5.5

Brady is officially 5 1/2 today.  We celebrated by taking him to lunch yesterday.  I bought him his own orange juice for breakfast this morning (a rare treat in our house) and of course he shared with Brooke.  Brady is usually pretty sweet, and I'm always grateful his younger siblings have such a kind older brother to help them and to set the example.  He is planning on having about 10 younger siblings.  I told him I can't guarantee that, but I would love to give him 3.  Here are a few more examples of his sweetness:

Brady: "At school one day everyone was calling Mikayla 'Vampire Girl.'"

Me: "What did you say?"

Brady: "I told her not to listen to them because they're just mean kids."

We were outside eating s'mores on the deck.  Once I finished making mine, I leaned against the rails to eat it.  Brady got up and said, "Here Mom, you can have this chair.  I don't need to sit down."  I did take the chair because I want him to keep offering.

At the park I usually put Brooke on the swing and give her a few big pushes before I'm too hot and retreat to the shade.  If she wants more, Brady will get off his swing and push her.  He also loves to make her laugh by pretending to fall over.

Brady is always watching out for Brooke at the water park.  If he's at the front of the line for the water slide and he sees her, he'll tell her to get in front of him.  He holds her hand and reassures her whenever she's nervous about the water or slides.

He is usually a pretty patient teacher.  He loves testing Brooke on her colors, shapes and letters.

“Mom, we’ve been playing really well together.  Brooke and I are kicking the soccer ball to each other, and she’s done some really good kicks!  She hasn’t even picked it up with her hands, so now I don’t have to worry about it!”

He is becoming so much more independent lately.  He'd been emptying the silverware basket for a year or so, but he has been unloading the entire dishwasher for the last few weeks.

Other chores include helping Brooke set and clear the table, using the Dustbuster after meals, put folded laundry away, make his bed, clean his room, practice the piano, math and writing. 

After a soccer game in early May, Brady showered himself and he's been doing it now after T-ball games.  Before, he was too scared to turn on the water, but he has overcome that now too.  So he's completely independent with showers now.

Brady has become a lot more creative this last year and is much more interested in crafts.  He loves to color and draw, usually drawing things from memory.  His favorite crafts are the "paper Star Wars" (the masculine version of paper dolls) that he draws, colors and cuts out.  Lately he's made everyone in the family our own light sabers as well.

Brady is very smart, academically.  He may not always have the most common sense (sticking a bag over his head and walking right into the counter), but that may be because he's a boy.  I don't know when common sense kicks in for boys, but maybe not until they graduate from high school.

Brady completed his reading lessons just over a year ago.  Now he picks up a book during his quiet time and reads it on his own.  He’s read “Where the Wild Things Are,” “Green Eggs and Ham,” and “Put Me in the Zoo” all by himself.  I’m happy he is choosing to read on his own now.  Lately we've been reading Henry Huggins at quiet time or before bed.  Those books are perfect for him right now.


In May Brady started doing addition and subtraction.  Cory found some math games online that he played and really liked.  In June Brady went from doing math problems online to a worksheet I made for him.  There are 60 problems (addition and subtraction) on each page.  He usually takes 2-3 days to finish it, depending on how much screen time he's requesting.  (It's a great deterrent!)  So far his best score is 57, with problems like 12-8 and 8+9.  He still uses his fingers for the most part, but I figure after a while he'll start to memorize them.

He also does workbook pages to keep up his writing, but they are pretty basic.  It's one more thing I use to put off screen time, our daily battle.

Brady is a pretty goofy kid.  His current best friend is the 2-year-old boy who lives down the street.  Whenever he sees him outside he goes over to play (a.k.a. make Liam laugh).  Give Brady any toddler boy to play with and he's in Heaven.

Brady is a winker.  I didn't realize how much I wink at him until he started winking back.  It’s pretty cute, but he has a hard time winking and smiling at the same time, so all his effort is pretty funny even though he looks so serious.

Brady had a bad dream the other night, and he told me about it the next morning.  It had something to do with two bats flying around at him.  “Daddy was throwing potty talk at them,” he told me.  “How do you throw potty talk?” I wondered.  “With a shovel.”  I said, “Oh!  He was throwing poop?”  “Yes.”  Brady does not use naughty words like "poop" because he is a rule-follower and that cracks me up.

Once he decided not to go to a friends' house to play.  He said he was saying mean things.  "To you?" I asked.  "No, he was just saying things like 'dumb' and 'stupid' so I wanted to come home."  

Brady will always be sensitive.  It can drive us nuts sometimes like when he has to plug his ears because of a relatively loud noise (like the Dustbuster or the toilet in a public restroom), or when he cries about the dumbest things.  But I want him to be a sensitive brother, husband and father who is in tune with his emotions, so we'll just try to let him feel his emotions and not get upset.

Photo courtesy of this creative food blogger.

I got on Pinterest to show Brady my desserts board so he could choose something for his half birthday.  I didn't get past the main page before he'd decided on these watermelon cupcakes my cousin had pinned.  So we sang "Happy Half Birthday" to him and he enjoyed his watermelon cupcake tonight.

We adore this kid, and we're so thankful he was the first to come to our family.