Happy 4th birthday to my rookie baby

You’re totally a kid. A boy. A guy. Not my baby.

I’ve been thinking so much about the impossibility of seeing into the future lately.

When I remember back to that night four years ago — after an impossible 44 hour labor (including the four hours of pushing) — I can’t believe we made it this far. I can remember stuff because I wrote a lot down and took even more pictures, but I have no idea what the future will bring.

Like, when do you start typing and twittering? When will you insist on getting an iPod or a cell phone? When will you have your heart broken by a girl? When will you tell me to go live on the roof (oh yeah, that started last week)? Do these things happen at age five or age thirteen?

I like to ask my parent friends what their toddlers “are into” because the answer is so different for everyone. Two years ago, I would have thought that every toddler boy loved trains and big vehicles. But I know some of them just love dogs or playing naptime.

At four, you’re still into diggers, dump trucks, construction vehicles and even more construction vehicles. We finally got you the garbage truck you’ve been wanting for two years and you couldn’t be happier. Now everything in the house is a candidate for your garbage gobbling habit.

You love to know the rules and make your own plan (like me). When daddy made you an obstacle course, you immediately told him he got it all wrong and made everyone do it your way. You still tend to throw a fit when we don’t do things exactly as you were expecting (So do I, sometimes).

You have a huge personality and a gift for talking to anyone. When you were only two, you knew all the names of the kids, parents, and nannies at your playground. I still don’t know all those people.

But somehow, despite all that overflowing extroversion, we figured out that you need alone-time too. When you started asking if you could live on the roof (or if we could all live on the roof, and leave the house to you), I created a “nook” of your very own: a pre-man man cave. Details to follow.

And when did you learn how to use a big kid swing? I saw you do it for the first time last week and you were already going so high!