Adele is 18!

Adele deeply felt the full impact of legally leaving her childhood. She felt the celebrations should fit the magnitude of her feelings. She went through several iterations of her birthday "weekend" and this is how this "action figure"brought in a new stage in life:

FRIDAY NIGHT
Let the celebrations begin! Tennie came home for the weekend she, Adele and Ceci went to Little Women, followed by pizza at The Pie, followed by a Goodly Cookies run.

SATURDAY DAY/EVENING
Adele's day plans fell through (hot springs with friends) and she fretted about a plan B. Finally, she and her sisters hit a fun little store they all love, met a friend at Sugar House Coffee (Adele's favorite homework spot), and then went out to a super yummy sushi place, just the three of them, followed by a movie at home.

SUNDAY (ACTUAL BIRTHDAY)
After church and Come Follow Me we prepped for a birthday dinner with local family. She didn't want the traditional treasure hunt, but instead asked for memories instead. Hmmmm. So I brainstormed and looked through old Hello from Seattle letters I used to write before starting this blog and came up with the following snippets of Adele. Each had a clue attached, to keep with the treasure hunt tradition.

Remember in Auburn when Adele was about 8 and Edie Hardman was her Primary teacher? Adele had a strong desire to touch everything as a child, and sister Hardman had very interesting hair. In the middle of class, Adele walked up and touched her hair!

Remember when Adele was 6 and we were in Hawaii. Adele had a FIVE DOLLAR BILL! In a store where she wanted to buy something we encouraged her to “break her 5”. She then ripped it in half!

As soon as Adele could walk she went for peoples shoes. She tried on every pair of shoes she came across.

Remember the Family Night where we talked about the importance of being nice and not inviting contention into the home? Adele exclaimed, “I could really do that if I were an only child!”

Remember the time we spent a night in Nevada, breaking up the trip to Utah? Adele asked if I heard the birds tweeting earlier that morning. Knowing her complete distaste for the state of Nevada I said, sarcastically, “What do birds in Nevada have to tweet about?” To which she quickly replied in a bird call, “Casin-o, Casin-o, Casin-o!”

Remember when Geoff took Adele with him on a work trip to DC when she was 3 and Ink about her a bag of 1,000-piece chicle gum for her birthday. Adele was in heaven. Right then and there she chewed about 750 pieces, filling up their small trash can with barely-chewed wads. This is what I wrote about her in that week’s Hello From Seattle soon after their return:  She loves chewing her endless birthday gum so much that she’ll dress up in coat, hat, gloves and boots and go stand on the porch so she can chew a piece.  When out she’ll chew a piece just enough to get some teeth marks in it, spit it out and start another.  This chain chewing can go on for an hour and keeps her quite entertained.

Remember when Adele was 3 and she made up her own little lingo? She would say things like, “Let’s go to Trader Jodie’s” or “I want Frenchie” for French toast.

Remember when Adele was little and anytime something was hot she would say, “Hot, hot, hot…hot chocolate!”

Remember when Adele was small and she was scared of public toilets flushing, as if they might swallow her whole?

Remember when Adele was really small and we bought her ladybugs? I wrote this in a Hello From Seattle about the day:  Today we bought (Adele) some ladybugs.  Tennie is growing her indoor garden and has the caterpillar process to attend to so we wanted Adele to have something of her own.  In contrast to Tennie who is bug-loving, Adele said, “I have so many it is ok if I smash one” (There are 1500 ladybugs!!!)  In the backyard she didn’t seem to mind too much that they were crawling on her, but if she saw one on the ground she would slyly walk over and stomp the bijibies out of it.  Tennie found one that was nearly dead and was cradling it in her arms hoping that through positive mental force and verbal encouragement it might come back to strength.  She put it on the ground and turned for a moment and Adele went over and stomped it to smithereens.  Tennie was mortified and let the whole neighborhood know.  It was a pure manifestation of their individuality.

This was from one week in a Hello From Seattle when Adele was 3:  Adele is so relieved to be eating dairy again.  Last week in one of her prayers she said, “Dear Heavenly Father, I love my friends.  I love Jesus.  I love normal milk.  And normal cheese…the orange kind without soy – it’s yummy!  Amen.  Another prayer last week went like this, “Dear Heavenly Father, I love my friends.  I love Jesus.  I love candy – all kinds; and gum!  I love dad.  Amen.  After clear warning Adele called Tennie “stupid” (she just had so see how it rolled off her tongue) and so went to the bathroom for the consequence…soap on the tongue. She came out with a contorted face and Tennie asked her what it tasted like.  Adele paused searching for just the right description and said, “It tastes like pee…with salt and pepper!” 

Adele's quick wit lives on too! Lots of good laughs with the treasure hunt.

Adele requested chicken tacos with slaw as her birthday dinner, and we fed the crowd. She also confessed she doesn't really like cake, and could she have donuts instead?

We had a sign up to capture favorite things, as well as an eye-level section where the little guys could draw her a picture, which all did.

 

Knowing Adele's love of quizzes and this or thats, I created a little quiz to see who knew the birthday girl best. Turns out it was Ceci. How would you have done? (This is Adele's with her answers, some of which she couldn't choose.)

Geoff had put together a slideshow of Adele's life in pictures, so we concluded the party watching her adorableness through the years. Since she had no expectations other than dinner, she was pleasantly surprised and had a great actual birthday.

(Britt provided all of the birthday pictures with people in them. Thanks, Britt!)

Loads of family and friends, and even many acquaintances, reached out expressing good wishes and what they love about her. It made her feel so good. In her own unique way she draws so many people to her. She is so easy to love.

I failed to mention that Nikki was out of town for her birthday, so she took her and Ceci to the same yummy sushi place earlier in the week.

And the next day life went on as normal.

Laie, Hawaii

The morning after Adele returned from Girl's Camp, she and I were off to a quick trip to Hawaii to check out BYU-Hawaii! We have a busy June, and this was the only window to visit the school while students were still there and before school starts in the Fall and her life revs up again.

We haven't been to Hawaii in years. Adele remembered it through a 7-year-old lens and at the resort in Maui we used to go to every year when escaping the rainy winters of Seattle, so the hot and humid weather of summer and the local, small town of Laie was so different than we both expected. We stayed in a small, cheap Airbnb that didn't have AC or a necessary cross-breeze, so we melted to sleep every night while there, observed the feeling of being in a different country and quickly adapted to our environs and fell in love with the place.

Sunday was our first full day there. We went to a student ward and then walked to the Temple. Wow is it beautiful! What a setting!

At the visitor's center we watched a short movie on the history of Laie that was so fascinating! Missionaries from our church, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, began gathering converts to this small town as early as 1860. It was a tight-knit fishing and sugar cane community and they worshipped together in a beautiful chapel. Somewhere around the turn of the century the chapel burned down. The villagers were devastated. They were poor and didn't have enough money to rebuild. They came up with the idea to invite tourists to Laie to eat traditional Hawaiian foods, perform native dancing to a song they wrote called, The Hukilau, and teach them to fish with the large nets that provided their livelihood. People came, and then they came in large numbers! And the "luau", as we know it, with Hawaiian foods and dancing, was born. The man who greeted the guests had lost his three middle fingers in a work accident. The children first mimicked his wave, and soon it caught on as a sign of mutual respect, love and goodwill...

Can you believe this history?! This cultural "business" rebuilt a new chapel in Laie for the faithful and hardworking Saints, and later it became The Polynesian Cultural Center, or the PCC. The PCC is the top visited site in Hawaii and one of the Top Ten Trip Advisor sites in America! We hadn't planned to visit the PCC during our short stay, but we sat next to a cute Laie resident on the airplane who offered to get us in for free, so of course we went!

This is really a fun place to visit! I went when I was 10-years-old and still remembered it! There are different "villages" of the Polynesian Islands, such as Hawaii, Samoa, Tonga, Fiji, Aotearoa (Maori for New Zealand) and Tahiti, all with their own cultural, hands-on activities.

There was a show on the river at one point. It happened to be during a downpour. We stayed dry under an umbrella with this adorable Cambodian student selling pineapples who reminded us why and and how much we love the people from that country!

We took a boat ride through the villages and wandered through the fun shops and food vendors. We tasted our first Dole Whip. Oh my.

In the evening we attended a luau, which was super fun with delicious food and beautiful dancing.

Following dinner we went to the night show which has traditional dancing from all of the Polynesian islands. It was incredible. Let me pause here to say that BYU-Hawaii has 70 different nationalities making it the most diverse collage per capita in the United States. Most of these students would never have the opportunity to attend a university, let alone a university in the US, but the PCC was created to give them a place to work their way through school. This was a great opportunity for Adele to see the variety of students at BYU-Hawaii. They are energetic, fun, hard-working and committed. It was a youthful and energizing environment. What a place.

We met with the Director of Admissions at BYU-Hawaii who was extremely helpful, informative and overwhelmingly kind. We learned so many amazing things about this small but powerful university. It has an average of 2800 students with over 50% being international (from 70 countries!) Graduation requirements require a major and two minors (or certificates), allowing students to have a well-rounded education and a strong skill set. Because of the small student body, the classes are small and intimate; professors know all of their students well. The international representation contributes to insightful discussions and an expanding worldview. This is right up Adele's alley!

We took a tour of the small campus, took a peek into the dorms, met some nice students and had an overall very positive impression.

We were also both really inspired by the university's mission to educate and strengthen students from developing countries so they can return and build their own communities and countries. They get a loan and work (at the PCC) for a full-ride "scholarship". Each year they are back in their countries their loan is forgiven 25%, meaning after four years back in their countries their US university education is paid for. This is the incentive to get them back to build their home countries. In addition, they educate students in peace-building with the intention of spreading peace throughout the world. Lastly, the university and PCC are part of the Laie community with its rich history of unity and faith, and the community is part of the university and PCC. For example, the university library is the community library (Laie is very small!) and the students and residents are intermingled, often sharing the same dwellings. We loved this community feel. It is small and intimate. And it doesn't hurt that it is in view of the ocean! Yeah, SOLD.

Every morning we got a Bonzai Bowl acai bowl and ate them with a view of the sand and water. Soooo good!

We spent a few hours in Honolulu on day just to make sure a city was nearby with all of its action and amenities.

Our last day we explored the North Shore. We went snorkeling and read on the beach. We explored the little town of Haleiwa and had a delicious lunch, we stopped and browsed roadside shacks and shops and ended the day at the beach in Laie for the sunset.

It was short and beautiful and we accomplished the purpose of our trip: would Adele be interested in attending BYU-Hawaii. The answer was a strong YES.

Prom

I'm really behind! But here I am getting back in the saddle of recording our lives!

Adele has a really great group of friends this year. They spend a lot of time together and have a lot of fun together. They all paired up to go to prom, and Adele went with a friend named Victor.

This month, right in the midst of studying for an AP (US History) test, Adele's school announced that it would close at the end of the year. It is a long, complicated story about how it came to such dire financial circumstances, a story I won't tell here. Geoff and I spent many hours upon hearing the announcement going to meetings, having phone calls and endlessly texting a friend on the board trying to find solutions to keep it open, or at a minimum replaced, but to no avail. Parent and students were devastated. It is a special school. Adele and friends were franticly trying to find a way to stay together next year. It was a stressful and emotional week as there was a period of trying to find possible solutions. Prom was all that much more sweet and significant for this sweet group of kids.

Snapshot of Adele – Part 2

Adele is totally uncomfortable with me writing about her. She isn’t one who likes a lot of attention. But I want to capture this time in her life! 

Geoff’s family has a tradition that we have carried on in our family. On one’s birthday, during dinner, everyone goes around the table and says something they love about the birthday person. We all do it in our individual families, but we also do it over text, or when we gather. I’m going to include what family had to say about Adele on her 17^th birthday:

Brittany

Happy birthday darling Adele! You are the personification of pure goodness. Your desire to do what is right, awareness of others and their feelings, and selfless nature is inspiring to me. You are beautiful inside and out and I love your effortless style and grace. I would always choose to be around you and love telling stories, laughing and spending time with you. You bring light into every room you walk into and I truly admire the woman you are! I love you sweet Delo!

Ingrid

I love all the things Britt said about you, Adele! And I love your genuine kindness to little kids and babies. I love your artistic talents and flair. I love your adorable handwriting. I love how much you love to be together with family. I love your good ideas and your commitment to follow through on them. I love your desire to make a difference and change the world. I love your wisdom and ability to assess situations. I love you so much, Adele, and hope you are filled to overflowing with how much this family adores you!!!

Ian

Happy Birthday Del!! You are awesome in so many ways. You are thoughtful and always mindful of others. You have a great eye for beautiful things and you are an amazing artist. You are funny and make others feel funny. It is always fun to be around you. Hope you have an incredible day turning 17!!

Erica

17 is crazy! I feel I just barely grew out of being 17. In some ways I can’t believe you are so old, and in others you have seemed so mature for so long that it seems like it’s about time that your age catches up to your soul.  You are wise and kind and thoughtful and creative and socially exceptionally talented. You bring people together in significant ways and are a remarkable power for good. You are gentle and sensitive. I love you!  Happy Birthday!

Booch

Happy Birthday Adele! I love your personality so much! You are such and incredible human being, your smile is contagious, your heart is as big as the ocean, your soul is purely golden good, your joy for life shines through your eyes, your love for adventure is unmatched, your love for your family is adorable, and your talents flow from every part of your being. You are so much fun to be around and you have a way of making everyone you talk to feel so special. We are so grateful to be in your family and honored to be able to watch you grow as a beautiful young lady. We hope this is your best birthday and your most amazing year yet. Love you always! Happy birthday!

Lucie (cousin)

Happy birthday Adele!!!! Also, this is Lucie ‘yo!

Nikki

Happy happy birthday, Delo!!!! I love SO many things about you! I love how much you invest in people. You love fully and unconditionally and fiercely! You prioritize people and experiences over everything else. I love how special and appreciated and awesome you make me feel every single time I come to your house or you see me. You really know how to make people feel like a million bucks! I love how thoughtful and kind and sensitive you are, and how you’d do anything or give anything in the world for anyone else. I love how passionate are about helping people and how determined and resourceful you are at finding ways to help people. I love how adventurous and fearless you are when you travel. You are one amazing chickadee and I am so grateful to be in your family. I love you so much. Happy day, sweet 17!

Poppop

Happy Birthday Adele. You are really a unique individual. It’s been a great privilege to watch you grow up and to be a part of your life. Thanks for your kindnesses and love. You have so many talents and great gifts. I hope and pray you feel good about the way you use them in your life.

  

Me

Adele has had many family and personal trials, all of which she has pushed through with such admirable grit and determination. She pushes, sometimes for years and years, without giving up, and has come through stronger and better for it.

Ceci

Adele is always really quick to apologize. Or if she sees that her mood or behavior is affecting another’s in a negative way, she is quick to change and say sorry.

There are some obvious themes through everyone’s kind words. I’ll let those speak for themselves.

But a few more things:

Adele loves lists – lists of things she wants to learn, do, tasks or any other possible list of something!

Adele loves little books and journals to practice lettering, drawing or to make lists and calendars.

.

Adele LOVES plants.

Adele receives love by getting small, thoughtful gifts or notes. One time, a few years ago, she asked if she could give me some money so I could buy things and leave them on her pillow. Mental note taken. I didn’t take her money, but she gets small surprises on her bed often.

She also leaves very kind notes, or notes of apology frequently.

Adele adores our cat Mila.

She always has a candle burning in her room. And she always smells good.

Adele is not a time-waster. She likes to be DOING stuff.

In summary, to know Adele is to love her.

Snapshot of Adele – Part 1

I’m going to start doing snapshots of the birthday person that will include more specific details about what they are doing and their hobbies, interests and pursuits at the time. Sometimes some details get lost in only mentioning events, so this may help capture a little more of the personality and person on a given year.

(PHOTO CREDIT: All photos in Adele's snapshot posts were taken by Tennie's friend Lindsay during a trip to the Salt Flats this past fall.)

Starting this past year, Adele began to grow. She has always been super petite, and probably always will be, but people are not mistaking her for three years younger anymore. She is looking older and taller. Right along with that growth came a huge launch of self. Her characteristics have always been there, but they are manifesting themselves in bigger, more obvious ways. Getting a driver’s license helped. This girls always wanted to go places, and now she is off!

She was uncertain where she wanted to go to school this past fall. She wanted a certain reality for herself, and after much deliberation, she created it for herself. She returned to her old school, but chose to take AP and Honors classes in core subjects, except math which she is doing on her own at her own pace during flex periods. This means not meeting state requirements or getting a paper high school diploma, which means she will apply to college as a "homeschool" student, but this also allows her to pursue what she loves and not sit bored in classes she doesn't find interesting. It was a great creation for herself.

She went after an internship at the IRC (International Rescue Committee) where she now teaches the beginner English class once a week to a handful of refugees. She is exploring getting a ESL certificate in the next year at the Salt Lake Community College. She LOVES working with refugees and is constantly finding possible summer opportunities to work in refugee camps around the world, humanitarian jobs she would be excited about, etc. The world will be open to her when she turns 18!

She got a job at Target making $12.50 an hour over the holidays. It was simply a job to make money for her to pursue dreams. She is an amazing saver and has an unusual knack at money management and responsibility. She also has a great business sense. One of Geoff’s favorite stories to tell about Adele is a time when he was trying to help her with a hard school subject when she was maybe 10 or 11, and she wasn't wanting to do it. He facetiously said, “You better work on this or you’ll be working at McDonalds your whole life.” Adele quickly retorted, “I’ll be the CEO of McDonald’s!”

Just since Christmas she has decided to give Decca a go. She’s a little late to the game, but her friends are helping her and she is going for it. I think she will compete in hospitality management, at least that was her direction as of this past week. I’m proud of her for talking something new and unfamiliar. This is characteristic of her this past year.

She is the co-chair of the youth board for Choice Humanitarian, a local humanitarian organization. This entails helping at Choice events, but it is also a fundraising endeavor. They meet monthly, and then before a fundraising event those meetings are weekly. She organizes the board members and leads the meetings.

This year she is in charge of the girl’s camp at church. The stake and ward leaders want the young women to develop leadership abilities, so they assist, when needed, but the young women plan the camp. This year they chose one leader, Adele, to oversee all other committees. Adele is totally capable of this. It will really rev up over the next few months.

And then there is SAT prep. She’s got big decisions for her big future ahead!

Lastly, for today, Adele has a great group of friends. They are all smart, high-achieving young women, all on the petite side, and a powerful force. They all have a great style and love to shop together; they love Pho Soup and Coffee Houses (Adele is a big hot drink lover and loves herbal teas); she meets her friend Sami for yoga once a week and they all study together, sometimes over Facetime until the wee hours of the night.

To be continued…

The Dancing Queen is 17!

I don’t know about you at your house, but Mama Mia soundtracks are common listening fare, and it was obvious that Dancing Queen would be a theme song on Adele’s 17^th birthday; it was played, on signs, on friend’s Instagram stories and she even did a post herself using it.

Adele had her whole Saturday birthday planned out for weeks. First sleep in until 9:00, then breakfast (eggs, sausage and potatoes), then yoga at Core Power Yoga, followed by the traditional treasure hunt and presents. Our treasure hunt’s first clue is always on the fridge, just like it was when I was a girl. Tennie did the clues this year. They’re getting trickier and harder to come up with!

Adele loves lots of gifts. We have a birthday budget for gifts and a party. They can spend the party money or keep it for themselves. These days most of that money is saved, but when I asked Adele how much she wanted me to spend on gifts she replied, “All of it!” She had a long wish list (as she did for Christmas), and most of the items were relatively inexpensive, so she had a pile of gifts at the end of the hunt.

On with her planned day, we headed to lunch at Sawadi (favorite Thai restaurant), followed by Menchies Frozen Yogurt where two of her best friends met us. From there we broke off from Geoff, Tennie (who was in town for the big day) and Ceci and went with her two friends up to a friend’s Heber house for the night. I was along to cook a little and be a token chaperone, but these are good friends who laughed and did funny things all night. I checked out as they started their movie marathon at 9:00PM! Those crazies stayed up until 4:30AM! Here is Alexa, Adele and Raja, late night extraordinaires. 

Yesterday those girls had a late morning before we headed home. In the afternoon Geoff’s family gathered at our place for a potluck taco salad bar, more gifts and relishing in cute Adele being 17.

How is it possible? How does the time of childhood pass so slowly when they are young and then speed up in their teens so that we blink and they’re grown?

Happiest 17th, dancing queen!