Spencer's Birthday Spotlight and Tag

This is one of my very favorite photos of Spencer. He's posing with his best buddy Lydia, who sadly, is moving to Maryland this week.

Spencer was recently tagged by his cousin Bentley so I thought I would combine the tag entry with his birthday spotlight into one post in order to avoid repeating a lot of the same information.

Spencer Nolan Oswald was born July 30, 2005. He is named after his grandpa Nolan Potter. He is celebrating his 3rd birhtday and is so excited about it. Apparently at the age of 3 he graduates from toddlerhood and becomes a "real" boy. He has also told us that at the age of 3 he will start using the potty. We'll see if he sticks to that one... He is a joy and a delight to have in our family. He is just so sweet and cuddly and makes us laugh constantly. He has a great sense of humor and he especially loves slapstick--one of his favorite shows is AFV which he calls the "funny show". We love the way that Spencer talks and expresses things. For example, he'll say: "I'm found mine ball!" or "Mommy, I want a snack about a cracker." He can sometimes be a bit bossy and demanding and wants things right now or else. We've been seeing an interesting side of him lately with his little temper flaring every so often and usually without warning. But then almost as soon as a tantrum comes, it's gone and he's just the happiest little person again. Spencer has been one of our most challenging children because of the severe food allergies and asthma that he suffers. We have to make sure that he doesn't ever eat any eggs, milk, wheat, or nuts. Did you know that eggs, milk, wheat, or nuts is in just about everything? It has been very difficult to find foods that are okay for him to eat, but we finally feel like we have things under control now and we are just really hopeful that someday he'll outgrow at least a couple of these allergies. He's such a good sport about it though. He recognizes foods that he can and can't have so he's good at letting people know if he can have a food when they offer him somthing. If we're eating something that he isn't sure if he can have, he'll ask us and if we tell him that it isn't for him, he usually just says okay and asks for something that he can have. But he gets SO excited if we tell him about a new food that he can have and he'll say over and over as he's eating: "It's okay! I'm can eat this!" We just really love him and are so happy he's in our family. That was a fast 3 years!

Tag:

Things he's good at:

1. running

2. getting what he wants

3. singing

Things he likes to do:

1. play outside

2. puzzles

3. play with moon sand (he can't do playdough because it has wheat in it, but this is a fun alternative that we discovered.)

Things he likes to eat:

1. rice cakes

2. fruit snacks

3. hot dogs

Things he doesn't like to eat: (this was a hard one because there are a lot of things he can't eat but of the things that he can, he LOVES just about anything)

1. bananas

2. mustard

3. cooked green beans (but he loves them fresh from the garden)

What he wants to be when he grows up: I asked him and he said "a hider hider" which I thought meant a fire fighter since he can't say his F's, so I tried to clarify if that's what he meant but he said "no, a hider hider so I can play hide and seek a lot!"

Favorite sports team: U.S. men's soccer team, Utah Jazz, Detroit Tigers

Favorite color: he said "red and yellow and orange and green"

Favorite songs:

1. Follow the Prophet

2. Down by the banks of the hanky panky

3. Beethoven's 5th

Favorite singers:

1. Laurie Berkner

2. The Backyardigan's

3. Fleetwood Mac

Favorite Nicknames:

1. Spence

2. Spencito

3. Spencerooni

4. Bubby

Spencer now tags Lilly, DJ, and Seth Alan