Little Boy Blue

It's here.  He is really excited and he thinks he is a natural!  I'm not really in agreement with that.  He is very sensitive about his playing abilities though.  We are going to have to get him a music stand so that he can stop using the end table next to my recliner.  He perches his music against the lamp and stands facing me blowing his horn right at me while I am watching tv trying to keep a straight face...which is almost impossible.  At the first sign of a smile cracking on my face he quits, sits, and pouts.  I try my best but the whole situation is comical.  The Boy, standing there blasting his first attempts at notes on his horn at me while I try to watch tv without looking at him or showing any facial expressions what-so-ever.  At least I could hear his notes getting stronger by the time he was finished...there is hope!

Middle School!!

First day of 6th grade is here!  He is so excited!  Gone are the basketball shorts and t-shirts (at least for today).  He has his own house key and will be letting himself in after school.  He packed his own lunch and asked for me to wake him up an hour before school so he had plenty of time to take a shower and get ready.  He even had to get himself off all by himself since I have to leave for work before he leaves for school now.  So many responsibilities and he handled them like a champ!  (with a little help from Oma on the phone.  Not as grown as he thinks, I guess)

He loved his first day.  He said he had no problem getting to all of his classes on time.  He had lots of papers for me to sign and insisted I do it right away, watching over me to make sure I didn't screw it up.  I will be going to open house soon so I can meet all of his teachers, one of which, lives across the street from us!  His favorite, Miss Hapner, his Reading/Language teacher.  I wish it was the math teacher so I could send him to her house when he has homework!

It's Almost Here!

We went to the school for Jayke to put his things in his locker today.  His first locker!  He practiced opening it and we walked his schedule.  He and Oma had done it a few days ago but he wanted to do it one more time before he starts school tomorrow so Oma brought him to the school and I met them there.  The three of us walked to all of his classes.  He is so excited which is good.  I was afraid he would be scared but he doesn't seem to be at all!  I told him there is a school dance coming up and he said he was going without hesitation.  I found out later he asked Oma what it was...LOL!!  Hard to believe he starts middle school TOMORROW and will be going to his first dance a few days after that!

Goodbye Elementary School!

Today was Jayke's Awards Day at school.  We thought that he would be getting an award for straight As since he got them this quarter but didn't realize that you had to have them for the entire year...he missed that by a B+.  He was looking at me from his seat looking some what bummed when he realized he wouldn't get any awards today...only a certificate for completing fifth grade when his name was called for the Presidential Award, the principal calling it the "top award"!

He told me afterwards he had no idea he would get that!  I was proud of him for working really hard for the straight As.  He isn't always very motivated and just settles for all As and Bs...much like I did in school.  I told him if he got straight As this year he would beat me by two years, as I didn't get them until 7th grade.  That was all the motivation he needed...to beat his mother at something.  This was by far his best school year yet and we are already talking about him working towards honors classes and scholarships.  I just have to figure out how to keep him motivated!  

 

Below is a first day/last day shot...I think it is slightly exaggerated due to the angle but look at the distance between his shoes and shorts for an example of how he has grown this year.  He is to my shoulder now.  He also looks older in the face to me.  He better stop that!

Positive Behavior...Probably Didn't Get it From Me

I was reading through the school newsletter today and came across this picture.  Every month each teacher chooses one child from their class for this award.  Jayke has never gotten it...which surprises me because he is always so good in school.  I just happened to notice that kid in the back who is almost hiding his face with his certificate and realized it's Jayke!  He didn't even bother to tell me he got this.  When I asked him he said he forgot.  Glad I read the newsletter!

Wretched With a Side of Wretchedness!

Is how I feel about this project.  Mini Economy, Market Day...whatever you call this.  I call it Wretched!!!  Jayke's class had to come up with a product to sell and open a store in the gym in which to sell his wares.  Jayke and Oma made book marks and rubber stamps.  We didn't have a lot of time for this project so I feel we could have made a few improvements.  The book marks, although cute, would not stand up to use from a kid.  The stamps might have been a good idea if we had provided some sort of ink.  Over all, he sold most of the book marks, very few of the stamps, and learned a valuable lesson in business.  He came home and said, "They made me pay $30 to open my store and I didn't even make $30!  I lost money!"  Welcome to the real world, son.  

I Deserve a Lil Appreciation

Apparently the school thinks showing appreciation means letting me buy books at their book fair.  They did have some donuts, coffee, and juice in thanks.  I figured since this was going to be the last one I ever get a chance to go to, I better go.  Jayke was happy I did.  He got to show my the mural the kids painted this year in the cafeteria.  He pointed out the square that his group of three did.  The back pack in the last picture.  He is quite proud of the mural and he should be, it was really nice.  Brightened up the cafeteria.

As we head into the final weeks of elementary school I'm finding it hard to believe that it's over.  Middle school is just around the corner.  We go for orientation on the 18th!  Jayke is nervous that he will get lost but I think he is excited about middle school.  That makes one of us.  :(

Snowball

Jayke's class has two lab rats this year that they are experimenting on...which I am highly against.  Here is the pic he took of one of them.  I had to sign a permission slip for him to touch them in class and noticed there was a some what tricky question on the slip.  You had to write no if you didn't want your child to bring the rat home for a weekend.  I'm pretty sure Jayke and the school tried to slip that one by me.  He even brought me a pencil to sign with so I made him go get me a red ink pen and I wrote a huge NO on the slip that we were not bringing the little critter home to play with the three cats for a weekend.  I'm sure that would have had a traumatizing out one for us all.  Guess I need to start reading what he brings to me and tells me to sign.

Hobnob aka HobKnob...

Jayke made the Spelling Bee...again.  He has made it every year except the time he was sick on the day they had the try outs, so to speak.  That was in fourth grade, but he was back this year!  He looks oh so thrilled to be there too.  He did well, unfortunately Hobnob took him down.  He put a K in it...which, I think I would have too.

Later that evening, I took the opportunity to use it in a sentence for him.  Mom told me how after school, he was holding the kitten and said, "Ew, she smells today" as he handed her to my mom.  After a while he came and took her back and said, "She smells better now.  Maybe its me who stinks.  I have worn these socks for four days in a row!"  Um....EW!!!  Turns out I haven't needed to be buying him those expensive socks after all.  He only needed one pair!  I told him later that I didn't hobnob with boys who have stinky feet.  He told me I'm "Sooo mean!"  I hear that often these days.

On another note, we survived another science fair project with very minimal anger, frustration, and yelling.  He investigated which kind of salt would melt ice the fastest.  I believe we got an A again this year.  I haven't seen the final grade yet but that is what he tells me.

Best Sub Eva!

That is what Jayke said about Mr. Matheny who subbed in his class today.  He is the father of Jayke's friend, Braden (in the green jersey) and chose Jayke and Braden, of course, as his special students.  Love this selfie which I found on Jayke's instagram account and promptly stole.  

More Choices

The first day of 5th grade brings more choices for The Boy.  Carrying over from his week at camp he was all about making his own choices for the first day of school, choosing his clothes himself and getting himself ready.  The shirt reads, "Nothing but Awesome"...I did go make sure his Awesomeness had on matching shoes since last year's choices had him wearing two different ones on the first day of school, which you can see here.   

After the inspection of the footwear and a quick picture he was off to first day of his final year of elementary school.  Where did the time go?  I feel like in the blink of an eye he will be off to his graduation but it was just yesterday he was waking up in his footed pajamas saying "Go fix me a waffle woman!"  I'm a lucky mom to have such a great kid!  

Things Nightmares Are Made Of

The fourth grade science fair.  I've been dreading it since he started school.  I've known it was coming but wan't fully prepared for the ordeal that it is.  Every single part of it from picking the subject to the final word written and graphic glued, it was an ordeal.

Jayke did his on the aquatic respiration in fish.  I had to get special permission to use a living thing which I would find out later was a bad idea.  Really, projects like this are just a bunch of work for the parents.  I strongly feel that if they are going to assign this sort of thing they need to allow time for the kids to work on it in the classroom where the TEACHER is available to help them since TEACHING is their job.  I'm pretty sure I'm employed by Mid-West Metal and NOT Delaware County School Corp.  I'm positive that after I've worked all day I don't want to have to come home and spend my evening for several days working on this ridiculous project.  No fourth grader knows how to go about organizing such a thing so parental involvement is necessary.  More than necessary!  It took me, mom, and Jim to get this thing finished!

I did manage to get Jayke to do part of the work.  He was frustrated, I was frustrated, the fish was scared and tortured.  There was yelling and crying, it was awful!  I didn't do the testing with Jayke, my mom did.  They had to put ice in the water to lower the temperature and measure his breathing.  As the water cooled the fish started to swim on it's side like it was dying which caused Jayke to start crying as he worried about the fish.  He was okay once they warmed the water back up but I think The Boy was traumatized.  I know the fish was, he died two days after we finished the testing.  

I helped Jayke write his final analysis and prepare everything for his board.  I had everything typed out and part of it on the board when Jim read it and discovered I had part of it wrong.  This caused a whole new level of panic since it had to be turned in in the morning.  Things had to be ripped off the board which sent him into near tears again.  Thank God we were near the end!  The consensus on Facebook was that NO ONE enjoys the science fair!

Except maybe Nemo...

4th Grade

4th Grade! Something is Amiss...

Jayke started 4th grade today!  He was ready to go back and quickly got himself ready this morning.  The bus came early so I missed getting a picture before he left.  I asked Mom to take this one when he got home and promptly posted it to Facebook.  Later it was pointed out to me by mom that something wasn't quite right in the picture.  If you look closely, in his haste to catch the bus, he put on two different shoes and wore them all day!  Good thing they are so similar, he said no one said anything to him so maybe no one noticed.  Didn't bother him, as you can see, he is all smiles!

3rd Grade

First Day of third grade!  He was up early and ready to go!

Third Grader

Look at that...struttin in there like he owns the place.  I remember a few years ago walking in with him plastered to my side, now he walks in with all the confidence in the world!  Says he is ready to start school!  I'm glad because I am certainly ready for him to start...and I think Bobby is probably more ready than anyone since he stays home with him all day.  

Jayke was slightly bummed that he didn't get the teacher he wanted but I took him to see his classroom and he was excited that there were sports themed bean bags in there.  The boy does love his bean bags!  I guess he is thinking it is going to be a relaxing time in third grade now that he saw those.  I did manage to find out that his teacher is really good.  A girl I work with told me her kids had her and LOVED her!  That's good but I think everyone is different and just because someone else's kids love a particular teacher doesn't mean my kid will the that same teacher.  Hopefully, Jayke will though.  Jayke is usually fine with his teachers and it's his mother who ends up having issues with them.  I was the happiest with his kindergarten teacher so far.  Not thrilled at all with first grade, and just ok with last year's.  I'm hoping this will be the year I love his teacher too.

We have registered, got all of his school supplies, and gone to the dentist.  All we have left to do is get a hair cut and get a few school clothes and he is all set!  School starts the 14th!

Turkey Surprise

I love when I find things like this in The Boy's backpack!

Gobble Gobble

Jayke got to be an Indian at his "Feast" at school the other day. Here he is in in his vest that I had to go out and buy a package of white t-shirts and use half of my coffee to make. Apparently the teachers haven't changed their curriculum due to the economy! They still have us spending money every other week.

Jayke is with his dad for Thanksgiving so it was pretty quiet at Mom's for dinner. Not so much at Dad's. There was a lot of complaining about the fact that it was 6 o'clock and the turkey was STILL cooking! Everyone was starving. I guess it takes longer than one would think for a 22 lb turkey to thaw. It should be ready in a week or two! LOL Good thing they also had an 18lb ham too!

I skipped Black Friday this year. I have all my shopping done so there was no need to go out and spend any more money. We are heading to IKEA Saturday though for my birthday!! Can't wait...first time at IKEA!! Happy Birthday to me!!

Apples and Indians

We went on a field trip last Thursday with Jayke's class. They are studying Indians and Johnny Appleseed right now since Thanksgiving is approaching so we went to Minnetrista which provides a tour and lecture on both subjects.

First up...apples! We went into their mini orchard to inspect some apple trees and taste some different kinds of apples. Their orchard leaves a lot to be desired and it was probably a little late in the season for this particular lesson. There weren't any apples left to investigate...basically they turned the class loose to look at leafless trees. Something second graders couldn't care less about. They did enjoy the eating part at least.

Next up...cider! This was a much more interesting lesson since the kids got to juice the apples themselves. Below is Jayke taking his turn...

They got to drink the cider once made. I think eating the apples and drinking the cider was the highlight of this outing for sure!

If you are sensing a lack of enthusiasm on my part regarding this field trip you are correct. Not only did I feel like it was a very dull experience but it was also FREEZING! It may have been the coldest day we have had so far this fall. I thouht this was an indoor field trip so Jayke and I were not dressed appropriately for the weather either. Since no note came home regarding wearing outdoor clothing I assumed it was indoors. Found out later that Jayke was supposed to tell me they were to dress warm and wear old shoes...neither of which we did. Luckily I had some gloves and a hat in the car for him. Many of the kids were underdressed so this must have been a common assumption.

We had lunch inside and were able to get warm before heading back out. I noticed one little girl who sat at our lunch table paid an extra amount of attention to Jaykeb. Her name is Katie and I've heard him talk about her before. he seemed fine with the attention from her too. Maybe he has a little crush..I'm pretty sure she does! LOL


The Indian part of the trip was the part I found the dullest. The kids seemed like they liked it somewhat. This was also the part that was the coldest. I was never so happy for a field trip to end! I checked my phone while we were out there and the temp was 41 degrees with a wind chill of 32 degrees. I know they don't allow them to go out for recess if it is below 40 so I was a little disappointed that they didn't reschedule or find a different location on a different day for their field trip. All of the moms were in agreement.

While out there I took the opportunity to take some pictures to edit. If it weren't so darn cold I would have stayed after the kids got back on the bus and taken some more!

Second Grade

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