Awww { Mommy Memory }

Last Saturday, we stayed in DC with Team ABC.  Michael woke me up at 6:30am because I'm his favorite person to wake up (YEA!)

In my sleep, I do remember him saying to me, "Mommy, your hair is like a present for me."  How do you not wake up happy to that?  Even at 6:30am!

I was once told to give him a burp cloth to touch while he was nursing so he would have an easy lovey to replace and use.

I never did because I'm lazy and so Michael used to play with my hair when I was nursing.  He would run his fingers through it, and I never thought anything of it.

Well, he's a grown boy now, and he still plays with my hair when he gets anxious about something.  He's got a little bit of a fascination with it!

So now many years later, I'm glad it was me who was his lovey and not a rag used to wipe up spit up.

And then it makes me think about his sentence about my hair because I've told him many times, "Michael, God gave me a present, and when I opened it up - You were inside it!"

Sweet Michael

I post a lot about how crazy Michael is - because well - he is.  He's the kid that wants you to play with him a lot - games, sports, video games, reading, watching TV, cleaning his room (hahaha - just wanted to see if you were really reading).  He's an only child so yea - he's a bit high maintenance for us adults.  Plus, he's six, which I think is just such a funny age.

But I rarely post about how sweet Michael really is.  Most people who meet him always seem to remark to me about how sweet and kind he is, which warms my heart.  As his mother, I love him to bits and think he's wonderful.  It's nice to know an unbiased assessment agrees!

His prayer buddy helped him to finish the statement:  "If I could make a change in the world..."

To which Michael responded, "I would let everybody to have a friend."

After all the school shootings (one of which was as a result of bullying), I am so glad he is developing a heart that sees this in humanity.

We talked a bit about how it was important to be kind and respectful to everyone.  And that if someone looks lonely and left out, we can always be warm and welcoming to them.  Who knows if that person needed it for that day?

What else do I love about Michael?  His confidence.  I think he got that from his father.

He's very sure of himself.  He's sure of what he's doing.  He's sure of his opinions.  He's sure he's fun and cool.  Wish I could drink a bit of that!

Last week, he told me that Julia said to him, "You have a creepy laugh."

I was appalled!  How cruel!  Made me so sad.

Michael then said, "So I laughed like this {insert crazy laugh}, and thought it was funny."

I was so impressed that he wasn't at all affected by it.  He thought it was hilarious.  And it didn't seem like he cared what she said or thought, which I hope he continues to have as he grows.  People can be very cruel and you can handle it a lot better with thick skin. I think Michael already has much thicker skin than me!

I guess this just turned into a post about Michael at 6.5 years old.

• Right now his favorite games are Munchkin and Scrambled States of America.
• He's learning to eat all sorts of fruits and vegetables now that I stopped buying crackers and such.  
• He loves raw cauliflower and tolerates raw carrots.  He hates raw cucumbers and raw peppers.
• He'll eat any vegetable that is just steamed except peppers.  He really hates peppers.  He hates roasted vegetables.
• Two nights ago, he ate almost an entire zucchini steamed.
• He's totally into MarioKart on...wait for it...GAME CUBE!!  SWEEET!  It's TOTALLY way cooler than the Wii version of MarioKart and we have LOVED playing it with him.  Brings back the glory days in our 20s when we used to play it so often we thought we would see giant bananas in the road.
• His reading skills are completely coming along.  We read 15 minutes every day and he can finish about 2.5 easy reading books in that time.  
• We started piano lessons! Michael practices for 5 minutes every day (kind of...)  He picks it up pretty well.  He can practice with a metronome, but it's not perfect.  He does understand that the notes get played on the beat and can do it so that's good!
• He likes to help with babies, but it takes about 8-10 hours for him to get used to them.
• He loves to bowl.  If you ask him what he wants to do for family time, he almost always says to go bowling!  If I ever hear of a mother/son league, we are SO signing up.
• He loves rock n roll and country music.  He adores the Black Keys El Camino album (which we do too!).   No judgement please.  Thank you.
• He still loves berries and pears.  He has ever since he could eat.  
• He won't eat quinoa.  Won't even look at it.  Brian doesn't help my plight with this.
• Lately he has been complaining and been very challenging. We are working on this.

In case you are curious, I have tried 3 things for dealing with attitude:

• Fill a jar with quarters.  For every time he has attitude with me or complains with throwing himself on the floor, I take a quarter out.  At the end of the week, he gets to keep whatever is left.
• In a week, for every day he has a good attitude, I give him 10 minutes of Wii time.  At the end of the week, he can have that number of minutes screen time.
• He loses screen time for one day for every time he gives me attitude.  That's one that's more negative.

Michael's currency is definitely screen time.  So that's been working quite well for us.  And cheaper than the quarters.  ;)