Z Man is wise beyond his years. Sometimes so much so I worry he’s growing up way too fast and I want him to slow down and be a little boy. The other night on the way home he began to ask why he didn’t have two brothers. Big C and I explained that we loved him and his brother very much and the two of them were perfect. He seems to have gotten it in his head that he is in dire need of another sibling, specifically a sister. “Mommy, when are you going to have a sister?” and so on. Both his daddy and I have tried to explain why two is all we need but it’s doesn’t seem to matter to him, he has his mind quite set. So the other night he comes to me at the dinner table and whispers in my ear that he has “talked to God about having a sister, but God hasn’t told him if the answer is no or yes yet.”

They both start soccer next week – first practice on Thursday and first game Saturday. We have to provide their cleats and shin guards (the uniform is part of the fee we paid). Z Man is thrilled and CaseyJ got upset just talking about going to get cleats and shin guards. We are forcing him a bit knowing he’ll probably end up having fun. They are on the same team too. Z Man also moved up to Black Belt Training at karate. He’s been going for six months already. He got his new uniform today and he’ll get his equipment soon. They teach sparring so he’ll get protective gear for it. It actually reminds me of the kid from A Christmas Story – you know where his jacket is so big he can’t put his arms down or walk…

Except it’s padding protective gear, he’s excited about it though. I’ll get pictures of him in his new uniform soon. Not much else going on, not a lot of new photos but I did make this one the other day. It’s a line from my favorite Robert Frost poem.

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.