That's My Girl

Class starts Wednesday, and I have a mountain of lesson prep to do (not sped along by the hour and a half I spent on the phone with Mom this morning, something we almost never do), so this will be a short entry.  Just wanted to share a quick Kiddo anecdote for your Monday morning.

As you know, I love books.  I love the written word.  And we have worked hard to make Kiddo a voracious reader.  She was reading on her own at four, and she is quite unstoppable now, reading anything you put in front of her.  She loves books, and I couldn't be happier.  Today, her appetite for reading netted her some recognition on the morning school tv broadcast, and I got to see her accept the AR (Accelerated Reader) trophy on behalf of her class.  Needless to say, she was incredibly excited.  (She was also the only girl top-reader.  Way to represent, Kiddo!)

But as proud as I am of her love and skill for reading, I think my heart swells even more for her obsession with writing/creating stories.  This girl loves to tell a story and has a story for every occasion.  She writes them, illustrates them, and then demands staples or binder clips to hold together her latest work of genius.  I deeply admire her complete lack of inhibitions with regard to her writing, and her assumption that everything she writes and illustrates is a masterpiece that will garner accolades from everyone who encounters it.

So here's the story with all the feels:

The other day when I picked her up from school, I was listening to one of my bookish podcasts, a recommendation request show called, Get Booked, from Book Riot.  The hosts were talking about a fantasy series author who used to write straight literary fiction but switched to fantasy after a request from his little girl to write "a book about a little girl who saves the world."  I don't remember the book or the author.  I probably wouldn't have remembered what they said at all if not for what happened next.

We got home and after the usual homework and settling in, Kiddo disappeared to her room to work on something that involved copious amounts of printer paper and markers.  I happened to walk past later, and she called me in.  Waving a page she was still writing on and illustrating she said, "I'm writing a book about an ordinary girl who saves the world.  Your podcast inspired me."

Have you ever just wanted to squeeze your kid until their little eyeballs bugged out?  It was one of those moments where you look at your child and think, Yep, she's mine.  She elaborated, "I was listening to you podcast, and when they said that about the book about the girl who saves the world, I just loved it.  So, of course, that meant I had to write about it.

Well, obviously.