Today is Kieron’s birthday! Paddy had his golden birthday in December, turning four on the 4th, and now it’s Kieron’s turn. He is eleven today.
It’s hard to believe how fast he’s grown up. I was looking for a picture of him to put on here and found that almost all the pictures are of him WITH an older or younger sibling. That seems to be a fifth-child thing but also, the type of personality he is. He spends part of the day with the “big ones” and the other parts with the “little ones”. He also does all right alone. He’s always been a steady, adaptable child with a humorous approach to life. He is thoughtful but not driven.
He loves computer games, Legos (especially Bionicles and Knight’s Kingdom), bugs and lizards and other creepy crawlies. He reads a lot. He is like a hobbit in that he has several breakfasts, lunches and dinners per day, usually concerning toast or some other carb. His personality is also a bit like a hobbit’s. He is quite a good photographer and has a great memory. He’s always the one we ask when we are looking for something around the house.
Yesterday we went outside to sled and the driveway was too icy to be much fun. So he asked me what he could do. We talked a bit about the possibilities — the snow wasn’t quite right for a snowman. He didn’t have anyone around to have a snowball fight with. Meanwhile I was chipping the ice off the driveway in big pieces like ice floes. Just as the conversation was moving to snow forts, we both realized that the ice slabs would make great walls for forts. So he made a couple of forts and took pics (but I haven’t uploaded them yet) and then brought out his plastic soldiers to make a nice battle scene. Then he helped the little ones make their own little forts. I was glad I hadn’t co-opted him to help me when he said he was bored, because this let him find his own way out of the boredom, plus find a way to be of help, by helping the little ones in a natural big-brotherly way. Plus it was more fun for me to see them building, and Sean ended up helping with the scraping.
It’s our tradition that the birthday child doesn’t have to do schoolwork or chores. So he gets the day off. He already had his birthday dinner on Tuesday — since he requested chicken strips and potatoes from the deli and that was the day we were in town.
I am expecting him to grow and GROW in the next year since his feet are already the same size as mine!
