The Pup Turns 4!!

Andrew turned 4 years old today!! As with every experience he has, it is his first and it is my first all at the same time. That's what happens when you are the oldest. I have never had a 4-year-old before. From now on, I will compare each child to what Andrew did at this age or to what a different child did at this age. But Andrew never has any comparisons. Because he is the first.
And what a first. To know Andrew is to know excitement materialized. Even as a baby he would laugh and laugh and laugh at things. And he has a smile to match. When he smiles or laughs, his whole face lights up and to me, he lights up the whole room. There is no holding back when he is happy, just as there is no holding back when he is mad. It is all out there. There is no middle-ground with this kid. He is my hot-and-cold boy; my on-or-off kid.

When he is excited about something that is about to happen, he stands there with his arms bent at the elbow and his hands up at about shoulder-level and shakes his hands like crazy. I said stands there, but more often than not he is jumping up and down and the same time. It is like he can't contain all the feeling that he feels. And in this sense, I think he is my son. I know what it feels like to think you are going to burst from the excitement. And I love watching him at those moments and feel almost the same level of excitement, without the shaking and jumping. I love sharing fun, exciting things with him because I know he will react. I picture him standing in line for the carousel, hands shaking; I picture him standing in line to ride the train at Christmastime, hands shaking. Pure excitement.

Andrew has always had his own time-table. From the beginning. He was 10 days late and even then I had to be induced. He just wasn't wanting to get here quite yet. He didn't walk until he was almost 16 months. He took a few steps several months earlier, but he did not like falling and didn't even try to walk again until he was almost 16 months old. Two weeks after turning two, he watched The Letter Factory a few times and knew all his letters and sounds, just like that. He liked it and it interested him, so he did it. He could jump off the diving board and swim to the side of the pool by himself when he was two and by the time he was three he could swim any distance by himself--he didn't need me at all. Peer pressure, or parent pressure, hasn't been much of an influence on him. He has to decide to do it himself.

He is fun, funny, stubborn, sweet, persistent, loving, bright, curious, a little engineer, helpful, social and not social all in one, energetic, cautious, a great singer, enthusiastic, always a negotiator, the rules enforcer but not follower, a one-of-a-kind. There is no one else like him. And I love that.
He is also so tender-hearted and sweet. He sporadically tells me "Mom." "Yes?" "Mom, I wuv you." That usually more than makes up for the "You're a mean mom!" comment from a few hours before. When I leave him with a babysitter he runs up to me and gives me a big hug and a kiss before I leave. I can't think of many things I like better than that. He can be so sweet with Natalie and James. He calls Natalie "Nats." His own name for her. It think it is so cute. Nobody can make James laugh like Andrew can. Really, James absolutely loves Andrew and smiles every time he sees him.
Andrew does not like many foods. He used to eat anything and everything. Now we are down to spaghetti and parmesan cheese (lots of it), bread, PB&J, cheese sandwich, quesadillas, and most fruits and veggies. Oh, and cereal and waffles and pancakes. But he has to try everything I serve, so we find ourselves waiting for Andrew to eat the macaroni and cheese (yes, it took him 2 hours of crying before he would try a mac and cheese noodle. He liked it) or the taco soup, or the potatoes, or anything else. It is hard for him. And hard for us. He usually gets around to trying it, but before we get to that point, we go through the crying, the whining, the "I'm going to eat it" with a huge grin on his face stages. He holds that fork right by his mouth, his legs kicking, giggling a nervous giggle and with a big smile, "I wike this food mom" before he has even tried it. It's like he's trying to convince himself before he puts it into his mouth. And more often than not, he actually gags and sometimes even spits it back up. But even when he has spit up the food he almost always says to me in a very sweet voice, "Thanks for making this dinner, mom." Or "Thanks for making these potatoes, mom." Whatever it is. I have no idea where he got it from. But I just love it.
Andrew loves his stuffed animal Zzzzs. (we pronounce it zeez). He has had it from the very beginning and I think Zzzzs has been a friend, a comforter and when we let Andrew cry to help him learn how to fall asleep on his own, Zzzzs was there for him. For a while, Andrew took it everywhere. It even went to preschool with him for the first few weeks. Every once in a while he will say to me, "Mom, I wuv Zzzzs." Or, "Mom, Zzzzs wuvs me." Or, "Mom, Zzzzs is my brother."
Andrew loves to read. Or at this point, to be read to. But he memorizes things so fast that he could read the books to himself if he wanted to. The other night I was reading the Little Engine That Could. There is a line in the middle of a huge paragraph that reads, "dolls and toys" and I said, "toys and dolls." I started to go on and he stopped me. "Mom, no, you need to say dolls and toys." Another time I skipped over a line in a huge paragraph and he stopped me and said word-for-word the line I had missed.

One of my favorite moments has been with Andrew on the trampoline. Sometimes when Natalie and James are asleep in the afternoon Andrew and I go jump on the trampoline. We do silly things and bounce each other and then we always lie down and look at the clouds (if there are any--we live in Arizona!). He snuggles up his little body right next to mine and we look up in the sky, comment on how good it smells out there--fresh grass/plants smell, look for different things in the clouds and I always try to find out a few more things about him. What he likes, how he feels about things. His answers are usually, "Nuffing" (nothing) or "good" but every once in a while he will start sharing his little mind's thoughts. That is heaven for me. I love getting a glimpse into this little guy's thoughts. And as he gets older he is sharing more and more of these thoughts.

Just a few more things I just love about Andrew:

• his WHITE hair,
  
• he has back muscles,
  
• his many excuses for why he can't get dressed right then,
  
• that he can sing the whole doughnut song after hearing John sing it once and I had to hear it about 5 times before I could sing it,
  
• pants off after about 5 minutes being home,
  
• he can crack an egg and add it to a recipe without getting any shells in,
  
• that no matter what he says in a prayer, he always includes, "spirit, gospel" before he closes
• that he runs to me with a big grin and jumps into my arms every time I pick him up from preschool
• that he says "nuvie" instead of movie and "naybe" instead of maybe and "mines" instead of mine
  

I could go on and on about this little pup (that is the nickname John gave him when his baby crying sounded like a puppy whimper). What a blessing he has been to me. I am so glad he is mine!

Happy Birthday Andrew!!