In lieu of a post per birthday boy the next few months, I'm going to summarize the goings-on with the younger Bartons in one post. We think they are all pretty Super!
Nathan celebrated his 7th birthday last month with a Star Wars party. There was great debate in the first grade class about whether the girls were interested in this theme, but they ended up agreeing to be invited. Nathan is very conscious of others' feelings and did not want anyone to be left out. Of course, he managed to stretch his birthday out over a week or more and I made at least 4 separate cakes or treats!
Paul (Master Yoda) made a great Jedi Training Course with light saber moves and a paintball slingshot from the x-wing fighter, culminating in a Death Star pinata...
...and light saber cake. Note to self: making a cake out of ice cream does not allow much time for decorating without melting. Also, the freezer needs to be big enough for the whole light saber!
Nathan reports that soccer and baseball are his favorite sports and science is his favorite subject; reading is a new passion, having recently "clicked" for him. Nathan loves being a jungle boy spends hours every afternoon with his friends building a fort in a small patch of jungle behind our house. No adults have been permitted to view this creation, but it entertains him for hours and leaves him completely muddy and happy. Nathan recently switched rooms with Isaac to have his own room and takes great pride in decorating, organizing and keeping it neat. Star Wars tops all his passions - if he's not out in the jungle, he is probably playing light sabers or playing with his x-wing fighter. Josiah turned five this month, a long-anticipated event.
He requested a space shuttle and jungle party. We ended up putting Curious George on a space walk from the shuttle and had quite a mish-mash of decor including a Lightning McQueen pinata. (This worked out well here since there is a limited selection to choose from.) The jungle-space games were suspiciously similar to the Jedi training camp of the previous month! Josiah had a great time as did his friends.
The cake, as usual was due to the baking skills of Mom and the construction and decorating skills of Dad. One of our more impressive cakes, especially tying in the jungle with Curious George, which was all Paul! So, a close-up.
Speaking of construction, Josiah is quite the master builder. He has recently joined the lego craze in our house, but continues to spend hours building with his magnatiles - magnetic construction shapes. His creations are only limited by the number of sets that we have. Josiah tells us that he is going to be a detective (or a spy) and an artist - possibly an artist who draws things and then builds them.
Sammy continues to be our bookworm and loves mysteries. He is working his way through the Hardy Boys series. His teacher has challenged his class to read the entire New Testament before school is out and he is close to finishing and earning an ice cream reward from his teacher. If he is not reading, he is playing Wii and loves the challenge of improving on his previous games. He is a sweet brother to Isaac and alternates between sweet and bossy with his other brothers. He proved to be a great help with Josiah's recent birthday party and made it possible for Paul and I to get everything done in time since doing it in advance didn't really happen. He is still out little boy, but more and more often slips into pre-teen mode.
Isaac is the last to have a birthday later this summer and is close to three. It is hard to believe how big our baby is and we would be even sadder if we weren't enjoying this stage of his so thoroughly. He is 100% boy and loves balls, planes, cars and Cars, asking to watch the latter at least once a day. He is quite the baseball player and asks us often to go out and throw the ball for him. When he connects with the ball, look out!
He is quite a talker, like his brothers and repeats things ad nauseum until he gets the answer he wants. He reminds us of the parable of the persistent widow in Luke 18 and usually get the same result by wearing us down. So at least he has learned one Biblical lesson well! The older boys dote on Isaac for the most part and are fighting over who gets to share a room with him when we are in the States next year. We went to a zoo recently and Isaac asks constantly to go to the zoo and see the animals.
He also sings "Awesome God" and chants "It's the Dad life!" from a youtube video he has seen. Basically he is as cute and sweet as can be, unless he is tired. Then he gets mad easily, sends himself to his room and either falls asleep or recovers his good humor. Although he will always be our baby and Mom enjoys every baby moment left, we are thrilled to see his own personality and talents emerge.
