We celebrated Nate's birthday two days early this year since Joe and I were leaving the next day for our trip to Chile. It was a quiet celebration after his big party last year but it was fun. It was especially quiet because he made it clear to all of us that all he wanted for his birthday was money to put towards a Nintendo Switch. So, that's what he got! By the time his gifts came in, he was over $200 of the way there and he saved his allowance every week, too. Then, he happened to get to ride on the next door neighbor boy's hoverboard. He found out he did have enough to buy one of those already and he changed his mind. I don't think he regrets his choice. He spends a lot of time riding around on it and it quite amazing at it. It's second nature to him now.
Back to his birthday... the kids like watching a show on BYUtv called Best Cake Wins and one day they all drew out cakes they would want. Here was Nate's:
Natalie got the idea that we should try to make his cake for his birthday. On the show, they are all tall, 3D, amazing cakes but our version is 2D. I was still pretty proud of it and Nate seemed to like it, too:
Natalie made him this cool balloon Blue Toad when we were blowing up balloons in the morning:
He loved it. :)
He chose cinnamon rolls for his birthday breakfast that morning. Then, Joe took him out of school a little bit early for his birthday lunch. That afternoon, he got to go rock climbing with Joe and Lizzie. Then, we had his birthday dinner.
Nate has had a great year. He just told me the other day that he has now been at his elementary school for a year. He still misses his old school but he has a buddy (Carlo) that moved over with him that he got to know better in baseball so that has helped. They have been taking an after-school basketball clinic together. He is getting pretty good at basketball--at least according to a dad in our neighborhood that plays with him a lot. He says Nate will shoot over anyone and make it a lot of the time. He's also been working on his pitching and is excited to play baseball in the spring. The boys all got really into watching the Dodgers in the world series. Nate is our one child that will sit and watch BYU football and basketball games with us (although Eli might be on his way) and we have fun doing that. He still loves sports of all kinds.
He is doing great in school. He keeps winning candy bars on Fridays for solving these math problems the fastest. He loves math. And, miracle of miracles, the girls finally persuaded him to read a book series they thought he'd like called Wings of Fire and he loves them! He has actually been reading voluntarily and is now on book 5. Now we need to keep it going into another book series. He's a good reader. He has more homework now that he's in 3rd grade but he is keeping up with it all. He also has more projects, which he does not love. We've already had some early mornings trying to finish them at the last minute because he puts them off. Still, he is doing great overall.
He missed his friend, Max, who moved this summer but he has fun playing with Brendan and the other boys in the neighborhood. He is still a really good eater and is my only child who is happy with sandwiches every day in his lunch. He also loves huge bowls of oatmeal, cheese fries, and bread.
Mary and Andrew took the kids to a farmer's market and let them buy something.
Nate's choice:
Nate still loves playing Wii and still wants that Nintendo Switch. He still loves Michael Jackson, Studio C, and American Ninja Warrior (and climbing all over the house :). He still doesn't love public speaking much.
We used this picture for Nate's All About Me poster in school this year and I love it:
We sure love our Nate. He makes life so much better!
