Some Max Love

I feel like I've been posting a lot about Kelly and Everett lately. It's kind of like the squeaky wheel gets the oil...the kid doing the most changing gets a blog post. Max doesn't have all sorts of new tricks because he's getting older. But, boy, does he get better with age!

His imagination is awesome. He is super creative. Take today, for instance. Right now he is in the front yard in this get-up:

Let's talk about each item he has on.

• First, he wears these boots outside all of the time. He loves them because of the ease with which they slip on and off. I'm a lame mom and restrict the wearing of these boots to our yard. I know, I should let him be a kid and wear them all over town. It goes against my particular mom "grain" to do it. Although, catch me in the right mood and I couldn't care less how looks in public. So I guess I'm not always lame.
• Note the plastic knife tucked into the boots. Essential.

• The flowery pink belt which is holding the sword? One of Kelly's headbands, of course.
• The thing draped across his chest is a scarf that my 80-year-old neighbor gave us and the kids have adopted for dress-ups. He's really into dressing up as a soldier, Nephi, Samuel, Ammon or Helaman. Kid has a great imagination and is such a BOY.

This quarter Tyler's classes are on Mondays and Tuesdays, so he tucks the kids in bed on Sunday night and doesn't see them again until Wednesday evening after work. I've noticed that on Tuesdays Max is kind of emotional and more prone to fits. Some Mom inspiration came from above that the little man needed to be wrestled. Ty is usually the wrestler in our fam, but I know how to throw down. So I did just that. We wrestled and laughed and tickled and took turns 'dying' for a good, long while. I think it did the trick! And I realized that it's a great release for me as well. Those days without my man can get really long and lonely and hard. So a Monday or Tuesday wrestle fest is on the books for the next several weeks.

Last Sunday, dude passed off the 6th Article of Faith. I love that he has a good memory and gets a kick out of memorizing. It gives us a kick to hear him rattle things off. The stake primary is holding an ice cream party in June; for every Article of Faith you get one item (for example: 1st A of F=spoon, 2nd A of F=bowl, etc.) We'll see how far he gets!

Max is getting jokes and humor more now and so we giggle a lot together. He's also into riddles and comes up with pretty good ones. "I'm camouflaged, I have guns, and I'm NOT a soldier (because he totally knew that would be my guess). What am I?" The answer was an ARMY airplane.
Max was meant to come first. He is the ideal big brother. I think I've mentioned before that Kelly repeats absolutely everything he says. Brother is so patient with her! It never bothers him. Lately during Kelly's naps Max has been asking, "When is Kelly going to wake up?" I've asked why and he told me that it's more fun when she's awake and that he LOVES playing with her. I am so glad they like each other! Sure, he pushes her buttons sometimes, but mostly he is so happy to be with his sister.And he will grab a diaper for me or comfort Everett anytime I ask. He's figured out how to make Ev smile all on his own now, which makes for some cuteness I love to observe.
If Everett's head happens to be near his face, he will give lots of rather absentminded kisses; it's like his lips just know what to do when a baby is near.

LOVE this little man of mine!