My Oldest Son's 8th Birthday

Today is my oldest son's birthday. He's a mighty eight-year-old now, and, as you may have read in earlier posts, he has both the talent and the attitude to show for it. But today has been a really good day. We got up this morning (I slept in because I didn't have an early meeting to attend) and had breakfast together and then we had him open one present before he went to school. He opened his paternal grandparent's gift, which actually was four gifts -- four books, even! He received a book about baptism (since he'll be baptized in a few weeks), a book of remembrance for his baptism, and two books from the "Liahona Legacies" series. He was in heaven, and he was just getting started.

After school, and after I got home from work, we sat down and opened his other gifts. His maternal grandparents gave him a set of Harry Potter computer game's, which he's playing with right now; my wife gave him Harry Potter #5, which he can't wait to read; his younger brother "gave" him a book on silly jokes, which he thinks are hilarious, but which go over the head of his younger sister. And said sister gave him a book from which a movie they had just seen was based, called "Hoot". All in all, he got a lot of books, and is ecstatic about it!

Me? Well, I realized that he really seems to enjoy Transformers, so my wife went looking for one on amazon.com, and she found an updated version of Jetfire! Now, if you recall the earlier post on this, it would be no surprise that I was ecstatic about the possibility to give my child an updated version of the very Transformer that I loved and adored as a child.

When he opened it, it was obvious that he absolutely loved it, too. This is something special to me, as it was really the first toy that he has ever really got excited about in his whole life. It's crazy, but true. And to have him excited about something that I myself was excited about ... well, that was just extra special. And to top it off, he's been flying it around the house -- keeping his nose out of a book, no less! -- pretending to blow stuff up. It's a proud moment.

And of course, all the kids ate (meaning: inhaled) cake and ice cream tonight and will hopefully sleep pleasantly this evening! It was a good and casual birthday.

P.S. -- Now for all you readers who may be thinking we're horrible parents because we didn't give him very much to actually play with, fear not. He will be having a birthday party on Saturday with about a dozen of his friends, each of whom will no doubt give him toys of which we don't approve.