Our Creative Connor

Connor is so unpredictable. You never know what he is going to say or do or how he may react to things. His mind is so different. So complex-but in other ways so simple. We love Connors unique personality and trying to figure his interesting little brain out!

Connor is doing great in school. Honestly we weren't quite sure how well or not he would do. He is one of the youngest ones in there. He turned 5 in August and the cut off is the last day of August so he is definitley a younger one in his grade. He doesn't have to try as hard as Zach. They teach it, he practices it once or twice and then he's got it down. He doesn't hate reading, but he does have a hard time focusing-but nothing like Zach. Also, he likes to joke around as he reads and say things that it doesn't really say to be funny-which makes it last so much longer than it has to! Once you tell him to quit and just read he can fly through all of his books from his book bags. He loves words, he loves spelling, he loves trying to figure out new words. He constantly looks at lables, signs,tags-anything and everything that has a word on it-he either sounds it out and figures it out himself or spells it for us and ask us what it says. Usually he will remember that word after that. He is right where he should be in school. He learns really good by songs. He is constantly singing songs from school. He knows his Months in order and how to spell each one. He remembers every song they sing word for word and you can tell they are often stuck in his head because he will just start singing without realizing. He also loves his music teacher Mrs. Fortner-she is very sweet-everyone loves her. Connor doesn't want to break any rules at school. He is a very strict rule follower and doesn't like when others break the rules. He tells us about those ones-although he does think it is pretty funny when they do something funny and he is ok with that because he isn't the one to get in trouble. His teacher is Mrs. Jones, she is so cute and super sweet. She has twins in kinder as well. All through our Christmas break the only friend Connor wanted to have over was Mrs. Jones.

Connors biggest interest right now is art. He calls himself an artist. He makes you messes all over the table with markers, crayons, papers and what not and tells us that artist are just dirty. He has never been much of a toy player and always has just tagged along side of others but now that he colors and draws that can keep his attention for hours.

Connor doesn't like to see other people get in trouble-especially at his expense. If Zach does something mean to him and we put Zach in time out 95% of the time Connor will beg us to not put him in time out and tell us that "it's ok." He does the same with Gavin. Gavin can be a bully. He likes to pinch and bite and throw things at the boys-Connor doesn't like it when we discipline him or even say "no" sternly to him because "he is just a baby mom! you have to be nice!" He has a big heart although at times he makes bad snap decisions. He has still has a hard time understanding accidents (like if someone were to accidently bump into him he would should the person was for sure just pushing him). He does not like when people talk mean or stern. It hurts his feelings very bad and makes him sad/ defensive immediately. He will be the first one to tell you are are talking mean to talk to nicer.

Connor wants to play basketball very bad. He is not sporty at all and has little to no endurance. He tires quickly-but he insist he wants to play, so hopefully we can sign him up this year and let him try it out and get it out of his system. Who knows, maybe he will surprise us. He loves his ziggle still. He isn't into bikes or scooter or skateboards. Most the time when we are playing out front with all the neighbors he is usually just walking around doing this own thing, talking to the adults or just fididling around. Sometimes he even just stays inside and does his own thing.

Connor is at the age where everything that comes out of his mouth is usually hilarious. His prayers are long-cute and pretty funny most the time. He insist on saying almost every prayer. He has decided this year that Santa is probably Heavenly Father. Instead of saying believe in he says "know in," for example he will say "I know I Heavenly Father so I know in Santa!"

Connor loves to give things to people. Any sort of gift or card-or anything. He loves to see how happy it makes people to give them something and is always looking for things to be able to give to others. If he finds something of mine that I may have left out (earings or whatever) he will pick them up and say, "mom I got these for you!" Usually he will add. "all by myself" haha. In return, Connor has loves to receive things. There isn't a day that goes by that he doesn't ask both Tyler and I if we have a surprise for him. Even the day after Christmas! Anytime ANY guest come over, whether it be a hair client or a grandparent the first thing he ask is if they have a surprise for him. He LOVES his surprises.

Connor is super independent in the way of getting and doing things for himself. He always wants to do things that he is way to little to do and sometimes that causes a problem or he has to learn his lesson the hard way. He really wanted to open a new package of knifes I got and slit his finger. He likes to poor things that are too heavy-make his own food and heat it up in the microwave and other random things like that. The good thing about Connor is that he DOES learn from his lessons most of the time. He is a good but interesting memory. He remembers exact things that people said or did from over a year ago-but he has no short term memory. On his way to use the bathroom he forgets what he is doing. He is a horrible cleaner (pick up toys), it is always "too hard" BUT recently he has gotten surprisingly better AND does it the first time we ask, which is huge bc no one in our family knows how to do that it seems. He loves people to be proud of him and he loves seeing others happy. He loves to clean anything that includs spraying cleaner-but sprays way to much every single time.

Connor still has some major anxieties. They are triggered by random things at random times. He insist on sleeping with us EVERY night. He goes to sleep in his own bed (as long as we are in there with him) but always comes to a room usually by 1 or 2 in the morning. We can't move him back because he wakes and freaks out and he will not sleep on the floor in our room either-it has to be in our bed right next to us. He has very vivid nightmares and to him they are very real and it is sad to see him so scared. He still falls asleep usually with in minutes and is pretty easy at bed time unless Zach is stirring him up. He appreciates his sleeps and doesn't fight it. He just has a hard time staying asleep or in a deep sleep in the middle of the night.

He doesn't have any close friends but would love to be invited over to someones house. He is sad that Zach gets to go to friends but he doesn't. The neighbors have him over occasionally and that just makes his week. He has a cute little friend named Lauren that goes to church with us and just lives a couple streets in front of us. He is very good with names and tells us all about the kids in his school class. He tends to be better friends with the girls than the boys-or at least he tells us more about the girls than the boys!

By the end of this last Summer Connor was very very brave in the water and was super close to swimming. He can hold his breath underwater and stay under for several minutes. He taught himself how to swim and could a little bit-but just in the places he could reach. He still has anxiety with water but is 100 times more comfortable with it and has learned his boundaries. Bath time is much easier now because he doesn't mind getting his head wet which is huge. In the beginning of 2014 water on his head was unspeakable! You can tell he is very proud of himself.

Connor is still very asymptomatic when it comes to sickness. This last November he has has phnemonia and strep for 2 weeks before we realized. He doesn't complain or whine. One day he had 104.6 fever and said he felt "good" as he was laying on the couch looking just miserable. He is an easy sick kid to take care of and we love the extra snuggles since he is our least snugly child.

We love Connor so much. He is growing and learning and changing everyday and we are sad to see him growing up and not being our baby anymore.