6 Years of Xan!

 

6!! Alexandria is 6! I wrote last year that it felt surreal that she was 5. I think it’s interesting that this year 6 feels just right for her. And it wasn’t that 5 didn’t seem right for the way she acted at that age, but that I’ve always seen her as my baby. I guess it’s mostly because this year she has grown a lot in independence. She doesn’t need me for anything basic anymore. Clothes, bathroom, opening snacks, getting water, shoes, car seat. She does it all no problem on her own. She grew up a lot in that way this year. She’s always been vocally and socially more mature than most her age, but now her independence is catching up so she is feeling like a big kid! Being the middle of middle kids she is now getting lumped in with the big three way more often than the little three. Getting to stay up some, going to monster jam, a play, skating and the fair are all things she could do this year, but wouldn’t have been ready for last year. I love each age for different reasons. Although, there is something special about this age. I really love this 6-8 year range where they are gaining confidence and separating from me a little to find themselves more. It means I can take little breaks from “mothering” her to foster a friendship type relationship with her. So yeah, I do really enjoy this age of discovery. <3

Xan had been asking to do school since she turned 4, but I told her I don’t start formal school with anyone until they are 5 years old. She finally got her wish last fall to start school! And she loved it!! … until about a month ago. Now, here at the end of the year and she is ready for a break! I can understand that. I'm ready for a break myself. ;) Of the big three kids she has had to do more school at this age than anyone else because we have a good amount more school work we do all together now than when the oldest 2 were in Kindergarten. That said she is a great student! She is forming letters well with little complaining and speeding through her math lessons with no trouble at all. She is good with her sight words, but sounding out words is a little more work than she would like. She’ll get there!! Jane and Atlas did! She regularly brings a toy or stuffie to the school table to have that toy either help her with her work or for her to teach the toy how to do school. I love it!

It is so sweet to see Alexandria with her girl besties!! Xan, Esther and Olivia all love hanging out together! They played Just Dance on Xan's birthday together and had a blast! I love their sweet friendship. Xan used to hang out more with boys when she was younger. Last year she found her first good girl friend and now she hangs out with girls way more than boys. She is still good friends with some of the boys that come to park day, but if the choice is there she will always choose playing with the girls. Now what the girls are playing isn't necessarily girly though! They are often hunting for caterpillars, lizards, frogs or other creatures they can find around the park. I'm sort of glad she has finally developed some natural stranger danger because she used to trust everyone and it would make me so nervous! The good thing is although she is now cautious about who she approaches, Xan still makes friends very quickly and is a sweet and compassionate friend.  

Alexandria loves her siblings! She can get along with everyone on pretty much any given day. Some days she plays more with Atlas, others it's Flynn and even some days she will play with Jane the most despite their differences. She will happily play with Piper if I ask her to entertain her for a while, but Piper is still a bit to young to be as fun a playmate as the rest of the siblings. That said, Xan LOVES Piper and gives her hugs constantly and really does enjoy playing with her as long as Piper isn't too grumpy. Jane and Alexandria have become better friends this year! They like to play mothers a lot and Xan even dressed up as Anna and acted out Frozen with Jane as Elsa much to Jane's delight! I'm glad to see their bond as sisters grow. Atlas and Xan have that middle kid bond and have the most similar personality in how they play with others and probably fight the least. Flynn and Alexandria have really grown in their relationship this year! Mostly because Flynn has gotten better at sharing and relating to others. They have the most similar interest in toys of all the kids. Xan has improved in sharing with Flynn as well and sharing toys they both love has done wonders for their relationship. I love how well Alexandria can play with everyone! I look at her and I see how she can be the glue between the big kids and the little kids and even between the girls and the boys. I try to make sure she doesn't get lost in the middle and gets a good amount of my attention to herself. So grateful for the cohesion she brings to the sibling crew! 

Weight

Birth: 9lbs 2oz

1 Year: 23lbs 9oz

2 Years: 29lbs

3 Years: 32lbs

4 Years: 37lbs

5 Years: 42lbs

6 Years: 44lbs

I haven't taken her for her 6 year check up yet. I'm trying to do one big appointment for all 5 kids once a year now. So I won't have exact percentiles for their ages anymore because of that. What do I care how they measure up to everyone else's growth in America anyway. I just want to make sure they are healthy! She has thinned out and lengthened a little more this year and her face lost it's toddler look for sure! She is definitely a healthy weight for her!

Height

Birth: 22 1/4 Inches

1 Year: 30 1/4 Inches

2 Years: 33 3/4 Inches

3  Years: 36 1/4 Inches

4 Years: 40 Inches, 3' 4"

5 Years: 3’ 6”

6 Years: 3' 8"

I really thought she would be tall for her age when she was little because she busted into 24 month clothes when she was just 9-12 months old! But she leveled out around 2-3 years old and has stayed at the middle ground of height for a while. I think she might even be a little shorter than most of the other kids her age now. Whether she ends up tall or short, she is and will be beautiful either way!

Last year I mentioned some teeth troubles that Alexandria was in the middle of and a dentist saying she needed to have all 4 of her top front teeth pulled because those teeth were in distress from previous baby crowns having to be put on them. Well, obviously that didn't happen! The next dentist we went to said we could just keep an eye on them and look for outer signs of distress, any swelling, redness or pain and hope they just fall out at the natural time. So far so good! Hoping it stays that way, I don't want to mess with that beautiful smile if we don't have to!

A Year in Pictures: Firsts and Favorite Moments

I started a "firsts" section as part of a birthday blog post back when Jane turned 1 and I've told myself ever since that I could still find a "first" for every month of the year at least for the first few years of their life. The firsts I found grew more and more unconventional through the years. And at some point I had to add in favorite moments to the firsts with a birthday blog post. I realize now, sure, I do love finding the new experiences that they had through the previous year, but I think I like watching them grow and change more. It has become less about finding "firsts" and more about finding a picture from each month of the year. So I'm renaming this section again as A Year in Pictures! It never gets old looking back through pictures of the previous year to see how my kids grow and what they got to experience! I do believe, as unconventional as they are, the vast majority of these pictures are still indeed firsts. We definitely had a cluster of firsts in September and February.

Strawberry picking with friends -  April 2023

First Explode the Code book done! - May 2023

First Foam Machine Experience - May 2023

First balloon animal from Los Cuccos - June 2023

Pig tail braid cuteness - June 2023

Realizing her favorite character in Smash Bros. is her middle name! - July 2023

First Day of Kindergarten! - August 2023

Xan's first time at Camp Tejas held lots of firsts, diving board, Mud pit, canoe, swimming in a lake - September 2023

Zelda Themed costumes! - October 2023

First time having her cousin at park day! - November 2023

First Christmas at Tejas experience - December 2023

Dressing up with her friend at the park - January 2024

First GoKart Ride - February 2024

 First time at the Skating rink - February 2024

First Play (Matilda) - February 2024

First time at Monster Jam - February 2024

First bike of her own - March 2024

First big kid fair rides - April 2024

Favorites

Alexandria likes and dislikes and disposition seems to have solidified over the last year or two because the description in the favorites section I have for her in her 5 year old blog defines her pretty well. This sentence in particular sticks out to me, " It almost seems like her mind is a battle ground of sweet and cute vs strong and dangerous and whichever wins the battle for that day is what she focuses on for that one day." It's such a truth for her. Some days she so full of sweetness and kindness and the next she is yelling and complaining and scratching one of her siblings. We're still working on the violent outbursts against her siblings. Thankfully she is usually very receptive to my corrections and guidance and is open to growth.

Xan has become a little more picky on foods lately. She will still try some foods, but is less willing than last year. She still has most of the same favorite foods from last year. The favorites she came up with are watermelon sherbet, ice cream, captain crunch all berries, jelly rolls, deli turkey, peaches, raspberries, chick fil a, my cheesy bread, Digorno cheesy crust pizza and Nutrigrain bars. She also likes grilled hot dogs, ketchup hamburgers, Ravioli, iced donuts, breakfast sausage, pancakes, chicken nuggets/tenders, any fruity candy and fruit snacks, and Hershey's cookies and cream drops.

The favorite toys she came up with were almost all things she got for her birthday and they are blue siren head, big spinosaurus, worm squishy and Thunder the dragon. The only one she already had that she said was her favorite was lizzy the lizard. She still seems to rotate through toys that she likes the most, but Bunny is still bedtime buddy! Other favorites she always goes back to are Mosasaurus, the shark attack game, Burrito dragon, stretchy bat, Toothless stuffy and big Octopus.

Look at those sweet girls!! I snapped this pic while they were watching some morning shows. Alexandria said her favorite shows and movies are: Rumble, Angry Birds shows and movie, teenage kraken, every show and movie related to how to train your dragon, Brain Child, Octopus documentary and Karate Sheep.

After Atlas, Alexandria is my biggest gamer. Granted she still plays way less than Atlas. She asks if she can play with him all the time though! So it can be a little hard to tell what her favorite games are since she usually just joins Atlas in whatever he was playing. In the picture above they are playing an old WarioWare game. Her favorite video games are What the Golf, Just Dance, Dragons Legend of the Nine Realms, Wrestledunk, Super Smash bros., and the untitled goose game. 

Alexandria is starting to read!! But we are at the point that reading books herself are still pretty bland so all of her favorite books are books I read to her or audiobooks. She said her favorite books are The Enormous Crocodile, The Night Fury and The Light Fury, The Very Hungry Caterpillar or any book about caterpillars or dragons. She enjoyed the Audiobooks Charlie and the Chocolate Factory and George's Marvelous Medicine. We've been going though Roald Dahl's works.

Xan's favorite activities haven't changed much since last year. She still loves to swim and jump on the trampoline and swing. She enjoys coloring a lot! Imagining with stuffies or other animal toys is probably her very favorite thing to do. That or searching for bugs or other creatures. She absolutely loved keeping a caterpillar and watching it change from a caterpillar to chrysalis to a beautiful Giant Swallowtail butterfly. If she is playing anything with friends it is her favorite. 

The first question I hear out of Alexandria's mouth in the morning is "Are we going anywhere today?" or the night before, "what's tomorrow?" She loves anything exciting and is disappointed if we don't have anything on the calendar that she is looking forward to in the next few days! So almost anywhere has become her favorite place to go. But I think her favorite this year was going to the Montgomery County Fair for her birthday! Followed by going to Camp Tejas. She also loves the Beach, Marmee and Pappaw's house, The library, The park (as long as she has a friend there), Zero Gravity, the theater and the skating rink.

Finish

At this point, out of all 5 kids, Alexandria reminds me the most of myself. Not in the way she looks but in the way she acts. (the good and the bad)  We definitely have some differences, but soooo many similarities. She adores animals and bugs, as do I. Especially reptiles, her favorite are dragons and mine happen to be turtles. She has a big heart for all living things and would love to pet every creature possible. I wanted to be a vet when I was little until I realized I would pretty much see hurting or scared animals all day. So she has said she would be a zoo keeper which seems like a great goal to me! She loves her family dearly, but also can be the most violent with them as well. The only person I would hit was my brother. Also like me at that age, she can be a little shy at first but when you get to know her she won't barely stop talking. Unfortunately, she got her fiery temper from me as well. I can see the same anger I felt boiling over in me as a child in her as well at times. I'm doing my best to help guide her through it like Marmee in Little Women guides Jo. Xan has a more tomboy like nature, but still likes girly things form time to time(me too!). She even inherited her car sickness from me! Sorry, girly! I could go on, but as I see it so far, Atlas is Sam's clone and Xan is looking like mine. It's interesting to parent myself sometimes! ;) Being her mom is such a joy and I love watching her learn and grow. Keep being uniquely you Alexandria!!

Happy 6th Birthday Baby girl! We love you so much!

1 Corinthians 13:4-7

Love is patient, love is kind, it is not jealous; love does not brag, it is not arrogant. It does not act disgracefully, it does not seek its own benefit; it is not provoked, does not keep an account of a wrong suffered, it does not rejoice in unrighteousness, but rejoices with the truth; it keeps every confidence, it believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things.

Atlas is Eight!

I have a son who is 8... What?? I don't know how I keep being surprised at my kids getting older, but it never fails to catch me off guard when I say their new age out loud for the first time. When I list out the ages of my 5 kids to someone I still keep saying 7 for Atlas! It's been almost a month already and I can't seem to wrap my head around it! I think part of it is that when we first started going to park day 7ish years ago there were some boys around the age of 8 that came often and I would always think, "I wonder what it's like to have a son that age." and now here I am! I know there is a big responsibility that comes when raising children in general, but for sons it feels really intimidating to me. Men have the potential to be amazing builders or insanely destructive. Just look at history. I know women can be that way too, but I think men have more of a tendency to be extreme and try dangerous things. Sometimes those dangerous things can lead to big discoveries and advancements for humanity and other times they can destroy countries. In raising 3 girls and 2 boys so far (I know I'm still not very far in this journey!) a few differences I see are that the girls usually side with reason a little easier. Also, admitting failures and recognizing weaknesses comes a little more quickly for them than for the boys. With that in mind, I think as long as the girls have solid support they're more than likely going to turn out pretty balanced. For the boys, if I'm not actively guiding them back to balance and helping them see that selfishness is not fulfilling and hurting others or exerting control over them is not how a man of God would act then I don't know where they would end up. I guess all that to say that I am feeling the weight of raising a growing boy of Atlas's age. I consider it a great honor to be the one tasked with raising him though!

I guess I put video games and school in the same place in Atlas's blog because they seem so linked for him. As soon as he is done with school and chores he asks if he can play on the "big TV". He means the family room TV. He has to ask because you can see it from the dining table where we do school, so everyone has to be done or very close to finishing school before the family room TV comes on for anything other than a school lesson. I know it might seem controversial to some and everyone has their own opinion on video games and screen time, but I do NOT have a time limit for video games. I only tell Atlas that he must have all of his school and chores done and he has to turn it off right away if/when we have to leave for an event of any kind. I have a no individual media (TV, Video games, computer Kindle, etc.) after dinner time rule. If we do watch something we watch it all together. I will tell you on a regular school day the time available to play video games seems to be between 3 and 6pm (it just so happens to be the time everyone is usually done with school) and that's if we didn't have an event that day. For example today, We got school done at about 1:45pm that left him with 30 minutes to play until we had to leave for co-op. We didn't get home from co-op until 5:20 or so because we had to drop by the store after. That left him with another 45 min or so to play before he had to stop for dinner. So he played a total of an hour and 15 minutes. Also he has to take turns with his 5 siblings throughout the day as well. We only own one Nintendo Switch and yes we have three TVs, but one is pretty tiny and everyone's favorite is the family room TV. It sounds a lot like I'm trying to defend myself, but I'm honestly trying to give a good idea about what Atlas's video game life is like right now. On a weekend he gets to play a good amount of video games, yes, but what I love is that I'm not constantly having to count how much time he's on it and very often he'll turn it off voluntarily to go outside to play or play something else with his siblings inside or watch Piper for me while I work for a few dollars. It's important skill to learn to know when to take a break. He also has to take a break if he's getting too upset while playing which still happens sometimes, but much more rarely than before. He's talented a video games and he loves them and I love that we get to share our love for playing Zelda now that he's old enough to handle a game like that. He still wants to be a video game maker when he grows up! Atlas was very excited to start Super Friday this past fall! His first semester he took Duct Tape Warfare, Perler Beads and PE. This spring he is taking Chess, Spanish and Rubik's Cube. He has enjoyed all of his classes so far! His favorite overall is chess. I look forward to seeing what classes he'll take in the future.

Atlas enjoys having lots of siblings, but also enjoys alone time. He will play with everyone and has fun. After a while he will decide that is enough time with people and either go play a video game on his own or go outside when no one else is outside. Jane and Atlas are the closest! That just comes from being the oldest and learning more friendship skills and having more maturity. On the other hand, they are still young and will fight often. They usually make up pretty quickly though. Xan and Atlas are good buddies. They continue to have a lot of the same interests. They fight the most over playing video games together because they want to play together, but can't seem to decide how to play the video game together or someone is mad someone else won. Still working on sportsmanship with everyone! Flynn and Atlas have such a stereotypical brother relationship. It's rough and tumble and usually someone is screaming at someone else like they are so mad one second (like playing chase) but then it will turn on a dime and they are laughing. It's so foreign to me since it was just me and my brother, but Sam assures me this is normal brother behavior. It's like they bond by irritating each other. I don't know how, but they do seem to be getting closer as Flynn gets older. Atlas LOVES Piper. She can do no wrong. She is the apple of his eye. He likes to babysit her to earn some money, but he also just loves be around her anytime really. It makes me so happy to see protective, loving older brother to a little sister behavior. It just took having a brother old enough to appreciate a baby sister. ;) Atlas is continuing to grow in his relationships with his siblings and I'm proud of him for it!

Since we did a birthday experience that we couldn't invite friends to (Monster Jam) I told Atlas he could choose 3 families to have a video game/chess afternoon with on his birthday. He chose the Cotas, the Wilsons and the Scotts. Even though it was just 3 families was a big group of boys and it was so much fun!! They all had a blast taking turns playing video games, chess, looking at the new Zelda guide book I got for Atlas and playing outside. Definitely the most laid back birthday get together ever. All of the boys that came are people Atlas enjoys hanging out with the most, Edison, Elliott, Calvin, Josiah, Collin, Davin, Hunter, Titus & Sean. Atlas picks great friends. I'm so glad he's got good gamer buds who enjoy the same things he does.

I continue to see similarities between Sam and Atlas. One recent connection is enjoying playing Chess! Atlas has yet to beat Sam in chess, but he has come close once or twice. He will play Sam any chance he gets. Another thing I noticed this year is they both have the tendency to get really into something for a while and only want to think about and buy things for that one interest and then one day it's like they've totally moved on from it and are on to the next hyper interest. I will say they might swing back around to former interest from time to time, but their tunnel vision on one thing for certain periods of time is definitely something they share. They have also enjoyed playing each other in Mario Tennis matches recently. Atlas has a few wins against Sam in that regard. Last thing for this post I will note about similarities is that if I don't remind Atlas to eat meals he will forget. Sam does this sometimes too! Again, it's about that tunnel vision on interests. It can be hard to get their attention at times, but I do love their focus and passion!

Weight

Birth: 8lbs 7oz

1 Year Old: 22 lbs

2 Years Old: 27 lbs

3 Years Old: 32 lbs

4 Years Old: 35 1/2 lbs

5 Years Old: 37 3/4 lbs

6 Years Old: 42 lbs

7 Years Old: 47 lbs

8 Years Old: 48 lbs

Atlas is a thin guy! He only gained 1 pound last year. He is a pretty picky eater so it’s not super surprising. Although he would live off of chips if I let him. I would think his love of chips would give him a little bit more fat on his bones, but I guess he has a pretty fast metabolism or just uses it all up with all the jumping he does on the trampoline and jumping up and down playing video games! I’ll keep trying to work in more protein to help him grow strong!! <3

Height

Birth: 21 1/2"

1 Year Old: 29"

2 Years Old: 33"

3 Years Old: 36"

4 Years Old: 3' 2.5" (38.5")

5 Years Old: 3' 6.25"

6 Years Old: 3' 8.75"

7 Years Old: 3’ 10”

8 Years Old: 4’ 1/2”

I can definitely tell Atlas is growing! His pants were all above his ankles at the beginning of this Winter and his shorts are looking smaller too. If my hunch is right he is still below average in height at this point and that's alright. He might catch up later and even if he doesn't there is nothing wrong with being on the shorter side of the percentiles. As long as your feeling good and eating relatively well, that's all that matters.

A Year in Pictures: Firsts & Favorite Moments

If you read Flynn's Birthday post you've read my reasons for changing the name of this section. I think I'll add the description to each birthday blog until I've changed this section name on all of them though. 

I started a "firsts" section as part of a birthday blog post back when Jane turned 1 and I've told myself ever since that I could still find a "first" for every month of the year at least for the first few years of their life. The firsts I found grew more and more unconventional through the years. And at some point I had to add in favorite moments to the firsts with a birthday blog post. I realize now, sure, I do love finding the new experiences that they had through the previous year, but I think I like watching them grow and change more. It has become less about finding "firsts" and more about finding a picture from each month of the year. So I'm renaming this section again as A Year in Pictures! It never gets old looking back through pictures of the previous year to see how my kids grow and what they got to experience! I do believe, as unconventional as they are, the vast majority of these pictures are indeed firsts. We definitely had a cluster of firsts in May, August and September. Enjoy watching Atlas grow from a 7 year old to an 8 year old. I sure did!

Arcade with Friends - February 2023

Playing a Zelda game! - March 2023

Strawberry picking with friends - April 2023

Trading Pokemon cards - May 2023

Foam Machine! - May 2023

Independent Reader! - May 2023

Stopping to smell the flowers - June 2023

Buying a toy with chore money - July 2023

Lost tooth! - August 2023

Super Friday - August 2023

So many firsts at Tejas. First of all first overnight stay at Tejas. Followed by:
Crate stacking, wall climbing, zip lining - Wall and Lake, Ax throwing, Canoeing, mud pit experience.
He was up for it all! - September 2023

Zelda Themed Trunk or Treat - October 2023

Balloon float creation - November 2023

Christmas at Tejas with Friends - December 2023

Learning a Rubik's Cube - January 2024

Monster Jam! - February 2024

Theater Play (Matilda) - February 2024

Roller Skating - February 2024

Favorites

Atlas's favorite place to be is in the family room playing video games either by himself or with anyone who wants to play, but his second favorite place to be is outside. We are grateful this year did not include any trips to the ER for Atlas like the previous year. (although Flynn did earn himself his first urgent care visit, BOYS!) I'd like to say he's avoided the ER this year because he has become more careful, but he's just as clumsy as ever. I don't know how to help him be less clumsy because he gets his clumsiness from me! Thankfully most of the time our clumsiness doesn't end up in doctor visits, just bandaids. He has no lasting trauma, physically, mentally or emotionally from his broken arm and stitches. I'm finally starting to emotionally recover too and don't cringe every time they go out to play in the backyard after dinner. He loves to all the regular backyard activities, jump on the trampoline, swinging, monkey bars, chase and races. He recently started loving throwing the frisbee and I am over the moon about it!! I've been hoping at least one of the kids could be my frisbee buddy! He enjoys throwing his light up ring disc the most right now. I'm enjoying this new stage of starting to explore sports and being open to my sporting instruction!

Atlas is picky and can forget to eat meals sometimes, but he does have his favorite meals and snacks! His favorite dinners are hamburger helper! Three cheese or double cheeseburger flavors only. Ketchup hamburgers are his go to fast food meal, Sam's grilled burgers are his fav. cheesy bread, breakfast for dinner with pancakes and sausage. Crust Pizza is his new favorite restaurant. Just barely edging out McDonalds. He still likes going to Cliantro's, but it's under new management and is getting a new name, so I'm not sure if it will stay a favorite. Oh and of course it's always exciting when we go to Cici's. Lunches are not his favorite, but he will eat a big apple and some salami or pepperoni or ramen to hold him over. Breakfasts are usually mini pancakes or sausage biscuits. Other favorite snacks and treats are popcorn, Cool Ranch Doritos, Cheetos, Chex Mix, cookies, ice cream sandwiches, Cheez it Puffs, french fries, donuts, ice cream and Hershey's drops candy.

Going to Monster Jam brought back monster trucks as Atlas's favorite toys! He was so surprised when I got him the big size of Son Uva Digger for his birthday! He loves having all the sizes of his favorite monster trucks. He has the big, medium and mini sizes of Grave Digger and the big and medium size of Son Uva Digger. He's working on getting the mini size he's missing soon! Other favorite toys are black siren head and little siren heads figures, Godzilla figure, light up ring frisbee, Pokémon cards, and his Snorlax squishmallow. 

Video Games still get the majority of Atlas's attention. His favorite are constantly changing, but he always has some he comes back to pretty often. Recent favorites have been Mario Wonder, Wrestledunk Sports, Glyph,  Flat Heroes, WarioWare Move It, and Monster Jam Steel Titans 2. Games he always comes back to are Sonic Frontiers, Clone Drone in the Danger Zone, Mario Kart, What the Golf, Mario Odyssey (or pretty much any of his Mario games), Kirby's Forgotten Land, Boomerang Fu, and Super Smash Bros. I mentioned in his last birthday post that he started playing Zelda: Breath of the Wild! I was so thrilled to share my love of Zelda with him! He enjoyed it and beat the game! I bought Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom for myself and he will play it every so often, but I think the amount that you can do in that game sort of overwhelms him! It's so huge! He may come back to it when he's a little older. One of his favorite things to do is to look for new demos on the Nintendo eShop. I only let him look for new ones with me on his special nights, so he really looks forward to it. It's like this generations video game rentals. I have fond memories of my mom taking my brother and me to rent video games. It was always a special treat.

Atlas only has a few favorite movies and TV shows since the majority of the time he gets to use the TV he uses it to play video games. So it only makes sense his favorite movies are The Super Mario movie and both Sonic movies. He can't wait until Mario 2 and Sonic 3 come out!! His favorite shows are Number Blocks, Sonic Prime and Bluey.

I think the most growth I have seen in Atlas this year is in reading!! I just looked back at the favorite book section of his 7 year old post and it says he was still perusing books and reading was not easy for him yet. Total change!! He is easily reading on his own now. I got a few of Scholastic's Branches series of books from the library to help Jane grow her reading skills because it didn't come naturally to her and I found a series that was about video games and Atlas took off! I thought he was just sort of reading the words he knew already in the books, but instead he was able to read them completely with no problem! In school I started doing decoding words with him and I kept being surprised with how many words he knew how to pronounce that I didn't even know he had ever seen. I love how much he has grown in reading this year. The books he likes most are humorous or of course about video games and he really wants them to have at least some illustrations on each page. Some of his favorite books or series have been: Press Start (biggest favorite, he keeps asking when they next one releases) Kung Pow Chicken, Boris, Haggis and Tank, Mario Movie early reader, He just now started enjoying The Bad Guys graphic novels. His favorite read aloud we've done was Peter Nimble and his fantastic eyes and his favorite audiobook was George's Marvelous Medicine. I can't wait to see him continue to grow as a reader!

Atlas's favorite activities include a good mix of relaxing and active. As I said earlier Chess has become a favorite of his. He loves trading Pokemon cards and talking about video games with his friends. He also enjoys throwing the frisbee, riding bikes and playing with duct tape warfare weapons. His standbys swimming, swinging, and jumping on the trampoline are still holding strong as well.

His favorite place other than home is now Camp Tejas which makes my heart happy! He says our Labor day Camp Tejas trip was his favorite memory from the year. He also LOVED Monster Jam. The Beach is still way up there too. I would say those are the top three. He started being a little concerned with germs and decided he didn't want to go to Cidercade this year. Other favorites are Marmee and Pappaw's house, the park, the skating rink, the library and the MOCO fair.

Atlas is my goofball. He loves to make people laugh by being ridiculous. I love it. When it comes to serious things he is very concerned with justice and things being how they should be. He will often say to me, "But that's not right." or "That's not how it should be." I love his fair-mindedness. It can be hard when as a parent you can't always be "fair" when you have a child who is very concerned with fairness. Recently while we were going though book about siblings it explained the difference between equal and fair in a way kids can understand and I think it really helped Atlas not be so concerned with everything being exactly equal. He definitely helps me make sure I'm being as fair as I can be. I remember writing a 3 year old post for Atlas and saying my sweet, chill, content boy had taken a backseat to todderness for a while, but I knew my chill boy would come back to me. I think it took me some time to realize it, but he's pretty much all the way back to my sweet, chill, content boy that I said would be back someday. (that is unless he's losing in video games, we're still working on it.) He has gained some more confidence this year and settled into what he really likes to do. I think that has given him back his level of calmness that was always inside him. I'm loving this age of him still loving his momma a lot and not being afraid to show it, but also having his own independence and confidence. I'm praying he continues to grow into a man that cares for others and follows after his passions!

Happy 8th Birthday Atlas! We love you so much!

Micah 6:8

He has shown you, O man, what is good;

And what does the Lord require of you

But to do justly,

To love mercy,

And to walk humbly with your God?