Anthony - Latin "Praiseworthy"

My Anthony is quite the little card. Looking up the meaning of his name reminds me – I need to give him more praise, as he is very praiseworthy! The other morning at breakfast before Christmas he informed me he wanted to add one more thing to his Christmas list. “Mom, I want Vonage, for only $3.99 for the first three months, then after that it is…..” I about split my side laughing. He thinks we can put that on his cell phone that he bought at a garage sale for $1 that isn’t activated! Sigh. That is what I do a lot with this complicated child, sigh. The moment I met him at ‘just turned” two – I loved him. He is so cute. I’m not prejudiced either – he is cute! He has freckles on his nose and a grin that can melt you. He also has some deep fears and demons that surface once in a while…I look at them as his baggage from a life that was not easy his first two years. His eyes get very dark when he is mad. He is very destructive for reasons unknown. He can lie very convincingly and is a master manipulator. For people that believe children can overcome a rough start – I’d agree – but there are some that are wired differently and have “things” they can’t explain or overcome easily – this is my Anthony. He is also afraid of the dark (he got a glow turtle for Christmas - we won't tell his peers!) and bullies.

He loves life and anything with a ball…. sports are his thing despite his small size – he goes after it with all his energy and is a joy to watch. He can make me laugh more spontaneously than any child I know, as well as cry. He is GREAT with little children and it warms my heart how he plays and watches Sophia. She is sooo tolerant of him as well and lets him haul her around the house. I can see the love and it encourages me.

Anthony is smart. He hates homework and school except his favorite subject P.E. and recess. He is talented in piano and trumpet. He loves movies and TV (which is largely limited!) and he loves the computer and his DS. He loves music. He loves God and I pray he’ll ask Jesus into his heart some day. Peer pressure can get to him and I’m sad about that – I wish for him to be strong and hold his own. I want him to know that life is BIGGER than our small town and his life can be anything he wants it to be. We put up a dry erase wall of the world when we made him a room of his own – it is SOOO cool…..I wanted him to look at it and where we live and know he can go anywhere and do anything he wants…..when he grows up that is!

He is Hispanic/American and once we came out of Walmart and a low rider car went by with Spanish music playing loudly and he looked at me and said “That is Chinese.” I said, “No it isn’t, that is Spanish – those folks are Hispanic.” He gasped and asked sarcastically, “Are those my peoples?” Cracked me up. He knows he is adopted, he knows some of his background and he knows he is loved greatly! We celebrate their adoption day every year, we call it Happy Gumball Day because when we were at the court house Anthony checked the gumball machine in the hopes of finding one – and sure enough he found one….so we nick named the day “Happy Gumball Day” and in years past he takes gum balls for all his classmates.

He has a passion for life that I hope someday he will put to good use in a career…but for now his is a young boy looking to see if any facial hair or armpit hair is growing, acting silly around girls his age, (usually using his little sister as a “chic magnet”) and trying to remember to put deodorant on every day. Life is full for him. I love you Anthony!