First Week of Summer!

We started summer off with a long play date with Alec's good friend Twain and a lego party. The kids built some pretty cool landscapes with hidden entrances to secret areas like inside caves or behind waterfalls. Gwen built a cool castle.  We had to make things as fun as we can by ourselves since Chris was gone in Florida this week.  My pregnancy brain wanted lots of junk food so we had little debbie cakes, cheetohs and ice cream sandwiches.

The second day of summer we went to Lake Tiako'Khata with Audra and Dash.  I'm so glad Audra gets me out of the house to do fun things like this.

Whatever kind of Lilly these flowers are finally bloomed in one of our pots on the deck. This was left over from the people who lived in the house before us and was a total surprise to me when it popped up and started growing amongst the other flowers I had planted a few years ago. I'm glad I didn't weed it out as a weed that first year. I love it for the week or so that it stays bloomed.

Yay for no school uniform/dress code! I loved seeing Gwen sport one of my favorite shirts from when I was a little girl.  Best Reunion Shirt Ever.

End of School Year Madness

Gwen had a nice awards ceremony the week before school got out. The cutie won the neatest handwriting award, the good listener award, an AR reading award, and an 'A' Honor Roll award.  She's really enjoyed her teachers (Ms. Walker and Ms. Jones) and classmates this year. 

Charlie was given the boy Leadership award (along with his good friend Elsa) for his class and an "A" Honor Roll award. His teacher, Mrs. Lawrence has just been singing his praises all year long. She said she could always count on him to help other people, or herself. She loved his positive attitude and overall good nature.

Alec was given the boy Leadership Award for his class and an "A" Honor Roll award.  His teachers, Ms. Taylor and Ms. Crigler would always lavish us in the Parent-teacher conferences on how much they loved depending on Alec. He would run errands for them, quickly, and without hassle, and complimented Alec on how well he treated the other kids (especially the ones who were hardest to get along with)

This year we had to say goodbye to one of our good friends, Ms. Black. She was Charlie's teacher for 1st grade but has been such a good friend to me and the kids ever since. She's moving to Jackson so we had her over for dinner a few times before she left. We'll miss her!

It was a challenge to get to both Alec and Charlie's award ceremonies as they were at the same time on opposite ends of the very big school and Chris was out of town for his NASA robot mining competition! I do not enjoy the timing of this competition... its always the last week of school, when we have field days, and awards ceremonies and I was busy watching a few extra kids for a few days. Involved single parents have so much respect from me. It is so HARD!

Chocolate Mustaches and Cubscouts

One Sunday morning Freddy had the most adorable chocolate pencil mustache. 

We've had a great Cub scout leader the past two years. She had volunteered to get the cub scout program going here in the Starkville branch even though not one of her 6 kids were in it and kept it going despite holding multiple other large callings (including Relief Society President!)  Their family is moving this summer and our last big hurrah for cub scouts was a tour of the Police Station.  We're are so sad to see them go.

Gwen's Spring Recitals

Gwen's class put on a sprint music recital with another class. They sang some songs, recited poems and did some dances. Gwen sang a duet for a few lines in "Lets Go Fly a Kite" and got to dress up as a silly bird and dance around the stage in another. I'm so grateful the teachers took the time to do this. Its the first thing of this kind any of my kids have done (Although they all sang a few songs at their kindergarten graduations). 

Gwen's ballet dance recital was a smashing success this year. She was nervous about it and months before it happened, would ask "how many more times until the recital?" and when I said a number like 8 she gasped and said, "but I don't know all the parts yet!?"  Like I said in the last post, she is uncomfortable in new situations involving lots of people potentially looking at her.  We talked to lots of kids and their parents and talked about how for many of the dancers, this is their favorite part and practically the only reason they TAKE dance. By the time costumes came in and we brought Gwen's home, she was happy and excited for the recital. Her and I had a little date the night before as I took her to the dress rehearsal.

The next afternoon we got all dressed up again (but put on a little make up and remembered the hair spray).  Chris and the boys got her flowers and a bar of candy while Gwen and I got her there early. The boys did really well watching all the dances. Gwen did amazing in both her ballet and tap dances. We're so proud of our little ballerina.

 

 Gwen and friends Jillian and Lakyn

Gwen with her student teacher Jill

 Gwen and her neighbor, Malli Brynn

Gwen, Ainsley and Malli Brynn

Gwen and her good friend from her class at school, Ainsley

Outside of school Activities

The schools around here do a program called Accelerated Reader (AR) where children set point goals for every 9 weeks and they earn points by reading books within their level and then getting 80% or above on a comprehension online test about the book.  Alec's teacher wanted to motivate her students to reach for even harder reading goals by offering to take any student (and a friend) on an afterschool adventure of their choice if they could reach 250% of their AR goal. Alec loved this challenge (he usually reached his normal AR goal maybe half way through the nine weeks) He and another girl reached the big 250% so Ms. Taylor took him and 3 other students to the bowling alley in Columbus. She paid for them to ride the bumper cars, bowl 2 games, get a pizza and play in the bouncy houses. It was SO generous of her and Alec absolutely loved it. 

Also this weekend, Alec and Chris went off for most of the day to a soccer tournament for Alec's Academy Soccer team, and Freddy and I cheered on Charlie and Gwen in their mile-long fun run. 

Gwen didn't really want to do it once she got there and saw all the people. I think she didn't like the idea of everyone watching her run. I tried to explain that most people there were only going to pay attention to their own children and that she would be running by lots of people. I really wanted her to do this and ended up making a deal with her by saying I would help her with her Saturday Jobs and getting extra screen time and ice cream. I knew she would really enjoy having done it, she's just really stressed out with new situations involving lots of people.  We ran into one of her friends from her class, Reed and he was super helpful in telling her she could run by him and that she should do it. 

The started the kids off in waves based on grade which was really smart and they were all organized with pick up after the finish line. The last digit of their bib number corresponded to a corral where parents had to pick up their kids. I was really impressed with the organization of the race. Just like I suspected, after getting Gwen and congratulating her, she told me she was glad I 'made her do it' because she 'had a lot of fun.'  Charlie was so fast, I couldn't even find him in his group at the starting line. He has such natural good form, its so fun watching him to athletic things. Although, Chris and I were thinking the race was slightly less than a mile, the kids ran it super fast! Charlie came in at 8:13. Gwen ran in at 10:10. Pretty impressive. 

We ran into other friends from church, the Duffs and the Leigh's (not pictured) with some of their kids. So fun to see friends.