark.

Love,

Mom