Andrew is 5

It's hard to believe that Andrew was born 5 years ago. Now he is a young Jedi master in training.

Max is the photographer for these birthday kissing pictures. I spy James.

He got a talking Yoda doll. It says different Yoda phrases when you push his tummy.

He also got a Star Wars blanket that he now sleeps under (though James tries to stuff it through the slats of his crib). We tried to get a picture of them but they mostly all look like these below:

Andrew was hyper and excited all day long, and even more hoppy-happy when Papa and Nona brought by new Star Wars jammies and socks.

On Sunday for family dinner I brought his birthday cake. He requested a Yoda cake. It says "Five Andrew is." In Yoda style of speaking. JB thought we needed a picture of me with it for posterity.

Andrew had only one candle on there but Ben made sure to help him blow it out.

Andrew is so imaginative. He can make up the most interesting scenarios and talks them all out as he jumps from couch to couch (against our rules, but he persists). He is really getting into drawing now and writing stories (almost always Star Wars-related). He comes up with stories to answer my requests that he put on jammies or clean up his crayons and paper. Hah.

He and Ben are getting along better as middle children and can play well together these days. He and James also are becoming best buds but still can throw it down and tussle. They come out of their bedroom together in the mornings in the 6 AM hour insisting they saw a 7 on their clock already.

Andrew wants to be grown up but doesn't, if that makes sense. He's a good eater but isn't as tall as his older brothers were at this age. He's still wearing 4T but some 5T now fits (and fairly recently even a couple 3T favorite things that we vacated from his dresser). His older brothers were long before this in 5T. But, comparing to his classmates, he's not short. Just shorter for a Richards I suppose.

He holds hands so sweetly. If he's sitting next to you, chances are he's reaching for your hand or has his feet on you. He's always reaching for James's hand, or a new baby cousin's hand.

He asks every night if he has preschool the next day or if I work the next morning, and we go over the days of the week every night. His favorite expression is "Oh Mom!" or "Oh Dad!" before he starts to spout off a new story or exciting thought.  Andrew is enthusiastic, energetic, excitable, loveable and opinionated and so so cute.