Dear Tobin,

The word that best sums up your month is friends. You have been hanging out with friends nearly every day recently, often going to your friend Jack’s house after school. He lives near the school, and his house (and the outdoor entertainments, like a basketball hoop and trampoline) have become a popular gathering spot for you and other classmates. When you’re not at Jack’s house, you’re riding your bike around the neighborhood, picking up friends along the way. You go to area parks, the school playground, and sometimes to a convenience store to buy snacks. I’m thinking it’s about time to get you a smart watch or phone so I can keep better track of your whereabouts.

You continue to be a good helper in the kitchen. I appreciate how you often want to contribute to meals (especially pizza and stir fry), and you’ve become more interested in trying new foods, too. We have adopted Sunday evening as our regular night to get take-out, and you’ve been branching out on the menu at some of our usual favorite places.You are a relatively new fan the Spicy Korean Beef Noodles from Noodles & Company, and Beijing Beef from Panda Express. I hope you continue to try new things and find favorites at some non-chain locations, too. It was my turn to choose the restaurant this week due to my recent birthday, and I chose Shakespeare’s. It’s a bar and grill in our neighborhood that a lot of people like, but for some reason it just hasn’t been on our rotation. You enjoyed the wings and onion rings you got from there, and everyone else seemed to like it too. It would be fun to walk there on a nice summer night and eat on the patio.

I’m really looking forward to the summer weather so we can start doing more outdoor family things. Cocktail hour on the balcony is one of our favorites, and it will be nice to get back to that. Also, we generally don’t eat in restaurants indoors, so returning to some of our local joints that have outdoor seating will be great. We’ve gotten pretty accustomed to take-out, but there’s something special about sitting down at a restaurant and getting fresh, hot food put in front of you.

The spring/summer sports season is starting soon, and we’re going to be a busy family. You and Callum talked me into letting you sign up for both baseball and soccer, so we’re going to have very few free evenings. I already warned you that I might not have the strength to attend every game, but I think we’ll be spending a lot of time at the baseball and soccer fields. You said you like playing soccer more but like the social elements of baseball. I think that’s because a lot of your friends also have little brothers who play baseball, so during the younger kids’ games, you and your pals hang around together and eat concession stand snacks. I’m sure it entirely negates the health value of playing sports, but anything that involves hanging out with friends is something you want to do.

You have a favorite outfit these days: one of your two pairs of Adidas sweatpants, your fuzzy hoodie with a couple of layers underneath that emerge as the day warms up, and a fedora. You wore the fedora to a special school “fancy day,” and you’ve worn it quite often since. You get your clothes pretty dirty, and I’ve already patched the knee of one pair of sweatpants. One day last week, both your pairs of Adidas sweatpants were obviously (to me) too dirty to wear. You tried to pull them out of the laundry basket to wear again, but I stopped you, lest your teacher think I’m raising a savage. You were rather grumpy about having to wear a sub-par pair of sweatpants to school, but that was preferable in your mind to jeans. Jeans are torture, according to you. Having observed kids lately, jeans seem to be out of style. Kids wear sweatpants, athletic warm-up pants, or leggings, and that’s about it. I thought jeans of one cut or another would always be around, but I guess that’s not the case.

Your school conference earlier in the month went very well. Both your classroom teacher and your ELP teacher had very good things to say about your academic and social development. You get along well with your classmates most of the time, though your teacher pointed out that sometimes you can be a little verbally harsh. That’s something we’ve noticed at home, too, in your interactions with your siblings. You are thick-skinned; when Artemis or Callum zings you, you usually laugh it off pretty easily. Sometimes you forget that not everyone is so quick to move past slights and insults, and what seems like a fun game to you isn’t always fun for others. We’ve talked about that, and I hope you’re working on it. I know you always feel bad when you end up hurting someone’s feelings.

Mostly, though, you’re a fun guy and a great friend. You’ve really blossomed socially this year. You have a solid friend group of some nice neighborhood kids, and I know you’ll continue to have fun with them over the summer next year as well. Our school district is changing from a K-6 model in the elementary school to K-5, but not until after your sixth grade year. You were very glad to hear that you’d be part of the last sixth grade class at your school. You’re also happy that when you start seventh grade, you won’t be the youngest in the school, because the new crop of sixth graders will be joining the middle school at the same time. I’m sure you could have handled being a sevvie, but I can still understand the appeal of skipping that stage.

Your current favorites: watching Ted Lasso with your dad and all the new swear words you learn from it, which I decided its okay because it’s part of your English heritage); nearly every sport; reading books and listening to audio books by Stuart Gibbs; biking around with your friends; working on your ELP podcast about NBA players; playing chess with anyone who will join you; and hanging out in your office downstairs.

You’re adventurous, fun, and full of energy. You’re a great kid, and you make life spicier every day.

Love,

Mom