Carter's TOP TEN List at 8 Years Old

It's one of our favorite times of the year. Time for Blake and I to sit and talk about just Carter for an hour and come up with our personal list of the TOP things that we would want to remember about him at this EXACT moment of his life. We had such a good and robust conversation this year that we had a difficult time trying to stick to TEN things about this incredible child.

10. Favorite Toys At This Age - Crazy cart, spy kit and little gadgets. He LOVES things like his headlamp, foam airplanes you can launch and "secretly" recording or conversations with a spy recorder. He has had a video game system (a handheld unit of a DS3) for a year now but we have purposely not encouraged him to use it for now - until recently he only had 2 games. He only plays with it while we travel longer distances in the car and even then, we have to remind him to pull them out then. He is usually content looking out the window or talking with us.

9. Carter's Growing Confidence - He has always been confident in sport's settings but now is finally able to go up to people at restaurants and ask sales associates at stores where things are. Carter has come a long way from just a year ago when Addie had to be the one to go with him and ask for more ketchup at Chickfile. With his natural confidence on field and court growing, even more, we have noticed he has this natural tendency to get the group of kids together huddled up during the recent soccer season.

8. Still Our Affectionate Little Boy - Every weekend morning, he comes into our room and climbs in bed to cuddle or comes and cuddles next to me if I am up reading. He still runs up to us and gives me hugs in public when I pick him up from after school care. Every single night, it is still critical to him that we both tuck him into bed and give him a hug AND a kiss. This is a marked difference from his sister, Addie, who is content turning off the light and tucking herself into bed.

7. His Love of Learning and Specifically Engineering, Science & Math - Recently The Perkins gave him a book, titled The Dangerous Book For Boys - fun explanations of how things work, which is perfect for this stage of his life. He loves to build and put things together and is the first one to offer to put his sisters' toys together. Just last week, he jumped at the chance to put Addie's bicycle name plate on all by himself and he is my go-to-person for putting new batteries in anything and everything; he's great with a screwdriver. With math, he is constantly wanting us to challenge him with new and harder problems and has gotten the concept of multiplication for several months now. He is SO inquisitive and asks such good and deep questions. Most of our amazing conversations happen in the car. Recently, on the way to school, he, Addie and Blake were talking about why people smoke. Carter said, "If it's so bad for you, then why do stores even sell them?"

6. High Energy- I am sure this is normal for this age but it's something to remember. We have found ways to divert his energy. For five months now, he takes Tiger running at 7AM each morning before school. This is a two-for-one win for us, burning lots of energy for both of them. We try to keep him outside as much as possible for this reason and it seems to work at this age. During the first month of the 2nd grade school year, he had a very difficult time controlling his energy in the classroom but we were given the most incredible teacher we could have EVER asked for - Mr. Alfaro and he has been able to work miracles with Carter and all the high energy boys he has and he recently choose Carter to be the class's one Stephen Covey Leader In Me Representative, showing how far Carter has come. We are so proud of him (and thankful God gave us Mr. Alfaro.)

5. His Love of Details and Telling Us Everything - He can be very long winded, detail oriented and LOVES telling us play-by-play about anything and everything about what he learned or where he was. After picking him up from a recent afternoon play date, during the seven minute drive home, his response to "Hey, Carter. What did you do at their house?" wasn't even half-way finished. The good news is at this age, we don't have to worry about the "Nothing," or "It was fine." responses yet. 

4. His Family and Helping Us - He would still rather be with us over anyone else. I was picking him up from playing at his friend, Caleb's house, and he was having so much fun, he didn't want to leave yet but as we were getting in the car, I told him, "Addie had a pallet set up ready to watch Racing Stripes," and he instantly was happy to be headed home. I know these days of wanting to be with family more than anybody else might be coming to an end over the next couple of years, so I am relishing in them, for now. He is always willing and wanting to help us do absolutely anything from making coffee for us in the mornings to picking up the back porch and dog poop to trimming bushes or washing the car. I am tremendously proud of his work ethic.

He makes the best coffee!

Picking up Tiger's poop.

He was proud to trim the bushes when Daddy told him he was really counting on him because he couldn't fit in most of those areas!

Sweeping the garage on his electric cart!

3. Anything outside - The first day of Christmas vacation this year, he left to go play outside at 8:30 AM and didn't come in until after 4:30 when we made him, except twice to go to the bathroom and get more gadgets out of his room. It is absolutely amazing the creative games he and his sister, along with the neighborhood kids - Reggie, Barrett, Raeann and James, can come up with to play. Many times it is spying in the bushes sitting on stools, catching "bad guys" or setting a trap for squirrels, rolling cars down the concrete ditch, playing in the water left by rain. They find "hide-outs," spend hours pushing one another on the new swing or playing basketball.

(Add picture here of neighbor kids all playing together)

2. Absolutely Amazing With His Sisters. I now truly believe that this one of the most unique gifts God gave Carter since he was 17 months old and became a BIG BROTHER for the first time. It has moved to the next level now that he has two sisters and he is over 5 years older than Delaney. Every single weekend morning and many times during the week, he gets Delaney and takes her straight upstairs to play. He has a game with her when he walks in and hides in the dark until she says his name, "Bubba" or "Carter." In the evenings, he takes a bath with Delaney. He is absolutely amazing with these two girls; something that I have never seen before with anybody. He has never once said no to going and helping with either one of his sisters, when asked.

1. Sports are the largest part of his life - Right now, as Carter turns 8. He is more into golf than ever and playing in regular tournaments (once a month) where he is learning how to compete. He just started the "First Tee" Golf Program in early December. He is about to start his 6th season/year of Basketball. He is playing in his second year of the Upwards league and still says his very favorite sport is basketball. After basketball is over, come March 2015, we have decided to take the big step and enter him into the next step of soccer towards club on a more professionally coached team with more practices. It's such a hard decision to decide when and what sport to start to focus more on but we will work hard to keep him balanced with other sports like basketball and golf, as well as lots of free time to explore outside, along the way. On Carter's actual 8th birthday, Blake was at his school for his 3rd annual WATCH DOG day and he was shocked at the number of times different children approached him while walking down the hall, without Carter being there, asking if he was Carter's dad and telling him how awesome Carter was at soccer, how many goals he scores at recess and how they always want him to be on their team. Blake said the absolute best was when one boy came up to him and asked, "Did YOU teach Carter to play soccer?" (That's probably one of the biggest complements for a father to hear!)

(Add picture of Carter playing basketball this week)