Thursday, August 27, 2015

Who is… Stevie?


I have been so excited to start highlighting each of my kids. Besides my Father, my job and my limited time I get to be with close friends, they are pretty much the sole source for my joy. With each of my kiddos (like every parent), I have a special bond with each of my kids. Stevie Joy and I share an extremely tight knit bond which just melts me. It’s clear we both adore each other. The other kids alone time with dad, is usually some activity, however, Stevie always just wants me to hold her and talk to her. It’s pretty obvious her little love language is Quality Time.


Best Buds

One of the things about Stevie that people pick up most about her is her sweetness., now don’t get my wrong, she is also the oldest and can take charge when she needs to ;)  But she is always helping with the other kids and it’s such a blessing. There’s a fine balance I find with letting your kids be kids. In our house there is always something to do, Stevie is so smart and sweet, she does go above and beyond. She really just loves to see me happy. Sometimes she makes it her job to make sure I'm smiling and not overwhelmed. She'll walk over rub my back while I'm sitting down working and ask something like "Daddy, are you having a good day? Do you want a snack?" (Great… now I’m about  to cry. Hahaha. Keep it together Seth. Side note, I can honestly count on one hand how many times I felt really empathy or cried before the marriage fell apart;  that’s one thing God really changed in my heart. It’s funny, but man I legit cry sometimes now. God has really enabled me to see things from other perspectives and with love. I love being like that, but I’m still getting used to having emotions, besides laughing or being hungry. Anyways, back to my sweet Stevie, I feel bad that she feels pressure to help around the house or with her younger siblings or that she is in charge of my happiness and stress levels, so I try my hardest be to not make her feel pressure to help as much and just let her be a silly little girl who takes a million screenshots of toys on the ipad… just so I will be in the know of what to get her on our next Dad/Daughter date. By the way, those dates are awesome.

One of our dates


This video is from one of our dates, we came home early 
because she wanted to make a frozen video. 
She set up the camera and I showed her some basic color keying. 
We only had a ipad and a dark blue bed sheet, so she did pretty good :)

She is extremely spiritual and believes in the power of prayer. Stevie is always happy to tell people about Jesus living in her heart. It makes me so proud when I see her talking to people about Jesus or praying for people. Actually last night, I let her play with my ipad when I was giving everyone else a bath. She loves games and stuff, so I figured I would walk in to find her playing Angry Birds or something, but instead she spend the entire time just reading her little bible stories app.

Stevie praying for people at church

She is very innocent still which I love. I don’t think she is sheltered at all. She knows whats up; however, she is still very sweet and embracing her childhood. I love that she’s not pushing me to let her grow up.  In contrast, she is very matter of fact, which I also enjoy. Sometimes, she will get pretty upset at a silly little statement because of the way she translates things so literally. If something is wrong, she will straight up tell you. If you aren’t looking your best, she will let you know. If you breath stinks, she will say “go brush your teeth or I am going to throw up.” Hahaha.


Stevie Joy is SUPER smart. That’s why she loves being a “tricker buddy”. She can think of these little elaborate schemes and plans. I love her “scheming face”. She’s also super artistic and loves to draw and color. I have seen her sit down by herself for hours at a time writing and illustrating her own little books. I lost my favorite, but let me give you a plot summary. “There was a kitten. The kitten was white. The kitten was hungry. The kitten ate poop. The kitten is brown now.” Hahahaha. There are times, my kids make me fall over laughing.

Right now, she is super interested in playing Zelda. Together, we have played a few games. She absolutely loves them and likes to lay on my back when we play them together.
We made her "Link" costume from stuff laying around the house and duct tape. 
I think it turned out pretty sweet.




She also loves to entertain a crowd. We are alike in that sense. Her and I are extroverted people, but both can get a little shy. However, if it’s a group setting, that kind of relieves the pressure, because we’re sure that we can get at least one person to laugh. She loves to get in front of big crowds and perform. During her first dance recital, her little class did her dance and took their bows and everyone walked off stage while they dimmed the lights. Once the lights came back on Stevie was alone on the stage from and center just smiling and waving to the crowd. The teachers tried to call her off from the side, but she wasn’t having it. That girl loves the spotlight. They physically had to close the curtains on her to get her off. Hahahaha. I dying laughing and so proud. (I have the video somewhere,  if I find it, I’ll post it. It’s hilarious.) Also, every year at church I host the Christmas party. Mostly, it’s about an hour of dumb skits and jokes, that I think of like the day before this thing starts. Stevie wanted to be involved last year, so I let her pick out any video she wanted to show and come up on stage to do the introduction. Let’s just say not many people get her sense of humor, but I don’t think she noticed everyone’s confused faces because me and her were on the stage both dying laughing at this little movie she picked out and showed to the church.

This is pretty much our sense of humor. 
When they make that little cat hop across the snow, I.lose.it.every.time.


However, there are also times I fall over from being so upset as well. Stevie was really the only one who was affected by what happened with her parents because of her age and the fact that she is so observant. She still loves her mom very much and loves to draw her pictures and speaks very well of her. However, she was old enough to see and hear things from both mom and dad. We’ve had a bunch of talks about things and hurts she felt. During that time, I could see little pieces of her that I really loved kind of getting sucked out, mostly her self-confidence. Let’s just say when someone you love so much leaves you, even little kids can feel their value diminished. She kind of withdrew at school and always talked about how no one liked her. It was heartbreaking. However, I’ve made a conscious effort to slowly build up her self-esteem and confidence. She’s starting those things back and it makes me really happy.

Stevie is a very funny little girl; however when I talk about her, for some reason I always tend to talk about how sweet and serene she is. However, just to show she is super silly like the rest of us. Here’s the infamous "cat" video I talked about in an earlier post.  

Don't worry I cut the video before "everything went down" ;)

It’s hard to limit me talking about my kids to an individual post, since we are so tight, I could probably write a book on each of them in about 3 days.  Reading about them is one thing, but seeing the way talk, their mannerisms, and personalities I think will tell a lot more about them then I can explain through written words.  So I’m doing little videos with each of them answering questions to the camera. They should be really fun and are coming soon (Stevie’s should be posted tomorrow)

Be Blessed,

Seth

3 comments:

  1. You are an amazing father to make an effort to know each of your children as individuals. Stevie Joy is a gem!

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  2. I literally teared up watching your Frozen video. You are one amazing daddy and the kids are so abundantly blessed. I'm in awe.

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  3. I love how you love your children. I have 3 also. They are so talented and so gifted. I love teaching them to pray and they are close to God too. Louirle miracles. I wish I could have controlled my marriage falling apart. But sometimes you can’t control what the other person does and their disregard for Gods laws. I’ve learned a lot. I’m still single and I pray every day that one day I’ll meet a good man. It’s been 7 years for me being single and I’ve dedicated so much to my kids that I really haven’t had much time to look!!!

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