Charlie at 7...

Charlie has always been an intense little boy with an amazing giggle. When he was a baby and would stare at people when he first met them and then point a finger at their nose as a greeting. But he also had an amazing belly laugh. 

Here are some things about Charlie at 7:

• he loves funny movies and will laugh like crazy throughout the movie
• he loves TV and movies - he can lock onto a show or movie and if you have to separate him from it he will most often lose it. he is getting better at controlling his responses, but a quick tv/movie shut down isn't easy. 
• Charlie is an extremely adept and diligent student. he loves learning and is fiercely competitive (not sure where he got that from - ha). 
• he is passionate and intense is almost everything he does. he can focus in and spend hours working on legos, reading books, playing soccer - whatever he decides he cares about that day. 
• he is a fierce chess player. he started playing chess with pappy awhile ago and then does the chess club at school and has become an awesome player. he is very strategic and often catches you off guard (he beat me in a few plays once and i was shocked!). Bill has finally figured out his strategy and has been able to beat him consistently, but Charlie is working on changing that. He will even play chess against himself, which is hilarious - he will say - wow that was a good move! (and it was him playing against himself!)
• Bill and charlie had went off and had a coke and a chat last week to discuss how babies really do get in mommies bellies. He handled it very maturely and I will say Bill did a fantastic job discussing it with Charlie and building a great foundation for many more talks in the future. 
• when we are driving - he will often pass me up a notebook with blank paper and ask me to write him up some math problems - just for fun. They are already doing multiplication in his class! 
• I am also sad to say he got his "say no first" trait from me. whenever we bring up something we are going to do next - he always says "nooo - i don't want to do that!". I have had to talk to him about how he unfortunately got that trait from me and that he will probably need to consistently work on changing his attitude. because once we start doing something he LOVES it. sorry charlie! 
• he loves his sisters. the girls think charlie is the man and they are happy to be his little side kicks. it is so sweet to watch them all play together. during spring break we stayed home for 1 full day and it was fantastic - the kids played legos in charlie's room for 4 hours straight. glorious! I knew having 3 kids in under 2 years would pay off one day.
• has grown into being a strong defensive soccer player
• can write in cursive REALLY well. I am amazed at the writing that comes out of charlie. He recently wrote thank you notes in cursive to his friends and I was beyond impressed.

I'm sure there are lots of other things I am missing, but most of all we are so incredibly blessed and proud to be watching Charlie grow into the boy God has created him to be. He is learning more self control and patience and especially to learn how to discuss his opinions respectfully. He has a lot of opinions and ideas and we want to allow him the opportunity to express those - just in a respectful way. We love you Charlie and are so thankful God entrusted you to us!