8-Year-Old Photography

Tucker has grown a lot over the past year.  He started acting much older than he used to.  He still throws fits and gets upset but now I've noticed sometimes he can let things go.  Some things aren't as important to him as they used to be.  I don't really know how to explain it but hopefully you get what I'm saying.  He has stopped being a little kid and I would now consider him just a kid.  He is more interested in reading and being on the computer, and he doesn't like to watch some of the younger type shows the other kids watch.  He started talking back a lot more and gets an attitude with me sometimes, but we are working on that.

I mentioned before that he likes reading and he has gotten so much better at it too.  Being a reader myself I love that he can now sit down and spend over an hour reading chapter books.  On days when we go to the library he spends so much time just sitting upstairs with his new books.  His favorite books are the graphic novels but I limit those to one per library trip.  He also likes the A-Z mysteries, the Magic Tree House, and a few other easy chapter book series.  We are both trying to get 100 hours of reading this summer and right now he is further along than I am.

Tucker is a great big brother.  He shares a room with Leon and every morning he helps Leon out of his crib.  Then he comes downstairs and get breakfast (usually cereal).  Sometimes he will set out the bowls and help all the kids get food, other times he just rushes and gets his own done.  Every morning he gets all ready as fast as possible so he can have more time to play.  He puts his clothes on the night before and hates it if I make him change for some reason.  He never even wants to fix his shirt when it is backwards or inside out.  That is because he doesn't seem to care at all about how he looks.

We've been doing swimming lessons for almost a year now and I can finally say that Tucker can swim!  He loves the water and can comfortably swim across the pool in any direction.  During his lessons he is kind of the loud kid who tries to play with the teacher and steal all their attention the entire time.  I don't think he is like that at school, it must be the smaller group setting.

Tucker had a good time in school this year.  His teacher said he did great and he played with new friends.  It seems like most recesses he either played Spy or Plants vs Zombies (not on the computer but just running around pretending).  Tucker seems to be about in the middle of his class for most subjects.  

Once in a while Tucker will get nervous to be up in front of a crowd but it never stopes him from doing anything.  And often times he won't get nervous at all.  He only seems to get scared if it is his first time doing that particular thing.  I would say that for someone his age he is pretty comfortable in front of people.  I'm sure I get more nervous about that sort of thing than he does.  

Sometimes taking pictures with Tucker can be hard because he keeps doing a fake smile.  But this time he did great and we got lots of fun and silly pictures.  This next one is his spiderman in a suit pic.

At home Tucker has been asking to learn breakdancing.  I think he said that he even showed people at school his "breakdancing."  So I am trying to teach him the basic six step.

I like this next picture because even though he is growing up he is still small to me.  He often thinks he is in charge and older than he is.   It must be an oldest child thing.  He has grown more independent this year and doesn't seem to need me to do everything with him as much as he did before.

Tucker has a great testimony of the church and knows what is right and what is wrong.  There have been a few situations that he told me about where his friends are doing something he knows he isn't supposed to do and he stands up for what he knows and doesn't do it.  Sometimes it is just a matter of picking the right friends, and I am proud of him for figuring that sort of thing out.

Tucker is such a great guy and I am happy his is in our family!