The Day for a Four-Year Old

We have a four-year old.  A four-year old. How did this happen?? This sounds silly, but this makes being a parent feel way more legit. Like I said, silly. But he's not a baby. He's not a toddler. He is starting preschool next fall and kindergarten the next year! Gaaaaah! He's a real kid!

The birthday was pretty awesome. Since I had made pancakes the day before, I bought his favorite cereal the night before: Frosted Mini-Wheats. We hadn't had it in a while, and boy, was he glad to get a bowl of that. The week before I brought James with me to mutual and on the way there I asked him if he was going to get a birthday cake for his birthday. He said, "Yes! A spiderman cake!" All I could think about was doing stupid webs on a cake and botching it completely and that it's not even his favorite superhero, so why do all that (I'm bad, I know). I asked him, "Well, what about a Captain America cake? Isn't he your favorite?" And with that, we had an order in for a Captain America cake (which he reminded me almost every day). So once Jack was down for a nap, I got started on baking and cooling the cake. I wasn't totally sure on how I wanted to do the cake... it kind of morphed as I realized what I could and couldn't do. The end product didn't turn out too bad, in my opinion :)

We stayed home all day and played around and watched movies. The boys had been sick all week (different post, blah) and though they were totally feeling better, they were still contagious. Luckily they didn't mind. James had a difficult time this year differentiating his birthday is not Christmas day, it's just around Christmas time. I ended up taking the ornaments off the Christmas tree the day before and made Brad take the tree out that night because it was just bugging me. I wanted it to be about James, with no Christmas left. His birthday seems to snuff Christmas for me the minute that day is over. Which I don't mind at all :)

For dinner we had (super)hero sandwiches and roasted sweet potatoes. One of his faves, of course. Then we opened presents (Flynn Rider and Rapunzel dolls, DC superhero pack, Hercules, Tinkerbell sticker book (he loooves her), church pants, money to go get something fun, and superhero felt masks I made)

Blew out candles and ate cake

Then showed Nana and Papa Dell all the fun birthday gifts and to say thank-you. James was so very happy with everything. 

James really is such an amazing kid. The amount of love he has... it's unbelievable. He isn't perfect, that is for sure. What four-year old is?? But he is sweet, kind, has great manners, is starting to listen so much better, so great to his brothers (most of the time), forgiving, loving, loves to learn... so many wonderful things about him. He has a special spirit and I'm beyond grateful for him in our family.