The Sweetest Boy

My Mr. Morgan is just the sweetest boy.

Did you know? I would call him unusually sweet and considerate... especially for his age. He is constantly surprising me with how much he thinks about others and cares for our family.

He is extremely affectionate. He will lavish his hugs and kisses on us all. Much to his chagrin Jack doesn't always accept such displays of love. Aly has to tackle Jack and hold him to the floor to get a good kiss. No joke... it's pretty funny to watch! At these times they refer to him as "the kiss monster." At bed time they sometimes do a brother hug, then Aly always says "now a kiss," which Jack turns down every time... sad! Corey and I don't turn it down though, that I can promise you. Every night we look forward to a "monkey hug," (legs and arms around us, holding on for dear life), and a kiss on each cheek, plus the mouth.

Aly is the kind of sweet that makes your heart a little achy.

It's hard to explain why, or how it feels exactly... but Corey and I both feel it.

In the spring when the dandelions appeared, he got one for me every day on our walk to the car to take me to work. One day it was raining and we had to run, run, run! Alaster held on to my hand, looked up as we ran and shouted "Sorry, I can't get you a flower today mom!"

When playing games he will look out for the wants and needs of others. Jack once said he was going to be Iron Man, so Aly ran right upstairs to go get the Iron Man costume and bring it down for him to have. If Jack has to leave for a potty break while they are watching a movie- Aly gets up from his seat and pauses it so that Jack won't miss anything. Once we were going to visit his little friend Henry. We had been out running errands and he asked me to go home, get his Toy Story toys (which Henry loves to play with when they come to our house) and take them to share. It's just little things like that, but it shows that he is thinking about other people and wanting to help them be happy.

(Pictures taken one morning at an extremely typical breakfast when I was loving him so much that it hurt --that achy heart thing again-- and I just had to get the camera out.)

He is my best little helper. He is happy to run and grab me things that I need. He proudly helps me dust, sort laundry, cook, do dishes etc. without being asked. He offers his services and is so proud of being a big helper!

One morning towards the end of both the school year and my pregnancy we were having a rough morning getting ready for school. There was arguing, there was dilly-dallying, there was disobeying, there was complaining... you get the drift. I was getting extremely frustrated, and was hoping at all costs to avoid being late. I was trying to hurry the boys along when Alaster had a melt-down over his shoes. It put me over the edge and I lost it and yelled at him. After dropping Jack off at school I had a chance to cool down, and by the time we got home I was feeling horrible that I had lost my patience. When we got out of the car I apologized to him and told him how sorry I was for yelling. He looked up at me with those big brown eyes and said in the most sincere little voice "I'm sorry I didn't get ready fast enough." Now if that wasn't the worst rebuke I have ever received I don't know what was!

I wish I could think of a few more stories to illustrate my point... it's really just a lot of little things that happen throughout our days that when put together add up to one extremely tender hearted little boy. I frequently think of a description Cindy once said of Corey "he was the sweetest pup in the litter," when I think of my Aly.

We love our Mr. O'Malley! More updates on him soon!