Happy 5th Birthday, Leadner!

Once again, time has done that crazy thing where it seems like it’s going nice and evenly slow, and then all of a sudden it’s been 5 years and we’re about to celebrate Leander’s 5th birthday!!

Leander’s birthday isn’t until Sunday, but that hasn’t stopped us from celebrating all week – and all this coming weekend! His big party will be Monday night and he is so excited!

Here’s a little update on our sweet boy!
(*note: we still don’t have baseboards on our second floor after it’s renovation EIGHT years ago – I’ve kind of given up hoping that “someday” they’ll happen – so we’re just rolling with it – don’t judge the bottom of my walls!)

• YES – I am fully aware that Leander needs a haircut. I didn’t even realize how long his hair was until the day before I took these photos! I swear, his hair grew super fast overnight, because it was just fine and cute one moment and then all of a sudden it was super long. Guess I need to call and schedule that appointment ASAP, eh? Oh well, he’s still super cute and we all secretly love his long early-2000’s hair swoop. (It’s the wings around his ears that drive me crazy!) Moving on!
• Our sweet boy lost his first tooth just a few weeks ago! Isn’t his little one-tooth-missing-grin adorable? He wasn’t too sure about losing a tooth at first, but he soon (thankfully) came around to it (especially after he got a special prize under his pillow!) Now, his other front, middle, bottom tooth is loose and getting so close to coming out! I told him that he’ll be able to sing: “All I Want For Christmas Is My Two Front Teeth” if he looses it soon! He loves to sit and wiggle his tooth, but he isn’t interested in pulling it out – Daddy pulled out his first tooth, and he’s already declared that Daddy will pull out the next one.
• Leander has learned how to play video games this year and has mastered playing Mario games on the Nintendo Switch. It sure helps to pass the time on long car rides! He is absolutely obsessed with Mario (thus his birthday party theme this year!) but his true love is Princess Peach – he adores her character and specifically asked for a “Princess Peach” birthday party!
• Speaking of long car rides – Leander continues to add to his list of “new states” this year – adding Arizona and California to his list! When Nana and Papa moved out west earlier this year, we planned a big trip out to visit them last month, so Leander got to fly on an airplane for the first time. He loved it and keeps asking when we can fly again. (If only it was so easy!)
• Speaking of rides – Leander rode his first “big” roller coaster this year: Jack Rabbit at Kennywood. He’s now ridden it twice and both times declared that he does NOT like it. We were shocked that he wanted to ride it a second time after hating it so much the first time, but he did, and still hated it. (In his defense, it is a big roller coaster for a little person!) He much prefers Lil’ Phantom and other kiddie coasters (most notably The Great Pumpkin Coaster at Kings Dominion – he loves that one!)
• Leander officially is in preschool this year and that means he moved up to the bigger classes at church on Sunday mornings and Wednesday nights. He has a best friend at church: Orion – and they are absolutely hilarious together. He still gets a bit shy when he realizes that he has to go to his “new” class, but then he sees his friends and he’s happy.
• Preschool at home has been going well. My main goals for this year are letter and number recognition and pencil control. He loves to draw pictures and his “skills” have been improving dramatically (he drew a Mario and Luigi picture and it makes my heart burst with pride!) He plays an app on the iPad called Reading Eggs (it’s an app I found to help Braelynn with her reading skills). He doesn’t even realize that it’s “learning”, he just loves all the little games – and I love that it’s teaching him basic reading and letter skills in a manner that he connects with and enjoys.
• Leander is quite the little gentleman – he holds the door open for us everywhere we go and gets quite upset if he can’t hold the door – or if we open the door and walk out without waiting for him to get the door for us.
• He adores his cousins Alethea, Layla, Alex, and Leo – they’re his little tribe of little people and since he’s the oldest boy, I think he kind of feels in charge of the little group. They all play so well together and love each other so much!
• Leander LOVES being outside and mastered riding a bike (with training wheels) this summer (while his sister was mastering riding a two-wheeler!) Together, they would ride their bikes all over town if we let them! Needless to say, we spent many many hours outside this summer taking long walks so the kids could ride their bikes, and just sitting on our front steps so they could ride up and down our street. He loves his scooter too, but much prefers his bike (shhhh, we got him a new, bigger bike for Christmas!)
• Speaking of bigger things: he graduated to a BIG big boy bed this summer! Last summer, he moved from his crib to a toddler bed, and he very very quickly outgrew that, so he now has his own twin-size bed. He hasn’t mastered staying in his bed though – he would roll out, land on the floor with a thud, and keep sleeping?! So, we got him these soft “bumpers” that help him stay all snuggled up cozy in his bed and off the floor.
• Of course: he still loves his blankie. Yes, he still sucks his 3rd and 4th fingers on his left hand and holds the corner of his blankie up to his nose. It’s a habit I know we’ll have to start to work on “breaking” eventually, but for now, it’s just so sweet that I can’t bring myself to asking him to stop.
• We got him a Thomas the Train “mega” track set last Christmas, but he really wasn’t able to fit the pieces together at the time by himself – but recently, he discovered that he can! So he and Derrick have been building big sets on the 3rd floor together. It’s their new favorite thing to do and it’s so sweet!
• When we asked him what he wants for his birthday and Christmas, he said “presents”. And when we pressed him further, he said “You know what to get me.”
  He saw Santa at Kennywood last weekend and he told him that he wants a “candy cane pencil” (which, of course is much more challenging to find than you’d expect). It’s just so funny because his sister always has a long list of things that she wants – and our sweet boy truly is just content.
• He is so sweet and silly – he loves to tell jokes and is a giant goofball. In fact, most of these photos are brought to you by the standard “fart” jokes that get any little boy laughing – but boy did it get Leander going!

*If you’d like a trip down memory lane, you can go back & see past “birthday” (I put it in quotes, because that encompasses the half-birthday photos I do in the summer too) posts here: 4 1/2 Update, 4 Years Old, 3 1/2 Update, 3 Years old, 2 1/2 Update, 2 Years old, 1 1/2 Update, 1 Year old, Leander’s birth story Part 1 & Part 2.

Happy birthday, Leander Roxas – we love you so so much!

Of course, we had to sneak big sister into a few photos – how are they both so big?