Wow, where have I been?

Seems I haven't posted here in forever. Need to do some updating and work on the old blog.

Later that same day.........

I've made some changes to the blog. Okay, one change -- the template color. I'm not completely happy with it but I needed a change and since I haven't figured out how to do a customized background I'm stuck with what they have available. I might decide to change it back tomorrow.......

This afternoon Philip and I walked the track up at the school for about 30 minutes. We went around 5 times before I told him we were done. Why did we do this? Because he has become a slug. He pokes along when we have to go some place unless he's acting goofy. Then he starts looking for places to sit down. He's been known to sit on the floor if there wasn't a bench or chair near by. He's 10! It's been bugging me for a while but this weekend when his grandparents were here they expressed concerns about how fit he was, or rather wasn't. Talked to James about it and decided that he needs to walk with me in the afternoons. So starting today, Monday, August 31 he was going to be walking for 30 minutes every single day.

He wasn't very happy about it when I told him at pick up. He was already in a snotty mood when he met me at Lindsay's classroom and then heard that we were going home to drop off the backpacks before going for a walk pushed him over into full blown brat mode towards his sister. We walked home, checked to make sure he had all his homework (he didn't but he ran back to the school to get it rather than freaking out about it), once he was back, off we headed. It was a good walk. He felt better about it before we even left the house and then we had a good talk while we walked. Not a lecture, not about his moodiness but just stuff. He didn't whine about having to walk and didn't make a fuss when we started our 5 lap. Lindsay played on the playground equipment and then with a little boy who was up at the school while his sister had soccer practice.

The walk seems to have helped with the attitude and his moodiness. He was nicer both in what he was saying and how he was saying it to both his sister and me. He did his homework, quickly and fairly neatly. It was nice to see. The only glitch came when he was not going to discuss his POW with me because "I'll just wait for Dad, or do it tomorrow in class." Ah, no. Lets look it over and see if you are on the right track. Why waste time? He pulled it out but you could tell he was just humoring me. He didn't think I would understand it, much less be able to discuss his thinking on the problem. The look on his face when he saw I could was priceless. He has the problem all worked out but was waiting to finish writing it up because he claims his teacher said not to do it all in one night or she would take it away and he'd have nothing to do for the next two days. The problem was pretty straight forward algebra which sounds weird when you are talking about math in the beginning part of 5th grade. I think she is trying to see who can do it or how far they can get with the problem rather than expecting everyone to get it. There are a couple of kids in that class who are not even going to know where to begin and a few like Philip who will have already figured it out. I think that is true in all three classes.

School is in Session!

The kids started the second full week of school this morning. Over all they are doing great. Little hiccups along the way but nothing out of the ordinary.

Lets see how did it begin?

School started on August 20th which was a Thursday. Took the required first day of school photos which are above. One of these days I'm going to figure out how to have them mixed up with in the blog.

Lindsay is in First Grade now. She has a wonderful teacher who seems to be a very good fit both academically and on the emotional maturity front. She seems to get what works with Lindsay. Very calm and organized which are things that go a long way to helping Lindsay feel more in control of what is going on around her. Also a safe place for her to make mistakes. She is so hard on herself that she needs to hear that its okay to make mistakes; that it isn't that a big of a deal. The luck girl ended up with three of her best friends in her class. She has also made friends with a few of the other kids and seems very happy to go off to school.

The only hiccups for her were getting yelled at by classmates on the first day of school and just being a bit tired last Thursday which meant she cried once when she couldn't do something and said a few times that she couldn't do something when she could. She handled it pretty well. Didn't yell back and didn't completely fall apart. She did end up sitting off by herself to calm down but did that fairly quickly. At pickup she told me that "only three people care about me" and burst into tears. She doesn't count her teacher in that group because she believes teachers have to care for you. I got her to tell me a little bit of what happened and got the rest from her teacher. The class was making a class picture dictionary and she got stuck on what picture to draw but didn't want to let the other pages on her desk move around. This upset a couple of kids (who were probably just as nervous about the first day as she was) and when they kept bugging her and then yelled at her she stomped her foot, said "fine" and pushed the papers to the floor. The word she was trying to figure out the picture to? Monopoly. Only Lindsay would come up with that word for the dictionary on the first day of school. Her teacher handled both incidents very calmly and in the way that Lindsay responds fast too -- staying calm, letting her know that she was there if Lindsay wanted help but also that its okay to go sit by yourself and calm down on your own. From what her teacher is telling me it isn't loud or out of control. It is obvious that she is trying to keep control of her emotions and roll with the punches. She believes that Lindsay will get there in a few weeks as she adjusts to being at school all day and isn't so tired.

Philip is in Fifth Grade. When did this happen? I can remember very clearly dropping him off at Kindergarten and feeling slightly lost without him those first few days. I can remember the school years inbetween but it doesn't seem like enough time has really passed for this to be his last year of elementery school. He started out the school year in a combo 4/5 class with his favorite teacher but that got disbanded. That was a traumatic day or two. Those 12 5th graders handled it wonderfully. They were a little bit tense about the move, what was expected from them. More than one made comments about being behind, needing to catch up, etc. They are a great group of kids, very aware of what they need to do so this change that they didn't even know was was a possiblity threw them. We have a group of 5th grade teachers who tried really hard to make the transisition mid week as easy as they could for them. They didn't assign make-up homework, just had the kids start with what they needed to do that day.

My hope is that they all had a great weekend and realize they are where they need to be this week and there will be no surprises. I told Philip that we are very lucky to have 3 wonderful 5th grade teachers where it really doesn't matter who you end up with as your main teacher. I say main teacher because the three classes rotate between the three teachers in the afternoon so you are taught by all three. One teaches science, one math and one social studies. I think he is going to have a great year.

Summer Round Up

Disneyland was fun. It was hot and crowded but maybe not as much as other summer visits. But then it was kind of hard to know because we split up a lot this trip. I took Lindsay to Small World a number of times while James and Philip did Big Thunder Railroad, Splash Mountain and Pirates (over and over). As a family we did Astro Blasters a lot. We saw the 3D show, Honey I Shrunk the Audience and Lindsay was not thrilled by it. Then later we saw It's a Bug's Life and she hated it. James had to take her out early. I don't think she was going to trust us for a long time, then she discovered Midway Madness and her trust in us was restored.

Another new ride Philip tried this time around was Grizzle River Run. It is a white water rafting ride. It was fun. Fast Pass was fantastic this year. Very little wait, every one was pleasant.

Lindsay made some friends while we were there. It was fantastic watching her play with other kids going into first grade. She behaved wonderfully even when she was hot, tired and frustrated with lines.

Again this year we met someone we did not expect to while on vacation. My friend Krystal and her family. We were waiting to get on to Astro Blasters when her son grabbed Philip's arm and they started chatting away. Neither of us knew the other was going to be there. It was funny and very very nice.

Okay I think I'm rambling. I'll try to do better when I post the stuff about the first couple of days of school later on today or tomorrow.

Is Summer really almost over?

Looks that way. The kids start school in about 9 more days -- August 20th. In so many ways it seems like school just ended!

We were at Disneyland last week. It was nice and fun. Despite the fact that it was hot there -- hot and muggy which is not how I remember Orange County being. It was also very crowded. Add to that rides breaking down or idiots unbuckling themselves and standing up on rides. What were they thinking?! I have pictures that I'll upload and post.

Summer fun

Wait, is that what I titled the last post? Oh well hopefully not, lol.

Swimming lessons are over and I am glad. I was getting bored waiting for the kids. That is sad I know but I think they were getting bored with the lessons. Not bored exactly. I think it was more that swimming lessons were intervering with all the other stuff they wanted to do.

This is a picture of Philip diving into the pool. The lady doing his lessons worked with him on his dives. He got pretty good at it. And this is a picture of Lindsay picking out a toy to dive for at the end of her lesson. I think that was her favorite part of the whole lesson.

There is no picture of me sitting by the pool reading a magazine while they swam.

Fun in the Summer Time

It's been hot the past week. It is 83F and it actually feels cool. Well not cool but comfortable.

The kids have been doing great swimming. Phillip has been learning to dive and has done a great job at it. Lindsay has done well except for yesterday. She didn't feel like swimming so she was difficult and ended up losing electronic time. She told me later that she was sorry and she would participate in the swim lessons from now on. Yes she used the words particpate in the swim lessons.

We have one more week of lessons. I'm thinking I will sign them up for a few more over the summer but not as regular as this three weeks have been.