All about Allen:
Height: 41 inches
Weight: 43 pounds
Shoe size: 12
Favorite activities: playing outside for hours, going to church, watching movies (I have to tell him "no" to shows many, many times a day), riding his balance bike. He and Oscar have worn a little tunnel system in a great row of lilac bushes at the edge of our yard, and they love to play and hide in there. He loves to pretend to give other people shots with any remotely needle-shaped object he finds. He loves trucks and tractors, and can name just about any type. He has really taken a shine to the piano lately- he's a real natural! He sits there and picks out chords and octaves by himself, and is very proud to know where all the D's are.
Favorite shows: Peter Pan, My Neighbor Totoro, Cars. Still loves Thomas the Tank Engine.
Funny things he's saying these days: "Cat church" (in reference to the Catholic Church that's right next-door to our church). "SNEEEEEEE!" (pretending to be Captain Hook calling for Smee) One day, when he saw me sit down at the piano, he started hollering, "STOP TEACHING LESSON!" For a while, Adam was getting on his case for randomly shouting "Nemo!" all the time. So of course, now Allen has evolved into randomly shouting, "Don't shouting Nemo!" He still mostly talks in fragments of sentences and gibberish... this past week, he started asking a bunch of "wh" (who, what, where) questions, which is cool. Still loves to say random things in funny voices like "Cashewwwwwww!" and "Dee dee dots!"
Favorite foods: any kind of fruit or berry! Last week, right after grocery shopping, I went for a run; when I came back a half hour later, an entire pound of blueberries was gone, and Allen had a purple mouth. He has been asking for watermelon ever since it hit the store shelves about a month ago!
Favorite books: Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs, Caps for Sale, Otis the Tractor books, Dr. Seuss's ABC's, Sally Sutton's Construction series, Mr. Tiger Goes Wild
Least favorite stuff: getting hair cuts, that pesky little sister Cici, avocado
Struggles: I can not get this kid to fully potty train for the life of me. I never thought I'd still be potty-training a kid at four years old, but here we are. I'd love to send him to VBS this summer, so hopefully things click with him before then. With Allen, he just takes a LOT of time learning skills- he didn't walk till 18 months- and no amount of pushing, praise, threats, encouragement, bribes, or punishment will move him along. The only thing that has consistently worked is time.
When he grows up he will be: probably in show business. :-D
On Sunday, we had a little birthday party for him. We invited my cousin's family, a young music student of mine, and a friend of Allen's from church (and their families, of course!), and had an outdoor hot dog cookout dinner. I'm glad we had the party at dinnertime as opposed to my original idea of two or three in the afternoon, because it turned out to be a sweltering day that peaked in the mid-90's! It was a bug-themed party, so Adam and Oscar made cupcakes with crushed Oreos for "dirt" and gummy worms on top.
We actually had a couple bug-themed party activities planned, but the kids and adults were having so much fun just playing and talking (especially after Adam turned on a sprinkler to cool the kids off!) that we ended up not doing them. Now I have a giant unused pin-the-legs-on-the-caterpillar poster that I'm not quite sure what to do with. Save it for next year's Allen party?
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| Next year's birthday party theme: Mud |
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