An All American Girl

Petunia just celebrated her 8th birthday. "Eight is Great" She has been preparing for her Baptism and is very excited about this important event in her life. Petunia is truly beautiful inside and out. She has so much love in her heart to give to others around her. Petunia is the teddy bear of our family. She is also the biggest tease.
Petunia was born the day before her due date. She was 7lbs. 10oz., I remember she had such chubby cheeks that it made her eyes squint like she was a Chinese baby. She has the distinctive family round face and has beautiful brown eyes. Petunia was a tough baby. She cried all day long most of the time - but then she slept pretty well at night. Petunia's favorite story of herself as a baby was the time when I was changing her diaper and she pooped. I looked down at the clean diaper, and it was still clean. Weird. I finished changing her and got her all dressed and then looked at the wall. Yes she had plastered that wall with her poop. Somehow the poop ended up on the wall and not on her diaper.


When Petunia was just about 6 months old she met her friend Cael. For the next five years Cael and Petunia played together almost everyday. Cael introduced Petunia to rock climbing when she could barely walk. She loves to climb whenever we get a chance to go to the gym. On any summer day you would find Cael and Petunia outside playing in the water and about drowning each other with the hose.
One day when Petunia was walking home from Cael's house, I was watching her walk and then she stopped and started to shake her leg. I couldn't figure out what she was doing. Pretty soon I realized that she had pooped and when she shook her leg, the poop fell down her pants and landed on the sidewalk. Cael moved the summer before Petunia started kindergarten and it broke her heart. They still are very good friends and still see each other every couple of months.


Petunia is a very talented young lady. From a very young age she has loved to cook. She used to love to watch the cooking shows on TV. She would give me hints on how I could cook better. She loves to make shakes, popcorn, and anything else I will let her. I think if something happened to me, Petunia could take care of the other kids pretty well. She definitely would make sure everyone was fed and happy.

Petunia is one who tries hard to please everyone. She is the girl in her class at school that the teachers have the new kids in class sit by because the teacher knows that Petunia will make them feel comfortable. She is Miss Congeniality. She is very nice to all of the other kids and is very concerned when someone is sad or hurt.

Petunia likes to write notes to her family and hides them for us to find. She usually writes how much she loves and cares about each of us. Petunia has a very close relationship with her Grandmas. Whenever she can be around Grandma that is the greatest gift you can give her. She loves to spend time with them and watch and learn from them. I hope that she can have those relationships for a very long time. I think she has learned to show love from the examples of her Grandma and her Daddy.

Petunia likes to do things that will make other people happy. Many times Petunia will clean the entire basement without me knowing because she knows that it helps me out and makes me happy. She is learning to serve others and has a great example from her Dad. One day when Mr. Smiley and and kids were driving down the road, they noticed a lady out raking her leaves in her yard. A few minutes later they got rakes and went and helped her pick up all the leaves. Then they jumped in them.

Last summer Petunia noticed that the fire pit at Spring Lake was in bad repair. She asked us if we could help her do a service project and make it nicer for everyone to use. She painted benches, moved rocks, weeded, and wrote letters to several people to ask for help in this project. She was able to get gravel and a fire pit donated for her project. It turned out very nice.

A couple of nights ago she saw a commercial about kids in Africa that need help. She asked if she could help in any way. She has such a big heart.

Petunia loves to sew, paint, sing, play the piano, play tether ball, ride her bike, rock climb, jump rope, swim and spend time with her family and friends. She is such a good big sister to Peanut, Farmer and Squeak. When Farmer gets scared at night she lets him get in bed with her. None of the rest of us in the family are that nice.

We love Petunia very much. She really is an "All American Girl"!