Cheeks is 4!!

I probably say this for all my kids' birthdays, but I can't believe Cheeks is 4!!! Whenever birthdays come around you're forced to acknowledge how fast time is flying by and how quickly my little babies are becoming big boys!!
Big Boy was so excited about Cheeks' birthday. He had a specific gift in mind that he wanted to get for him. He even put some of his own money toward buying it, helped me wrap it, and made a card. Here he is explaining his card to Cheeks:

It was fun to see him excited about giving. Never mind that the gift he gave is already broken, it was really sweet!

The big gift was this dinosaur mountain set a neighbor had given us. As we sat up late the night before trying to figure out how to put it together we began to understand just why the neighbor was giving it away. There were so many pieces and it kept falling apart. I think ideally it was made this way so you could put it together in different configurations. But, when there's a 2 year old in the house it is constantly being knocked down.

It did make for a great display when he woke up though and they played with it all day and for a few days after (until we became so frustrated with the billion pieces and bagged it up and put it up high in a closet).

Opening a few more presents after Daddy got home from work:

Wearing his cute birthday shirt:

Grandpa and Grandma came over that night for cake and ice cream:

And there's the birthday boy waiting to blow out the candles:
Cheeks is the sweetest boy and we're so grateful to have him in our family. I'm kind of sad because he's really trying to say his letters correctly like R and L. We haven't even been encouraging him, he just suddenly started trying to say them right. They are pronounced very slowly and clearly now. It's good, because I know he can do it and he won't need speech therapy or anything. But, I'm really going to miss how he said 'weew' and you weren't sure whether he was saying real, or wheel, or rear.

I love that he still comes in to cuddle with me in the morning when I'm lying in bed preparing myself mentally for the day. I love that he still gets so lost in his own little world playing or examining something that he has no idea what's going on around him. I love how he's so smart, even though we used to joke that he was the one who was 'not so smart' (you know the line from the 3 Amigos?) He's so good at memorizing things, especially if it's in song form. I'm always surprised when he can correctly point out a letter or number (mostly because I haven't really worked on them with him). He picks up on so much and I don't even realize it.

We sure love our cutie 4 year old Cheeks!!