Happy 17th Birthday Lily!

Today we are celebrating Lily’s 17th birthday! It seems like just yesterday she was a toddler, jabbering at the dogs to put them in their place when she came home with us from China. Fast forward from China to Okinawa to Norway to Nebraska…she has grown into such a beautiful young lady, inside and out. We are different. She and I have had our moments. High school online for half a year was a VERY LONG MOMENT. However, she still makes me laugh everyday and amazes me weekly with either her quick wit, her knowledge on a random topic, or just her unique insight into something. One of my favorite things to do? Go grocery shopping with her. I laugh the whole time. We have only gone shopping together a handful of times in the last couple of years because of COVID, but I treasure the times we have.

Lily has been pretty tolerant with me trying out photography stuff with her. I have been blessed to get some great photos of her over the last six months on our travels. Today I bugged her again. Lily has a huge glass jar that has 4800 origami stars she has made over the COVID times…that is a LOT of origami stars! So I took a photo of her with some of her paper stars. For the curious out there, they are made with 3/8’s stips of paper 9 inches long. These are the kinds of things she asks for when Christmas comes around….thin paper strips for making origami stars. Then I thought I would do something to represent her birthday. Since blowing out candles are a big no-no now that we have a pandemic, I found a faux tealight for her. Then onto her Chinese heritage. Long noodles = long life. Of course, Lily eats ramen almost every day. She loves the stuff. Anyhow, today I took photos of her eating and slurping her noodles. She is an expert noodle slurper.

Happy 17th birthday, daughter of my heart. I love you so much! Thank you for all the joy you have brought into my life!