Dear Evan,
I failed to write you a birthday letter when you turned five, so now I've got a lot of lost time to make up for. You turned six today! It's a little bit unbelievable, how much you've grown. Looking at your six-year-old face, it's hard to find any traces of the chubby-cheeked baby who used to toddle around our house. You're getting taller and skinnier all the time -- those Schmidt genes are finally starting to show themselves.
You've had a lot of big changes in your sixth year. The most important in your day-to-day life was starting kindergarten. Finally, after all those years of waiting, you get to ride the bus with your big brother and your neighborhood friends. Now you, too, get to have gym (your favorite) and music and library and computer class and field trips and bingo nights and all of the wonderful things that come along with grade school.
And you're right at home in school. Your teachers have sent home glowing reports, you're making friends, your handwriting has progressed from shaky preschooler scrawl to careful, precise printing, you're adding with ease (and getting there with subtraction), and best of all, you're reading! You took your time getting into reading, but once you got the hang of it you quickly became a pro. Now you read stories aloud with perfect expression and barely any stumbles at all. You're a huge fan of comics, but you're beginning to make forays into chapter books as well.
School has been a huge deal this year, but you've grown up in other ways as well. You learned to ride a two-wheeler this spring, and you could not have been more proud of yourself. In true Evan fashion, you spent a few days complaining that it was too hard and you'd never be able to do it, and then one day practically without warning you climbed onto your bike and rode off down the street as if it were the simplest thing in the world.
One of the biggest changes since the last birthday letter I wrote you is that tantrums are nearly a thing of the past. You have come a long way in learning to control your temper, and your hard work and practice have paid off. You seem so mature these days. There are still occasional bumps in the road, but you're really learning to master yourself, and I think that makes everyone who lives with you a little happier.
One of the biggest challenges you had to face this year was the sudden death of your uncle John, your dad's older brother. This was your first real, personal encounter with death, and it took some time for you to really process and comprehend what had happened. We were all deeply affected, of course, but it breaks my heart a little that you only had a few short years to know your uncle. I hope you'll always remember how much he loved you.
This year wasn't all changes, though. In many ways you're still the same Evan we've known and loved for so many years. Rambunctious, spontaneous, imaginative, funny, affectionate. Still obsessed with Legos, still in love with any animal you lay eyes on, still ready for snuggling at bedtime. You're still the same unpredictable child who constantly keeps us on our toes. You make sure our lives don't get boring.
Only a day into six years old and we've already been told that six year olds don't need help with things anymore. Six seems to be a Big Deal, the first year, maybe, in which you really believe you have changed. But at the same time you're not in too much of a hurry to grow up, and I'm glad for that, because it's so much fun to be your mother, Evan.
05 June 2011
now we are six
21 January 2010
belated birthday post
Dear James,
I'm a month late with your birthday letter, but surely after eight years of living with me and your dad, you've learned that punctuality is not something we're known for, nor does it run in the family, so I know you'll forgive me. I know this, too, because you're a forgiving sort of person, quick to move on, never holding a grudge.
Thank goodness for that, because this year you are beginning to make comparisons between your life and the lives of your peers, and you're quick to let your dad and me know when we fall short of the parenting ideals. Too many chores, no allowance, we never take you to McDonald's, that sort of thing. You like to inform us of all of the wonderful things you'll do as soon as you turn eighteen. I almost died the day you added "buy whipped cream in a can" to this list. Someday you will understand that your mother always whips real cream not because she hates you and wants you to be weird, but because she loves you and wants you to enjoy real food.
Yesterday you were angry with me for one of my many parenting failures and you demanded, "How do I know you're my real mother?" It's hard to tell sometimes, because you are still so remarkably like your dad. Your second-grade teacher is very impressed with your math knowledge and skills, and she told us how surprised she was during the first week of school when you informed the class about negative numbers. I would have loved to see the look on her face a couple of weeks ago when you went to school armed with the information your dad had just taught you about imaginary numbers.
You take after your dad in so many ways. You share his curiosity about the world around you, and from him you've learned to turn to science for your answers. You're so imaginative, always coming up with new ideas. You share his love of games, especially video games. You can be so silly -- you should have seen the look I gave your dad when your teacher told us about all of the weird noises you make in class, seemingly without even being aware of making them -- but you still have a surprising attention span, especially when it comes to drawing and reading.
Now, reading: that's one way I know you're my son. When you find a book you like you get so wrapped up in it that you can't put it down. You don't hear people talking to you, you carry the book around with you when you're forced to do something other than read, you bring a flashlight in the car so darkness won't prevent you finishing this chapter. You're reading books that are shelved in the Young Adult section of the library, yet you still like to be read to at bedtime.
It's a strange age, eight. You're navigating the gray area between childhood and adolescence. You like to snuggle on the couch and watch nature shows, yet you like to rock out to Weezer. You play Legos and cars with your brother at home, yet on the playground at school you and your friends play Twilight. I was the kind of kid who always felt a little out of place at this stage, but I think you're enjoying it, being able to move within two worlds.
You and your brother are still great friends, but I've noticed a bit of a change this year. It's becoming apparent that you are growing older, your tastes are changing, and you're a little less content to play the same old games. Sometimes you even decline to play with Evan in favor of reading, which sends him running to me, pleading can we please not get Calvin and Hobbes from the library anymore because all James does is reeeaaaaad!!! Evan gets frustrated with your growing maturity, but you are often kind enough to humor him.
It's fun being your mom in so many ways, James, whether you're telling jokes or drawing comics or helping me cook or regurgitating facts you've learned from Nature or Nova or from your dad. I like watching you crack up while you watch movies; I like sharing favorite books and movies and music with you and knowing you're old enough to really appreciate and enjoy them; I like overhearing you sing songs or recite poems you've learned at school; I like to see you drawing charts and graphs for fun, or designing board games, or writing stories.
Thank you for helping make our lives so much fun, James. Happy belated birthday. I love you more than any blog post can convey.
19 November 2009
28
Today is my 28th birthday, and I realized this morning that while I always do birthday posts for the boys, and even once in a while for Greg, I've never done a real retrospective birthday post for myself. So I dragged up some old photo albums from the basement and scanned in every photo I could find from my past birthdays.
Surprisingly, out of 28 years, I only have photographic evidence of 5 birthdays, and one of those was an especially unphotogenic year, so I'm only posting 4, plus a bonus photo. We'll start with the most recent and work our way backwards (because the cuteness factor increases the further back in time we go).
Here is my ninth birthday, and let me tell you how cool I thought that buttoned bow was. You can't really tell from the photo, but my blouse also had some random colored buttons on it, and I was convinced that the combination of the two was the height of fashion. I believe this was the first year I was allowed to use the big knife to cut my own cake, which might explain why my mom is hovering so closely over me.
This is my sixth birthday. That's my grandmother in the photo with me, my mom's mom -- I was born on her birthday and she was a constant fixture in that corner chair at all of our birthday parties. Other photos from this particular party, by the way, include photos of my presents, a little bunny family and a bunny-sized playground, which I posed and made my mom take pictures of for me.
My third birthday. I have two memories of this day: 1) I adored my cake. When my sisters were little, my mom made creative cakes for them, much like the cakes I make for my boys, but when I was a kid, she must not have loved me enough or something, I'm not quite sure, but this is the last cake I remember her making. 2) I loved my outfit. You can't see it in the photo, I think it's under my arm, but the vest had a little plaid cat on it to match the shirt. I loved that little cat. Clearly my fashion sense was still developing at that age.
My first birthday. Yes, I looked like a boy.
And for a bonus, because I don't have any good photos of myself on my actual birth day or as a wee newborn, here's Baby Heidi:
And that's it for the birthday retrospective. I'm not sure where the other 24 years went, although I think I already mentioned my mom not loving me enough, so that might have had something to do with it. (Kidding, Mom! I love you!) I don't even have any fun birthday stories to share -- in the first place I have a terrible memory, and in the second place, birthdays for most of my life have been pretty low-key. If I remember correctly. Which I may not.
This morning over breakfast James said, "Wow, Mom, in two years you'll be thirty!" I said, "Yep, and in twenty-two years I'll be fifty."
"Yeah," said Evan, "and then you'll be dead."
I replied that I'm planning to live until at least a hundred and forty, but you know, half of that wouldn't be too bad as long as I get to spend all of my birthdays until then with the people I love.
03 July 2009
friday photos: belated birthday edition
I realized that I did my annual birthday letter to Evan, but I forgot to post any photos from our birthday festivities. So, as long as I'm still not uploading photos from the new camera, I can at least catch you up on some older photos.
Evan requested a strawberry Pikachu cake this year. Not one of my prettiest efforts, I'm afraid, but it was one of the most delicious birthday cakes I've made. He was pretty happy with it, which is what counts.
He got not one, not two, but THREE giant Star Wars Lego sets for his birthday. This was by far the most exciting birthday event. Here he is showing off all three:
And here he is with one of the finished (or nearly finished) products. Which one, I have no idea. I'm not up to date on my Star Wars ships.
Now that he's four, he's decided he's big enough to really ride his balance bike, and he's been practicing coasting with no feet:
The funnest part of any birthday is the balloons, obviously. But what's more fun than playing with balloons? Drawing scary faces on them! (Ignore the smiles; I think it's the teeth that's supposed to make them scary.)
All in all I think it was a pretty enjoyable day for the birthday boy.
05 June 2009
four years old
Dear Evan,
Today you're four years old. This is an important birthday -- this year was the first year you've really understood what birthdays mean, and you've been waiting for this day for a long time. Since James' birthday back in January, every time we've gotten a new Lego catalog you've gone through and pointed out to us which sets you wanted for your birthday. For the last week, you've been counting down the days.
When Grandma arrived this morning to spend your birthday weekend with us, she asked you how old you are now. You replied three, and wouldn't admit to being four yet. Eventually we were able to understand that you didn't think you actually turned four until you had the birthday cake. Eventually we were able to make you understand that this isn't true.
You've grown up a lot this year. I'm not foolish enough to tempt fate by saying that your tantrums are completely over, but I really think we're getting close. We can even go whole days without tantrums, sometimes! You're learning to control your temper, and I am so proud of you when I watch you struggle not to scream or flail or explode, when you express your emotions with words, because teaching to do those things has been a very long, hard road for both of us, and I think you're finally coming to the end of that road.
Lately you like to hear stories about what you were like as a baby. I tell you that we used to call you Monkey Paws, Crazy Eyes, Tomato Face. I tell you that you've always been a picky eater, and you've always been a reluctant, light sleeper. I tell you that your first words were "ball" and "car" and that you loved mama's milk and that you've always adored your brother and you just eat up every word.
Your imagination continues to surprise me. You're so inventive, creating names, putting together costumes, designing Lego ships, constantly narrating stories. Now that you're learning to draw recognizable pictures, your creativity is blossoming even more as you color monsters and Pokemon. You and your brother spend hours together inventing and creating and designing and building.
You are still stubborn, still willful and determined. Now that your tantrums are fewer, though, I'm coming to value these qualities in you because it shows you know your own mind. You're full of confidence. You hate being told what to do, and you won't take no for an answer. I keep reminding myself that someday your persistence will be an asset in achieving whatever you set your mind to.
Physically you're still spirited and rambunctious. You run almost everywhere. At the community play classes we went to this year, you tested your physical capabilities and limitations, often threatening to give me a heart attack with your stunts, jumping, leaping, diving on the mats. Any time I asked you to stop doing something dangerous, you'd look at me with that pouty lip and say, "But Mom, it's so much fun!" At playgrounds, other parents watch you with worried eyes as you climb structures they don't think someone your size should be able to climb. You like to tell people that you're small, but you're very strong.
It's been a difficult year for you in some ways, now that your brother is going to school full days. Learning to play without James alongside you, and learning the patience of waiting for that bus to arrive every afternoon have been hard for you. Yet you've done it. You two are still best friends, and you still miss him while he's away, but I think you've grown into yourself more as an individual without James. You can't wait to go to school now yourself.
We've had a good year, Evan. Maybe even our best. You're learning so much: you can write your name, you can read simple words, you've learned to dress yourself and do some simple chores around the house. You hardly nap anymore, and are learning to deal with being overtired. You are naturally very resistant to change, but you are learning to be a little more flexible when it comes to trying new foods. (We're still working on your clothing and shoe issues.)
Also, this morning, after years of thinking you'd never be able to, you learned how to roll your tongue:
Four years old, Evan, but I'm still allowed to call you my baby. I love you.
27 February 2009
friday photos: january edition
It's been a while since I posted any Friday photos. I mentioned before that our camera had been broken for a while, and it also has some crazy issues with the image quality, so I don't actually have very many photos from the last few months that are both in focus and in realistic colors all at once. So there are not many photos here representing January, but at least there are a few good ones.
I made a hat for Evan. It's supposed to be a crab, but he wouldn't let me round out the top, so it's a square crab. Or, alternately, just some kind of square red monster with beady eyes and claws.
We've done a lot of sledding this winter; the weather has been just perfect for it. Greg and James at one of our favorite sledding hills:
James' birthday occurred during my not-posting phase, and while I did manage to write the annual birthday post, I didn't post many photos. So here are a few extra birthday moments.
First, James putting together the Lego ship he got from Grandma Kathy and Papa. (SO! EXCITING!)
With the finished craft (for a moment there I was almost disappointed with myself for not remembering the name, until I remembered that I don't really care), which he put together all by himself:
One of the treats we had instead of a real birthday cake was a birthday sundae. Candlelight is really not adequate to illuminate the staggering amounts of sugar on top of the ice cream in that bowl. It was truly impressive. And naturally he ate every bite.
The photos don't show it well enough, but it was a pretty good month.
08 January 2009
happy birthday to james!
Dear James,
You're seven years old today. Seven years old! It hardly seems possible. But it's true; you're growing up. Things are changing in your world. You're slowly growing away from being a little boy, and starting to make your way to adolescence.
7 mini Dutch babies for a 7-year-old boyPhysically, you continue to grow up and up and up. Just last week we sent you to get ready for bed and you returned, totally oblivious, wearing your little brother's pajamas. Sure, they were short in the arms and legs, but they still fit you, you insisted. It wasn't until I really looked at the photo above, taken this morning, that I realized your face is growing up too. I think it's because your grandmother just trimmed your hair to allow us to see your face properly for the first time in months. Now, looking at that photo, I can see that all traces of chubby babyfat cheeks are gone. I don't know how this is possible when you're already out-eating me much of the time now.
You still look exactly like your dad, and you behave like him more and more as you grow older. You like to tease, tell jokes, play pranks. You are agreeable and cooperative. Anger and moodiness can often be cleared away in a matter of minutes. You're as curious and inquisitive as ever, always wanting to know how and why. Thank goodness your dad is a scientist with endless patience. He's been teaching you multiplication as well as some scientific principles that I would have expected to be too advanced for a first-grader, but you've proven me wrong.
Old age hasn't yet diminished your cheerfulness or optimism. When we were stuck in airports for so many hours over the holidays, you were the optimist. You were sure, every time, that we'd be on the next flight, that any minute now we'd be boarding an airplane. You played games with your brother, you befriended other kids waiting in the airport, you made your own fun and continued to enjoy yourself and boost our spirits when your dad and I threatened to get too disgruntled. You were tired, but you kept going, so excited about going to see Grandma and Papa for Christmas. When we left the airport after that first day of unsuccessful travel attempts, you were so surprised and disappointed that it hadn't happened. It was heartbreaking.
I feel like we don't see you much anymore these days -- you're at school all day long, and when you get home, most days you play outside until sunset. We get to see you for dinner and bedtime, with a little play in between, sometimes a bath, some homework,some chores, some reading. Your days are full and busy, but you don't seem to miss us much. I don't notice it most of the time either, how little time we're really spending together, until weekends or vacations when I get to spend entire days in your company and I'm reminded of how much fun it is to play games, to cook, to read, to snuggle with you.
I love you, darling boy, my sweet baby James. Happy, happy birthday.
05 June 2008
happy birthday, evan
Today feels like summer. The cottonwood trees are spreading their fluff all over the neighborhood, making it look as if it's snowing, and I wonder whether you will ever really see snow on your birthday. Maybe one day you'll travel to Australia or Chile or the Himalayas and celebrate a winter birthday.
One of your most prominent traits to develop over the last year is your sense of adventure. It's easy for me to picture you climbing mountains or crossing the outback when you get older, because those things aren't so very far from diving fearlessly off the side of the couch or charging off on your own in strange places.
Your independence and your will have continued to grow this year. Now more than ever you are doing things for yourself, and you are as insistent as always that you do things your way. You have a very un-toddler-like quality of being incredibly determined and single-minded, frustratingly so.
But that doesn't mean that you don't still need us. Because no matter how stubborn and determined and aggressive you can be, you are in equal measure affectionate and loving. One of my favorite times of the day is naptime, when we lay quietly together in my bed and you pet my hand and I get to watch you fall asleep. Every day.
One of the things I love best about you is how free you are with your emotions. You still scream, oh yes you do, about all kinds of things, but when you're not unhappy, you are very, very happy. You are the most generous child I've ever seen when it comes to spontaneous acts of affection -- unsolicited hugs and kisses and snuggles and I love yous. It melts me every time.
You've grown delightfully silly in your third year. In fact, it's hard for me to tell how much you really know, because counting and reciting the alphabet and rhyming are games where you like to send yourself into fits of giggles giving wrong answers. But just when I start to think I've got a backwards child who can't even count to five without mistakes, you count perfectly to twelve. You like to keep us on our toes, in all kinds of ways.
Your creativity is blossoming, guided by your brother, who you are very easily frustrated with and angered by, but without whom you're a little lost sometimes. You and your brother devise clever games in which your identities are always changing, in which the adventures never end. Your imagination has grown in leaps and bounds this year. It's incredible to watch.
Something that puzzles me about you is how easily you identify with the bad guys. Your favorite part of The Wizard of Oz was the flying monkeys, you've requested a Darth Vader cake for your birthday, and you're the villian as often as you're the hero in games with your brother. You like the bad guys because they are big and strong. I hope to help you learn over time that strength isn't always physical.
We play a game at meals, at almost every meal these days, in which I tell you and your brother to stop eating, because I don't want you to grow any bigger. This is the only trick that has ever worked more than once to convince you to eat more than a few bites of dinner. "Look, Mom!" you tease, "I'm growing!"
"No!" I say. "You two are growing too fast! Stop growing! I want you to be my babies a little longer!"
And you think I'm kidding.
I love you, darling boy. Happy birthday, today and for many years to come.
16 March 2008
expressions of love
I was going to do a weekend recipe this weekend, really I was, but then I got too busy cooking. You see, last Wednesday was Greg's birthday, and for the people I love (read: the people I live with who have no option to refuse), I bake birthday cakes. And for my lovely boyfriend, I will spend most of the afternoon making a cake full of questionable flavor combinations, dirtying just about every dish in the kitchen, because I love him, and baking is one of my favorite ways to express my love.
Sometime last week, Greg was making popcorn and hunting in the spice cabinet for something to put on it when he spied a jar of molasses. I hadn't realized until that moment how much Greg loves molasses, until he suggested putting it on our popcorn. Then he started rhapsodizing about his ideal popcorn toppings, which included flavors like molasses and mocha and caramel. Needless to say, I shot this train of thought down pretty much immediately, because unless popcorn is covered in butter or chocolate, I won't eat it. But he did give me something to think about.
Later on, I put "molasses mocha caramel cake" into Google and came up with a recipe for Chocolate Voodoo Cake. After looking it over and seriously underestimating the time and effort involved, I decided to make it for Greg's birthday cake.
I started the cake process at 3:30 this afternoon. Now it's around 8:30pm and we've got another 45 minutes of refrigeration until the glaze is set and the cake is ready to be poked with our voodoo needles. In the interest of saving time, I didn't bother to shape the cake, thinking I could mask any lopsidedness with the mousse and/or the glaze. This, of course, didn't work at all, so we've got a very misshapen little cake. And we tried, we really tried with those stupid chocolate caramel voodoo needles, but ours are all blobby, and either too fat or too thin.
Still, I tasted every bit of batter over every step of the way, and I'm convinced that though it is a really strange combination of things, it will taste good even if it's not pretty. And trust me, it's not pretty.
So happy belated birthday, honey. There aren't many people who I'd deem worthy of almost six hours (non-continuous, but still!) of my labor, just for a birthday cake, but you're one of 'em. I just hope this cake is worth it.
14 January 2008
even better than mere survival
Not only did we survive the birthday party, we actually had a really fun time. All of us. Five 5 and 6-year-olds in one room (plus one 2.5-year-old who wishes he was six), crammed full of sugar, do not necessarily destroy one's sanity and will to live, as I had feared. Perhaps it had something to do with the fact that three of the other kids' parents stayed for the party, perhaps I was more prepared after my harrowing birthday party experience last year, perhaps the children have actually grown up and matured a little bit. Whatever the reason, we had an awesome birthday party.
But would you like to know the real key to keeping kindergarteners (and a toddler) busy and happy?
Balloons.
Balloons! Simple, right? If you don't mind a little good-natured shouting and running, balloons are the best birthday party game I've ever seen. Here I had planned all kinds of fun games and activities, and it turns out all we needed were fifteen or twenty balloons. Also a good idea -- a big box to put the balloons in. This way the children have a goal: either get all the balloons and hide them in a box, or, once the grown-ups have imprisoned the balloons in the box, you can liberate those balloons and beat the other children with them. Fun for all!
And of course, I can't write a birthday party post without mentioning the cake, because if you've ever read this blog, you are aware that I am a fan of cakes, both baking and eating them. It was a vegan (to accomodate one of the party guests) vanilla (to accomodate James' predictable, unchanging preference) cake with vanilla icing, and James requested a big cake with the Transformers symbol on it -- the Autobot symbol, to be precise, if you care about such things. I never used to care about such things, but as the mother of a six-year-old boy, I now have no choice but to know these things whether I care or not.
Here is the cake, a product of intense labor from both Greg and me (I baked, Greg designed, and we both very carefully, delicately, decorated).
So. I was pleasantly surprised by all of this birthday party stuff this year. Here's hoping it gets better and better every year.
