Skip to main content

The Best Things About Carl (at 5)

1. He enjoys fantasy literature.  He and I have been reading lots of great chapter books recently; we are currently halfway through The Lion, the Witch, and the Wardrobe for the second time.  Reading together is something we both enjoy a lot.
2. He is verbally affectionate.
3. The verbal affection is related to his eagerness to please adults.  I can usually trust him to follow rules and interact pleasantly with authority figures.
4. He is excited about Soren's schoolwork and copies a lot of it.  He wants me to know that he is always doing his "best work".
5. He "reads" to Sven, reciting Sven's favorite books from memory.
6. He has lots of energy!
7. But he can also sit still and play with legos for hours.
8. He does not nap but will look at books quietly in his bed for an hour every afternoon.  I was worried what would happen if he stopped napping before he learned to read but it has turned out ok.  I still get my quiet time.
9. He is a great storyteller.  He remembers all the important details and relates them dramatically.
10. Being brave is very important to him.  I enjoy the pep talks he gives himself when working on something scary or difficult.
11. He rocked his swimming lessons this summer.
12. I enjoy hearing him sing.
13. He is learning negotiating skills through daily vehicle swaps with the neighborhood kids.  They trade bikes and scooters, determine appropriate lengths for turns, and set rules for playtime behavior.
14. He can help a lot with work around the house.  He can independently dry a load of dishes, clean the sink, dust the living room, and pick up after Sven.
15. He gets an allowance now that he is 5 and he dove right into experimenting with it.  He mostly wants to buy legos, which requires him to save instead of buying Oreos.
16. He loves to play board games.
17. He is very cued into the frustration level in the home.  This encourages me to take better care of my own emotional health.
18. He still enjoys Kindergarten.  He really lives into the stories, plays outside with gusto, and expresses himself with great care in his artwork.
19. He gives great hugs.
20. He is a good looking kid.  His ready smile and thick, blonde hair help a lot.

Comments

Oozaroo said…
He is very charming. I can't wait to see the kids again!

Popular posts from this blog

What Works for Us: Room Time

I've decided to do a new series of posts on how I make parenting work for us. Every parent does it differently--which is great!--but I have a hard time keeping my discoveries to myself. The things I do may not work for anyone else but I want to record them and remember them. Hopefully, it will also help me vent my soap-box-y-ness so that I'm not always imposing my ideas on other people. That will be what "What-Works-for-Us Posts" are about. One of the things that we have always done, but has made a HUGE difference in the move from one to two children, is Room Time . When Soren was 6 months old, I started having him play alone (in a safe place) every day for a few minutes. At first it was only five minutes in the port-a-crib but we quickly worked up to fifteen, then thirty. At that time, I used those precious minutes to do housework or relax on the couch. When I was pregnant with Carl, Soren would play alone for about an hour in his room and I would usually tak...

Just Enough is More

They say that later-born children have skinny photo albums.  While parents lavish attention on the firstborn (making certain to record every milestone and in both print and pixels), later children are forgotten and neglected.  So the common wisdom goes. Maybe its true.  There are certainly fewer posts on this blog about the younger boys than there were about the older ones.  And there's no doubt about it: fewer photos are taken now-a-days.  I don't even want to talk about videos.  Poor neglected Leif.  According to the records, he's hardly even a presence in this house. Except that's not true. The paucity of posts and pictures does not reflect an absence of affection.  It does not speak to my feelings about living with children at all.  I find them no less delightful and amazing than I did eight years ago when I first began my mothering journey.  If anything, the little ones delight me even more now.  I know better how to enjo...

Surrounded by Love

One of my greatest worries about having four children was that I would not be able to welcome and love my new baby as well as I had the others.  Now that he is here, I feel that he is perhaps the most welcomed and best loved of all my sons.  More on that in a moment. I struggled to bond with Leif in utero, in part because pregnancy was old hat to me and in part because life was busy with too many other things.  The new miracle  growing inside of me was the most normal thing about my life.  There were a few good moments that helped me prepare mentally: doing guided meditations during Christmas vacation, my blessingway on January 6th, and a really good conversation I had with Scott about my hopes and worries.  But mostly, my mind was elsewhere. And then there was the birth.  I should have known that it would be a totally unique experience and that it would prepare me for this totally unique child. Needless to say, I'm crazy about the little guy. ...