Everyone says it. Our family, friends and acquaintances are in agreement – our two middle children look just like each other. They could pass for twins, except for the fact that Sammie is almost 5 and Disney is 2½ – so twins years apart, you might say. Don’t believe me? Nothing like photographic evidence…
Our oldest child was always “the good one”. She was responsible, logical, creative, and very helpful with her 3 younger siblings. A few months ago, things changed. Not a day went by when she didn’t have a tantrum or when she was the worst behaved kid of the day. What has happened to our sweet little girl, we wondered? Are these teenage hormone changes kicking in, and will we not see any relief until she’s grown up? With a high-maintenance spitfire 4-year-old, a toddler deep within the throes of the “terrible twos” and a baby in the house, how would we ever make it, especially without the help of our “model” kid?
I was so frustrated with her behavior that I did a simple google search for ‘moody 9 year old’. What I found was a HUGE relief in the form of a very informative article that helped to define the behavior of a child going through this particular transition period. Most people aren’t aware of any traditional behavior problems in the average 9-year-old child, but this article described my daughter to a “T” (and her name is Taylor, haha) But seriously, the article was a huge load off! Not only did it totally describe the alarming behavior changes, but it also gave survival tips for the rest of the family. Coincidentally, ever since I read the article, her behavior has improved and she’s pretty much back to normal. But if we should have a relapse or if someone else does a search for ‘moody 9 year old” and they’re led to my blog, here is a copy of the helpful article:
From https://www.informedfamilylife.org/2005/01/parenting_the_nine_year_old.html
This article by Rahima Baldwin Dancy on “Parenting the Nine Year Old” describes the developmental changes of the nine-year-old child and how parents and Waldorf education meet this psychological stage. It first appeared in Mothering, Summer, 1989.
Parents of nine year olds often wonder, “What is happening to my child?” Children at this age can become very critical and argumentative, or very moody and withdrawn. Nightmares, irrational fears, headaches and stomachaches often arise. Some children feel as if no one at school likes them, or others become suddenly self-conscious about being rich, poor, or otherwise “different.” Parents may be accused of being unfair or of not understanding, as the child rushes off and slams his or her door.
Searching for an explanation for the changes in behavior, parents sometimes blame a new teacher, a recent move, changes in the family such as separation or the birth of a sibling, or simply “growing pains”. An understanding of what is actually taking place can help us avoid needless worry and provide the support and guidance that children need during this time.
What is Happening?
The special needs of the nine year old are the result of an important change in consciousness that marks the end of early childhood and the transition to a new developmental phase. Rudolf Steiner, the founder of Waldorf education, states, “In the ninth year the child really experiences a complete transformation of its being, which indicates an important transformation of its soul-life and its bodily-physical experiences.”
Earlier, before the age of five or so, the child has a dreamlike state of consciousness in which the outer world and inner experience end to flow together. Outer events are not “observed,” but are deeply taken in through unconscious imitation. Whereas babies learn nearly everything through imitation, kindergarten-age children continue to imitate many aspects of their world, such as the movements of the teacher or parent.
While the power of imitation is so strong, the child feels united with the world and experiences no sense of aloneness. But with the loss of this power around the age of nine, the child feels separated from the world. Something that was hidden and slumbering begins to awaken. Nine year olds suddenly have a strong experience of themselves as separate beings, with a new feeling of distance from the world and other people. This sense of self, first experienced around age two-and-a-half, recurs now in a much deeper way, as the inner emotional life of the child begins to develop.
Although children react differently to leaving the sweet, dreamlike world of early childhood, one response is nearly universal: children become more conscious of their surroundings. You will probably find that what was once passed by unnoticed is suddenly focused on and questioned. This awakening to the world may be met with quiet astonishment or sharp criticism, depending on the child’s temperament.
A critical child may notice whether the statements people make are grounded in the real world or are a veneer. He or she may begin to question parents and teachers, wondering, “How do they know everything?” and, indeed, “Do they really know everything?” Something in the child is seeking reassurance that the authority of the adult will stand the test of quality, and that it carries an inner certainty.
In contrast, another child may become more withdrawn and start to look under the bed at night, or may have frequent stomachaches in response to this new sense of being alone. Parents whose children suddenly want to be alone often feel as if they are “losing” their children, as if the children no longer want to share their developing inner worlds. This is a time when intimations of mortality and death can enter a child’s consciousness. Religious questions and concerns about good and evil may also emerge with the child’s increased self-awareness and sense of choice and responsibility.
Usually, within six months after the ninth birthday (and sometimes earlier), the children are profoundly aware of this new sense of separateness between the self and the outer world. As the “I” penetrates into awareness, children begin to experience themselves as self-contained beings. The often feel as though they are in a threshold situation, poised, as it were, on the cusp of their own destiny. A 70-year-old woman wrote of this time in her life: “In this year I had a significant I-experience. I had just come from school in the city and had to change trams. In this moment of waiting, the complete certainty came to me that now all of life lay before me and that I was the one that must travel it.
Essentially, the nine year old is experiencing his or her own identity-to become a separate individuality, able to confront the outer world. Ideally, the child comes through this difficult time with a sense of connection with his or her higher self, a kind of “knowing” that will remain even after the heightened awareness is integrated.
My son spent many difficult months in the throes of “the nine-year change.” One night, as he popped out of bed for the third time, I had to muster great self-control to say, “What now?” “I’m glad I’m me!” he announced, radiating like the sun. He went on to explain, “It’s just like the song “The Age of Not Believing.” The words of the Disney song ran through my mind: “You must face the age of not believing, doubting everything you ever knew. Until at last you start believing, there’s something wonderful in you.” We all shared in his joy and thanked God that family life could once again return to normal.
Parenting Tips
What can parents do to help their child through this important turning point at age nine?
– Understanding what is happening will help both your child and yourself as a parent. When both parents, or parents together with the teacher, consider a child and his real needs, it can help give the child balance. Be patient– this, too, shall pass. Ten is a wonderfully harmonious time between the crisis at age nine and adolescence, when the next intensifying of self-consciousness occurs.
– Be willing to let your child have her own inner emotional life. You can’t “fix it.” Honor her need for privacy or her sudden impatience with a younger sister. Be willing to let go and tolerate distance. Your relationship is changing and will improve again once alterations have been completed. Be nearby with understanding and reassurance that she is still loved.
– Share your thoughts with your child about things that go beyond the every-day affairs of life. But don’t limit your child by providing “answers” or definitions that can’t grow within the child when asked about things like God or death.
– Have faith in self-healing, in your child’s ability to come through this phase. Support individual artistic activity that attracts your child (writing poetry, keeping a diary, drawing or painting, music).
– Support your child’s interest in the world by providing opportunities to build things, visit a farm, plant a garden, do work in the real world. Encourage a connection with the plant and animal kingdoms and with simple human creative activities now before the child explores the world of technology, which is more appropriate for adolescence.
– Nourish your child with stories that illustrate the interconnectedness of life and the powers of fate and destiny. The story of Joseph and his coat of many colors has this element of the dream heralding his destiny and the patience he needed to see it manifest. In the curriculum of the Waldorf schools, the Old Testament stories are .told in third grade because they mirror 2- the inner state of the nine-year-old child. The creation story, for example, describes the child’s own experience of leaving the paradisiacal realm of early childhood, acquiring new self-awareness, and with it the added dimensions of choice and increasing responsibility for one’s actions. In fourth grade the heroic tales of the Norse myths represent the exploits of the new ego in larger- than-life fashion. The Waldorf curriculum also introduces the child to the world through projects in house-building, farming, and the study of the plant and animal kingdoms, not as abstract sciences, but in relation to the human being.
– Recognize that the child needs to establish a new respect for adult authority that goes beyond the blind acceptance of the younger child. Parents can encourage this by honoring a child’s new relationship with a teacher or other adults in his life. Steiner states, “What matters is that at this moment in life, the child can find someone–whether this be one person or possibly several persons is of less importance–whose picture it can carry through life.”(3) Parents can also help themselves be this kind of authority by presenting a united front to the child and by both sitting down with the child when questions of discipline arise (single parents may want to bring in a teacher or other adult during this time).
The magnitude of the changes that a child of this age is going through can be better understood if you contemplate the differences between the child of seven and the child of twelve. The seven year old is light-hearted and always in movement. The limbs are active for learning (through touching, doing, walking the times tables, and so forth). In contrast, the head is relatively large and still dreamy. The seven year old is just beginning to get adult teeth. His or her emotions are easily influenced by impressions from the world, with tears changing to smiles relatively easily.
The twelve year old, on the other hand, has a head that is very awake for thinking and longer limbs which seem heavy, tired, and often awkward to control. There is a rich and sometimes over-powering inner emotional life; the older child brings a great deal more to each experience. Physically, the sexual organs are beginning to mature as the child enters puberty.
The nine-year-old is in the middle between the world of early childhood and the world of adolescence. The physical and emotional changes which you may observe in your nine-year-old child are the outer manifestations of the tremendous change in consciousness which is going on within the child’s expanding inner world. By understanding the nature of these changes, we can better provide support in parenting the nine year old.
Awakening to the world and a new sense of self brings with it a new need: to understand the real world of everyday life, while at the same time long for intimations of something beyond ordinary life. As parents and teachers, our task is to become loving authorities for the growing child, sharing both a true picture of the world and a sense of our own inner striving.
It’s no secret that our formally sweet daughter Disney is in the throes of the ‘terrible twos’ right now. One minute she’ll be snuggling… But the next minute, she’ll be spitting, pinching, hitting, pulling hair, or one of the other horrible behaviors that define the ‘terrible twos’. So the other night, we had some friends over for a game night – a bunch of adults sitting around the table snacking, talking and playing games, and the kids were kind of hyper. Attempting to calm them down, I suggested putting a movie on the big tv and letting them watch it downstairs, and so our two oldest laid down to watch it peacefully. Their baby brother went to bed without fuss, and all was well until Disney decided to wreak havoc upon her unsuspecting sisters. As they were laying down trying to watch the movie, she began sitting on them – spitting on them, pinching them, and basically just trying to do her best to make their lives miserable for the moment. We separated the kids, and Disney came over to the adult’s table to finish her special treat of root beer – and that’s when it hit me – she was on a sugar high! Sure enough, after she chugged down her root beer, she began going for (and at a record pace) the gumballs from her Strawberry Shortcake gumball machine she had gotten for Valentine’s Day. Some game night friends noticed this, and Cathy distracted her while John passed the gumball machine to Jamy, who passed it to me. I hid it under my shirt and stealthly (or so I thought) left the room with Dis at my heels…
I made it to the bathroom where I was able to stash the gumball machine without her noticing, and although she did ask about it, we were able to avoid fueling the two-year-old fire any further, and within an hour, she fell asleep. It only took 4 adults to stage a sugar intervention for our two-year-old, and thank goodness they did because too much sugar+terrible two’s = horror for everyone!
So thanks everyone, for staging Disney’s intervention – we all know it was for her and OUR own good!
We were grocery shopping the other night and my 9-year-old daughter was jumping around and telling us about some kind of dance she was learning in gym class. “And then you dance with the pole…”, she said, and that got our attention – pole dancing in gym class? She then went on to explain that they have 2 little poles (closer to stick-sized, it sounds like) the kids dance with… but you can see where I’m coming from. In this day and age, pole dancing has a much different meaning. It’s something popularized in the adult entertainment industry, and because I’ve heard that it’s recently found its way into normal (?) families’ homes as a form of exercise. Not that I know of anyone who actually exercises this way (and if any of my friends or family reading this have taken up pole dancing, I really don’t want to know about it, even if it is just for exercise!), but for a minute during my daughter’s story, I was worried that this form of “exercise” had become SO mainstream that they were teaching it in the schools! I couldn’t be happier to be wrong, but the misunderstanding makes for a funny story!
Saturday was one of the funnest days I’ve had in a long time. I’ve been having major zoo-fever lately, and my husband knew this and renewed our Toledo Zoo membership online before I even woke up Saturday morning. When I finally arose, he said, how about going to the zoo today? So we packed up all the kids, and took advantage of the almost 50° weather and headed to the zoo. We first ate lunch at our new favorite eating establishment in the Toledo area; a place called Nick’s Cafe on Reynolds Road in Maumee. They have excellent gyros and scrumptious Greek salads, just to name a couple of their delicious dishes… pretty much everything is made from scratch. Potatoes are sliced up for french fries right there in the kitchen, gyros are off the spit, the burger meat is hand-rolled… you get the idea. Awesome food and great service too. Highly recommended from this hard-to-please food critic!
On Saturday, everyone at Nick’s was staring at us because of our four five adorable kids – we let our oldest invite her friend along who had slept over the night before. It made for a mini-van filled to capacity, but I’m so glad we invited her because she is a great kid, a big help (especially with our little ones because in her family, she is smack dab in the middle of 5 in birth order and knows how to help in cases of sibling rivalry!), and she had never been to a zoo before! If I had known that, we would have taken her sooner… Every kid needs to get to a zoo! This little girl is 9-years-old and for me, a highlight of my trip on Saturday was getting to witness her experience the zoo for the first time: the cuteness of a real-life cheetah, the immensity of a white rhinoceros, the playfulness of the baby orangutans… I’m currently reading Jack Hanna’s new book, My Wild Life right now and it details many of the trials and tribulations the Director Emeritus of the Columbus Zoo has gone through to get where he is today. In one chapter, he addresses his many critics (people who protest live animals being held captive in zoos, as well as protesting Jack’s taking animals on television show appearance tours), and Jack says something in defense of these practices which I completely agree with: Captive animals are ambassadors of their cousins in the wild. We NEED to have zoos and reach out to the public with animal tv appearances; it’s the only way to get people to care enough to help with conservation.
So anyway on Saturday, after lunch, we made our way to the zoo. When we first got in, we discovered there was going to be a magic show in the Museum of Science (one of those old Works Progress Administration buildings from the post-Great Depression era; I love their architecture!). We settled in with the kids looking forward to a fun show. My husband is into magic, and we staged a magic show for our local theater company a few years ago, so I know a little bit about how some tricks are performed – enough to know that this guy hired by the Toledo Zoo last Saturday was simply awful. First, he began the show with a crabby demeanor. He didn’t have much charisma or charm; he wasn’t very good with the kids, and his tricks stank – everything he performed could be bought in a magic store for under $100 – for the whole lot! And during the show, he would literally sum up his tricks with one sentence – “and that’s the magic coloring book.” Also, according to my husband, he continuously broke one of the cardinal rules of magic – telling his audience what to expect ahead of time. For example, he had a ball trick where he told the audience, “Wouldn’t it be amazing if the red ball were no longer on the top?” And then magically, it wasn’t… Amazing trick, maybe; amazing magician, I think not… On top of all that, he messed up some tricks (which happens, I guess… a little hard to forgive when it involves tricks this simple, but…), and announced the fact that he did indeed mess them up! Oh well, this “magic” show was free with zoo admission. I was a little anxious after the first 7 or 8 minutes; wanting to make sure we had enough time to see actual animals, but the kids seemed to like the show, so we did not leave the magic show before its finale. I will mention that we literally broke into a run when the guy announced that he was doing a puppet show next… Our 4-year-old was asking to see it, but I cannot imagine what that guy (his name is Chris Clark and you can click on his name to visit his website if you’re interested in renting a magician entertainer popcorn machine) would do with puppets, so we told her we missed the puppet show… Besides, we were at the zoo to see animals, and we were running out of time! Here is a picture of the crabby magician (sorry Derek for the large pics – I don’t really have time to be trying to figure out how to change code):
But not a terrible experience, because look at the amazement on the face of our 4-year-old when she witnessed the “magic”:
Luckily, we did get out of the magic show in time to see lots of animals at the zoo. The elephants were moved from their outdoor exhibit to indoors, and in the process, they crossed the path right in front of us zoo visitors:
Then, the silverback (dominating male and largest) gorilla was sitting right up against the glass of his exhibit, and at the Toledo Zoo, the visitors are allowed to get right up close and personal with the great apes. Unfortunately, I had run out of available space on my camera after taking so many pictures of the worst magician in the world – I was worried people wouldn’t believe me about how awful he was,so I made sure to snap lots of pics! But anyway, the silverback gorilla was right there, and as we did with the chimp just minutes before, we held up everything we had in our arsenal (double-stroller) that we thought might interest him, but all to no avail. Maybe he likes shiny things, we thought, so we held up our car keys. Maybe he will recognize babies, we decided, so we held up our 7 month old son… and no reaction (held up the baby with caution since witnessing a gorilla CHARGE a little boy and pound the glass really hard in his exhibit in Omaha Nebraska years ago)… This gorilla stayed cool as a cucumber and didn’t react to any of it.
My one complaint about this zoo visit (besides the magic show!) is: where the heck is the octopus? He is usually one of our favorite animals to see at the zoo, and this time he was missing – something else was in his tank. That’s disappointing, the octopus was always fascinating for our family and fun to watch. I hope nothing bad happened to him…
Dinner at Steak N Shake after the zoo was also a fun treat – yes, even Steak N Shake is a treat when you live in a rural utopia like we do since the closest decent sit-down chain restaurant is an hour away. A fun treat (had to be something casual after a big day with 5 kids who had had a sleepover the night before), and Disney, our 2-year-old, went poopie on the potty for the first time EVER at Steak N Shake! That reminds me, we used to live in the same town – Normal, IL (which is actually anything but normal) as the very first Steak N Shake restaurant – it is (or at least was 10 years ago when we lived there) still in its original building – too bad I wasn’t into history as much then as I am now… Oh well, anyway, extremely fun time at the zoo. And as I always ask the kids, what was your favorite animal that you saw today? Mine was the silverback gorilla. He was magnificent. For awhile, the gorillas were my favorite animal to see at the zoo. Then we visited frequently last summer and got to know the family of orangutans, especially dad Boomer (an extraordinary orang because he actually plays with and helps care for his offspring – orangs in the wild and even in captivity are very easily annoyed with youngsters). Boomer and the fam are doing great and only fell short of being my favorite animal at the zoo this weekend because of the close proximity of the humongous silverback gorilla… Maybe my preferences will reverse next spring when I visit and the orangs are back outside and pushing their button which sprays water upon unsuspecting zoo guests… Looking forward to that!
The other day, my husband reminded me of a cute story about something our oldest daughter did when she was younger, probably around 4 years old. He said I should write it down somewhere so we don’t forget about it, so I decided to write something about all four of our wonderful kids, starting with the oldest and going down. Here’s a visual:
TAYLOR – About 5 years ago, we began finding the letters “WCPL” all over the house. The letters were always written together like a word, and they were everywhere – walls, books, VHS movies, chairs, everywhere. We couldn’t figure out what word our then-4-year-old was trying to spell, so we had a talk about not writing where we’re not supposed to, cleaned it all up, and moved on. A few weeks later, I took my daughter to the library to check out some books and movies, and that’s when I saw the labels on the VHS cases – WCPL = Williams County Public Library! She had noticed that all of her books and movies that came from the library had those letters on them, so I guess she figured things were supposed to be labeled WCPL – hehehe!
SAMANTHA – Sammie is a very unique child. She can be a real spitfire, but she just has this incredible spirit about her… But she’ll ask me questions that I have no idea how to answer. When her older sister was her age, she would ask the normal kid questions about life and how things work, and even if she didn’t phrase her questions correctly, it was always easy for me to figure out what she wanted to know and where she was coming from. Not true with Samantha! Since half the time I don’t know what she’s asking about, I can’t think of any of her confusing questions to share here on the blog, but I will say that she is the type of kid who asks the embarrassing questions in public – and loudly. We went to a nursing home to sing Christmas carols during the holidays, and there was a gentleman in a wheelchair who suffered from a muscle illness that made his tongue swell. He loved the caroling and really got into it, singing quite loudly. This got Sammie’s attention. She asked me, “Does your tongue hang out because you get so old?” She just has such a different way of looking at things… This is the same kid who asked me one time (really loudly of course) why someone was wearing purple underwear in the bathroom stall next to us!
DISNEY – It’s funny because Disney and Sammie look very much alike, almost like twins years apart. But their personalities are night and day. The other day, Disney, our 2-year-old, looked up at the sky and said, “Airplane! See it, on ceiling?” Awwww…..
CHRISTOPHER – I remembered something I forgot to mention about my son’s 6-month doctor visit. The nurse said he should be eating 3 meals a day – something that seems obvious, but I’m actually really glad she mentioned it! When you have a baby and you’re used to popping bottles in his mouth all the time, you forget that when he’s old enough to be eating solid foods that he needs meals just like big people! My son loves all kinds of food; he tries to grab as much as he can, and he shoves it into his mouth with his little fists. As he gets older, I’m starting to notice the difference between girls and boys, especially when it comes to their eating habits. Boys are messier and more enthusiastic eaters, while girls tend to be dainty and more picky. But again, maybe these are just differences in my kids, rather than a difference based on gender, who knows. And from what I remember, all the kids started out not being picky about their food – they were just so happy to be experiencing flavors after an entire life of only formula!
I have been blessed with 4 kids, and they have 4 very individualistic personalities. It’s really neat to watch how they interact with each other. Well, except when the interacting involves fighting!
A few months ago, I learned I had a second cousin in Florida who was killed in a horrific car crash. She was on her way to a fun outing with her daughter when out of nowhere, a drunk driver (mid-afternoon on a weekday – not that there’s ever any appropriate time to drink and drive, but still) who was going the wrong way on the expressway hit her car head-on, killing her and gravely injuring her young daughter. The little girl persevered, came out of her coma and re-learned to walk and talk. She was recently in the news again because she just turned 5 years old and sadly, she still thinks her mother is coming back. Her courage and strength is inspiring, so I’d like to share this clip of her on the Florida news. Please keep Summer in your thoughts and prayers. Click here to see the news story about Summer’s 5th birthday. And please, please, if you’re going to drink, always have another mode of transportation set up ahead of time!
INSERT DISK HERE:
My son Christopher passed his 6 month baby checkup at the pediatrician with flying colors. If only adult physical tests were this easy – pass a block from hand to hand, pick up a raisin (which was promptly taken away because he’s too little – where’s the reward in that?), a turn of the head when your name is called… He has mastered all of it and is right where he should be developmentally. Except for one thing – sitting up. No I didn’t forget the ‘p’ – he has mastered spitting up… haha. But he can’t sit up unassisted yet, and he doesn’t even seem to be close to doing so. The problem is that he refuses to bend at the waist. If I can get him into a sitting position, (and that’s a big IF!) he arches his back immediately and tries to stand. I tried to explain this to the nurse so she wouldn’t think he is physically slow, but he lost points anyway. Never mind that he can use his legs to jump vigorously in his bouncer that hangs from the doorway, or that he can single-handedly pull and move a heavy dining room chair with his iron grip – he still loses points for not being able to sit unassisted. Oh well, if that’s how they score it, that’s how they score it. It’s not like it bothers me at all; I actually find it amusing. I think he might be crawling and walking before he sits…
Other news from the doctor appointment is that he weighs 16 lbs. 13oz. which is in the 30 percentile for weight. An easy explanation of the percentile comparison is this: If you take 100 babies my son’s age, 30 of them would be at his weight or lower and 70 of them would weigh more than he does. He is 27¼ inches long, which puts him in the 75th percentile for height. His head circumference is 45.2 cm which is exactly average. I think he is probably our most average-sized baby; our oldest was always small for her age and the two in the middle were huge – Disney was once in the 100th percentile for height! Just another example of how different kids are, even ones in the same family. My 4 children physically remind me of each other, yet it’s so fun to watch their differences emerge as they learn and grow! Here are Disney and Christopher, my two youngest:
Our 4-year-old daughter Samantha is having her first sleepover tonight. She’s been here when her older sister had friends sleep over, but tonight it’s her friend, just for Sammie. Four years old is a little bit young to have a sleepover. And tonight is the second sleepover in a row since older sister Taylor had a friend sleep over last night. I don’t usually condone two sleepovers in a row because that would make for a very crabby Sunday. But this is a special sleepover.
Sammie’s friend, Hannah, is an extraordinary little girl. She was born with a condition that made her spine grow into her brain. My daughter knows her from preschool, and then she was invited to Hannah’s 4th birthday party – that’s where we learned of her condition. In the weeks after the party, Sammie called Hannah to see if she could come over and play, but Hannah could not – she was scheduled to have brain surgery in early December, but it was postponed because she suffered a seizure and was also diagnosed with asthma. Then she underwent the brain surgery just before Christmas, and Sammie called her to see how she was doing. For an entire week after the surgery, Hannah was bedridden and in constant pain. She couldn’t come to the phone, much less go anywhere to play. Now she’s feeling better, although her symptoms are starting to reappear. So crabby Sunday, shmabby shmunday – my kids are having 2 sleepovers in a row.
Hannah’s recovery wish was to sleep over at Sammie’s house. And even if it involved a 4-year-old with a double sleepover, what parent would be able to refuse Hannah’s wish?
Since I’m on the subject of Girl Scout cookies (per my previous post), I’m going to conduct a flavor poll. Girl Scout cookies are very popular. So many people enjoy them that I would consider them a slice of Americana. So what’s your favorite flavor?
[poll id=”5″]
And thanks to Jamiahsh for giving me the idea for the poll!