6.1 is tons of fun

Anthony and I have both remarked how awesome "six" is many times in the past month or more.  Beatrice had a strong end to the school year and has been so very happy, helpful, and just plain fun to be around. She has also been a real trooper despite being plagued with pretty bad spring allergies. She's on meds twice a day and has throat lozenges for the near constant throat clearing she's doing from time to time.  Fortunately, it seems to be improving, finally.  The big excitement in the house is Daddy's new studio, which is our finished attic space.  He painted one wall with dry erase marker, so he and Bea had great fun trying it out:

 

Her creative side seems to be expanding every day.  When left to her own devices this weekend, she all of a sudden showed us her new bathing suit, designed out of two Target bags:

She had a major milestone when she spent about six hours with newly retired "Uncle John" the other day.  He has tried for so long to "break in" with this girl, but of course the fact that he is a man and that he wants her to like him so badly are two major deterrents, but oh the fun they had!  They went to the park, gardened, drew, and had a picnic hot dog lunch:

 

This past weekend was her annual ballet/dance show.  They couldn't wear their costume to the show, nor were photos allowed, so the only pictures I have are from The Complex's Facebook page, which showed these from dress rehearsal and the final practice at the studio.  The show was just fantastic and Beatrice was in three different dances:

 

One of our sweetest moments ever happened when I was driving her to the show on the second night.  I asked her if she felt beautiful in her white tutu?  Yes I do, but not as beautiful as I always feel when I'm with you.  Speechless.

 

Here she is this morning, getting ready to go to the airport with Daddy (I have two more days of school) to pick up her cousin Jaden, newly graduated from 8th grade, and spending the week with us.

 

This girl is trying to hard to spell and read everything lately. On her last day of school, Anthony asked how her day was.  "I will spell it for you!  G-U-D!"

 

So the summer is off to a roaring start for her.  She's enjoying working on her first grade summer packet, participating in the library's summer reading challenge, and in between all that trashing the house with her building of tents and cities and putting on plays and puppet shows and writing in her secret diary, drawing, singing, and living loud and large every minute of the 14 or so hours that she's awake each day.