Owen wanted to carry his own umbrella to the bus stop. Fine. So I opened it for him and off we went. Then he goes and plays with the other kids and I see someone else has the umbrella then I look back and see this.
I think we need to practice. 🙂
Category Archives: School
Owen’s Summer Reading Challenge
The school wants to prevent “summer slide” with the kids (what happens when young minds sit idle for three months) so I decided to create a reading challenge for Owen. If he reads 100 books in 100 days (we’re starting before school ends to get a nice 100 days) he’ll get a reward. He suggested 150 books but we’ll start with 100 and maybe give him a bonus if he reads more!
I’m also considering a 1st Grade Prep Challenge which would include workbook pages from his old kindergarten books and his new first grade prep books.
Friendship Poem Performance
So I took my nice camera to be sure to get the best photos and video possible…and I pretty much failed at both. You really need the telephoto lens and it’s really too dark to get anything really good.
And then I completely botched the video by not noticing that it was blurry. GRRR. At least you get to hear it.
Owen at the bus stop
Playing guns by himself while being first in line to get on the bus!
Visiting Owen at school
For some unknown reason, Owen really wanted me to come to his Friday morning program. So we did. This is some of what happened: getting the sillies out and then dancing along to a video. Owen’s dancing is hilarious.
He says he saw me when he walked in, but I didn’t even get a wave until the very end when they were filing out.
Afterwards we went home, but I had to be back in a few hours for a luncheon the teachers were throwing for the classroom volunteers…and I was going to time it so that we’d be able to go see Owen at lunch!
Katie looking at her pretty headband.
The luncheon was nice. I knew a few people there so we were able to chat for a bit. Katie knows the library well so she kept herself busy playing.
Then it was off to see Owen. Katie loves visiting him. 🙂
Then I heard him say something about he had to do his job at 55. I had no idea what he was talking about…but he kept watching the clock and at 1:55, he started his job: Floor Sweeper! (The other jobs are table washer, line leader, door holder, etc.)
Then it was time to head home…and deal with Katie’s typical tantrum because she desperately wants to play on the playground but I won’t let her whole school is in session (and kids are outside)…
Owen’s report card!
We got Owen’s second period report card today. He did very well, maintaining the majority of scores while actually increasing his score in 25% of the categories! (He only lost a point in one category, which we’re not really concerned with: Demonstrates appropriate skills playing instruments.) So, he has all 4s with a few 3s.
Achievement Levels:
4 – Consistently demonstrates concepts and skills
3 – Usually demonstrates concepts and skills
2 – Sometimes demonstrates concept sand skills
1- Seldom demonstrates concepts and skills
This was his reaction when we told him he did a good job—followed by throwing his fists in the air!
Owen went to the zoo!
A bunch of classes from Owen’s school went to The National Zoo today. I really wanted to experience it with him (and—who am I kidding?—be there to document it) but I would have had to take Katie and then it wouldn’t have been quite as fun since I’d be corralling her the majority of the time.
When he got home I asked about it, and this was what I got.
Owen rocked his school pictures, Spring version.
A well-behaved Katie
Katie was well-behaved while I help set up for next week’s book fair.
Katie and the acorns
We were wasting time waiting until we could start helping set up for the book fair…and Katie was having a blast collecting acorns.
Green Eggs & Ham
With all the recent snow days, Owen’s class was behind on celebrating Dr. Seuss Week, so the making of Green Eggs & Ham was this week. The teacher had emailed asking for volunteers, but with Tom gone and me prepping for our vacation, I opted to skip it. Then. The teacher emailed me directly asking if I could come in because no one else had volunteered. Hoo boy. So I said of course.
We got there as they were reading the book. Owen was, as usual, super excited to see us and gave Katie a hug.
While the teacher explained what the groups would be doing today, kk played in the kitchen.
And then it was time for centers. And as I had imagined, it was pretty much a cluster. Thankfully another mom showed up—as normally we’d have three 15-minute sessions of 4 kids each but since they were trying to make up time, we had three sessions of eight kids each. Yeesh.
There was cracking of eggs (after the mess the first group created, we broke the eggs ourselves), stirring of the eggs with food coloring in two bowls, sharing turns stirring, then cooking the eggs in an electric skillet and cutting the ham, the kids crowding around us trying to cook and us trying to keep them from touching the pan and burning themselves, trying to rember who can’t have ham due to religious reasons, then serving the eggs and ham and trying to keep things cleaned up while cleaning up the utensils for the next batch. WHEW.
The first session was SO crazy that I never had a second to snap a picture. Thankfully Owen was in the second group and we were getting the routine perfected by then.
Giving me a thumbs up on the green eggs!
Thankfully Katie is pretty well-behaved because I couldn’t do the eggs and watch her at the same time. I did see her with the assistant most of the time, and she was at a table coloring another time. I apologized to the assistant and she said no worries, Katie was really very good. PHEW.
And then just like that, it was done. And even though it was crazy, it hadn’t been that bad. 🙂
Snow day Lego project!
This was Owen’s last new Lego project…The Research Institute:
I bought it for the super cool dinosaur, but since it was under 200 pieces it literally took him like 20 minutes to put together. 🙂
Superhero Spirit Day!
Today was Superhero Spirit Day at Owen’s school! I had debated sending him in his complete Superman outfit but honestly worried about bathroom breaks… 🙂 So he wore his Super Owen cape and a mask! This was a picture posted to Facebook!
100th Day of School
Owen came home with this 100 day project. Plus he’s excitedly wearing his new footie PJs. 🙂
And then he helped Katie eat some. 🙂
Kindergarten Valentine’s Party
Finished project (taken later at home):
Classmates:
Estimating how many candy hearts fit into a heart shape (math!):
Decorating sugar cookies! Katie was very into this part!
Then it was time to hand out party snacks, eat, and then go home! Since it was the end of the day, we just took Owen home with us!
Owen’s been buying food again.
I don’t think kindergarteners should be left in full control of their lunch accounts.
So at the beginning of the year, we anticipated Owen buying hot lunch now and again, so we put $20 in his account. A few months in, I happened to check his account and saw a lunch deduction. I questioned it (emailed teacher, etc.) and found out he had purchased a pretzel. That was fine with us, the lunch people fixed the deduction to show the cost of a pretzel vs. the cost of a lunch, we had a talk with Owen about buying food at school, and life went on.
Fast forward to last night when I get a robocall from the lunch account warning us our balance is low, and we have $6.90. WAIT. WHAT? The last we knew, he bought a 75¢ pretzel in October. I looked up his account, and yep, there were four lunches purchased—one in October, November, December, and one JUST THE DAY BEFORE!
WHAT?!?!
We figure maybe somehow some other kid had randomly punched in Owen’s account number. So I fired off an email to his teacher, saying we tried to get an answer from Owen but that’s near impossible (oh, he isn’t quite sure what we’re asking, but then says yes he had a burger (but that was the one I brought him for his birthday)) and he says he doesn’t even know his lunch number so I can’t imagine he’s punching it in. We do know from past experience, however, that if the kid doesn’t know their number, they just give their name and the staff deducts it later.
The teacher writes back that in talking with her assistant (who usually goes to the lunchroom with the kids), she remembers a time or two he bought a lunch (once when he couldn’t find his lunch bag—WHAT?!?!) and once he bought a milk—but the others she had no idea so was going to ask the lunch people.
So I’m sitting here just gobsmacked. Of course the money isn’t the big deal here—we just need to get Owen situated with buying things and telling us he did so we’re not shocked when his account is suddenly $13 less than we think it is…and if I’m not packing enough food and he’s still hungry he needs to tell me! He has been adamant he has never bought anything aside from the pretzel! And he has never brought home an uneaten lunch. We told him he wasn’t in trouble at all—we were just trying to figure out what happened. We asked if he was extra hungry so bought more food? No. Was he buying food for someone else maybe? Or giving away his lunch? Nope. Ugh.
So, I was eagerly waiting to hear the post-lunch report.
And boy, was I surprised.
[The assistant] talked to the cafeteria lady and we all seem to feel that it is pretty accurate. I think there were only four lunches purchased and a couple of extra items and three of the purchases were made prior to January. It is really hard to expect a child to remember what he/she did a couple of hours ago, much less a couple of months ago. We will try to make sure that Owen does not purchase lunch unless he needs to. The cost for lunch is $2.90, so it doesn’t take much to go through twenty dollars. I hope this clarifies things for you.
Well, honestly, it doesn’t clarify much of anything other than you are pretty sure he did buy that stuff. They did give us an exact printout of what he bought, and it still blows my mind. Owen is not a big liar—granted, his memory for things non-Lego is pathetic—but I can’t believe he’d forget BUYING LUNCH THE DAY PRIOR.
Needless to say we’re not putting any more money in the account this year. And for future, I’m setting a “low balance reminder” for like $1 less than what we put in his account so we’ll get notified when he purchases anything.
And we’re hoping this behavior gets better in first grade!
Post-birthday crown
Owen got off the bus today with a birthday crown! He told me they forgot to sing to him in the crown yesterday so they did it today!
Story time and volunteering in Owen’s class
As part of the Star of the Week stuff, family members are welcome to come in to do something special. We chose to bring in a book for me to read during story time. Of course, I wanted to read one of the cool books we’ve had specially made for Owen with his name in it but he wanted Pirates Love Underpants. 🙂
Hallway artwork:
Owen’s SotW poster on display:
Owen is Line Leader this week so he gets to do a bunch of things in the classroom (this will likely be super boring for anyone except grandparents 🙂 ):
Their Groundhog Day predictions:
Of course, Katie wanted to go sit with Owee during their other story.
But it didn’t last for long:
And that didn’t last long either… Soon she was back over playing with the toys:
“Mama! A lion! Mama! Mama! A hippo! Hippo! Chomp chomp! Crocodile! Kangaroo! Hop hop!” While placing each animal on the floor around her. 🙂
Trying to keep her occupied so she doesn’t bother the class:
I saw this and laughed. It seems to say a lot about kindergarten in one picture. 🙂
After storytime, I had agreed to stay and volunteered to help while the kids did their daily center activities. I lucked out this time and Owen got to be at one of my tables. 🙂
Katie is a bit more outgoing now and doesn’t want to stay in the play area while the kids are working so she kept bothering me and I finally just gave her a sheet of paper and let her color with the big kids.
What they sing before every snack time:
Birthday lunch at school!
I took Owen a Five Guys cheeseburger and fries for lunch. 🙂
Katie got some fries, too!
Handing out his birthday treats (mini candy bars) to his classmates!
BINGO!
The PTO had a pizza dinner/Bingo event tonight and we all went! Unfortunately we didn’t win any bingo games, door prizes, or raffle items…but we all had fun! After almost every game when someone else won, Owen would say “OHHHH! I ALMOST WON!” Even if he was five numbers away. 🙂
Two out of four looking…that’s about right. 😉
With Aden, one of his classmates (and the one he went to the martial arts event with and broke the board):
The picture taken by the school principal (she’s at every event and walks around taking pictures with her iPad!)—again, two out of four looking:
Aden’s family (our table mates):
Afterwards, since the kids had been so good, we stopped and got froyo on the way home. 🙂
She had to wear her backpack, too!
Gingerbread House Close-Up!
From 12/19 but I forgot I had the pictures on my real camera!
Gingerbread houses in Owen’s class!
Today was Owen’s last day of school before the holiday break and we were invited to decorate gingerbread (graham cracker) houses with them! (It was also PJ Day for the whole school!)
Earlier in the week, parents had glued the crackers to a milk carton to speed things along.
The teacher offered a house for Katie to decorate, but I had my hands full helping Owen and his classmates. And she was having fun with the toys.
But then she came over to see what was going on and of course had to get involved. 🙂
Video?
Oh boy, now she’s helping with frosting.
“No! My seat!”
Happy boy!
She ran right over for story time!
Then it was time to pack up and go!
Owen’s first shopping spree
Owen’s school offered a Penguin Shop for the kids to shop for inexpensive gifts for their families. I volunteered one afternoon and it was…a little crazy. 🙂 Owen had $10 to spend on gifts for me, dad, and Katie. He came home with something for each of us (plus about $3 left over) and he was SO excited for us to open them…so we finally did tonight.
I got a cupcake pencil sharpener, Tom got a purple high-heeled shoe pencil sharpener, and Katie got a barrette with a feather on it! Our very first gifts from Owen with no parental input whatsoever! I told Tom I would switch him sharpeners, but he said no way—he was keeping the very first gift his boy bought him! 🙂
Katie LOVED her feather…
Katie wants more ball!
We were watching Owen’s last AfterSchool athletics program and they were playing dodgeball. Of course Katie wanted to run and play with them but she couldn’t. However, she could grab balls that came over by us…
Look who we ran into at the book fair!
Owen had just watched Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets (movie #2 where Dobby was introduced) so we thought he’d be really excited.
Nope.
Katie loves going to school!
I volunteered in Owen’s classroom today and after awhile Katie wanted to come color with the big kids. Well, I say color but she really just wanted the pencil…and the scissors!
I’m glad I’m not a turkey!
Owen singing my favorite song from the feast. This makes me smile SO much.
Owen’s Thanksgiving Feast
All the kindergarten classes were having a combined Thanksgiving Feast today. We had all signed up to bring something and Owen really wanted us to come, so I kept Katie up from her nap and off we went.
To say it was all a bit disorganized would be an understatement. I joked that at least it wasn’t a state dinner—it was just a kindergarten meal. 🙂 The feast was supposed to start at 1:45 and at 1:35 the last of the kids were still eating while parents and teachers were cleaning the empty tables and taping colored paper tablecloths on. No one knew which teachers were going to sit where so all these parents had no place to put their food donations and just kept moving them around.
Katie was being good, actually, and kept herself busy with an acorn she had scooped up on the way in. And then playing with my Visitor sticker.
Then I realized that parents were just making plates ahead of time and putting them on the tables—so the kids wouldn’t even get to pick what they wanted. I knew Owen wouldn’t eat any of it (except maybe the corn and a roll) so I had packed his lunch. But with all the confusion (and seeing that their class assistant was running around setting up), I was positive the lunch would not make it to the cafeteria. I asked her if it was okay to get his lunch and she said yes, so I had to take Katie to the classroom. The classroom was dark so I figured the kids were all being held somewhere beforehand. So it was a quick grab, but I was glad I did it because I got to see the other turkeys that had been disguised! 🙂
On the way back to the cafeteria, I saw all the kids in a lower hallway with their feather headdresses and pilgrim hats. Owen saw me and got very happy. Katie, of course, wanted to go down and sit with Owee. 🙂 Back in the cafeteria, Katie wanted to hide.
The centerpieces:
I grabbed these entrance pictures from the school’s Facebook page. Each kid walked in with a “friend” from another class, so each Native American walked in with a Pilgrim.
Then it was time to line up for the exchange of necklaces:
And then the first few songs. Things seemed to be going as expected. Owen was happy and laughing.
Then the singing started. And he saw me. Remember his meltdown/panic attack last year when he was line leader for his pre-K graduation? Yeah, it wasn’t a one-time thing. I do not have a public performer. And I could slowly see it happening—he was getting shy and starting to tear up and definitely wasn’t participating. I’m not sure if it was performing in front of a big crowd or seeing me or a combination of both…but it killed me to watch.
Here’s exactly what I saw. Poor kid.
And then it was over and he got to come sit down to eat lunch and he was fine.
But he REFUSED to put his hat back on so I just took a picture of it.
And by then, all the plates of food the parents had set out were ice cold. Which didn’t really bother Owen as he was eating PB&J—though he did have three bites of corn and a roll. I picked at the rest of the plate but it wasn’t very appealing cold.
While everyone was eating, they were playing a slideshow of drawings the kids had done in the computer lab.
This was Owen’s:
The music teacher came up while Owen was eating and asked him what was wrong because she saw how he had been acting. She told me that he was amazing in class and loved to sing!
They had a second set of songs planned for after lunch so I tried to tell him that he didn’t need to be shy and that he just needed to look straight at me and pretend that no one else was there…and that I really really wanted to see him sing and I knew he could sing the songs because he sings them at home all the time. He would barely even look at me or acknowledge what I was saying! He said he didn’t want to do them and wanted to come home with me. I told him that wasn’t an option. I told him again if he was scared to just look straight at me and don’t pay any attention to anyone else. I got him to laugh a bit and kept my fingers crossed.
Lining up—so far so good.
And then he actually participated in the closing songs! Without melting down! YAY! I’m guessing it was more luck of the draw then my pep talk but I’ll take it. 🙂
Proof I was there! (I found this pic on Facebook afterwards!)
Heading back to class!
Owen’s after-school athletics program
If we leave when we should to pick him up, we get stuck in bad traffic and what normally takes eight minutes takes about 20 (not bad in the grand scheme of things, but awful when you’re used to eight) and we barely make it on time. If we leave early enough to beat the traffic, it takes the eight minutes but then we’re there 30 minutes early.
Today we left early. Amazingly, Katie sat in the chair (with her dolly) for quite some time.
This is what we got to watch. Owen is behind the instructor (in orange).
I’m hoping they have another class like this in the spring—he LOVES it and there’s only two weeks left!