We officially have a teenager! Happy 13th birthday, Sutton!
You are just the coolest kid ever and so responsible. If I ask you to do something, or not do something, I can count on you obey. At least 9 times out of 10, haha. Your brother is a different story! I love that we can have real conversations about real things and that we have the kind of relationship where we talk about everything.
At your doctor's appointment wee just had, we found out you are now 5'4"! You're only a half inch below me now.
You are a pet lover and insisted on getting some of your photos with Riddick. He isn't great at posing...notice how he's getting ready to bolt in that last photo.
You also love allllllllll our cats. Currently we have just Blueberry who lives inside. But then outside, we have Luna and her 5 kittens (OJ, Smoky, Snowball, and the math twins - Times and Divide), Oreo and her 2 kittens (Cici and Preston), and then Coconut and Kyle. You and your brother are trying to convince me and Daddy to let Snowball live inside too.
Our school is K - 6, so you graduated from elementary school this year! It was pretty emotional for me and I can't believe you are now going to junior high. You started weights class with your friends this summer, which also sounds like such a teenager thing to do.
You are still loving soccer! Last year, you played mostly defender and some goalie on your club team, the VC Fusion. This year the main goalie won't play in the fall season, so you get to be goalie! Very exciting but nerve-racking for your mother. Daddy will be coaching this year, so that will be fun as well. You also do goalie lessons with your hero - Steven Hamersky - who used to be the goalie for the Wichita Wings. We go to all the Wings games together, and we LOVE it. It's so cool to have that special time with you since Daddy is down on the sidelines filming the games, and Ren doesn't enjoy them so he usually stays with Grandma.
You guys can argue like crazy people (and it drives me INSANE), but you and your brother are seriously the best together. You love each other and do everything together. He sleeps downstairs in your room on the weekends and in the summer for "brother sleepovers." He rarely uses his real bed because he just wants to be with you. You also include him when you have friends over, which is very admirable, and I appreciate that so much about you.
You're obsessed with spicy Cheetos, Lipton green tea with citrus, and anything with buffalo sauce. You love Chic-fil-a (for their Mac n cheese), McDonald's (for their spicy chicken sandwich), Noodles and Co (for their Mac n cheese), and Chili's (for their chips and salsa). You either order a bacon cheeseburger with ranch or something buffalo when we go to most other restaurants. You haven't ordered off the kids menu for quite awhile, but now you're too old for most of them!
When we go to the pool, you like to get a Twix at the break. You also love plain Hershey's chocolate bars, Milk Duds, Juicy Fruit gum (you just recently taught yourself how to blow bubbles).
During the school year, you usually eat toast with peanut butter for breakfast. On the weekends and the summer, I leet you have whatever. Usually I make chocolate chip banana bread (which you're obsessed with) or chocolate chip muffins. If I haven't made any of those, you'll do a bowl of cereal (Cinnamon Toast Crunch, dry), or an egg sandwich.
Your best friend right now is Brayden. You guys are always asking for play dates and sleepovers - which we have done quite a bit of this summer! You had your first sleepover at his house this May (other than a random one when you were 4, and aside from staying at grandparents houses). It went well and you didn't get homesick! You and Brayden are constantly texting each other, and playing video games together (while online, at your separate houses).
You love to play Gorilla Tag (GT) on the VR with your friends. Once again, online while at your own houses. You get such a workout and get so sweaty from it. You also do a lot of Minecraft. You have a YouTube channel with your brother - the Rad Redheads - and you love posting short videos of our cats there.
We did the inflatables at Splash Aqua Park for your birthday party with a bunch of your school friends and two soccer buddies. It was a blast and everyone loved it.
You still love swimming, we go to the pool as much as we can, but you decided you didn't want to do swim team this year.
Daddy had given you his old phone a year or two ago but it wasn't hooked up to a number. If you were at home, it was connected to our Wifi so you could text or FaceTime us if you were home but we weren't. We let you have only us, grandparents, and Brayden on there to contact. But for your 13th birthday, our big gift was that we turned it into a REAL phone. So now you have a number, you can be online even when you're not connected to Wifi, and you are in the process of gathering more of your friends' numbers. You also have been added to our "stalking app" (Life360) so we can all always see where each other is.
We have been leaving you home alone, or alone with you brother a lot more often this year. It's so weird. SO WEIRD. But you seem to love it...I think it makes you feel more "adult." If I'm gone too long, you always text me to ask where I am though and when I'll be back. So you DO love me.
You have the best sense of humor and are actually funny. Even your main teacher last year (Mrs. Ferguson) pointed that out. I love that you are positive, you don't try too hard to be cool, you are kind, you care about people and animals, you love your grandparents well, you still get excited about things like a little kid, but you're able to understand more complex things like a grown up.
You still have some OCD-type tendencies which has always been the case with you. But I think you might be loosening up on them a bit. We always have to do the same bedtime routine (brush teeth, hold hands to pray, you always have to hold my right hand while Ren holds my left), then I have to kiss you both on the forehead and say the EXACT SAME PHRASE every night. Yours is "Love you, goodnight, see you tomorrow." I always have to say "Good morning," as the first thing to you when you come up from your bedroom. I also am always supposed to make you aware of the plan for the next day and if I don't, you get a bit upset and say "WHY DIDN"T YOU TELL ME?!" You like to keep a lot of things that I would prefer to throw away. And (as evidenced in these photos), you always wear entrance bracelets until they fall off. This one was from your birthday party.
You got braces! You've had them just over 10 months now. You got them in August last year. Your teeth look SO STRAIGHT, especially when you compare them to last year. You are supposed to have them for a total of 24 months but I don't know why, when your teeth are already looking perfect. Wishful thinking that maybe wee'll get them off sooner? You've done really well with them, the worst was when you first got them on and then had to go to school, and ended up crying at school from the pain. Some of your adjustments since then have left you a bit sore, but nothing like that first time. You do pretty well with your elastics too.
We weren't consistently going to church for awhile because we couldn't really find one that felt right. But recently, we started going to Riverlawn mostly for you and your brother. At the beginning of June, your age group was promoted to the youth group and you have been loving it! A couple of your soccer friends go there, and it's a pretty big group that holds some fun events. You love Jesus and love learning about him, you are outgoing and like meeting new people. You make new friends easily. So it has been really good for you and I am thrilled that we seem to have found your place.
(Please notice Luna and Coconut photobombing in the photo above.)
You love to wear your Crocs constantly. With socks. You also prefer to wear those dry-fit type of shirts but will pretty much wear any t-shirt. You still don't love jeans. You have like 2 hoodies you rotate in the winter.
You're a smartie! You got pretty much all A's...ended each semester with all A's but had a B or two on your quarterly grade cards.
You play the trumpet in school and have the most amazing natural talent for it! You are doing "Sweet Dreams" and "Feliz Navidad" and "the Can Can" while the other kids are doing "Hot Cross Buns" or "Mary Had a Little Lamb." You also took the skill you now have of reading music, and taught yourself to play piano on a little keyboard that my mom gave you from when I was a kid. You Google the notes for songs you like or you figure them out yourself. So cool.
All in all, you're the best son a mom could want, and you love your family and friends so well! We are so beyond proud of you and LOVE YOU SO MUCH!!!!
(We found Kyle lounging in the woods as we were taking these photos.)
And here's the birthday video:
