Happy Birthday William!

 

Happy Birthday my sweet boy! How will you be a teenager next (or more appropriately--"this", since this post is so belated) year?!?

Happy Birthday William!

 

Happy (belated!) birthday to my favorite eleven year old! I promise I'm not too upset that you wanted a Dairy Queen ice cream cake instead of something Mom made

William: Ten Years!

So I haven't made any final decisions about this, but I'm thinking that ten will be the last year of birthday updates for my boys on my cozy little corner of the internet. I like to think that my children don't run the risk of being tracked to this blog by their peers, and I try to make a point not to share anything distasteful anyway, but I also know the preteen and teenage years can be rough, and I don't need to run the risk of exacerbating that by something I might put on here. Plus--let's be honest--I'm always behind on them anyway and it's something I could afford to start weaning off my plate sooner than later. And to my sister-in-law who might be reading this and worried that she won't have as many pictures to use for the family calendar--I'll try to do better about texting you a handful throughout the year. You just might need to remind me at first. 

What is your favorite color? Blue

What is your favorite animal? Cheetah

What is your favorite book? Alcatraz vs the Evil Librarians

Fairly typical William--book in hand (although not Alcatraz--this was taken shortly after he flew through the six-book Alcatraz series) and annoyed with something I'm doing (taking his picture, in this case). Teenage years are going to be fuuuun with this one

What is your favorite song? Old Church Choir

What is your favorite sport? Soccer

Soccer may be his favorite sport, but piano is still a favorite pastime. Nothing like knocking out a few songs on the piano before a 9AM soccer game!

What is your favorite thing to do with Mom? Play catch

What is your favorite thing to do with Dad? Play kickball

If we hadn't JUST been at the lake and playing kickball the week before his birthday I daresay he would have answered this question differently. Or maybe not--I suppose there's a chance he doesn't like having to share his Christmas gift with Daddy because Daddy also likes solving logic puzzles 

What is your favorite thing to do outside? Play soccer

Where is your favorite place to go? Air Madness

I know he SAID Air Madness, but I'm going to throw the challenge flag. This picture and the one below were taken almost exactly four years apart, and train shows still excite him like they did when he was a little kid. It's a crazy expensive hobby that I really don't want him to get into, but man does he love all things model trains 

What is your favorite fruit? Pear

What is your favorite vegetable? Cauliflower

What is your favorite cereal? Lucky Charms

What is your favorite treat? Eileen's Colossal Cookies

What is your favorite meal? Beer Cheese Soup

What makes you happy? Cake. No, wait--solving the Rubix's cube from memory

Not a Rubix cube, but. In August, when I was in MSP running my triathlon, Darrell and the boys stayed with my cousins, and William convinced my cousin to let him take apart and reassemble his 600+ piece Lego jeep

Which, thanks to an unplanned layover in Minneapolis due to weather after our Thanksgiving trip to NC, he did. And man, was he excited

What makes you sad? When people tell me lies

Who are your best friends? Aiden, Zoey, Bennett

His friend Zoey was one of the performers in a local production of "A Christmas Carol" and I loooved getting to take William (and Garrett) to the performance. Live theater is the best

What do you want to be when you grow up? Astronomer

What was your favorite part about last year? Beach Week

All smiles. All week. Beach Week is the best

What is one thing you want to do this year? Go to a Vikings game

Hopefully the Vikings excite a little more than they were in this picture (although let's be honest, it's the Vikings, so that's probably unlikely), but for his (belated!) 10th birthday outing, we are in fact going to a Vikings game in September. The countdown is on!

Honestly, I don't even know what else to say. Not only am I so far behind on this post, but there's just so much to say and yet so much that feels repetitive of previous years that I wouldn't even know where to start--or where to end, for that matter. So, pictures it is, along with probably far too lengthy of explanations.

Music is a huge love language for this kid. It's all very mathematical and precise for him, and I doubt he would do well in a jazz musician situation where he had to ad lib, but reading notes off a page and turning them into music is something he is exceptionally talented at doing. And yes, even when we are on an airplane without an instrument in sight, he's still pulling out music and air playing

Braces! Just four across the front, and he also had an expander in place to help widen his jaw to make room for said front teeth. He only had them on September to March, and there's a good chance he'll need them back on (plus more), even with the retainer he has to wear nightly, but he tolerated it all pretty well, so hopefully that will continue

He's made plenty of comments about preferring the warm weather to the cold, and seventy degree weather days are "perfect" days according to him, but when we manage to find the right kind of cold-weather activities for him to do, it makes me feel like I have just a little bit of hope for keeping him at least somewhat close to the Midwest when he gets older

Not only is William well on his way to driving the pontoon on his own at the lake, but he's desperate to drive the lawn mower independently as well. Mom is not so thrilled with that, but fortunately he's content (for now) to just ride along with Grandpa (or Uncle Mike, or Uncle Nick, or Dad, or whoever is driving)

So William has definitely been more affectionate with Theodore--my sister's youngest--than he really has with any of his other cousins/brothers when they were infants, but it's also progressed into more tolerance/closeness with some of his other cousins. It doesn't always happen, but he also doesn't always brush them off immediately and sometimes even initiates cuddliness with them (of course, Rose isn't actually sleeping here, but still) 

I know I alluded to his swimming confidence last year, but honestly, most of it was just heard second-hand because I never really got to see his swim lessons last year. This year, however, I was there for most of his lessons and while he certainly won't be winning any races, it was very enjoyable to see how comfortably he could swim the length of the pool (I don't know that I'll ever be ready to let him ditch the life jacket at the lake though--the water is just so murky!)

Not only is he usually pretty willing to play piano for an audience, but he also seems to have very few issues with public speaking (which I feel like I've probably already mentioned, but whatever). This was from Palm Sunday when he was part of a reader's theater message sharing the passion story and he barely flinched through the whole thing (I think I was more nervous listening than he was reading!)

Can't believe you are ten kiddo and so glad I get to call you mine! (And yes, that is an eye ball cake. Matthew had a garbage truck cake and Garrett had a dirt and worms cake, so William decided he needed a gross cake too. We'll see if Connor continues the trend in September--or more likely November when I actually get around to posting his update!!)

William: Nine Years!

Introducing William: 3rd Grade Edition!

Birthday Interview

Age: 9

Height: 4 feet, 2 inches

Weight: 58 pounds

(Still a little heavier than he is tall per percentiles, and still overall pretty small for his age... But none of this is unexpected information with Darrell and me for parents)

What is your favorite color: Blue

What is your favorite animal: Dog

What is your favorite book: HiLo series (if by "favorite" you mean "read through three books in one evening", then yeah, it's his favorite. To be fair, it's a graphic novel series, but still--he has flown through these books)

What is your favorite song: Old Church Choir

What is your favorite sport: Soccer (as you'll be able to see from his answers, soccer is pretty forefront in his mind right now, most likely because his spring soccer season started just a few days before his birthday)

I should note that spring soccer is a carry over from fall soccer, which he thoroughly loved

What is your favorite thing to do with Mom: Play (Oof. Well. Two years in a row and he doesn't have much of an answer for this question. Even with some prompting he really didn't have anything to elaborate with)

I mean, maybe by "play" he just means being silly with Mom, which I suppose isn't all that terrible

What is your favorite thing to do with Dad: Play soccer (At least it's a little more specific than the answer he gave for me)

What is your favorite thing to do outside: Play soccer

Where is your favorite place to go: Air Madness

What is your favorite fruit: Apple

What is your favorite vegetable: Carrot

What is your favorite cereal: Marshmallow Treasures

What is your favorite treat: Cake

What is your favorite meal: Beer Cheese Soup

What makes you happy: Playing with people (considering all we hear about from school is recess, I suppose this makes perfect sense)

What makes you sad: When people don't play with me

Who are your best friends: Aiden W

What do you want to be when you grow up: Soccer player (or any sport)

What was your favorite part about last year: Going to Air Madness

What is one thing you want to do this year: Win a soccer game (sooo much focus on soccer, and considering they lost their first soccer game 2-3 the day before his birthday, I'm not at all surprised by this answer)

I made the mistake of saying in his eight year post that because of his age and the "slowing" of his growth that there were fewer "new" things to note. Maybe this is all just catch up from the COVID junk and lack of activities during that time, but holy buckets, did William have an exceptional year of growth and new things.

Swim lessons certainly aren't new, but his confidence in his independent swimming grew leaps and bounds, and was especially evident over the summer when he went to a friend's birthday party at a pool. Not only was he swimming and playing in the deep end, but he also went down the tube slide, body slide, AND a drop off slide (a drop off slide that I was probably a teenager before I ever went down)

See that pretty little lesion on his lip? It's called a mucocele, which was a new vocabulary word for all of us. And while being under anesthesia to have it removed technically wasn't new for him since he also had a surgery at 18 months, it was certainly the first surgery experience that he'll likely remember

So there's some debate as to whether or not this was actually William's first time flying a kite (#fail on us if it truly was his first kite experience), but regardless, it was definitely his first time flying a kite that he made himself. We love the enrichment activities he does at school!

First camp milestone! Three year campers receive an Ole Horn, and Mommy impressed the boys by still remembering how to blow in to one. This also should have been his first overnight at camp, but due to COVID precautions, they had not reinstated overnights (which, candidly, was probably fine because he was still having a bit of a rough time staying dry at night...)

Playing golf on an actual golf course? Check!

Hard to tell from the photo, but William had his first fair experience and was pretty brave trying out the rides (this is a picture from the Ferris Wheel, but he--and Garrett!--also braved a hang-gliding ride that I'm pretty certain I wouldn't have done at their age)

Two years ago I mentioned that William had started to play the piano, mostly just from what Mom and Dad could teach him and from the knowledge he gained from the "Learn to Play Piano at Home" books we got from Amazon. Well, at the beginning of 3rd grade, we bit the bullet and enrolled him in lessons and by November he was playing a piano solo for church. He played one again in December for the Sunday School Christmas program, and in March he accompanied a 2nd grader while she sang "Amazing Grace". Needless to say starting piano lessons was a good choice

William got his first concert experience in December when For King and Country came to town with their "Little Drummer Boy" concert. Darrell ended up taking William (and Garrett) because there was a bit of a blizzard the night of the concert and I wasn't super comfortable driving in it, and other than it being a little loud the boys LOVED it

Our local ski hill (ski bump, as Darrell calls it--apparently it is miniscule compared to the mountains he grew up skiing on) has a snow tubing hill and when our church hosted an outing there this winter William got his first go at snow tubing. We've been sledding a handful of times before, but due to the somewhat icy conditions and steepness of the hill this was MUCH faster, and he loved it. I guess it's safe to say this is the year we unlocked William's daredevil side?

More piano accomplishments--in February he participated in a Piano Festival where he had to memorize two pieces to play in front of a judge and get scored on them. His piano teacher told us that she doesn't usually require first-year students to participate, but she felt like William would be able to handle it, and I don't think any of us were terribly surprised when he received a "superior" rating (the highest possible). This kid loves himself some piano (and I'm sure my mom wishes I would have practiced as willingly as William does--I remember constantly fighting my mom when she wanted me to practice piano, and with William, we more often find ourselves setting boundaries for when he ISN'T allowed to be on the piano)

Of course, the past year wasn't all new stuff, and especially as COVID restrictions eased, we got to enjoy many oldie-but-goodie activities as well.

Boogie Boarding at the beach is always a favorite  

College basketball returned! The boys (and Grandpa) had a great time cheering Augustana to the NCAA DII National Tournament, but unfortunately they fell short of the Elite Eight

Model train shows also returned! We've been taking William to shows like this since he was two (or slightly younger), and he is still as fascinated as he was those first few times (I can't say the same for all his brothers, but for the most part they all tolerate going)

Lots of fun at the lake!

Our Outdoor Campus resumed some of their recreation classes, and although fishing is definitely way more Garrett's thing, William still enjoys it once in a while (especially at a pond that is stocked with fish so catching something is basically a guarantee)

I suspect it won't be long before I'll get to add "drove the pontoon independently" to his list of  things he accomplished in a year. I'm pretty sure he mans 90% of the controls when he sits there with Grandpa

One note that I made during the previous year is that William really started to grow in to himself and gain confidence. Sometimes it's self-serving (like initiating a conversation with the choir director at church to ask for a copy of the cantata music so he can take it home and play it or privately approaching a teacher to clarify a misunderstanding about an incident that happened between other students at recess because he was afraid "tag" was going to get banned as a game) but sometimes he walks in to very public situations and owns them for no other reason than he decides that he wants to (like all of his piano performances or reading some of the speaking parts for the choir's Christmas cantata). He definitely takes after Darrell in that regard; I'll get up in front of people and talk if I have to, but man does it make me nervous. And I'm pretty sure I get more nervous for William's sake than he does when he is doing something in public. He's also really starting to pick up on the sarcasm that Darrell and I *occasionally* use, and sometimes he'll even dish it back to us (which is usually fun...for now at least). 

  

Focus and determination are not in short supply with this kid--when it's something he wants to do. But ask him to look for a toy that's missing and he'll give up after searching in two spots because "it's too hard" and "I'll never find it"

I'm sure if someone checked on me a few hours after I went to sleep they'd find me in some pretty silly positions, but it's fun to pretend like that isn't true and it's just William (and most of the time, his brothers) who end up in weird positions. Also worth noting is the lack of stuffed animals in his bed; his stuffed puppy made its way to Matthew's crib one day and it has stuck there (with no tears on William's end). He does still sleep with his baby blanket though (which is probably tangled up somewhere under his comforter)

His initial interest in this project was minimal at best (especially because all he wanted to do was eat the marshmallows), but once I helped him get started he had at least a little bit of fun trying to construct a tower (of course, if he had had specific directions in front of him detailing a build idea he probably would have been all in from the start--he much prefers direction following to free building!)

It's a little hard to read, but his shirt says "EYE am 100 days smarter". He was sooo excited about this "pun" for the 100th Day of School--and a little bummed by how few people commented on it

Happy Birthday Kiddo! Hard to believe it's been nine whole years since you made me a Mom, but I've loved every minute (well, most every minute) of watching you grow into the boy you are now

William: Eight Years!

Last year, we were a month in to quarantine when we celebrated William's birthday. Everything was still pretty unknown, and while there was some sadness over experiences that would be missed due to COVID, I don't think any of us really expected things to remain "different" for as long as they have. Fortunately, I think I can safely say that things are starting to look up (at least in the US, where vaccines have been pretty accessible), and even though things have looked pretty different this past year, it hasn't all been bad. There may just been a few things from "pandemic life" that I hope stick around long term.

Naturally, he lost that tooth about two days before his school pictures. I teased him and told him we were going to make him do the retakes, but I honestly love the super iconic gap-toothed smile

Birthday Interview

Age: 8

Height: Just over 4 feet tall

Weight: 55 lbs, 12 oz

(Per the percentiles, he is a decent amount heavier than he is tall, but I really don't feel like you'd be able to tell that by looking at him. Guess he must be hiding it all as muscle or something)

What is your favorite color: Blue 

What is your favorite animal: Giraffe (ironically, this is the same answer he gave at five--the first year of the interview--so maybe he's settling in to a favorite?)

While not exactly a giraffe, he did have to draw an emu (by following along on a learn-to-draw video) for his remote art class and it could *almost* pass for a very frazzled giraffe

What is your favorite book: Treasure Hunters (So. There's a story behind this book #shocking. It's actually a series written by James Patterson this is *probably* written for middle school aged kids. But early in the pandemic when the libraries were closed I was desperate for new chapter books, and a used bookstore was offering "pandemic packs" of books. This book was in a pack with some others that looked good, so I ordered it--sight unseen--only to discover it was a massive 400+ page book. He loved it though, and after reading the first book multiple times, has since made his way through the next five books in the series)

I don't think he's reading the Treasure Hunters book in this picture--more likely a book from the "I Survived" series, which he also FLEW through during the pandemic--but this picture pretty accurately depicts his reading habits when he gets into a book he likes

What is your favorite song: Lord I Need You (I think he actually prefers playing it on the piano to singing it, but no complaints here!)

What is your favorite sport: Football

Fall. Family. Football. Need I say more?

What is your favorite thing to do with Mom: Show her cool stuff, like LEGO builds (he actually had a bit of a hard time coming up with an answer for this one. Looks like I need to start focusing on some Mom and William time--although I definitely don't mind having him get excited to show me the cool stuff he is working on!)

Apparently being my puzzle buddy didn't qualify as a favorite for him, but I sure love it

What is your favorite thing to do with Dad: Play soccer

What is your favorite thing to do outside: Play soccer (it may be his favorite, but it's definitely not what he spends the most time doing since Daddy doesn't always take the time to set up the soccer goals. He honestly probably spends the most time kicking the football around, but I suppose that's a favorite too!)

Where is your favorite place to go: The bowling alley (no doubt on this. I'm surprised this has never come up as a favorite sport--maybe he doesn't actually think of it as a "sport"?)

It was a little belated, but we finally got to take him out for his birthday outing in July, and shocking--he picked the bowling alley

What is your favorite fruit: Pear (he's not super consistent on this answer, which is totally fine, but..)

What is your favorite vegetable: Carrots (...carrots has been the vegetable of choice every year)

What is your favorite cereal: Marshmallow Treasures (also a consistent answer, because marshmallows in cereal is always the best)

What is your favorite treat: Gum (did not see this one coming. We have never bought gum for the boys, so to my knowledge he's only gotten it in suckers or as an occasional treat in school. Maybe the fact that he doesn't get it as much as other things makes it more desirable!)

I'm a little surprised cake and/or ice cream didn't make his favorite treat list (although I suppose gum is cheaper?). This is an ice cream flavor he "invented" as a remote learning assignment, and since he came up with a fairly simple idea (strawberry chocolate chip) I surprised him by making real ice cream with of that flavor

What is your favorite meal: Honey Lime Enchiladas (another throwback to an answer he hasn't given since five! Kind of fun to see some of these reappear--and interested to see if they'll stick now!)

What makes you happy: MarioKart (oh boy. By far one of the best/worst things to come out of the pandemic was the boys getting a little toooo much unsupervised play time in our playroom, which caused them to discover all of our old Wii games. To say they've been obsessing over them is an understatement. I swear William's days revolve around when he is and isn't allowed to play Mario--and considering he only gets that privilege once a day, it's a suuuuuper big deal when that time rolls around)

Hiking/Climbing these rocks also made him reallllly happy, although we only made it to this park once before the weather got cold and wet--and I was nervous enough with the boys hiking around on dry rocks I wasn't about to take them back when the rocks were wet and/or snowy

What makes you sad: Being 12th in MarioKart (fortunately he's gotten good enough that this doesn't happen very often, although that is just one of many--many--perceived injustices in MarioKart that causes him to get upset. Like I said, the discovery of Mario has both been really good and really fun, and really--really--bad and tantrum-inducing)

Who are your best friends: All my classmates (he would not be swayed to pick just one or two best friends, and I guess I can't fault the kid for that!)

Not a classmate, but definitely his favorite lake buddy. Luke's grandparents have the cabin next to my parents, and usually these two are inseparable, but this past summer they didn't get to play together until Labor Day Weekend because Luke's mom had a baby in August and they were being very cautious with COVID. Tubing together for the first time was definitely a good way to make up for lost time

What do you want to be when you grow up: Astronomer (a star-gazing seed was planted last spring as part of a remote learning school assignment, and this year when we came home from the Ash Wednesday service at 7:15 and the sky was clear and dark, the stars grabbed his full attention and he hasn't looked back. I think he's  read through almost all the books the library has on constellations, and we recently discovered that the library has telescopes available to check out, so I'm super excited to blow his mind with that) (Also--how freakin' cool is it that we can check out a TELESCOPE from our library?!?!)

What was your favorite part about last year: Going to the beach (with everything else that got cancelled, I think the beach was the highlight of the year for most of us)

I thought these pictures were a fun comparison--while he definitely favors the beach to the snow, he sure gets just as excited about sledding as he does about boogie boarding!

What is one thing you want to do this year: Go bowling (weird, it's like he knew we were going there for his birthday party or something #notoneforthinkingoutsidethebox)

(And I just happened to catch this note I made on his five year post about his bedtime "stuff" that I didn't consistently keep up with, but better late than never! He still sleeps with his blue baby blanket, although it is far too small so both he and Garrett got full-sized blankets this year which they love. He still has his puppy Sammy, but I don't know how much it actually makes it into bed with him. I saw it on the floor between his bed and the wall one night and when I asked him how long it had been there he very nonchalantly answered "I don't know. Probably a couple weeks or so". Safe to say this kid won't have any attachment issues outgrowing any of his "baby" items!)

Usually I end these posts with a handful of notes/important things I want to remember (and a photo dump, of course). While the (somewhat small) photo dump will definitely be coming, I honestly don't have a whole lot more to say. So much of the past year has been "clouded" by COVID that it's hard to separate the layers that are William and his antics. Or perhaps it's just a by-product of getting older--he's not changing nearly as rapidly as he was when he was younger, so far fewer "new" things come to mind that need to be mentioned. I do know this--we are so in love with this boy and his kind heart, technical (to a fault, at times) brain, and dedicated personality. We're not quite as much in love with the eye rolls, attitude, and sarcasm that have been developing, but I'm pretty sure some of that is self-inflicted, so we probably can't complain too much (sometimes I say things just to get an eye roll out of him, and I know Darrell does the same. Hopefully he understands this as a sign of affection!)

Not an eye roll, but definitely falls in the same category. The kid seriously has some spunk to him--and while we enjoy it (even in pictures like this) sometimes he does it while we are trying to get *real* pictures, so we're trying to help him get better at making appropriate decisions based on the environment he is in. Still a work in progress for sure

I didn't exactly count, but I definitely think we did more bonfires during the pandemic than we have in previous years. Something I'm not sad about in the least (and something the boys are ALWAYS asking about now that it is warming up)

We registered William for his first summer of baseball two months before the pandemic hit, and while the season was shortened, the city allowed it to happen with certain modifications in place. He loved it--and we loved the sense of normalcy it brought to an otherwise weird summer

Also on the list of modified but still allowed was YMCA Day Camp. The shortened the sessions (among other changes--like cancelling the Little Vikes program that Garrett was enrolled in), but I still think it was one of William's favorite weeks of the summer (although I was not thrilled that he lost his mask on the first day--fortunately he's been much better about keeping track of them since!)

Another thing we've done more of during the pandemic? Hiking. We've ventured to new state parks (see above photo of rock climbing) and explored new--longer--trails at familiar parks. Some of this is probably due to the ages of our kids, but it's also been easier to fit into our schedule because "normal" activities are fewer in number. Hopefully we'll be able to strike a balance with this once things fully get back to normal (or whatever normal looks like), because I have loved every one of the hikes we've done (and will always remember this one for the fact that William hiked a quarter mile with a tooth in his mouth because it fell out and he didn't know what else to do with it--apparently giving it to me to hold never crossed his mind)

Eights years buddy. Look at you grow (and that smirk--oh my word). Love you!

2021 has also been the year of the cupcakes for birthday parties (with a mini-cake for the birthday boy); usually I love making elaborate cakes for the boys based on whatever they request, but when we decided to celebrate in person with my family for birthdays (starting with Matthew's in January) we decided cupcakes would be a better COVID-friendly option and I honestly haven't hated it (I had this perception that cupcakes were way more work, and that isn't necessarily true). I think cupcakes will definitely stay on the table as an option in the future.