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Calgary woman celebrating just her 7th birthday when she turns 28

Click to play video: 'Calgary woman celebrating 7th birthday at 28 years old'
Calgary woman celebrating 7th birthday at 28 years old
WATCH: It's a day that only comes around once every four years: Feb. 29. And it's on the calendar for 2020. For one Calgary woman, it means she's now lucky number seven. – Feb 28, 2020

EDITOR’S NOTE: This article previously said Le was getting ready to celebrate her eighth birthday. It has been corrected to say she is celebrating her seventh birthday.

Jessica Le is getting ready for her seventh birthday and it’s pretty unbelievable what the Calgarian has accomplished since her sixth birthday.

You get a bit of an advantage getting things done between birthdays when yours only happens every four years.

Le is only getting ready for her seventh birthday even though she is going to turn 28 because she was born on Feb. 29, 1992 — a leap day.

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There is a mathematical and scientific explanation for why leap years happen.

“Every time [the Earth goes] around the sun is 365 [days] and about a quarter of a day,” said Mount Royal University associate professor Charles Hepler. “Those quarter days build up and every four years… we build up a whole day, so we just add that into the calendar.”

According to Hepler, it’s not only the extra day we tack on.

“The moon puts a little bit of friction on the Earth by the tides, so we also have leap seconds.”

Hepler said those are much less frequent, with only a couple dozen since the 1970s when they first started being tracked. But you can take in that extra second this year on June 30.

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Le will no doubt be savouring every second of her special day that comes once every four years.

She knows it’s only a matter of time until her two-year-old daughter surpasses her in the number of birthdays she’s celebrated.

“When she turns 10, she’ll officially be older than me,” Le joked.

“It’s kind of funny. At least I’ll be younger than everybody for the rest of my life.”

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