Ricky has grown up so much! He’s getting a little taller and he doesn’t have an ounce of baby fat on him – of course, he doesn’t have ANY fat on him at all, so … His arms and legs have gotten long. But the biggest change, and the most fun one, is seeing him mature. He takes on more responsibility and does more just because he knows it needs to be done. One day he started a load of laundry JUST BECAUSE his clothes were dirty! Miracles still happen, folks!
It only happened that once, BUT it still happened.
Ricky is quick witted and smart. He’s very compassionate and kind. He is rarely angry and just goes with the flow of life. Even if someone is unkind, he looks for their good and refuses to call anyone “bad.” He still isn’t a fan of scary movies (and by scary, I mean any intense or slightly scary thing happening) and he prefers fuzzy animals to most anything. He still loves to pretend and imagine and is usually the last one home from the bus stop because he’s taking his time and reliving some book or story in his mind. Ricky reads likes there is no tomorrow and is open to reading all kinds of books. He is even in a book club at school with 7 members – him and 6 girls! Ricky doesn’t care because he likes girls … “not like THAT,” he reminds me.
For his birthday, Ricky wanted a variety of pizza for dinner. I wasn’t about to make a “variety” of pizza, so we all went with Grandmama to the Pizza Pie Cafe. They have a pizza bar, a pasta bar, and a salad bar there. All the boys were happy!
Bobby was happy, he just likes to scowl.
Afterwards, we had Ricky’s birthday cake. He wanted an ice cream cake, so I made him one using ice cream sandwiches. He was completely happy with that.
I love that he’s 11. I will cherish my memories of his babyness forever, but I absolutely love this phase with him. He can talk my ear off about seemingly unimportant things, but I love it.
Eleven is a hard age to buy gifts for, though. He’s moved beyond toys and you can only buy so many books at a time, so what to get him? We decided to try something different this year. Our good friends have season passes to Lagoon and had hinted about us getting passes as well so we could go with them. Since Kevin didn’t have a job until the end of June, that didn’t seem like a good use of our limited money, but we could buy one. So, Ricky got a season pass to Lagoon and has gone many times with our friends.
Ricky gave our friends another big kid to ride with the little ones and since he never complains about little kid rides, it was a perfect arrangement!
He was trusted to go on big kid rides with his friend Hyrum and he proved that we could trust him by not going on the scary new Cannibal roller coaster. I asked him not to go on it and gave him my reasons. The ride was new and I wanted to hear a few more reviews about it, but I also wanted to see what he would tell our friends. Ricky proved himself by telling them he couldn’t go on it yet. So, the next time he went, I told him he could ride Cannibal and he loves it! He really has proven that he is growing up and can handle a few more big kid things!
He has loved Lagoon and Lagoon-A-Beach and can’t wait for the rest of us to go to Lagoon so he can show us around! Birthday present win!
I love my Ricky. Very, very much!