Early birthday celebration for Sofia: double digit!

Sofia will turn 10 in a week but I’ll be away then, so we planned an early celebration for her 10th birthday. While the chinese tradition of 10th birthday is a big party, we opted for a low key one. She invited her best friends from school, fewer friends mean playing together in the party. That’s probably how I’d have opted to celebrate my birthday, just with people I really want to spend time with.

A birthday tradition that we started 2 years ago is to run number of Kms as her age on her birthday. I have no doubt she can make it to 10km. She had sleepover on Saturday so I run to her friend’s home to pick her to start our 10km run.

65 min later, we were done. So proud of her stamina.

Then daddy picked us up to go to pick up her birthday cake, got home, shower, change, and received her friends at 10:30am. They played a bit before going to The activity of the party, mani/pedi with her friends.

then it was lunch time, pizza was an obvious choice for them, and they played “avocado” play while waiting for the pizza. I love seeing kids making up games out of nothing

back home 1:30pm, they played a bunch of made-up games until it was cake time. Strawberries short cake from a japanese bakery was super light and yummy.

I love seeing Sofia grow into a “teenager”. I can’t help to think that she and I have so many similarities, no wonder all my friends say Sofia is a mini version of me.

She is a caring, sensitive, athletic, adventurous, brave girl, who values friendship and family above everything else.

She loves school, she is responsible with her homework, and loves reading in her free time.

She is a good sister, although often fights with Lizzy as kids do, caring and protective.

Sofia loves to travel as much as I do, and very easy to travel with as she’s very flexible in what to do, where to eat, who we meet.

She is not as girl as other girls of her age. She prefers running outfit than a dress, she value comfort over pretty, she doesn’t like when I remind her to apply sunscreen, she doesn’t have the asian value of pale skin for girls. She is just easy going and doesn’t have too much of her appearances. Yet, i notice she loves wearing short shorts/skirts to show off her legs. hahahah

She still doesn’t have meat in general. She likes pasta, pizza, toasts, one type fish, teriyaki chicken, sushi, pancakes, and lately oatmeal.

Her sleeping schedule is the same since few years ago, 8pm to 6ish am. She rarely naps.

She loves all kinds of sports, badminton, golf, running, soccer, swimming, or whatever she gets to try.

She is a spoon when it comes to knowledge. Everything is interesting to her, even stories she read in her kumon writing she finds it fascinating.

She is a cat lover, no doubt, other than our Cookie, she loves all street cats. I know she treats Cookie as her baby, her friend that she can tell secrets, her comfort place.

She still likes to spend time with me, and I enjoy more and more having conversations with her.

Her teacher says she’s a bit shy sometimes, sensitive, has amazing short term memory, and is more traditional compared to Lizzy.

Her desired job when she grows up is still my job… I wonder when she’ll want something else, not that I’d prefer that, but I want her to get exposed to many career paths before deciding on that she’s passionate about.

Sofia is resilient and has learned to process her negative emotions well and faster, sign of maturity.

I no longer see her as a kid or baby, but someone that I look forward to have as company that I want to spend more time with, chat about life and dreams, and learn from her wisdom.

Happy birthday Sofia, I love you so much!