Double digits!

Earlier this week, Samuel Nicholas De Falco turned 10! No longer 9 3/4 (as Sam loved to tell folks), he is now double digits! Looking back, the last ten years have gone by in a blink. Sam arrived when Tony and I were both thirty, so we spent our thirties figuring out parenthood, starting with our Sammy. He was the sweetest, easiest baby that any newbie parents could ask for...we knew we had struck gold with Sam. Many aspects of his personality are still like this; he's outgoing, fun-loving, and very loyal. He has an excellent memory for details and has never met a pun he didn't love. He's very athletic, but hasn't quite figured that out yet. And we've watched Sam's language arts skills sky-rocket in the last year or two...it's fun to have a conversation with him because he always surprises with vocabulary that's quite advanced for a fourth grader. He's also majorly into YouTube videos with creepy toys and haunted houses. Hmmm...

This year marked a lot of growth for Sam, too. A year ago, he was struggling a bit with self-esteem and not handling setbacks well. Let's just say he didn't roll with the punches easily. Fast-forward to now and he's grown so much. His self-talk is much more positive and he takes initiative beautifully when it comes to homework, larger school assignments and everyday tasks. He's increasingly organized, surprises us with random acts of kindness, and definitely switches gears with more grace these days. We hope these are all signs of even more good things to come.

Since our family has contracted "the plague" in the month of December before--possibly due to exposure at a birthday party that knocked us out well into the holidays--we've held Sam's celebration earlier in the month for the past few years. Two weeks back, Sam and his buddies had a jumping good time at a nearby trampoline park. 

The kids got a lot of exercise!

Dodge ball was a particularly big hit.

There were only a few tears... ;-)

Who's ten years old?

This guy!

Sebastian enjoyed the gibbon, even if he didn't quite use it the way you're supposed to.

And Brie played spider on this net.

Then we ate lots of pizza and...

Oreo Blizzard ice cream cake from Dairy Queen! (It was the birthday boy's request.) Yum!

On Sam's actual birthday, the fourth grade took a field trip to Matthew 25 Ministries, a local disaster relief non-profit. Tony chaperoned and was really impressed by the facility.

You're never too young (or old) to do community service!

Ready to volunteer!!

At the very same time, I headed over to Rockwern to help Sebastian and his classmates celebrate his HALF birthday! I read The Hanukkah Hamster to his class (Sebastian's pick) and then they ate fudgsicles!

Sebastian has the sweetest group of classmates this year!!

So fun to celebrate with you, little guy!

Speaking of birthday boys, I spotted Sam (in orange plaid) in a class picture on the wall of Sebastian's classroom. He's changed so much in five short years...

Later that night, we enjoyed Taco Tuesday and more Fudgsicles. Here's one very happy big kid.

And then gifts! Bey Blades from Tony's folks...

And Pokemon cards from mine. All fun!

We can't believe you're ten, Sammy. Time has really flown. You can bet that Dad and I will be doing our best to slow it down for the next ten!!