If you follow me on Instagram and Facebook, you’ll know this already but it’s worth mentioning time and time again…
My firstborn, Graeme Thomas, turned 5 years old on April 1st!
When I mentioned to him on his birthday, while he was playing with this new Transformers toy given to him that morning as a birthday gift from Neil and myself, that we needed to hop in the studio for a few minutes to take his 5 year portraits, he dropped what he was doing and said, “Let’s do it now so I can play for the rest of the day and not worry about it.” I couldn’t help but laugh because that’s not usually his response to taking a break from playing. But he does this all the time though – surprises me with his random mature thoughts and ideas. Sometimes I forget that he’s no longer 3 years old.
If you can’t tell, Graeme is really into Transformers right now (has been for a while now). He’s never seen the movies but has watched one of the cartoon versions on Netflix more times than I can count. If you have a 4-6 year old boy, look up Robots in Disguise. His birthday party was going to be Transformers themed, as you can see from his birthday shirt. He’s handling the social distancing well enough but he was very sad and disappointed when we told him that we couldn’t have his birthday party until who-knows-when. He sort of understands, which helps, but when his birth day actually came, it was bitter sweet. Friends and family came to our front sidewalk to talk to him from the front porch to sing to him drop off presents. Seeing people made it better but I’m heartbroken for myself and for him. He’s been talking about this birthday since before Christmas and this is likely the first one he would have really remembered throughout his life. It’ll definitely be the first one he remembers now.
But I hope that’s not all he remembers from this time. I hope he remembers all the walks we’ve taken, all the family bike rides we’ve been on, and all the quality time he’s had with his dad since Neil’s home all the time now. There’s no one Graeme would rather spend time with than his dad and I love that about the two of them. Sure, when he’s hurt or scared, he comes to me – that’s what mamas are for! His third favorite person is still Georgia, even though at this age they mostly just pick on each other. Sometimes they play together so well, it makes me forget all the times he’s made her cry or she’s made him mad. Especially right now since they’re having very little breaks from each other.
This year Graeme is in 4’s preschool at Immanuel and during this time of social distancing, he’s really missing his teachers and his school friends. I’m teaching him from home with the ton of workbooks that I’ve been hoarding… for what reason? I’m not sure but I’m now so glad that I did because we’re able to stay on top of his distancing learning without him working on his iPad every day. Which YES! We got him an iPad for his birthday and gave it to him early once we learned he wouldn’t be in school for a while. That way he doesn’t get overly tired of doing worksheets every day. PLUS it gives me back some work time while Georgia’s napping.
Speaking of sleep, Graeme hasn’t been napping for a while now – I wish I could remember when he solidly stopped. But he still sleeps 12 hours every night in his big boy bed in his big boy room. He’s very proud of his bedroom that he *helped* Neil build. It’s usually the first place/thing he wants to show people when they come to the house. Either that or whatever he’s just built with his legos or magnatiles. That boy can build! Almost every morning he’s downstairs before Georgia and I are and when we do come down he’s already built an impressive (seriously) structure and I just know that he’d make a great engineer.
When he’s not building, which is a rare thing, he’s singing and dancing along to music. The Frozen 2 soundtrack is a popular one with out kids but he’s recently gotten into rock and rock and likes to play air guitar with the toy broom. I’ve also gotten him into a few of my favorite Indie Folk bands but if you ask him what he wants to listen to, he’ll most likely say the Dinotrux theme song. Look it up, it’s a show on Netflix.
He’s recently shown interest in playing soccer and when he and Neil are in the backyard, that’s most likely what they’re doing. It looks like we’ll be enrolling him in fall soccer! He’s definitely Neil’s son because Graeme also likes basketball, golf, baseball, and running! This kid has a future ahead of him and I’m so honored to be his mom and just be along for the ride!
On top of all the things he can and likes to do, he’s also a very sweet, wild, handsome boy. He’ll say the sweetest thing one minute and accidentally knock his sister over the next. There’s something about this age in boys where they’re not fully aware of their surroundings and it’s something we’re working on with him but part of it he’s just so full of energy. His emotions are also back and forth at times, which is exhausting to us but I know it’s even more so for him. Even the last few weeks, though, we’ve noticed improvement. I believe it’s another thing that age helps with. I can’t wait to see him mature and learn and grow but he’ll always be my baby boy – the one that made me a mother.
