Dear Carter,

Today, you are four. I couldn’t believe when the day came that your big brother turned four.  And now it’s your very own turn.  We’ve been celebrating your birthday for about a week, starting with dinner last week at a friend’s house, followed by a birthday party and cupcakes at preschool.  You are sure to tell everyone, “I’m still three though”  as you hold up your hand in a stop signal and nod your head matter of factly.  You are so terribly bright.  And witty.  You say the funniest things, and your adorable voice makes it even funnier.  People comment on you everywhere we go.  How cute you are.  How funny you are.  How oh my goodness, how do you ever discipline him? you are.  You light up the room.  And our hearts.  I can’t believe we were gifted with such a boy as you.

You are totally into big boy things. .  .you still love superheroes, but can’t get enough of Star Wars, Angry Birds, Ninjas (any kind of ninjas, but also Ninjago and Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles), Skylanders, Pokemon, Mario.  You love weapons–mostly swords and light sabers. We have quite the collection.  You never tire of them.  You don’t love dress up as much as you used to, but you like the accessories.  Mostly, of course, the weapons.

You love teeny, tiny action figures, and have accrued quite the collection.  Lego micro figures (which of course are much smaller than lego mini figures), squinkies, fight pods, heroics super heroes that are like a half inch tall, teeny mates, little tiny ninjas, and little tiny army men.  You like to set them up, fight them, make good guy and bad guy teams, and mix and match them all.  Pretty much that’s all you would play with if you had the choice.

You are so good at coloring.  Coloring things the right color.  Staying in the lines.  It’s amazing to see how much progress you made in the past year.  Your scissors skills can definitely be improved on, but man, the coloring. . . so good.

Eating is still not your forte, though I have to say, you’ve definitely gotten a little better in that area.  You seem to be hungry a lot more than before, but you still are pretty limited to what you’ll actually eat (and enjoy).  You like snacking a hundred times more than eating meals.  And ditto with the snack food.  You’d rather eat fruit snack, gold fish, crackers, pretzels, and any other kind of snack food over a real meal any day.  We’ve grown accustomed to calling your meals, lunch snack,  or dinner snack just to entice you to be excited about it.

You love Sawyer with all your being.  You love hugging him, holding him, talking to him, playing with him, having him “walk to you”.  You have always been drawn to babies.  And you’re thrilled to have one of your own.  You loved him from the moment he came out, and your love has just grown and grown for him.

You are not a very good sport when it comes to losing.  Tears come quickly.  We’re trying to work on it, but it’s sort of engrained in you and a tough one to fix.  You get frustrated very easily.  Just like your older brother, perseverance isn’t a strong character trait.  If you can’t do something right away, crying quickly follows.  If you are losing in a game, you give up without finishing.  Hopefully we can try to turn that habit around.

You are an amazing learner, and soak things up like a sponge.  You can memorize things so well, and have learned so many things this year from preschool, Sunday School and AWANA.  I’m so proud of you and all that you’ve learned–I love hearing you randomly say things in the car, or when you are playing.  You sometimes ask questions at the strangest times out of nowhere and make the most random comments.  Just the other day you were playing a game on the iPad and said, “Mom, the sheep are walking on the water.  Only Jesus and God can walk on the water.”  It’s so nice to know that you learn and retain information with such ease.  That should be helpful for you 🙂 You like being a helper.  Especially the wash–you like to throw the clothes into the washer and then put them in the dryer.  You aren’t super good at cleaning up your stuff though, and like to leave little messes everywhere.

You are still a tiny dude.  You haven’t even hit thirty pounds yet. . . some of the clothes in your closet are still 2T.  It seems you got the small genes in the family, but who knows. . . maybe there is a growth spurt in your near future.

You love the iPad.  Games are sometimes too hard for you, but you try to play them anyways. You are a creature of habit. You still need your blankie all the time. You love lollipops, but it drives me nuts that you just bite them–I feel like you’re going to break your teeth.  You love waffles and pancakes, bagels with cream cheese, ice cream, pineapple and candy. You love taking showers. You love being held still and lately have been sweet with your words, telling us that you love us so much. You love when I print pictures out for you to color. You love your cousins so much. You are not shy. Your voice is so LOUD, and you get that from your daddy. Some of my favorite things that you say funny are egg yoke- “oke”.  Knuckle- “nickel”. Sandwich- “samitch”. I can’t remember- “I can’t renember”. Did I already do that “this day?” (today).  “Can somebody wipe my bum bum?”  I’ve never seen a cuter belly button than yours.  I possibly have never seen bigger eyes than yours, nor longer eyelashes than yours. I can’t handle how cute you are when you run. You are so obedient, and we are very thankful for that.

You are such a joy, Carter J.  We love you to the moon and back. Happy Birthday, big guy.

Love, Mom