Isaac is 4

My sweetest boy, my favorite boy,

You are FOUR!  Hooray!  I must admit, I have loved three-year-old Isaac, and although it is exciting to watch you learn and grow, I will miss you as a three year old. This has been a great year indeed, and we have much to be thankful for. Today, at your 4-year check up with Dr. Wade, you weighed 37 pounds. You are in the 30th percentile for height and 61st for weight. You are one solid kid, pure muscle, very very strong. You lost your baby belly sometime this year. You ask often if a certain food has protein and if it will help you to grow big and strong. Which is great, because I'm able to tell you yes to the good foods and no to the junk. I don't know if that makes a difference, but you are asking and we are able to talk about things like this with more of a conversation than just me talking to you. It has been so fun to watch as your vocabulary expands. You say the smartest and funniest things!  Some words are still hilarious, like piano sounds something like pian-yo. Elephant is ef-el-ent. Precious. Also, quick and trick both sound like twick. So sometimes we ask you to say "quick trick" and you say "twick twick."  We love you. And you say back "I wuv you too."

The other night I snuggled with you in your bed for a few minutes after we said goodnight. You were absolutely precious, you said things like "you da best Mayah evah. I wuv you." You are really good at being thankful. You often tell me that I make the best breakfast, lunch, and dinner. All three, no matter what meal it is.

This year has been special because you became a big brother. and you simply are the BEST big brother. You are loving, kind, sensitive, and really really caring. You do not like for her to be upset. When we had to take her to a lab for blood work, and she was so sad and distressed and crying non-stop, you looked up at Abi and said "Abi, we have to do something about this." You say frequently that you will protect her, and we have no doubt that you will, and will do an excellent job of it.

This year I think we have read every single Bill Peet book he ever wrote and illustrated. They are fun, they are great stories, and you will sit and listen to the whole book, some of which take a good 15 minutes to read. I have always loved your love of books. I love reading to you. Today we read The Pinkish, Purplish, Bluish Egg, Kermit the Hermit, and Fly Homer Fly. I love Zella, Zack and Zodiak as well as The Ant and the Elephant.

Today, we put balloons outside your door for you to see when you woke up. You said you didn't really like them "b/c they got in my way." Ha!  We went to get a birthday donut for you, but because it's cold and sleeting, the donut shops had sold out by 9:15 so we got a chocolate donut for you from Homeland and you were thrilled. I love your joy and excitement for the little things in life, it's so refreshing. Your innocence and joy are beautiful and keep me going on days when I might otherwise tire out. We next went to your dr's appointment. You have met all milestones. You did everything the dr asked of you, following directions really well. There are some concerns about your vision and possibly hearing in your left ear (the dr said he'll wait to check your hearing again next year, nothing too alarming today). You had to get 3 shots, and whew, that wasn't pretty.  You tried to be brave, you wanted to be brave, but the tears and screams came quick. Abi held you and talked you through it. Afterwards we went to Lowe's to pick out our Christmas tree, then to Braums for a cheeseburger, fries, and two scoops of ice cream for you. Your favorite flavors are mint chocolate chip and sherbert (specifically red and orange).


Your favorite color has been black until maybe a month or two ago when it changed to green, maybe because that's Abi's favorite color, or the color of your new room. Your new favorite number, instead of 5 (which you still talk about a lot) is 100. You seem to like and be interested in bigger animals lately, like lions, panthers, rhinos, and elephants. You like to watch Justin Time and Wild Krats when you get to watch a show on Netflix. I found my childhood story-book records and you love to listen to Peter Pan, Thumbelina, and Heidi's Song. This cracks me up. You love it.  You have the best attention span.
This year as well you have started praying at dinner time. You say such hear-felt prayers to our good Father above. I know He must be so proud of you and the boy you are becoming. Sometime this summer you started to pray something like "Thank you God for our food, Thank you Lord for loving me, Thank you Lord for blessing me, Thank you Lord for making me whole and saving my soul..." at which point you broke into song while praying "thank you Lord." This became a nightly occurrence.

A few things that I value about your personality and temperament: your strong-will, you are one determined boy, when you get your mind set on something, there is no stopping you. This is a great strength but also can be a weakness that will need to be submitted to our God so that your will can be molded to His will. You are sensitive and have a keen sense for other people's emotions. This is a beautiful thing as it enables you to be loving and caring and kind when others might be upset or down or in need of a friend.  You tend to care a lot more these days about physical strength than in loving others. No doubt, this is largely because of your age, so we often talk to you about the importance of having a loving heart and courage thru God is more valuable than physical strength.


Our prayer continues to be that you will grow to be a man who loves God will all your heart, mind, strength and soul, that you will love others whole-heartedly, and that you will grow in wisdom. Last night I prayed that you would be a strong warrior in God's army, you interrupted me to ask if this meant you would die. Hopefully not yet son. Death is a hard topic to discuss, but one you are more and more curious about. So as parent's we pray for wisdom.

You love to climb. Lately you have been climbing our fence in the back yard and walking along it all the way around the yard. You climb the couple of small trees in our front yard, and love to climb up on top of our cars in the driveway and jump down. You love wrestling with you Abi and I often get to be the commentator for your match. You recently learned how to play Candy Land and Chutes and Ladders and just last week Abi taught you how to set up Dominoes and knock them over---this blew your mind!  You also LOVE to run, and run fast. You always ask others to watch you run, they are always impressed with your speed! I sincerely hope we get to run races together someday.
You have been at Parent's Day Out for two years now and are in the "big class". You are learning new things every week. Like how to use scissors, how to spell your name (you are the best with the letter I), and learning lots of social rules/norms/expectations as well like taking turns, standing in line, etc. Your teachers are Ms. Dana and Ms Jessica. They are fantastic!  So far you know how to write the letter I, O and C.  You can identify most single digit numbers and several letters. It's so fun to watch all this learning in your precious mind.
We are always remindful of your birth mother, that this was not her plan, that she loved you so so so much. That she did everything she could for you and wanted you to have the best life possible. We are grateful that God puts families together and for our family but also know that our family did not come about without some pain and loss. But He redeems. He makes beautiful things out of things that are lost and broken and hurting. We serve a mighty and powerful and sovereign God. He is our good and faithful Father. We thank Him for you every day dear boy. Here's to another exciting and wonderful year!
Love always,
Abi and Emayah

and a few more pics:

 You love the Bible App on Abi's phone. We have to limit how much time you get on it each day.

 Yes!  new Veggie Tales from Warry and La-la (Larry and Cathy Bowles)

 At the Tulsa County Fair October 2013.

 A little baseball practice in the front yard. With your sweet Pirates helmet Grammie gave you.

 

 Niccodemus, the cat, that you love.

  Climbing, always climbing.

 A Pirate for Halloween.

 Savoring some hot chocolate at Erly Rush Coffee House.

 Spotty, your favorite stuffed animal.You ask me all the time "What is ______ (Spotty, a matchbox car, your wash-cloth, whatever you have in your hand at the moment) saying?" And I get to come up with something that the stuffed animal or other inanimate object is saying.

Christmas sweater. You sure do not like me to take your picture. Thanks for obliging.