She's how old?!

Yep.

She's 8.

Today.

I know, right?

Hard to believe, right? After all, she was just born the day before yesterday. I swear.

Unfortunately, the world doesn't agree with my assessment of time, and my little girl is now gossiping with girlfriends, talking about boys at school (eek on that last one- at least she mostly talks about how dumb they act), doing her own hair (on the rare occasion that her control-freak mother lets her), watching Billy the Exterminator and Hoarders instead of Little Einsteins and Finding Nemo.

In other words, she's growin' up.

Adi's a small fry- a good 6 to 12 inches shorter than pretty much anyone else in her class- and I'm pretty sure that Wyatt is going to surpass her weight soon. Just kidding. Or am I? But there is nothing small about her personality. She defends those that are picked on at school, she'll argue with anyone if she doesn't think that their right, and her mouth has ended up with a bar of Dial soap in it more than once for not being able to just zip her lips when she gets in trouble.

She loves climbing trees, riding her bike, checking the mail (quite the event in the Merrill House) hanging out with her friends, and pretending to read entire books in only 30 minutes. Adi writes stories, manages her siblings pretend play, knows how to do a Google search, and tries to get out of taking baths whenever possible.

Adison shoves her dirty clothes in the strangest places (doing more work hiding them than if she just put them in her hamper), plays Oregon Trail on my iTouch whenever she can get her hands on it, loves to tell "your face" jokes with her dad, and still sneaks into my bed at night.

Adi is uber-observant and picks up quickly on the feelings of people around her. She is also my walking, talking grocery list- mostly because the girl has amazing recall and always reminds me to get toilet paper. She holds her baby brother while I hurry to switch around the laundry and she always lets Piper have the pink one and Porter go first.

She is beautiful. She is strong.

In other words, this girl is amazing.

And even though she is preparing to be baptized soon, doing long subtraction, and can officially wash her hands in the kitchen sink without a stool,

she is still my baby.

My little Adi Nae.

And that ain't ever gonna change.