Last Day of School - First Grade

Wow.

It finally came.

The last day of school.

Mr. Orange was so excited to get to school that he absolutely, could not, hold still long enough for me to take a picture of him.

 "We're going to have a lot of fun this summer.  Right, Mom?  Right???"

 Mr. Orange with his Chinese teacher - W. Lao Shi.  She was an incredible teacher.  I cannot believe the patience that she had with these kids (mine in particular).  It was amazing to see Mr. Orange's progress this year.  Once he decided to pay attention in class (insert bribes by the parents and creative teaching by the teacher) he decided that he really did like Chinese.  I'm so excited to see how he does next year.

I would have taken a picture of his English teacher, but he had several.  Mrs. B. had a baby right after Christmas.  Then they had a long-term substitute.  Mrs. B. decided not to come back and to stay home with her baby.  Enter Mrs. J. - also pregnant.  She had her baby 9 days early and missed the last 2, or so weeks of school.  Enter long-term substitute number 2.  That is 4 teachers for his English class alone!  Incredible.  Let's hope he has post-menopausal teachers next year.  :)  I'm only half kidding about that.

Since I never got around to posting Mr. Orange's last day of Kindergarten picture, I figured I'd stick it in here.  Mrs. Y. was a great teacher and friend.  I loved, loved, loved volunteering in her classroom.  Mr. Orange loved her too.

{Monday Memory} Last Day of Summer

On Mr. Orange's last day of summer he had a special request.

He wanted to go to the Children's Museum and could we please go?

Pretty please?

Please, please, please???

Of course we went.

(I didn't want to lug around my big camera, so I apologize for the pics...)

We spent several hours at the museum.

The kids played in the water features, went grocery shopping, played house, sat on a "horse", planted "seeds", climbed a rock wall, and built buildings then turned on the earthquake and watched them fall over.  The also became part of a Life Flight "crew", played music with their bodies, and had an all around great time.

The kids favorite part was building with these magnetic blocks.  I think we spent an hour at this table.  Sorry to anyone else that wanted to play here!  I'll admit, it was my favorite part too.  :)

We were enjoying our day so much that when we came to the end of the museum we weren't ready to go home.  We stopped at Ben and Jerry's for some ice cream  (They have really big cones there!) and then sat at the Gateway fountain to enjoy the sunshine and drippy ice cream.  The kids ran through the fountain for awhile (until they were no longer sticky).

It was a perfect last day of summer.

On the way home Mr. Orange said to me, "Thanks mom.  That was the best."

It's nice to know that I can still make his day.  :)

He made mine too.

{Monday Memory} First Grade

 Mr. Orange started First Grade this past August.  Last spring we were informed that he had been accepted into a Chinese Immersion program.  We were thrilled, Mr. Orange, not so much.  He was not thrilled about switching schools, having to learn Chinese, going to First Grade (he thought he would have his kindergarten teacher for first grade too), etc.  Once we told him that he would be on a traditional school schedule - 3 months of summer vacation, instead of going back to year-round school - 3 weeks of summer vacation, he started to warm up to the idea.

Now that there are only three months left of school, I am so glad that we decided to have him do this program.  It has not been easy - there have been difficulties with one of the teachers (luckily she had a baby and decided not to come back), it's not the neighborhood school, so getting Mr. Orange to and from school can be a trick, there is extra homework on the Chinese side of things that he would not have otherwise, some days he says that he absolutely does not want to do this anymore and there are tears, tears, and more tears.

On the positive side of things I think his Chinese teacher is amazing.  I honestly don't know how she does it.  :)  Mr. Orange has made a class full of friends.  According to him all of the girls love him.  He is reading above grade level in english.  His math scores are awesome - that says something since it is taught in Chinese.  He is friendly to his classmates (and talks waaaaay too much in class).  Although he says he doesn't want to speak Chinese, he is fascinated with China and their culture.  He is constantly telling me new facts about China, pointing it out on a map, drawing pictures of pagodas and dragons, having me read books to him about China, and when he plays pirates in his room he slips in chinese words here and there.

There are times when I look at Mr. Orange and I can't believe how grown up he is.  I listen to him read, or go through his spelling lists with him (he is getting 17/14 on his tests lately!!), or listen to him speak Chinese and it amazes me how much things change in such a short amount of time.  I swear he was a baby yesterday and now he is a boy.

Happy Chinese New Year!

We decided to have Mr. Orange switch schools this year so that he could be involved in a Chinese Immersion program.  He has loved it.  Or, at least, I am pretty sure he does.  He is a boy and just doesn't talk like girls do.  :)  I have been very impressed with his Chinese teacher and I know he is learning what he is being taught in that class.  He especially loves the math portion (taught in Chinese).

Monday was the Chinese New Year and the immersion students put on an assembly.  Miss Pink and I went to the morning assembly and watched Mr. Orange sing some Chinese New Year songs.

After the assembly Miss Pink and I visited our local Asian Market to pick up some CNY decor.  After school we went to an Asian grocery store to find some last minute ingredients for dinner.  Guess what.  Most of the labels are written in Chinese.  I had a hard time finding what I needed!  I can't wait for Mr. Orange to be able to read the package labels!

We came home and the cooking began.  We didn't have anything fancy, it was our first year celebrating this new (to our family) holiday.  We had (really yummy) peanut noodles, stir fry vegetables (so-so), miso soup (needs work), and coconut rice (oh my! this will be a new staple at our house!).  Hopefully by next year we'll be more familiar with some other Chinese foods that we can incorporate into our tradition.  We gave the kids a red envelope with some money in it and they thought that was pretty fun.

Mr. Orange figured that since it was New Year's he could stay up late.  I finally had to tell him to turn out his light at 11, reminding him that he had school the next day!

Happy New Year everybody!

Say What????

**Disclaimer**

There may or may not be some potty talk in this post.

You have been warned.

The other night Mr. Blue was giving Mr. Orange a bath.

Mr. O: Dad.  Dad.  Daaaad.

Mr. B:  What?

Mr. O: Is piss a bad word?

Mr. B: {Where on earth did he hear that??}  Well, it's just not a very nice word and we don't use it in our house.

Mr. O:  Well, what does it mean?

Mr. B:  It's a vulgur way of saying pee.  {Why am I explaining this to my SIX year old??}  Again, it's not very nice, so we just don't say that word.  Where did you hear it anyway?

Mr. O:  Oh this girl at school.

{A few seconds later...}

Is tiss a bad word?

Mr. B:  Tiss is not a word.

Mr. O:  Okay, then I will say tiss now.

{After thinking for a minute or two...}

Ass.

Mr. B:  What did you say?

Mr. O:  Ass.

Mr. B:  Um, that's not a nice word either.  Where did you hear that one? {Good grief!  What is he learning at school?????}

Mr. O:  Oh, I was just thinking of words and thought up that one.

Mr. B:  Well, let's not use that word either.

Mr. O:  Dad?

Mr. B:  What?

Mr. O:  Can I say pass?

Mr. B:  Yes.

Mr. O:  What about grass?

Mr. B:  Yes.

Mr. O:  But those words have ass in them.

Mr. B:  It's time to get out of the tub.

preschool program

 Today was Miss Pink's preschool program.

It was great.

I was so proud of her, she sang to all of the songs and I didn't even have to bribe her.  :)

(PS - The Cute Little Girl that I've talked about here and here is the one in the white sweater.  I will laugh if she really is my daughter-in-law one day!)

 I can't believe how much she has grown up this past year.

When she started preschool she was a few weeks shy of 3.

 Being the youngest didn't bother her one bit.

She made lots of friends and learned lots of fun things.

 She is a huge tease!

She started to tickle this boy halfway through a song and I think she may have accidentally kissed him too.

Miss Pink had a wonderful teacher.

We love Mrs. S!

(She taught Mr. Orange for two years as well.)

We are so sad that Mrs. S will not be teaching next year.

I couldn't decide what to do with Miss Pink regarding preschool.

With Mrs. S not teaching, I didn't really want to put her in a 3 year old class somewhere else.

(Mrs. S had all of the kids combined for the most part.)

So we're going to let the 3 year olds catch up to her this next year, and then the year after that she can go to preschool with the 4 year olds.

(Remind me why I had a baby in September?  She misses the school deadline by 13 days!)

Summer has officially begun.

Well, for Miss Pink at least.

Mr. Orange has two more weeks off track and then he's back on until the end of June!

zoo day

I had a blast last Monday.
I was able to be a chaperone for Mr. Orange's trip to the zoo with his Kindergarten class.
We met in his classroom to wait for the bus to arrive.  The kids were hysterical.  They were sooooo derned excited to RIDE the bus!  I think some of them forgot they were actually going to the zoo.

Last week the kids chose their buddies for the zoo.  Mr. Orange came home from school that day to tell me who his buddy would be.
Mr. Orange:  Mom, we chose our buddies for the zoo today.
Me:  Oh yeah?  Who is your buddy going to be?
Mr. Orange:  T.  (She's a girl who came into their class about two or three weeks ago.)
Me:  Really?  How did the two of you get to be buddies for the zoo?
Mr. Orange:  Well, we (the kids whose mom or dad would be going to the zoo) were standing around Mrs. Y's desk and we were choosing our buddies.  I noticed that T had not been chosen, so I wanted her to be happy and I chose her to be my buddy.  I can't wait.
Me:  (trying to get the misties out of my eyes and clear my throat)  That was really nice of you.

Before we boarded the bus one of the girls from his class was sent home sick.  T was able to join a group of girls and C (whose mom was not able to come) joined us.

We wandered all over the zoo.
The kids had one thing, and one thing only they wanted to visit.
THE SNAKE HOUSE!
Seriously??
We found it (unfortunately) and looked at snakes, lizards, scorpions, spiders, etc.
They were not satisfied with me just saying, "There's a green snake" or "Look at that lizard".  No, these boys wanted some serious information. They weren't playing around.  They wanted to know their names, where they came from, and, most importantly, if they were poisonous or not.

We took a lunch break and sat near a table of some of Mr. Orange's classmates who happened to be girls.  Pretty soon all of the girls were sitting with us.  Those girls cracked me right up.  They all acted so differently from the way they act in class!  It was so funny to listen to them.

After lunch the boys wanted to go to the park.
On the way we wandered through the Nature's Nightmare's exhibit.
I was doing fine in there until I saw the huge, neon-colored tarantula jumping around in it's cage.
Gave me the creeps.
Serious creeps.
The boys had to look at that one on their own.
Ew, it gave me the heebie-jeebies big time!
Totally gross.
(Arachnophobia is in the top 5 scariest movies I've ever seen in my life.)
We had to go into the ape house after that just so I could catch my breath.

We finally made it to the park and when we did I couldn't believe my eyes!  There were bazillions of kids running every which way.  It was insane!
I tried my hardest to keep my eyes on my boys, but quickly discovered (after losing Mr. Orange for about five minutes) that I needed about 8 more pairs of eyes.
I would be watching them, and a few minutes later would realize I was watching the wrong kid in a red/blue shirt with blonde hair.  It drove me c-c-c-c-razy!
Both boys, after seeing my panicked face when I found them the first time I lost them, would come over to let me know where they were every once in a while.

They chatted my ears off on the way back to the bus.

Kindergarten Zoo Day -
I highly recommend it.

Nothin' for Christmas

 Today we went to Miss Pink's Christmas program.  She has been singing all of the songs in the program for the past month, at least.  She sat through most of the program like this.  (See above.)

 She slowly warmed up and sang some of the songs at the end.  She's so silly.  :)

There are NINE kids in her preschool class.  Miss Pink is one of the youngest.  Every time I see the kids running out of her teacher's house when preschool is over, I think to myself, Bless her heart!  She has them twice a week for two and a half hours.  She does great things with them and I really love the programs that she puts together.  (Mr. Blue had the same teacher for two years.)

first day of school

I realize that school started several months ago...but Mr. Orange and Miss Pink were so excited to start school that I would feel bad if I never posted their "first day of school" pics.

Mr. Orange was excited and nervous to go to Kindergarten.  School starts early (well, early for us anyway) so we took these pictures super fast so he wouldn't be late on his first day.

 I took Mason to school, we said a little prayer in the parking lot, and then I went inside with him to help him find his seat.  I was worried about how he would do.  He took some summer camps at Thanksgiving Point and would cry and cry and cry when I would leave.  It just broke my heart!  I didn't want that to happen on the first day.  I made sure he was okay then turned to leave.  I took one last look at him when I was at the door.  He had on the bravest five year old face!

After school I picked him up and on the drive home we were talking about his first day.  He said that he had really liked it.  I asked him if he was okay when I left.  He said, "Mom, I wanted to cry when you were leaving, but then I felt a 'warm comforting' and I that's why I didn't cry."  {insert sigh and huge hug here}

Towards the end of his first week he came home and said, "Mom!  Mrs. Y. is MAGIC!!!!"

"Oh, really? How do you know?"

"Because she did magic in class today.  She held this thing in her hand and a white thing came out of the ceiling.  Then she did something on her desk and there was a light on the sheet.  She put something on her desk and WE COULD SEE IT ON THE SHEET!!!!  It was so cool, Mom.  Mrs. Y is magic."

Oh, I love magic projectors.  :) 

 Miss Pink went to preschool in August.  She looooved taking her first day of school pictures.  (We had a bit more time.)

She was so excited to go.  I was sad that I did not get to take her.  Mr. Blue was able to.  It was my first day as a volunteer in Mr. Orange's classroom.

 I would love to say that Miss Pink always races out of the car and up the steps to the preschool, but that would be a LIE.  In fact, it's usually and all out war before school.  We'll pick out an outfit and it takes several minutes to get her into it.  Then I somehow manage to buckle a kicking and screaming Miss Pink into the car.  As soon as I shut the garage door she'll scream, "I don't want to wear (insert any article of clothing that she has on)!!!  I wanted to wear (insert any article of clothing that she said no to 5 minutes earlier while getting dressed)!!!!!!  It goes on and on for the 4 minute drive to school.  Then she doesn't want to get out of the car, then she needs 500 hugs and kisses, then....  Bless her teacher's heart!  If her teacher didn't continue to tell me that she stops as soon as she gets in the door, and Miss Pink didn't run out of preschool when it was over with a HUMONGOUS smile on her face, and if she didn't continue to talk about it for the rest of the day, I would give up.  Progress has been made, however.  Miss Pink went this past Tuesday without any kicking or screaming or crying or...