Zander is NINE today! He is independent, empathetic, loyal, brave, outrageous, perplexing, intense, and completely ZANDER! He is loud and impulsive and generous and energetic. He’s always got his brother’s back. He is super interested in dinosaurs, animals, and monsters. He can have a very intense, laser focus when he is working on a project. He draws almost every day and his reading skills have finally improved so that he can even competently read over my shoulder when I’m reading to them at bedtime (side note to other frustrated homeschooling mothers of reluctant readers, particularly boys. Apparently, 8-9 is the magic point when it finally clicks. Whew. My older son was exactly the same and it gave me headaches for six years!)

It is weird for me somehow to look back at his birth while currently holding and nursing another baby boy. Is it possible that the next time I blink my eyes, this baby boy will be nine too?!?! My heart!

That said, I’d never wish Zander back to babyhood, because who he is now is so dynamic and so HIM. It is just a bittersweet juxtaposition to be holding one, while watching another get so big.

Presents have been opened and enjoyed today. Birthday breakfast request of link sausage, scrambled eggs, toast, and fresh mango has also been enjoyed. Bacon sandwiches are on the lunch menu and biscuits and gravy for dinner. (It is a pork theme today, apparently.) Birthday party is later this weekend, which is nice because we can just enjoy the day rather than preparing for company.

Zander’s birth was a super quick and intense train ride of a birth, two hours total, that literally drove me to my knees. You can read his birth story here: My Second Birth | Talk Birth. He was born in the living room of our little temporary house at 2:45 in the morning and parenting him has been an intense ride ever since!

Blink…

First nursing, 2006