William is 7!!

Today William is 7!!!

We sent him off with Daddy and Amelia to his favorite spot: the Science Center this morning.  I stayed home with Ms Daredevil Gemma.  William appears to have had a wonderful time, although he was a little sad about leaving me behind.  He initially asked for a notepad so he could write down everything they saw so he could tell me about it when he learned I wouldn't be coming with.

We hosted a few friends yesterday for some bowling at the local bowling alley.  It was fun to watch him interact with his friends and meet a few of them for the first time.

Now for 4 facts about William right now:

1. William is growing up.  He has responsibilities and chores to complete, which he does either without any fuss or a minimum of 20 minutes of complaining. 

2. William still adores dinosaurs and has checked out every single book of our local library about them at least once, if not twice.  He will happily talk about dinosaurs for hours on end and has developed the ability to turn just about any conversation into one about dinosaurs.

3. He adores reading.  He goes to bed each night and reads by hall light for at least another 30-60 minutes.  I don't even try to stop him most nights.  When given the choice between TV time and books, William will choose books a surprising amount of the time.  While William's favorite books now are about about dinosaurs, he really will read just about anything.  He loves learning new information, so he finds nonfiction very enjoyable.  Last month he discovered a book entitled: Oh Yuck.  An Encyclopedia of Everything Nasty.  He was delighted.  He has also just started to discover comics when he checked out a book of Garfield comics.  He was totally enthralled and walked around with his nose inside the book for the better part of the day.  I personally CANNOT wait to introduce him to Calvin and Hobbes.  However, he is not quite ready for that one yet.....

4. William is an awesome, sweet older brother.  He isn't perfect, but he loves his younger sisters SO much. He loves playing with Amelia and most days can't wait to see her when he gets off the bus.  She feels the same way.  He is also enamored with Gemma.  He plays with her and often comments about her cuteness.  She adores him and he can do (almost) no wrong in her book.

A funny story: Last week, William was home from school and I asked him to play with Gemma for 8 minutes while I cleaned up a mess in the bathroom.  He agreed and I got right down to work.  Less than 2 minutes later, Gemma came wandering into the bathroom by herself.  I went to find William and found his nose in a book.  His eyes glazed over as I tried to explain what I needed his help to do.  So, while he is caring and kind, he will not be ready for babysitting for quite some time.

Today is a big day for the Mama as well.  I can't tell you how I feel about that because I haven't decided yet. As I was thinking about his birthday over the last few days, I realized that I have been a mother now for 7 years. This then led to the realization that I have been changing diapers every day for the last 7 years with the exception of a 48 hour work trip I took three years ago.

Anyhow.  I'm sure William will be thrilled to know that my birthday thoughts for him included changing diapers.