I was a terrible blogger of events this summer, so enjoy the flashbacks. Simon turned 4 this year. He is suddenly into real kid territory. I kind of love it a lot – as nuts as #thisis4 can be. We’ve gotten into a birthday routine and will probably keep on this path, until we change it. We celebrate birthdays on the actual day.
We start with birthday breakfast and presents from Mom & Dad (us) and the grandparents and great aunts and uncles.
Then there is the school party! Daycare means so far Simon has been in “school” all summer. This one will be the most interesting change as we will have the summer birthday (on a holiday weekend) problem once he’s really in school. This year I brought mini ice cream sandwiches and blueberries for the class. Then Simon got to hold the book during the CD read aloud time.
Then we got to leave school early to go pick up the cake. And home to pack up for the party. The party was at the park from 5-7. I ordered pizza and we sang Happy Birthday and ate ice cream cake. We invited a few families of Simon’s best friends and had a low key evening of hanging out and letting the kids run free.
And now he is four.
Stats at four: 31 lbs; 39 inches; 3T pants (2T/3T shorts!); 4T shirts; size 9 shoes.
Simon talks all the time and is getting more into pretend play. He is still working on the Children’s catechism at church and can go through the first 20 questions. His favorite shows are Paw Patrol and Doc McStuffins. He loves to watch YouTube and YouTube Kids, although his time watching “unboxing videos” is heavily limited (that deserves a whole post on it’s own), and likes to watch video game videos – Jelly is funny but “language” and anything Mario. He and Rob still play Wii games together, like Mario Kart and Bowling, but have added PC versions of Super Mario Bros. (old school) and some of the new Lego games to their mix of video game time.
Non screen time favorites are RescueBots and PawPatrol figures, basketball and bowling in the hall and due to new “go build” rules Magna Tiles and Duplos and Legos (as of last week) are back in heavy rotation. Trains are still played with but not as obsessively right now. That could change though as we move in to winter and more indoor play.
We still spend as much time outside as possible and the playgrounds and parks are amazing. Simon has mastered every apparatus except for the monkey bars.
We also frequent the Hall of Science and Simon is finally big enough to enjoys areas outside of the Preschool Place.
He started tennis lessons this summer and is doing really well. He loves Mr. Carlo and got his first trophy at the mini tournament he played in September.
Not that there aren’t times he’s difficult, but this is to celebrate the great. I love this kid.