Drew // 4.5 Years Old

**This post was set to go live on his actual 4.5 birthday (the 12th) but it failed so pretend you're reading yesterday!

Oh Drewdlebug. You are just such a little man now. I have no clue the exact age you stop using the term toddler and replace that with kid, but to us you are already a kid. Over the past 6 months you have grown so much and I'm so proud of where you are at. You're reading several 3 and 4 letter words and can spell so many as well. You ask a ton of questions nonstop and although sometimes I respond with 'I don't know', I try to answer the majority of them. The smarts and sensitivity you have doesn't come without it's challenges though. You're starting to understand what others think and have had some concerns that the boys in your class won't like a specific clothing item. Once and a while you have mentioned that you think a shirt would be made fun of. It breaks my heart that you're already encountering bullies and I wish I could kick all of their asses.

I'm so proud of how well you interact with your sister and others. You are courteous to other adults and play with your friends and sister so nicely (most of the time). You have manners and know right from wrong in most general aspects of life and you handle your *chores like a champ without arguing. You are helpful around the house when asked and are able to do so much yourself. The independence you have is outstanding, and you seem to be quite the people pleaser.

You definitely are still a narrator of life. You LOVE recapping everything that happened with the utmost detail full of adjectives. You are still quite the chatterbox continually talking nonstop. So much of your chatting is questions, and pretty smart ones if I do say so myself. You ask questions like "what is life" all the time... deep, deep questions!

You're still eating and sleeping as well as you always have. We start your shower (which you do all yourself) around 7:15 and you're in bed generally around 7:45 ready to read our 2 books, do some math/spanish and then say prayers. I would say depending on the day you're asleep by 8:30-9p. Sometimes you'll wake up around 7 on your own, but sometimes you'll sleep in until 8. And you're still napping the majority of days. If we're out and about on the weekends we will try to get you to take a car nap, but sometimes skip naps all-together. You still do much better with a nap so we're not ready to give them up just yet! And we've had a good 2 weeks or so without pullups at night so we might be fully moving to undies! You've always had an issue holding your pee throughout the night being that you drink so much fluid but you've been doing great at that lately! Sometimes I'll hear you get up and pee in the middle of the night but the next morning you have no recollection of doing that. I'm glad you can do all that in your sleep!

Thank you for being the best example and big brother ever. I love hearing you say things like 'no, Ady, you can't chew on that' in the sweetest tone right before you gently take it from her. Although you sometimes still squeeze her a bit too hard out of love, you're generally very sweet with her and can be found giving her hugs at all hours of the day. You also get just as excited as us when she hits milestones and you love waking her up in the morning before school. Thank you for being the best role model she could ever have!

Love you little man. So, so much.

* Your 'chores' right now include getting your milk for dinner, placing napkins at each spot before meals, taking the recycling to the bin and taking your plate to the sink after dinner. Sometimes you help feed Bailey and you often carry in the mail as well.