"Negra, can you say red ball?"

Today at the soccer field we were playing with Negra (our dog), Dani, Matthew and Julian. All of a sudden Julian said to Negra, "Negra, can you say red ball?" Then he said, "No, Negra can't say red ball because she can't talk very well."  It was so cute. He said it in a disappointed voice, like, oh, poor thing, she can't talk. He talks to Negra like she's another kid and ask her if she knows what color things are, etc.

Getting into the bathtub tonight Julian was taking off all his clothes meaning his shoes, shorts and underwear except for his shirt. I said to Julian, "You are so big! Look at you taking off your clothes all by yourself!" And he said, "I am so big. And I am Superman." He says the cutest things.

Recently, he's started telling me a bedtime story. He says, "Once upon a time, there was a princess. The princess found a coin. Then she found many more coins" and then he says some other things that  I can't totally remember right now and part that I don't understand. Finally, he says, "and then she lost the coins. The END."

Matthew has been doing really well in Taekwondo recently. They do these things called "formas" which are a series of calm, controlled movements and in the first group, there are 18 steps. They are different positions of defense moves and punches. For a while, it was really hard for him to learn them. He seemed to just copy what others in the group were doing and he barely got by. I decided to learn them by watching a video online so we could practice in the house. We practiced and practiced and practiced. Obviously, being a 5 year old, he didn't want to practice so much. Well, the other day, they were doing formas and he was in a group of 3 kids. The teacher was going over it and was reprimanding anyone who wasn't doing it correctly and making them do it again and again. The teacher is pretty strict and serious and kind of scary actually at times, especially for that age. Matthew is so shy and for a teacher to basically yell at him is not easy. I was so proud of Matthew because he was the only one not getting reprimanded and made to do it over and over. He knew it PERFECTLY and was so confident. Not at all like he had been before when he was looking around at everyone else and unsure of his steps. Later, they each had to do the formas alone in front of the group and teacher. Matthew is the only one who did it perfectly and he got a stripe for his belt for doing so well. It made me so proud and he was so happy that he had gotten the reward of the stripe on his belt for all to see. We talked a lot about how important it is to practice to get better and look how well it worked for us to be practicing at home and that way the teacher had nothing bad to say about his performance. I think he realized how good he felt from his efforts and this will be a great learning experience for the future when we have to practice other things like reading, writing, math, etc. Practice makes perfect!