Eight in 2008

One cool thing about Lucas's birthday is that it always matches the year, i.e. he turns 8 in 2008, will turn 20 in 2020, and so on. I know, I know. There are millions of kids who were also born in 2000, but still, I think it's pretty special (maybe because it helps me to remember how old he happens to be at any given moment.)

Last week we celebrated his eight birthday with gifts, cake, balloons and presents. He asked the day before whether we had called his teacher to tell her he would like the day off -- in Lucas's world, no one should be forced to attend school on such a special day. We had to disappoint him on that one, but the class took a field trip so it wasn't all hard work that day.

Earlier this week, Lucas impressed me by bringing home his first real chapter book from school, and reading all 140 pages in a single day. Being of the somewhat suspicious sort, I wondered whether he had really understood everything he read, so I sat him down and asked him a few questions from the book and had him read several pages to me. To my delight, he answered every question correctly and read without much trouble whatsoever. How this huge development happened over the summer, I have no idea. Perhaps it was the brain-building power of Italian pasta?

Matthew has started fifth grade with all the gusto he usually shows for school, with an added dash of excitement because he is now in the school's final class. He is serving as a crossing guard this year (so very proud of his neon orange cape with color-enhancing reflecting stripes when he dons it in the mornings).

Both boys will be doing judo and tennis this year, and Matthew will start on the swim team. In other words, The M&N (mom and Nicholas) taxi service will launch this afternoon and run basically non-stop through Christmas.

Nicholas is advancing by leaps and bounds -- literally. A month ago he couldn't go from laying to sitting by himself. Today he is pulling himself up onto the edges of furniture and cruising around from couch to table to windowsill to adult pantlegs to drawers, and standing for a few seconds without support. He is also rearranging my cupboards on a daily basis and it's all I can do to throw everything back in haphazardly before catching him in the next cabinet.

But he makes up for it all with his smiles and his emerging sense of humor. I mean, doesn't this just melt your heart?