Posts Tagged ‘6’

Evan: 6 Years Old

Saturday, April 11th, 2015

Six is a lot of years. It’s one-third of the way to 18, which I immediately regret both thinking and typing. But there is no denying Evan is a big kid, well on his way to being a full grown human who barely even needs me. He’s way too busy watching Star Wars while building Star Wars Legos while playing Star Wars Legos on the iPad to even notice I’m offering him food.

Evan actually asked to be left at Kid’s Quest for his birthday. That’s the child care half of the arcade at the casino https://super88bet.com/ – for the low low price of $11/hour you can gamble while they entertain the crap out of your kids. It’s an excellent strategy for the casinos since kids aren’t allowed on the gaming floors. And they are REALLY GOOD at entertaining the kids. Which is why Evan asked us to leave him there for his birthday. I basically begged him to hang out with us as a family instead, starting a long slow descent into me being his super uncool mom.

I felt sort of guilty all weekend that Evan wasn’t getting a Big Party. It was what everyone (both family and not family) expects and what the kids are used to when it comes to birthdays. But now that he’s in school and has a whole list of friends I’ve literally never met I figured we could switch over to “fun activity that in the future we can invite a few close friends to join us in doing”. After he opened his presents on Sunday night he declared turning 6 was the best birthday ever, so obviously my guilt was unnecessary and he still felt special for his special weekend.

Evan is a super nice, fairly sensitive kid who is a total people pleaser. I’m focused on being more mindful of that trait and working with his teacher to make sure she keeps it in mind when he’s struggling in class. Last week she had to call me because he was sitting in a chair refusing to do the ONE worksheet he needed to finish before he had free choice for the rest of the day. She said it happened the week before and he had literally sat, pouting, head down for 2 full hours. I asked her if it was possible he had made a mistake (he had) and was just upset with himself (he was) and if she could maybe offer him a hug before she gave up and punished him (she did). It turned out that was all he needed: he bounced right back to the happy, sweet kid who wants to do a good job and I got nice notes the rest of the week assuring me he was behaving perfectly.

So what I’m saying is having a kid that’s old enough to be upset for ACTUAL REASONS instead of things like “cut their strawberries to small” or “asked them to put their shoes on” or “changed their diaper” is pretty cool. Even if you do hear a lot more fart jokes.

Here’s how we celebrated the big S I X.

Dinner at Margaritaville, because what kid doesn’t love watching a giant blender fill up with tequila? (No, that’s a serious question, the kids love that part.)

evan 6 years old-5

evan 6 years old-7

evan 6 years old-4

evan 6 years old-8

Arcade games:

evan 6 years old-10

evan 6 years old-11

evan 6 years old-12

evan 6 years old-14

MOAR BABY GOATS:

oak leaf dairy april

oak leaf dairy april-16

oak leaf dairy april-17

oak leaf dairy april-20

oak leaf dairy april-26

oak leaf dairy april-29

oak leaf dairy april-57

oak leaf dairy april-58

oak leaf dairy april-59

oak leaf dairy april-45

oak leaf dairy april-47

oak leaf dairy april-49

oak leaf dairy april-51

Cake and presents:

evan 6 years old-16

evan 6 years old-18

evan 6 years old-19

evan 6 years old-20

evan 6 years old-21

evan 6 years old-23

evan 6 years old-28

Evan’s birthday interview:

(Please ignore the Caroline and Lincoln background noise, they were actually really quite compared to their regular volume.)