Nate got to do an animal report and he was super excited about it. When I asked him which animal he chose, he responded with a Rhinoceros. I was a little surprised by his choice, but was glad to see him so excited about it. This was one homework assignment he wanted to get started on ASAP.
Most of the work they did for this project was done at school and that made me even more happy. The day FINALLY came to show off his work and he was super excited to see me. The teacher was surprised to see me, since I had had a baby only a couple weeks before. But there are things you know you don't want to miss.
Nate was working on another assignment when I showed up, for some reason, but he was all too happy to pause what he was doing and show off all of his work on Rhino's. Especially the book he wrote!
One of the 'joys' of 6th grade is that they get to do a country report. They can choose any country and do a report on it. My kid chose CHAD! Why in the world he would choose Chad is seriously way beyond me. Had he consulted me first I would've recommended Brazil or England (either place his grandpa's served a mission). Sure things have probably changed since then, but we'd have more of a clue about the place than choosing somewhere as random as Chad.
Thankfully it wasn't much of an issue for me as they did a lot of the work during school time. IMAGINE THAT! So Lex did a pretty good job of gathering information on his country and did his report on his own without help. The only thing he wanted help with was the poster and I don't think he really even wanted my help, but I get a little OCD when they have to have something to present. Although, I'll be honest - I really didn't put as much effort into it as I have in the past. I was just too tired to worry about it.
We got everything down and good to go and he was super excited to go to school the next day to present it all. Parents were also invited to come view the projects. The problem for me is that the end time was 20 minutes before Ailey gets out of Kindergarten. I really didn't want go to the school, go home for 5 minutes and head back to the school. So I decided I'd go just before the end time so that I wasn't waiting for too long for Ailey.
When I got into Lex's classroom his first words to me were, "Took you long enough."
At least he says what he thinks. I explained to him why I came so late and he was understanding and it made sense to him why I was late.
I didn't really view many other projects, cause quite honestly I don't care about it - but, I made sure to get pictures of my kid.
{...The flag is upside down on the presentation board? Ummm, yeah - that was my fault...}
We then left and went outside of the school to wait for Kindergarten to be over. Thankfully it was a pretty nice day for November and Jace had tons of fun running around and I had a front row seat to an interesting situation.
The cafeteria outside door faces the front of the school where I was sitting and out of the corner of the eye, I saw the janitor on a walkie and then glanced over and saw a little girl standing by the building. The janitor was talking to the secretary and was asked to find out the girls name. The girl actually responded and then took off running. Two seconds later, the secretary comes out the front doors after her. The little girl paused for a moment and looked at the secretary, but then proceeded to cross the street. Once across the street she stopped again and glanced at the secretary. When she realized the street wasn't going to stop the secretary she took off again, the secretary had to jay-run to catch up with the girl. She got the girl and got her to come back to the school. Or so we all thought. Once back on school grounds, she tried to make a break for it to the parking lot. The secretary caught her before she got there and then the girls teacher came out. They took the girl back to the office to call her mom.
It was a surprising sight for me to see as the girl was probably only in 4th grade, but she was determined to leave school. It was interesting to realize that the secretary's job involves so much more than answering phones and paper work.
5th grade is the year when the kids get to learn more about the States, or so I'm guessing - as Lex had to do a State Report. He chose the state of California (I'm guessing it's because he had so much fun at Disneyland) and they did most of the work at school. I was all for doing work at school because it is a school project.
A couple of times he mentioned he needed the computer to print off a couple of pictures and that was about all we heard and saw of him working on this project.
Then a few weeks before the project was due, I just happened upon some papers in his backpack and in that stack of papers was some important information. The students were supposed to make a float of their state and it was something that had to be done at home! Because a poster isn't enough, they needed to do some sort of project. UGH!
Thankfully, I saw it a few weeks in advance so we had time. I decided we'd start the float on the Sunday of my birthday and then we put some final touches on it the next day. Lex took it to school and waited anxiously for the little kids and I to come see him at school.
While his float wasn't the greatest of floats present, it looked pretty good. I was just hoping he'd get an okay grade overall. He got all points possible for his float which made all the work sort of worth it. I still think it's ridiculous to do silly little projects along with a poster, but I just get ornery when teachers think parents have all sorts of time to help their kids with stuff like that.
There are some projects the kids do at school that make me absolutely crazy. Anytime I have to get involved and I have to do homework - I get annoyed. So I wasn't thrilled that Lex was up to do a county report. But then I got some of the best news in my life: they were doing most of the work in school, DURING school time. THANK YOU VERY MUCH! All we had to do was grab some pictures and I think that was it.
So the weeks went by and Lex completed his project and was really anxious for me to go to the school to see it. I made it a priority as he had something a few weeks before that I missed because I was sick and Jace's timing that day just didn't work out.
I got to the school towards the end of the time frame and Lex's teacher told me that he had been waiting all day for me to come. Made me feel just a little bit thrilled and guilty at the same time. For whatever strange reason, Lex chose to do his report on Uintah County. Um, I don't think he's ever been in that region in his entire life - I'm pretty sure I've only been there a time or two and it hasn't been any time recently.
...Wouldn't be complete without a salt dough relief map...
With 3 kids in elementary school, May becomes a whirlwhind of end of year activities. I somehow always manage to forget this small detail and end up running around crazy when every May comes around. This year there was no shortage of activities to keep us as parents, and students busy. And since I like to keep things semi-organized and orderly, I will go in kid order. (And yes, most of my pics are crappy. This is because I had to use my cell phone for most of these days and well, I'm not so proficient at it...)
TANIS
May was perhaps busiest for this kid.
We started off the month with a DARE graduation on the 14th. Tanis is in the lucky group of 6th graders who are the LAST to actually do the DARE program. They are switching to something called NOVA next year. Apparently the DARE graduation was advertised poorly as very few parents showed up. I was thankful that Tanis was excited enough that he didn't let me forget about it and I was there.
When Tanis returned home I wanted to get a picture of him in his shirt, holding his certificate - which I did. But this was also the night we went to the BEES game and I lost my camera - so no picture of him in his shirt with his certificate. I did like his shirt much better than the one my brother got eons ago. My brother had this black tee with the words DARE written across it and it was just blah!
Tanis has a tee that is in the shape of a smiley face, but the words for DARE are what makes the smiley face. Trust me, it's much better and more creative that it was...
On May 22nd, we were pleased to go to Tanis' Spring Pony Band concert. I couldn't believe the progress this group of kids had made in 4 months. Now, they aren't great BY ANY MEANS, but they are so much better than they were in December. I think our kid still has a lot of work to do, but it was a nice concert anyway.
I'm even so nice to share it with you:
May 30th was probably the toughest day for me in all this hoopla. May 30th was 6th grade Graduation. I would've been fine without an actual ceremony as I'm struggling with my kid being old enough to head to Jr. High as it is.
The gym was decorated nicely and all the 6th graders looked nice in their best clothing. I held things together until they had the sweet special needs kids 'graduate.' The sweet lady that works with these kids seems so amazing and listening to her speak was enough to open the flood gates. Then the kids actual walked the stage and got their 'diploma' and that was when the water works really started going.
I composed myself for a bit and was only slightly teary when Tanis had his turn:
After all the kids had 'graduated' the principal made his speech. I laughed through a lot of it, but then at the very end he had all the Moms stand up and then the kids had to yell to the moms, "I love you." Yup, I totally lost it then.
This is such a hard thing for me to go through and I'm sure I won't be done with the tears. I was so appreciative of Tanis' teacher this year and was so grateful that he was blessed to have Mr. Orr as his teacher. I think it was a very good thing for Tanis.
My baby boy is growing up so fast and has now said 'goodbye' to elementary school. Le sigh...
SHAYLYN
On May 18th, Shaylyn (and the rest of the 4th grade) had a day where they shared their county reports. When I heard about the county reports I was so thrilled...NOT! Doing it for Tanis made me crazy and I wasn't looking forward to doing it again.
I was pleasantly surprised this year that all we had to do at home was gather some information a couple of times. Shaylyn did that effortlessly. So I was happy to see her finished project that she did all on her own during classtime.
-- This was a little project that was hanging in the hall that I happened across...You should read the part about
her brother, Alex... ---
One day on Facebook I had a friend mention how excited she was that all 3 of her kids got to compete in the 'big race' on Field Day. I thought that was an accomplishment and then being somewhat silly and/or curious I asked my kids if any of them were going to run the big race.
Shaylyn pipes up that she was able to. (I wonder if I would've been told had I not asked first...hmmm) She didn't know when the big race would be though. I asked my friend and thankfully she knew and I was off to the races at 9:30 in the morning on May 29th.
What happened that we don't see is that before the big race each individual class had the girls race, then the boys. Each class took the top 3 and sent them to the 'big race'. Shaylyn was one of the top 3 in her class. The gym coach then had each of the girls run in 2 separate heats. By my math that should've been like 12 girls, but I think there was only like 8 or 10....
Anyway, Shaylyn ran the 1st heat and came in third which meant she would run with the 1st 3 girls in the 'final'. So when she ran against all six girls, she came in:
(She's in a white shirt and khaki shorts...)
THIRD!!!
She was so excited that she won a ribbon and I was so happy I was able to be there for it. She was even more excited that her 'boyfriend' got the same place as her when he ran with the boys.
ALEXANDER
For starters, ball season has begun again. Although this year Lex has played very seldom. He had a friends birthday party one week, then the same friends baptism the next week. This past week we weren't home and so I feel somewhat bad that he hasn't had a better season.
The first day of the season I again didn't get pictures, but the second game (May 19) I made sure I got pictures.
-- Sometimes, he gets bored in the outfield and decides he's a robot... --
-- Straightening the cap, things are gettin' serious now --
On May 25th, Lex got to show up his dance moves. The 2nd grade does a dance thing every year teaching the 2nd graders about different cultures. Lex's class ended up with an Irish jig and they were told to wear their best clothes. I was thinking Irish - wear your green shirt. Well all the other mothers dressed their boys in a white button up shirt and black slacks...My kid looked a bit out of place, but he was cute nonetheless.
Little Baby Lexi
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There are times when certain scrap kits just call to me...this was the case
when I saw Connie Prince's Baby Love. My little sister had a baby in
January, s...
