Paulo 6

Paulo,

You and your brother are one of my favourite topics to talk about. But time is short and I won't let "perfect " get in the way of "done", so I will try to keep it short.

You are an amazing little boy. It is a strange feeling to know that just 6 years ago you were just this subjective thought, and now you have become a complete, articulate person with his own personality. You are smart, kind, very creative, brave and mature. Since you started Kindergarten you have become the dream student. You are quiet, you are pensive, very creative and you listen very well. In one of your teacher's words: you are the dream student. In the last year or two you have been chosen to carry the wreath on Remembrance Day, receive awards for showing "Respect" at school and most importantly, you continue to love school.

Your dad and I feel that we share a true connection with you. We trust you, you trust us, and we truly admire the person you are becoming.

This time I want to share with you my challenges, and not yours. You and your brother have opened my eyes and I have realize that my challenge with you is to respect who you are and try to preserve that bright mind of yours and encourage you and help you become the best version of yourself. You are brave, and I don't want my fears for you to get in the way of your learning new things. You are authentic, and I don't want my desire for you to fit in to get in the way of you staying true to yourself. You are confident and I don't want my own shyness to rub off on you or my insecurities making you feel you need more friends to feel approved. You are creative, and I don't want our structured world and our need to fit into a mold to block that. In sum, I have to overcome my own limitations to help you foster your amazing self.

And just to finish, a little list of things that you do:

- You have become phisically very coordinated and strong. You climb trees, run, dance very confidently.

- You are OBSESSED with bikes and your bike. You have also recently started riding a cruiser (skateboard) and spend hours outside practicing. You are becoming quite good very fast. You also recently got a scooter and love riding that as well. The amount of energy you have lately is way way above in beyond what you had last year.

- You are learning to read and write at school. It is a challenge to find the time to sit down and practice reading and writing with all the time you spend outdoors, but we try and some days you really enjoy just sitting down and browsing through magazines and writing.

- The odd time you will sit down and start drawing. I don't consider you super keen on drawing, but you are actually good at it, putting lots of details and you always come up with very interesting ideas.

- Even though school has kind of gotten in the way of your creativity, you are big on building things with paper, cardboard, tape, etc. You have an incredible ability to keep yourself busy.

- Tons more than I can talk about, but I just want to mention that despite the fact that you are quiet and serious, you are good at making friends. You even have some friends who are years older than you. But you have made lots of friends in our street and at school. I think they like you because you are kind and respectful, you never hit, push or talk disrespectfully to anyone.

Paulo, chiquis, we love you always,

Mama