First Day of School

It was off to 1st grade for Jack and Pre-K for Max yesterday.  Before school Jack was ready to go and Max was not so sure he wanted a new classroom.  After school I think they had changed roles, but I know that in a few days, once the routine isn't so new again, they will both be happy and excited about all that there is to learn.

First up was a fun breakfast of "1" and "Y" (for Yellow Birds, his new classroom) sprinkle pancakes to get things started off right!  For the record, they were much more excited about the sprinkles than the shape, so next year I hope I remember that and save myself some trouble! :)

Then it was time for a few pictures before heading off to school.

Kenny dropped Max off at school and he never looked back.  We walked Jack to school and got him settled in.

 He was all smiles until we started to leave and then there were a few, just a few tears.  :(  Heartbreaking.

At the end of the day, I think he enjoyed a fair bit of the day, but he wasn't too keen on having to go back.  He asked me if I thought we could try homeschooling and my heart broke into a few thousand pieces.  But he gets it honest.  I have such a hard time with goodbyes and transitions and until I know what's going to happen and when, I'm a nervous wreck inside.  This too shall pass and before we know it, he'll be loving school again.  Right? :)!

Father's Day present

Here's a little video the boys made for Kenny for Father's Day this year...

Off to the river this morning...

Kindergarten cuteness

One of our favorite parts of kindergarten has been interpreting Jack's spelling and stories.  At this age, they allow them to sound out words when they write them instead of memorizing the correct spelling.  It's sometimes hard to let your brain "hear" the word based on his spelling, but it's often fun too.  I was impressed he came up with an animal for each letter!  Try to "read" them and I'll post a key at the bottom.

 Ant, bear, cat duck, elephant, fish, goose, hippo, iguana, jaguar, kangaroo, lion (of course he got that one right!), monkey, nautilus, octopus, pig, coral, rhino, shark, turtle, umbrella bird (I'm not sure what this is, but he swears it's real and he learned about it on Wild Kratts!), vulture, whale, x-ray fish, yak, zebra.  
Trdle is my favorite!

Buzz Lightyearn

Contrary to popular belief, the Toy Story character is NOT Buzz Lightyear, but Buzz Lightyearn...

We all laugh hysterically every time he does it.  Hope it makes you smile too!

Boy of Summer

Jack's playing tee ball for the Orioles this year.  It's our first season of tee ball and I won't lie, they are very serious about it, which makes it a little overwhelming for me, but we're off to a good start!

Saturday we had opening day ceremonies.  It had been postponed because we have had the longest winter ever here and last weekend it was cold and rainy.  It turned out to be a gorgeous day and perfect for kicking off baseball season.  

Jack was a little nervous before the ceremonies, but he loved being in his uniform.

The kids had to do a lot of listening to the history of Richmond Little League and take the Little League Pledge.  Then they got to run the bases and Rodney Ram even made an appearance.

 Then it was game time.  

We only got to play one inning due to all that listening the boys had to do, but they each got to bat and it was super cute!  Jack hit the ball really well and almost hit the fence!  He ran with all he had and was safe!

He chose to play 3rd base for the 2nd half of the inning.  Kenny tells me lefties shouldn't really choose 3rd base, so we'll see where he ends up next week.  Either way, he did great.  Funny story - after his 2nd tee ball practice, I think he realized that being a lefty was different.  He asked me what we would do if he went to play and they didn't have a glove for him.  I reminded him that we take our own glove to tee ball and Unk had bought him a glove made for lefties, so he was fine.  He said "No Momma, I mean when I make it to the major league!"  I assured him I'd be happy to buy him his own glove for that too...;)!

He took it so seriously.  See this kid playing in the dirt while Jack is ready for anything? 

 It was a good game and the boys all seemed to have a great time.

And look at that smile as he walked over to us after the game!  That's what it's all about!!

Go Orioles!

Jack is SIX!

Somehow six seems much older than five.  Five still sounds little but six, well, six seems like a big kid. Maybe that's just because Jack seems like a big kid these days.  It's so fun watching him learn and embrace new things, and I won't lie, it's lovely having one that is a bit more independent, but it's hard too.  It's hard when he doesn't need a kiss at daycare in the morning or when he breaks out the little attitude that so clearly reminds me that he is six going on 16.  But all things considered, Jack is still my sweet, sweet boy that makes me smile every chance he gets.

He loves sports more than I realized was humanly possible, especially at six.  He will watch them all, even ice dancing, for hours on end.  He wants to know why they do what they do and how they do it and he memorizes their every move and statistic.  He can play most of them quite well, or at least the backyard version.  He played on the school soccer team in the Fall and will do so again this Spring.  He's also signed up for tee ball, so we'll see how that goes.  He loves watching soccer with Kenny and plays more FIFA on the kindle than he probably should.  He's a Lions football fan, Nationals baseball fan and Liverpool soccer fan.

He only recently gave up his nap, and honestly, sometimes he still takes one on the weekend.  He eats few things, but eats them well.  Since school started he's put on about 4 lbs and 2 inches.  He wears a 6 slim and is all leg.

He thinks he loves Pokemon.  The bigger kids at daycare play and he wants so badly to be one of them.  I have tried to understand what I hope is this "phase," to no avail.  I have read the instructions and even the guide for parents on the internet and I think the conclusion that I have come to is that either I am not as intelligent as I once thought, or he doesn't play it right.  Either way, my take on such things like this, that I'm not a huge fan of, is that they go away faster if I don't resist.  And the game, at least the way he plays it, seems to contain a fair bit of math, which can't be bad.

Speaking of math, he's quite good at it, and very interested.  He does very well at simple addition and subtraction and is even catching on to the patterns associated with adding together larger numbers.  Fractions and tally marks are his favorite part of school I think.  Just this past weekend he was curious about how to tell time on a "real" clock and after about 5 minutes, he seemed to get the hang of it.  He was very excited to get to count by 5s!

He enjoys school, except Spanish, which he really loathes.  They have it twice a week, on back to back days, and he really just doesn't like it. I'm not entirely sure why except that I expect it doesn't come easily to him, which just leads to frustration.  Other than that, he has really taken quite well to school and is doing great.  I will admit I never anticipated it would go this smoothly!

Jack is so very thoughtful.  He worries about everyone (and every thing!), and while sometimes that's exhausting and leads him to be very on edge, it is also a big part of what makes Jack, Jack.  He's quite perceptive about how people are feeling and works hard to keep them happy, especially me.

Six isn't so old that he doesn't still want snuggles, thank goodness.  I still get to snuggle with him before bed every night and if he's tired or has had a long day, he'll ask for snuggles on the couch when we get home.  I am usually trying to do 28 things in that hour after school, but nothing makes me drop them all faster than a request for snuggles.  I know those days are numbered so I try to take all that I can get.

He loves Max, and while they do drive each other crazy at times, there are other times when I'm overwhelmed with how well they get along.  Just the other day, when Jack had to get a haircut and Max didn't, Jack was only concerned about getting 2 lollipops to take home because Max wouldn't get one otherwise.  At the dentist, when Jack got to pick a treat from the treasure chest, he chose something for Max.  At Jack's birthday party Max burst into tears because he wanted to sit next to his brother "Jackie."  They really do love each other.  Jack is always trying to teach Max something and sometimes comments that he just wants to be sure that Max knows everything when he gets to kindergarten!

Speaking of his party, this year we had a friend party, with a lot of friends, at SCOR.  Jack wanted a baseball party, but with the weather so iffy on his birthday, we knew better than to plan that outside at our house.

It turned out to be super easy and the kids had a ball.

We gave him a Bryce Harper jersey and some tickets to a Nationals game in a few weeks.  He was on cloud nine.

He's smart, he's funny, he's thoughtful, sweet, happy and healthy.  What more could a mother possibly want?  I love you Jack Lion.  You make me so proud and I just love the boy you have become.  I can't wait to see what's next...

Max is 3!

As it turns out, I had written this post back in September and somehow never got around to posting it...

We celebrated Max's birthday on Monday - the big 3!  It was a fun-filled day that started with Kenny singing Happy Birthday outside his door when it was "wake up time."  When he opened the door, Max said, "Is it MY birthday?"  "Is my birthday downstairs?" He came flying down the steps to find some presents, some balloons and a special birthday breakfast waiting for him.   He got some new "Froggy" books and a watch and a new letter movie.  He was so excited!  He and Jack both devoured their chocolate chip muffin breakfast (so much so that Jack told me later he was not hungry at lunch time at all and barely ate anything!) and it was off to school to share cookies (pronounced koo - keys  by Max) and brownies with his friends.  When I'd asked if he wanted to take cookies or cupcakes to his friends that day he said he wanted to take cookies and brownies and let his friends choose what they wanted.  This child isn't one to do what everyone else does - he marches to the beat of his own drum.  Jack would never have chosen anything but "pupcakes."  Anyway, when I picked him up in the afternoon, he was hot, sweaty, covered in sand (the sign of a fun-filled day!),  and really excited to go get what was left of his cookies and brownies and eat them again.  I asked if he wanted to go to dinner and he exclaimed that he wanted to go to CiCi's!  Being a city kid, we don't really have any of those close by, and let's face it, it wasn't at the top of my list of places to go, so I offered him a few closer by Carytown options and he chose "Burgers and Fries."  We all had a big, yummy dinner and then headed home for some ice cream sundaes!  He'd gotten some packages in the mail by the time we got home that he was very anxious to open.  Cousin Dillyn had sent the coolest "Jake and the Neverland Pirates" ship and toys that both boys went crazy over.  We had to drag them off to take a bath and snuggle up to read our new books.  It was an exhausting day, at least from my perspective, but I think Roni would consider it one of the best he's had so far, so it was well worth it.  

Roni is so full of life.  He's wild and crazy and definitely all boy.  He bumbles and tumbles and isn't graceful.  He loves to get dirty.  He loves to play in the sand and loves anything involving a ball.  At the playground he usually wants to swing and he wants to do it all by himself.  He can get on and off the swing himself and knows how to pump his legs to get going really high.  He is pretty picky about his clothes and wants to pick out his shirt most every day.  At 3 Jack was all about dinosaurs but Max has no interest.  And he doesn't like most of the dinosaur shirts that we have.  He will eat really almost anything, as long as he wants it at that moment. There are few things he really doesn't like, but what he wants today and what he wants tomorrow likely will be completely different. He usually prefers whatever Jack isn't having, which means I sometimes get to make 3 meals at night.  (And before anyone tells me that I just shouldn't, Jack is a very picky eater and has big issues with texture and consistency.  So much so that he will actually gag and throw up his dinner if it's not what he expects or wants.  It's something we've battled for 5 years now and I've tried every suggestion there is, but the literature says not to push them at this age, and it doesn't mean they won't ever eat anything else, he just needs time.)  Most of the time, however, Max will eat whatever Kenny and I are eating, which makes it easy.  His favorites are still probably fruits - he loves watermelon and strawberries.  He also loves yogurt.  He's a good eater. Most days at school he eats whatever Mr. Glen fixes, which is wonderful.   He sleeps really well - still takes long 4 hour naps on the weekend and 2 hours at school.  He goes right to bed at night around 7:45 and we don't hear from him until 6:30 or 7 unless he's had a bad dream, which is pretty rare.  He still sleeps with a paci, and a band-aid.  He's gotten VERY picky about his bandaids in his old age - he doesn't care about the picture but he doesn't like the "scratchy" kind, which are the band-aid brand, because they are too sticky.  He sticks the band-aid to his forehead most nights while we read books and then once he's in bed he takes it off and moves it between his fingers.  If it's too sticky, he has trouble getting it off and one morning he even woke with 3 little gashes in his forehead from a "scratchy" bandaid incident.  

And there was more celebrating to do - that weekend we had his party.  It was the first one he kind of understood and he was VERY excited.  We kept it to the usual family and close friends but that's probably the last time we'll get away with that since he'd been invited to a few of  his classmates' parties just before his own and I'm sure that will continue to be a trend in the coming year.   He loved every second of his party. 

 He'd been asking for a pretend kitchen because every day when we went upstairs to pick Jack up from Yellow Birds, he begged to play in their pretend kitchen.  By the time I was picking him up however, the pretend kitchen stuff was usually all cleaned up for the day and Max was so disappointed.  So a pretend kitchen seemed the perfect gift...that is until we set out to assemble it the night before the party and it was in literally 80000 pieces.  I wasn't sure the pretend kitchen would be ready before Christmas really, but somehow, we got it done, in the wee hours of the morning, and it was a BIG hit.  See that big thing covered up with a blanket on the right side of the room?  That's the kitchen.  It was there the entire time he had the party and opened gifts and he didn't even notice!

Thanks to all who came out and made his day extra special!