Doug

This is Karissa, my youngest sister.

She is sweet and innocent but the picture above does not describe her at. all. First of all, the hair. Oh, the hair. There were many tears shed while I curled her hair for her baptism. She cried and cried and would put her head in her arms, smashing her curls, while I was still curling. Therefore, I had to go back and re-curl the smashed curls. The process was so painful and stressful that I finally told her I would never curl her hair again until her wedding day. She was okay with that.

Then comes the dress. Most little girls love to put on big, puffy, white dresses and dance around. Not Karissa. She waited until the last possible moment to put on her dress, and was the first to change her clothes once we came home from the baptism. When Rissy was getting her pictures taken, the lady told her to twirl (like little girls do in dresses), but Karissa didn't know how. When the lady showed her how, Karissa attempted the twirl but got her shoe stuck in the dress and tripped. So as you might have gathered, Karissa is NOT a girly-girl. She is a tomboy...

You will almost always find her playing outside with some type of bug, wearing an old soccer jersey (that belongs to her sister), NO shoes (I don't think shoes even exist in her world), spandex pants with holes and a size too big, dirt on her face and under her fingernails, and her hair in a tangled mess, not even in a pony tail. Here's the proof:

{She made this face on her own... she was willing to show her true side without me even telling her to}

{A few of many potato bugs Karissa has befriended}

So now that you know a little about Karissa, I've gotta tell you a funny story that happened the other day. It was a typical Friday night. It just so happened to be a girl's night because my dad was hunting. Anyway, on the way to a store, Karissa would not stop talking. Finally, I told her, "Karissa, you need to meditate. Like in yoga." She said, "Okay." and went into meditation mode. I told her to stay like that for 30 seconds, just to see if she could do it. This was the result:  

{Notice the unique breathing style}

We were all laughing sooo hard. It was great. She amazingly lasted the 30 seconds and when she was done I asked her if she felt calmer. She said yes... but then she went back to her normal self within another 30 seconds. After we went to the store, we decided to go out to dinner. Apparently she got bored on the way because she started telling knock-knock jokes. The first was (and I was not expecting this), "Knock, knock. Who's there?" Now wait a second... what do you say to that?? That's the whole point! I hadn't laughed so hard at a knock-knock joke in... well, ever! You've gotta admit that's pretty funny, coming from and eight year old. She enjoyed the attention and continued on with the knock-knocks until no one could take it any longer. She decided to tell a story instead.

Here's what she came up with. "There once was a hamster. He was a karate hamster. Whose name was Doug." HAHA! Everyone laughed hysterically. It was such a funny night, I couldn't stop laughing.

Oh, how I love my hilarious, tomboy, cute little Roo.