Dearest Eva,
Happy birthday to our amazing ten-year-old! As with every year, it is such a delight to celebrate you, our beautiful daughter! You are developing beautifully into a young lady, extremely kind and big-hearted and with a warm smile and graceful presence. We are in the middle of a big season of transition right now, and it is a joy to pause on all of the craziness of end-of-year events and moving details to celebrate your birthday well with friends and family.
You are completing fourth grade and thus grade school next week, quite a big step into young adulthood. We are proud of your hard work this last year. You have become extremely independent in school responsibilities, and you were even able to perform well on all of your fourth grade exams, opening up the door for you to attend Gymnasium next year! You are ready! You have become quite the math wiz, and you have been able to master all of the requirements in German for fourth grade. Well done! This year, your class got to perform in the big Monsterfreunde concert at the Stadthalle, and that was a great experience! You completed your ballet classes at the Vienna Music School this year. You finally got to have a true performance, and your class did such an amazing clown dance. You were amazing! You took a few months of violin lessons from December to February, and although you were picking it up beautifully, we decided that the pressure to practice was too much this year with fourth grade exams. We were proud of you for trying and deciding it wasn’t the right time. Dyslexia training with Christine has continued well, and you have enjoyed doing homework online after school with friends.
Friendships have stayed stable this year, Adele and Eliza remaining your strongest school friends, and Charlotte, Julia, and Emma your closest church friends. You attended Jungscharlager in July with Jula! The church retreat at Jufa Neutal was a definite highlight; Julia stayed with us in the summer house, and the two of you were independent and responsible the entire four days! This year allowed your class to have another Adventsingen, and the church organized a Christmas advent skit on Christmas Eve, in which you were a dancing angel. You continue to value inclusion, both for yourself and others, and you have even begun to recognize that about yourself.
You enjoy riding your new birthday bike, crafting and creating beautiful projects and gifts with paper or jewelry or clothes, playing on your ipad, and connecting with friends. Tiger Lily cuddles are essential. Visits with family were special this last year, both here in Vienna and in the States last summer. You especially enjoyed the week we spent in Boston with the Cioffis, our family week in Colorado with the Shaffers and Gimples, being together with the Bryans and Kings in Michigan, and Hallstatt with the Shaffers. Krishana stayed with us for a while this Spring, and it was special to continue bonding with her as well, including ice skating at Rathaus. A highlight of this last year for you was our mother-daughter trip to the Pyramid hotel in Brunn. We had such a special time swimming, eating delicious food, shopping, watching movies, and relaxing together as mom and daughter.
Finally, this year brought the excitement and disappointments of house hunting and now the anticipation of moving into our long-term home in Maria Enzersdorf in less than two weeks! You longed for a top-floor room and a bath tub, and God provided you a beautiful room with tall ceilings and wooden beams and a home with a bathtub! You even have a view of the hills. You are excited about this move, and we are confident God will provide you friends in our new home and neighborhood.
Our dear Eva, we love you so much, and we love sharing life with you! Happy Birthday!
Your mommy and daddy
10-Year-Old Eva
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