Our 4 Year Old

Luke at 4 years old

We visited Dr. Dugoni this week for Luke's 4 year well visit. He looks great and is right on track devleopmentally and health-wise.

First off, his stats:
38 lbs *clothed (67th %)
41.5 inches tall (75th %)

She tested his some of his large motor skills (hopping on one foot and skipping), and he did well. She was impressed with his ability to hop, saying that it is usually something she looks for at a 5-year old visit. She also asked him about colors, shapes, and then had him write his name and draw some shapes. Again, he performed closer to the 5-year old range, particularly when he was able to draw a triangle (apparently that's more difficult than some of the other shapes - I had no idea!).

In terms of his health, she checked the tubes in his ears (which were also recently checked by his ENT), and found that they were both basically out, but still floating in the ear canals. We talked a bit about his speech and the very slight hearing loss that the ENT discovered during our recent visit to him in Luke's right ear. We will continue to keep an eye on that. Dr. Dugoni felt that we should go ahead and have his speech screened again by the school district, so I have a call into them and we will likely have that done shortly after schools are back in session. Although his speech has improved dramatically, and in general people do not have trouble understanding him, he is still missing some specific sounds. She was happy to hear about the progress that's been made with his eyes. We're seeing Dr. Alcorn at Stanford again at the end of August, so will have more of an update on that soon.
We also talked quite a lot about his eating habits (he continues to be extremely picky). She told Luke that the new rule would be that he has to try two bites of one new food each day. He seemed to take it well hearing it come from her, so we'll see how that goes. That being said, she didn't seem overly concerned since we do try to squeeze veggies into things he likes (smoothies), and his fruit intake is fabulous (he really likes it all). Another topic was bed-wetting. Again, she didn't seem at all concerned, assuring us that it was very normal and much more of a sleep disorder than a "potty" disorder. She gave us a few suggestions for attempting to break him of diapers/pull ups at night, but I feel pretty confident that he's not ready to try those just yet.

Finally, he received two immunizations (which he was VERY unhappy about - thrashing and screaming the entire time). These were primarily to avoid him needing 5 or 6 next summer in preparation for Kindergarten.

What is Luke like right now?
I have to say, he is a complete joy. He is a very easy and fun child to raise - seriously, we have very few "challenges" at the moment (I realize that these will come and go, but right now we are SO enjoying him). He continues to be very sweet and loving, telling us often how much he loves us ("Mommy, I love you to the moon and back 200 times" ... be still, my heart). He also loves to snuggle and have someone lay with him in bed at night as he starts to fall asleep.


He wears 4T/4 in just about everything now, but can also wear 5T shirts in some brands now if they tend to run small. His feet hit a bit of a lull in their growth this year (thank goodness), but I'm now starting to pull out the size 11 shoes - his feet are at about a size 10.5 right now.

Naps are completely gone for Luke, but he sleeps somewhere between 12 and 12.5 hours at night. He is usually in bed around 7:30pm.

Luke loves to color, play with play-doh, build blocks, dress up, jump in his new bounce house, watch his favorite TV shows, swing, be read to, play with tools, play board or card games (Uno, Scrabble Jr., Candyland), and SWIM. And, oh the swimmer he is becoming (more on that in a separate post). He is very attached to his Yankees baseball hat, and will put it on as soon as he gets out of bed in the morning and not take it off all day.

Favorites right now:
Movies: Toy Story and Cars
TV shows: Super Why, Bob the Builder, Handy Manny
Books: Cat in the Hat, Thomas the Tank Engine stories
Colors: blue, green, and pink (but, his "most favorite" is "bluish-greenish" ... otherwise known as aquamarine or teal)
Foods: grilled cheese, yogurt, fruit, chocolate milk, cheerios


Luke is quite the talker. During the second half of the school year Luke really seemed to blossom socially. He loves to talk to us, and will often speak up more frequently in a group situation than he ever would have before. His sentence structure and phrasing, despite missing some sounds, is very mature and adult-like, and at times, even surprises me. He attended 6 weeks of summer school at Mandala, and will be returning there in the fall for their afternoon preschool class that is geared towards children who will be entering Kindergarten the following year. Scary for me to think how quickly this time has gone and that in the not so distant future he will be off to elementary school ... I'll be savoring our days together this school year!

What a special little boy he is - we feel incredibly lucky to have been blessed with such a smart, healthy, energetic, inquisitive, and fun guy.