Ike is 4

This adorable little boy turned 4 on Saturday. A few things about him:

• He is in pre-school one day a week, and he really likes it. He usually refuses to tell me much about what goes on over there, but I know he has fun because he asks me pretty much every day if it's Friday and if he's going to school that day. He loves to take the same favorite toys to show and tell over and over again. When show and tell has a theme I have a hard time convincing him to take something along that theme. (The pic on the left was taken after his field trip to the fire station.)
• He is a (mostly) fun big brother. He loves to wrestle and "teach" his little brother the right ways to play things. He also can get pretty frustrated if Felix doesn't do things his way.
• Ike is such a cuddly kid. It's so nice because he wasn't much of a cuddly baby.
• He's really social and is constantly on the lookout for other kids to play with.
• He loves to watch shows and movies. 
• Ike is an early riser and is usually up between 6:30 and 7.
• His favorite color is yellow.
• He loves dinosaurs.
• Ike loves being read to, but he doesn't often sit down with books by himself. This is surprising to me because when he was about 2 he'd sit down with books by himself for up to about half an hour.
• His chores include putting away the silverware and other dishes that he can reach, picking up his toys, and helping with his laundry. It usually takes a lot of coaxing (and bribery) to get him to help with these things.
• Ike frequently wears the same shirts for as many days in a row as he can get away with. His favorites are his dinosaur shirts, his cougar shirt, his fireman shirt, his Cars hoodie, and a few others. I will let him wear them as long as he'd like, as long as they are not visibly dirty and they do not smell. This is what I call choosing my battles.
• He's very independent when it comes to choosing his clothes and going outside to play with his friends. But when it comes to taking his shoes off or putting them on, or going to the bathroom, he acts totally helpless. We're working on that.

For his birthday we went to the Bean Museum with his grandparents. Then we went to McDonald's for lunch. He had a great day but was a little disappointed to wake up and learn that he was still the same size as he was the day before.