Pete turns Eight

Well, it's a week later and we survived not having a big party for RePete and now it's time to deflect the advances of the party bug with Pete. It doesn't help that he has been inviting anyone who will listen to his "party". Luckily I've been there to remind him that we aren't having a big party this year. He's so persistent. We are celebrating with RePete, BN, my sister and my nephew. Pete asked me if I sent them all invitations....

As you can see, how shall I say this...Pete has always made me strive to be a better person. He arrived after 18 hours of serious labor with a perfect conehead. Oh yes, he knows all the intimate details of my birth canal. And on January 30, 2004, he introduced us to parenthood. He had a serious bout of jaundice and had to be hospitalized with the big lamps. It was very emotional because his levels were so elevated and I was post-partum and having trouble pumping, but in the end it all worked out.

Most babies start out with blue eyes, but not Pete. His were a rich brown from the beginning and BIG! I melted everytime I looked at him. I won't sugar coat it and say it was easy. When he was happy, he was really happy and when he was mad, he was really, really mad. No middle ground with Pete. No gray areas. It's either black or it's white. It still is.

For his entire first year, he cried everytime we got in the car. BN took a job in Charlottesville in Pete's 3rd month and we made many three hour trips between our two homes. Let's just say it took its toll on my nerves. And you never met happier parents who jumped up and down with glee when Pete turned one. Just by turning his carseat around to face the front, all the screaming stopped and he was perfectly happy in the car. Backwards=screaming. Frontwards=happy. See, no in between.

He has always had an incredible vocabulary and every night we had to read no less than five books to him. He always had to choose them and there could be NO LESS THAN FIVE. Because of his height and vocabulary, people always thought he was older. They were always amazed by it.

He loves exploring and has an awesome imagination. He still tends to focus on one thing at a time and it absorbs him. I've always thought he should be an actor or at least be in local productions. That's our next venture. I think he'll love it.

He was Buzz Lightyear for about 2.5 years. "To finty and deyon!" he would say.

He's been a terrific big brother to RePete. Sure he casts him aside sometimes, squeezes him a little too tightly sometimes, but mostly he tries to play nicely with him and teach him things...like how to pee outside...

And this is about as far as I can go with pictures. He hasn't changed much in his appearance for the last few years and BN will have my hide if I show our babies to the world. So I'll leave you with this one.

Those big brown eyes get me everytime.

~M