Rawlings: Cohen @ 4

In the past few months, this boy has been busy. He was on his first real soccer team in May and loved every second of it. We tried t-ball next, which he loved, but was mostly hilarious and entertaining for us to watch. He would tackle or attack anyone who tried to get in his way of "catching" the ball in the outfield. We would have talks with him after every game about letting other kids catch the ball, and not attacking teammates, but he just couldn't do it. He had to have the ball at all costs. At least we know what we need to work on for next year.

He's been attending swimming lessons this summer for the first time, and I'm pretty sure he was a fish in a previous life. He is amazing in the water! Does every mom think their kid is a swimming prodigy when they take them to swim lessons? Yes? Dang. I'm just glad we found something he loves. Although, I'm not sure where his love for swimming came from; he still cries in the bathtub when I wash his hair and get water in his eyes.

Cohen also just got his very first bike. We have a friend who works at a local bike shop, so he hooked us up with a really good one for him. He loves it and tells anyone who will listen that he has a new real bike that has pedals. The first day he got it I don't think he took a break for over an hour. He just rode and rode up and down the street. It was so fun to see him so excited about it.

In other Cohen news... he caught his first fish! On the morning of the 4th of July we went up the canyon early to take the kids fishing. Joe would help Cohen cast in the river, and reel in the spinner. Cohen kept saying over and over that he wanted to just do it by himself, but of course we kept telling him it was too hard and he would get it stuck on something. He was getting more insistent of doing it alone, so we stepped back to let him learn the hard way that it was too hard for him. First cast, Cohen's line starts pulling and he starts yelling "Mom! I think I got a fish!". Of course we thought it was just stuck on a rock so we get up to help him and tell him we told you so. Instead, there's a fish jumping around at the end of his line. It was bigger than any of the fish Joe had been catching on his own, so we had a good laugh about it. Cohen was one proud boy, and his parents learned a good lesson, too.

Just for fun, here are some of my favorite things he's said lately:

C: "Mom, can I please have a snack? This is so boring."

M: "After we we finish taking the sacrament you can."

C: "But, Mom! The gospel is SO long!"

"Mom, did you know this song's kinda bad? But that's okay. Bad songs are my jam."

"Can you believe we live on the planet earth??"

(When a picture of the Hawaii temple came up at the Payson temple open house):

"Hey! How did they know about the Hawaii temple?"

(Surprisingly hit Elliot in the middle of lunch):

E: "You just hit me?!"

C: "Yep. That's how big my muscles are."

(Singing a song with his guitar in his room):