Oscar you are 4! – Mummascribbles

Hello my darling boy. Your birthday was a few days ago and I have finally gotten around to writing your birthday post. I know I used to publish it on the actual day, but Mummy got super busy with her VA work and so she doesn’t have as much time to blog anymore!

So, you are 4. I can’t quite believe it.

You were so excited about turning 4. When I woke up next to you at 6.20am on the day, you said to me,

Mummy, is the next day yet?

And when I said yes, you said,

Does that mean it’s my birthday?

And at that moment, you couldn’t get back to sleep no matter how hard I tried to get you to!

What can I say about you aged 4? There is so much!

First of all, I will focus on the big thing. The fact that despite you being only 4, really, you should be in reception! Your pre-school key worker always said you needed to get to nursery and then as time went on, she told me that you were very much working at reception aged level. And you prove this every day.

You recognise almost all of the letters of the alphabet. In fact, I sat with you playing your new fishing game that your Auntie got you for your birthday and there were only a few letters that you didn’t know on the first look. When you then looked at those letters again, you got them right. Except for ‘i’ and that is because I don’t think you recognise a capital i. You know that an i usually has a dot above it!

Your counting is great. Your teacher was always saying how good you are at counting, not just knowing your numbers but actually pointing at things and counting them in order. You are great with recognising what is small and what is tall, what is wide and what is thin. You know many, many shapes, and you even have a go at maths. The other day you told Daddy that two fours are 8, and then when you asked what three fours were, you worked it out by counting in fours three times up to twelve when you reached your answer! I told your Auntie who is a Reception teacher and she was amazed! You also recognise multiple digits and know what numbers make big numbers. So if I wrote down 63, you know it is 63. But you know it when we say it too. You often sit and do it, saying 3 and and 6 is 36, 5 and 4 is 54, 1 and two zeros is 100. Honestly, your little brain is incredible!

You can also write. Yes you can do your name, but you can also write many of the letters in the alphabet, and if we write a word for you to copy, you do it almost perfectly. In fact, sometimes your writing looks better than Mummy’s! Your pen control is amazing and your focus is incredible. When you colour in, you do it so precisely and you always try and make sure that you keep within the lines!

Now to a different angle – sport. My word, is there anything you aren’t good at? It started out ages ago with footie. Your kicking ability is immense and Daddy will be forever jealous of the way you can just kick a football and it goes where you want it to go. But we quickly discovered that you are also fab at cricket, basketball, and now tennis. The way you whack a ball with your racket is quite incredible and our poor neighbours are forever finding balls in their garden. I mentioned your focus above in regards to getting your writing correct, but your focus on your sport is also commendable for someone so little!

Your confidence has grown so much over the last six months – which is weird because we have been in lockdown, you have mostly been around us, and barely seen other people. But six months ago, you would still shy away from even the closest members of your family. You were a nightmare at settling in to pre-school and I had to stay with you for ages. And so I thought that the whole lockdown thing might set you back even further. But it didn’t. It seems to have done you a huge favour. Given you time to grow and develop. And now you are just fine! You happily sit with your close family, you fight over Nannie with your brother, and you even willingly talk to Aunt Coo, who for ages you said you didn’t like! And you just had the best settling in at nursery and waved me off at the gate each day happily. It is completely not what I was expecting at all and I am so relieved.

So what do you like?

Ryan Toys. Seriously, he is your fave. So annoying! You are still akin to a bit of Blippi and you love watching random toot on YouTube. You also love watching your brother playing Minecraft and you love playing a bit of Mario Party on the Switch!

You are obsessed with aeroplanes and helicopters and whenever you hear one flying over the house, you rush out to the garden to see it. Your greatest recent experiences was the air ambulance flying over our garden incredibly low, a few days later the police helicopter did the same, and then on your actual birthday, when we had just sat down to eat our BBQ, an actual flypast flew over! I couldn’t have planned the timing of that one better if I had organised it myself!

You love chocolate brioche, biccies, pizza, and snacks! You also like Mummy’s lasagne, cheesy pasta, nuggets and waffles! You don’t like veg because you don’t like the feeling of it in your mouth and it sometimes makes you heave. We have to give you veg pouches so we know you are getting some goodness!

And of course, you love your brother. You think he is the bees knees, you think he is hilarious. I don’t hear you laugh in the same way as when you are laughing at your brother!

You also love our dog Buster. We got him last October and he very quickly became your best furry friend ever. You often sit cuddling him, laying on him, playing with him. Until he gets a bit excited and nippy and then you send him away!

You are still a complete mummy’s boy, and whilst I do manage to get some sleep in my own bed, I generally end up in yours every night. I won’t lie, I love it. Snuggled up next to you. It won’t last forever so I might as well enjoy it while it does. And you do this new thing where early in the morning, you roll over towards me and flip an arm and leg over me, y’know, just to make sure you are holding me in place. It is such a lush feeling though. I love it.

You do however, now let Daddy put you to bed. Although he did it the first time and let you watch cricket with him so now you want to watch sport with him every Daddy bedtime! Naughty Daddy!

You love watching sport with him though. The pair of you often sit on the sofa staring at the TV and celebrating when England get a wicket or something!

And on that note, I think I am done with your 4 year update! I am so proud of the amazing little boy you have become and I love watching you grow and grow.

Happy belated birthday little man!