1) Every day is his birthday. Also:
2) Every birthday party he goes to, he believes he deserves a candle and a round of "Happy Birthday To You."
The second thing can get a little tricky. As for the daily birthday, I have to say, it's not a bad thing to go through life thinking every day is your birthday.
Max also likes to pretend that he is 7 and Sabrina is 9, even though he knows full well he is 9.
Saturday the kids went to a friend's birthday party at a pottery-painting place. Max made a chocolate ice-cream cone. Then Dave helped him with a purple cup, and Max watched carefully to make sure every single bit of cup got coated in paint.
"Dad! You missed a spot!"
At Max's bedtime, we were talking about birthdays. He regularly tells me he wants a birthday party and a Cars 2 ice-cream cake, and I humor him. There are worse parenting mistakes I could make (and, heck, I probably have).
We started discussing how many candles would go on his cake. All of a sudden he said, giggling, "Sabrina is nine, Max is seven!" And I was floored: It was the first time he'd ever said two full phrases in a row like that. The kid could have said "I want to rob a bank, will you drive the getaway car?" and I would have been thrilled.
Max's speech patterns are progressing. He's been talking a lot lately; the iPad and Proloquo2Go seem to encourage more speech, not less (something I know a lot of parents fear about communication apps and devices). I hear him babbling in bed at night, before he drifts off to sleep. He rambles on and on in the back seat, when I'm driving. It is heartening to hear and yet, I'll admit, at times I get heartbroken that he's so hard to understand unless you speak "Max."
Max being Max, he just keeps on talking. He is not aware he is hard to understand; he's just loving the sound of his own voice. And I know I should chill and enjoy the sound of his voice, too, and stop aching for those words of my dreams.
