7

We have a 7-year old now. He wanted a frog cake, so I was happy to oblige. It's blue, like blue poison dart frogs. He was pretty excited about his birthday, which was low key. Thankfully, I was late in planning an actual party this year. Had I managed to plan something for his actual birthday, we would have had to cancel it due to about 6 inches of snow, and then ice. 

He's the coolest 7 year old I know. Ok, I might be a little biased, but still. He's got such personality that he isn't afraid to show. He's funny, interested in lots of things, friendly with everyone. He has a lot of friends at school and is really comfortable with the activities that he does. 

There are times that he has a little too much attitude, manifesting as sass/backtalk/stubbornness/whatever you want to call it. Like he wasn't going to do X, Y or Z because it was his birthday weekend. Or the large quantity of selective hearing that goes on. 

But then he does something so socially aware that I think he may turn out ok. For example, the other night he and I went to pick up pizza before going over to Kelly's. He went in with me to pick up two pizza's and a salad, the latter of which was in one of those tin foil containers on top of the pizza boxes. As we were walking out, he just took the salad off the top, saying "I'll carry this because it's going to slide off." Which was exactly what I'd been thinking and likely true. 

He's still doing well in school (many fewer problems with chatting now that he's not sitting next to his "partner in crime"). His reading is progressing well, and the math they're doing is definitely higher-level than we ever did in first grade. They're essentially doing basic algebra: e.g. 8 + ___ = 12. Yikes! But he can do it. 

So, as we often tell him, we think we'll keep him. He's kind of grown on us over the past 7 years and things would be a lot less interesting without him. 

He looks so innocent when he sleeps.