I try not to brag excessively about my kids.  Of course I think they’re beautiful, brilliant, sweet, loving, strong, fast, kind and generally amazing and wonderful — I’m their mom, I can’t help it.  But I do try to keep most of it to myself, because otherwise it would be all I would talk or write about, because they’re my most favorite people in the whole world.

But every so often they do or say something so cute that I just can’t keep it to myself.  At only 3 years old, Benjamin knows all of the planets.  I don’t know if that’s typical, but it’s pretty impressive to me.  He can recite the names of all 9 of them (including Pluto — I grew up in a world where Pluto was a planet) in order, and tell you a little bit about all of them.  He tells me that Jupiter is made of gas (which he says is funny), that Mars has lots of dust and that Neptune is very cold.  Earth is his favorite, but he might like to try to live on Jupiter.  He asks really good questions, like “Whats’ the difference between a planet and a moon?” and “What do the planets have inside of them?” and “Is the Earth spinning very, very fast?”

I can take almost no credit for this.  Like many other things he’s learned in his 3 years, this came almost entirely from tv (in this case, I think we have Olivia and Bubble Guppies to thank) with some supplemental material from books.  It’s so cute to hear him, and so impressive to see how his mind works.  He told us, the other evening, that he wants to be an astronomer when he grows up — he has previously alsoexpressed a wish to be a fire fighter and a chef.  I love watching him grow and learn and be excited about things.  Being a mom is the best thing ever.