Zack Harry

The other day Zack wanted to know why EVERY other Zack had the middle name Harry. It took me a minute to realize what he was thinking.. In his four year old mind Zachary = Zack Harry. I just love the way he thinks.

He is CONSTANTLY making us laugh. He is such a bright personality in our home, especially these last few days, with everyone sick and mopey. Zack isn't feeling well either, but it doesn't keep him from bouncing to and from. Tonight at dinner, Daddy told him to stop kissing Simon (who happened to be sitting next to him.) Zack lifted his head for a moment and explained, "I'm NOT kissing him! I'm punching him with my lips!" I almost spit out my milk, it caught me so off guard. Oh, he kills me.

He is always making up his own rules and often gets Luke and Ben to bend their way of thinking to accommodate his. They will try to persuade him kindly with the two against one theory... Zack comes back with, "Simon thinks we should play this way" or "Simon told me a secret". This gets the older boys to laugh and they often end up doing what Zack wants anyway because he's so charismatic. I seriously worry about him going off into the real world...

His imagination is very real. He has a story for everything and can talk a hind leg off a mule. If ever I try to explain why he SHOULDN'T do something, he will give me a reason why he SHOULD. He sat on my lap this afternoon and I saw that he had written his name in bright red pen on his pants. I scolded him and he grabbed my face and said, "I needed to do that in case someone tries to wear them. I will see my name and say 'Hey! Those are MY pants!'" I tried not to smile as I told him we don't need to write our name on everything just to know that it's ours.

He's so artistically talented and still makes the biggest messes! Recently his punishment has been taking time AWAY from the art table. He hates being banished from crayons and paper... but it's one thing I can hold against him. Every single day he has a million papers that he NEEDS to keep. I throw the majority of them away... every once in a while, he will search through the garbage in the homeschooling room (which is basically a paper recycling bin) and find something he's been "missing". The other day, he found such a drawing and came to me with his hands on his hips. He said, "Mom! Why did you throw this away?" I rolled my eyes and told him I was sorry. He shrugged it off and meticulously explained, "It's okay. Because if a bad guy ever wants to steal it, he would grab it out of my hands and smell it, and think that it smells like garbage, and he would just give it back because it stinks. So I don't care if you threw it away!" And all my guilt just melted away.

Tonight after FHE, Zack was REALLY mad at Luke-- for one reason or another. I could see steam coming out of Zack's ears as he geared up to say something terrible. Luke was going up the stairs (avoiding conflict is what Luke does best) and Zack yelled after him, "You are going to have to marry a GIRL for the rest of your life!!!!" Apparently, that is the worst possible punishment he could ever imagine.

We love our crazy Zack. He gets away with a lot and he's always "too tired" to help around the house, but we think he contributes enough to the family... at least in the entertainment department, anyway.