Thursday, February 21, 2013

The Amazing Wilbur T. Higgenbottom

Today is my youngest son's sixth birthday.

It seems crazy to me that he's already that old, that he's already in kindergarten and reading.

The birthday boy :)
reading to Grandpa

Yet of course he is, and of course he's still funny and smart and stubborn and fearless, a little old man in a child's body. Just a few weeks ago, off school for a teacher's in service, we spent time at the museum with my Mom. We laughed in the car on the way home about how he'd strolled through the museum with his hands in his pockets, slowly looking from side to side, not entirely interested in anything until he'd ask me to read a placard. Then, he'd get angry if I skipped any words - even those that were in Latin.

"All he needs is one of those little plastic coin purses...that you pinch on the sides to open?" we howled.

Will frowned from the back seat. "You guys...you SHUSH," he demanded, wagging his finger. This just made it funnier.

I've written here about Will a lot - he's such a personality - in a way that his older brother is not. Don't get me wrong -- Nick is charming and adorable and smart and friendly and sports all of the physical traits typical of eight-year-old boys (freckles, a dimple in one cheek, front teeth that appear slightly too large for his face, the gangly limbs and concave chest of a skinny child). Nick is very much a boy's boy. Its just that Will is...different.

We have many nicknames for Will. Will-I-Am. Willard. Willie. Willie Woo Woo. Wilbur. Wilbur Yum-Yum. And my personal favorite, Wilbur T. Higgenbottom, mostly because the first time I called him that he didn't get angry or laugh or say, "Mo-om...that's NOT my name!" He merely rolled his eyes at me, as if to show how utterly ridiculous his mother is, and walked away.

Monday of this week was my birthday, and when I asked him to draw a picture for me on our whiteboard, this is what I got:


Thanks for the reminder, kid.

(Nick on the other hand, later X'd out the 35 and wrote 2,000,000 underneath. I'll remember that later, ya poop.)

Last night, my birthday message got erased and Will wrote out his own:

The birthday boy :)
He's very literal, that Will

I let him open one gift this morning - a Skylander Giant he'd been wanting - saving the rest for his party this weekend.

The birthday boy :)
Another way he's an old soul -
he refuses to get out of bed until he absolutely has to

He'd asked for cinnamon rolls for his birthday breakfast, and I was happy to make them. As a surprise, I bought some strawberries, too, even though they're out of season because I know how much he likes them. Today he left them on his plate, proclaiming, "I don't really like those, Mom." Since when? 5 a.m.?

Will continues to be the type of boy who keeps me on my toes - just when I begin to feel like I've got this parenting thing figured out, he whomps me on the head with some crazy kid logic that only makes sense inside his little brain. This morning he claimed he couldn't brush his teeth because they felt too fat.

Happy birthday, little boy. You bring so much joy to my life.

The birthday boy :)

Read Will's other birthday posts:
one year
two years
three years
four years
five years

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