Will is FIVE

Well, my baby is now FIVE years old. Every year we throw a party to celebrate the birth of our children. It's just a little celebration with their/our friends. This year Will wanted a pirate party - a fun theme! I bought little bandannas for the kids and we made sashes out of red fabric - a sort of pirate costume for them all to take home. Joe made an excellent pirate treasure map and the kids all got to go on a treasure hunt to find their treasure boxes. Once they found their box, they got to paint it. After it dried, they all got to pick out treasures to put in their box - fake gold coins, stickers, little jewels, and candy. Every year I've made a birthday cake for my kids. I really enjoy making cakes for them. This year Will wanted a pirate ship cake - AHHH. Well, anything is possible with the Internet and I was able to pull that one off..... :-)

My favorite part of his party was when everyone was singing Happy Birthday to Will. My eyes teared up as I realized how many people love our little boy. He has made some wonderful friends over the past couple of years and it made me realize what a special boy we really have. One of his biggest strengths is empathy. He is able to really feel when others are sad, scared, or just unhappy. He has such a loving heart and I can tell that he really feels for others in need. I know that is a special gift and God will really be able to use him in a special way when he gets older.

He's also an amazing little kid. While he has some fears, he's also pretty adventurous. He loves to ride his bike (with no training wheels!), his scooter, and we're working on his roller skates and skateboard. Recently, he and Lauren have been playing out in the backyard more. They've enjoyed the swings (he flies like crazy on the disk swing), the slide, and just being plain adventurous in the back yard. He loves roller coasters and sports. He's tried his hand at soccer and basketball this year. He even scored his first goal in soccer! We're also doing a lot of swimming this summer and Will has really enjoyed his swimming lessons!

This year has been a big year for growth in his academics, too. He's learned how to read and he can sound out most phonetically spelled words with ease. He's made some great progress on his cutting and coloring as well. It's been awesome to watch him become a little boy instead of a toddler. We just love our Will and we can't wait to watch him develop even more. As we look into his 5 year old year, we see Kindergarten in the future! While I'll miss him being home M-F, I know that he's going to love school. He's always enjoyed going to school and being with his friends. We're starting to see how important his friends are to him - and we continue to pray that he makes some good lifetime friends while he's in school.