THIS IS JAKE

Have had zero time to blog this month. Gonna break that trend and celebrate Jake cuz I've been wanting to do this for a while now.

THIS IS JAKE.

He's 7 years old. He is a clown and keeps us in stitches. He has a HUGE heart. He is definitely the most gifted dancer and rapper in our family. He can even give his little brown sister a run for her money with his moves. (Billy has no moves. None. Zipola- unless you count shaking your butt as a move. Then he has 1 move. Kid has 2 left feet and ruins all the African rhythm heritage stereotypes. Don't worry though, Jake has enough for both of them.) Jake likes to act and pretend and has a vivid and powerful imagination.

He is both the original little brother and the newest big brother and he does both with passion. He is fragile. He is tough. He is always the first to volunteer to "fight the bad guys" when the brothers are too scared to take out the trash at night. He is all boy and last week filled a bin with dirt full of worms he had collected from the empty lot next door.

He recently told me in a car ride home from church that it's his job to "pwotect" Billy at school. When people are mean to him on the playground, Jake told me he leaves the game he's playing to go and make sure people are not taking advantage of his little brother's lack of playground street smarts. If so, he says he doesn't talk mean, but "I say it kinda loud that this is not ok. They listen to me. Billy's not very loud dad."

Billy thinks he and Jake are going to grow up and live together. If you ask Billy, he'll tell you what kind of house, car, and everything you can imagine that He and Jake will be doing together. Often when he sees something new or that he likes at somewhere like Costco, he'll say, "Jake and I are going to have one of those one day."

THIS IS JAKE'S MOST RECENT PROJECT.
When we were in Africa as a family, everywhere we went for dinner, Jake collected bottle caps. And not just one from every kid on our missions team and family, but one from everyone in the whole restaurant and even asked for a bag from the waiter/waitress. By the time our month was up in Africa, jake had quite the loot. We were trying to make a basket or something like the ones we saw in Africa, but it was taking forever. So finally he decided he wanted his name on his wall with them. He bugged me like crazy to get it done and on a recent rainy Saturday, we finally made it happen. I hammered. Jake and Tyler drilled holes.

THIS IS JAKE'S MOST RECENT PURSUIT.
Jake is also the only one in the family who has ever answered the question, "what do you want to be when you grow up?" with "a pastor like dad." A few months ago he gave me a handmade heart-shaped note. On the front it said, "dear dad". On the inside it said, "I'm going to take your job and you can't stop me." Dang that kid is funny.

And most recently, he has started writing his own "worship songs." A couple of weeks ago, he crawled into my bed beside me in the morning and said, "hey dad, want to hear the song I wrote?" I said yes. He then proceeded to sing me a song he had written on several sheets of like a 2 by 3 inch pad of paper. I stopped him mid-song to ask when he wrote this. He said simply, "Yesterday at rest." I said, "Oh", and he kept on singing it. I'm not a big video guy anymore cuz of the time they take to edit and render and such, but I had to get this one on video.

Here Jake is singing two "worship songs" he wrote.



3 Cheers for my "good ol buddy jake." Dang I love this kid.