"I'm number four!"

My son is growing up.  He turned four this week.  You probably already know this, since he has told everyone one the planet, unless you reside in a cave in Kazikstan, in which case, he probably has not gotten to you yet.  On Wednesday, the Big Day, he got a birthday haircut and I made him home made cupcakes with home made buttercream frosting, which apparently has A LOT of butter.  If you take the amount you are currently imaging and double it, you will start to come close.  They both really enjoyed those.  But he reminds me of how quickly he is growing up.  He's gone from calling me "mama" to "mommy" to "mom" to the nails-on-the-chalkboard "ma." and he agonized for 30 minutes on that morning of how to wear mismatched socks that were matching enough for him, which are totally irreconcilable things.  Apparently all the kids wear mismatched socks, and this has filtered down to the preschoolers.  I am waiting for Ani to refuse to wear anything but a bare midriff starting next week, but I digress.  Gavin and mismatching don't belong in the same sentence.  I picked out several that were exactly the same, with slightly different designs, and this sent him into a hand-wringing tailspin of angst.  He finally went with matching.  

We had a joint birthday party at a gymnastics facility with another boy and some friends from his class, and it went great.  The kids bounced like monkeys all over the room on all sorts of equipment, and tonight they are both so pooped they fell asleep almost as soon as their heads hit the pillow.  Ani really loved it.  She even held herself on the rings for a few seconds on her own.  She even bounced on the trampoline with the big kids.  She was beside herself with giddiness.  I think we might look into little kid gymnastics for her.  

Gav has also been enjoying his friend Tommy at school.  They have had two water fights, both unauthorized, this week, then yesterday I got pulled aside by his teacher at pickup to be told that they went into the same bathroom stall and decided to pee all over the place.  After the shock and the obligatory "talking to", I have to admit, the image is pretty funny.  I write this here because though it is disgusting it's still a good story, and also some day when he is about to get married and I bind all these posts into a book, he can be slightly shamed and mortified at his mother, because I am apparently that kind of mom.

Annah is talking up a storm.  She even said "pizza" at the party today (that girl can put down food with the best of them), but her favorite word far and away is "no".  It sounds pretty cute, rather high pitched, and fairly girly in tone, but with plenty of self-assured conviction.  She sings all the way to school on most days.  She loves her music class which we go to on Saturdays.  She dances and sings and claps.  It's very fun to watch.  She is definitely different than her brother.

I have included some pictures from the party today at the bottom.  Enjoy!