Israel Turns 5

 Our little Israel turned 5 at the beginning of May! Poor little Israel has to wait so long after his 3 older siblings have their birthdays in the span of five weeks at the beginning of the year. But he gets perfect weather, and a less tired Mama on his birthday so  I think it all evens out. We decided each 5th birthday will be a party year for our kiddos, so he got to have a friend birthday at Dinosaur Park this year and he was thrilled. 

He told us he wanted a "dwarf cake" so I did my best to deliver! I really love making the kids birthday cakes, I hope they always want me to. 

For one of his birthday presents, I made him a "baby book". A photo book full of pictures of him for the last 5 years. I had made family photo year books each year but I fell off that wagon right about the time Israel was born (someday! someday I will catch up and get back to it!). So the girls had books with their baby pictures and Julian had a photo book I made for his adoption, it was time for Israel to have one! Israel loves hearing about when he was a baby so he really loves looking at this book. 

Israel is such a sweet boy. He is the biggest Mama's boy and tells me he loves me everyday, many times a day. He loves his brothers and sisters and can play well with all of them. He also plays great alone and will literally play legos for hours on end without interruption. However, with that big heart comes a lot of big feelings. He can be a very challenging child for me to parent at times, he reminds me a lot of my brother Bennett as a kid ha. But we are learning together. He loves to forgive and be forgiven. He is slowly learning how to handle all those big feelings and I see improvement in him all the time. 

Israel loves to learn and has a brain that seems to just soak up information. Without much teaching on my part he has learned his numbers and letters and their sounds. He has learned how to write his name and now loves to practice writing all the numbers and letters. He likes to draw and has a charming way of drawing people. He is eager to learn how to read and is very excited to be an official homeschooler in the fall. 

Israel loves to be funny and silly and make people laugh. I have a whole note in my phone dedicated to the funny things he says. He makes friends rather easily and loves talking to adults when he is feeling comfortable. He really is such a sweetheart and I am very grateful to be his mom. 

For their birthdays the kids get to request their favorite meals. Israel choose chocolate cereal for breakfast, as most of the kids always do. For dinner he wanted flat bread and hummus, just like our Jerusalem Dinner we have every Easter Week. It was a bit of an odd dinner, but I was happy to oblige and we ate another Jerusalem Dinner this year.