The Last Day of School * 2013

I cannot believe that another school year has passed. Kindergarten and one year of pre-school is behind us and the girls did wonderfully! Em had a fun year of learning in Mrs. Shipman's class with many parent parties and field trips to Purina Farms and The Magic House.  They enjoyed their first of many Spring Carnivals at the elementary school and also met new and exciting friends. Piper had a great first year of pre-school with Ms. Julie, Ms. Jaime & Ms. Twanna and also met some really great friends.   Now we are looking forward to an awesome summer filled with travel, swim team, gymnastics, camps, Six Flags, pool time and fun with family and friends.  Bring it on! 

Final Bell @ Marquette High School!

 Unbeknownst to myself, Marquette High School has a tradition called The Final Bell every May for their graduating seniors.  All the elementary schools that are in the boundries for MHS select two kindergarteners, a girl and a boy, to represent their school.  These kids then go to the graduation practice the Friday before the ceremony and line up and ring bells as a signal that the seniors are done with their educational journey and the kindergarteners are beginning theirs.  It is apparently quite an honor to be chosen and my Emaline was picked to represent her school :-) Also, a little boy named Dylan was her partner in crime from the afternoon kindergarten class.  

So, Emaline, Piper and myself headed to MHS in the morning yesterday.  When we arrived we had to wait for a while for all the seniors to fill up the auditorium, so the kindergarteners started to handout their homemade cards that each of their classes made for the seniors. I never realized that Emaline had such great confidence, she was handing them out and making sure the seniors knew where to go! Afterwards, the kids lined up and were handed a bell and told what they needed to do in the auditorium.  Each child would get the microphone handed to them and they would need to say their name, which school they were from and a congratulations of some sort for the seniors.  Emaline was fourth to do this and all the kids before her were a little soft spoken, but not my little one.  She practically yelled out, "I'm Emaline Little and I'm from Elementary! GOOD LUCK SENIORS!" and the crowd of seniors all yelled and clapped and cheered for her.  She was so proud!! I teared up a little knowing that one day my little girl(s) would also clap and cheer for those kindergarteners taking part in this tradition.  She had such a great time, it really made her feel important! Afterward, we walked out and everyone had cookies and water for a "job well done" snack.  :-) I'm so glad to see that Emaline is not afraid to be involved with school activities and I truly hope that it never ends. 

Girl Scouts at The Painting Paw

This year Emaline joined our local Daisy Scouts troop and I couldn't be prouder of her achievements with the 10 other girls she has been introduced to and formed new friendships with. These are the girls that she will go to school with for quite some time and I'm so glad that they have these fun activities in common.  This was a meeting for a Painting Paw patch specifically for the Girl Scouts.  The Painting Paw is a ceramics workshop that you can choose items to paint.  All our girls got a tile to decorate as they liked and it would end up with their initial on it.  I think it built a little bit of sisterhood and bonding time, the girls had to share their supplies and worked with each other to come with an idea of what they wanted.  They all did a great job! We are all looking forward to the fall when we resume our meetings! 

Farming in West County

Today I had the pleasure of accompanying Emaline on a field trip with her CCL class to the Wildwood Community Farms.  There we learned about sustainable urban gardening and composting.  It was very interesting and Emaline was really into it, asking questions the whole time we were there.  The kids got to see the various stages of composting and what the end result was and how the soil was used again.  After touring the beds and learning what was planted there, they got to fill a pot with soil and plant radishes provided by the farm.  They had a little scavenger hunt and then it was back to school.  Such a great learning experience for all of them! Now to build and tend our own herb garden...or so I hope.  My thumbs aren't exactly green, so we will see if me and Dad can put a box together this summer for the kiddos.  

Mother's Day

Who's got two thumbs and did not get one SINGLE picture of me and my girls on Mother's Day? This lady.  After getting home and realizing that I didn't take any pictures, I was super bummed.  So I dragged out an oldie, but goodie of my babies from a few years ago. 

We had a wonderful brunch with my family where we stuffed our faces and ran around after the kiddos.  Then headed over to my in-laws where we proceeded to stuff our faces AGAIN and run around the yard with the kiddos there.  Piper even roasted her own weenie.  I was a proud Mama watching her take care of her own food needs.  She's self sufficient now, right? :-) 

All joking aside, my Emaline and Piper are the light of my life.  All the whining, fighting (with each other) and dramatic wardrobe changes are overshadowed by the enormous amount of unconditional love they pour over me every day.  I'm constantly amazed that after numerous times of telling them over and over again to use manners and have compassion that they do listen.  They are really good kids and it makes me feel like I'm doing something right when they show empathy and ask questions on how to make themselves better.  Them, along with Josh, make me want to be the best Mom and Wife I can be always.  I cannot fathom a different life than what we have made and I am grateful every minute of every day that we are happy and healthy.  Love my Stinkyfaces!!

Now, I didn't just know this stuff automatically when my kids popped out of me.  It was a learning process my whole life.  Watching my Mom was the best learning opportunity I could have ever had.  She taught me that love and family support was a foundation of having a happy childhood.  Even when I didn't want her to be involved she was and I will forever be grateful for that.  It's one thing to say you care and quite another to show it.  Thanks Mom, love you always.

First Grade Watch Out!!

Today was Emaline's Kindergarten celebration where she has officially been graduated to first grade! I cannot believe this year has gone by so quickly already and she is moving on the big kid school for real.  Full day schedule, CCL (at a different campus), riding the bus and many extracurricular activities are in our future this fall. We have had a fantastic introduction to school this past year and there is a reason that her teacher, Mrs. Shipman, does what she does.  She is so patient and attentive to all the kids in the class, I just don't know how she does it. I'm just so glad Emaline is so happy to learn and be around her friends to experience everything that school has to offer these days. We will definitely miss Mrs. Shipman in the classroom, but I'm sure we'll visit with her often. :-) Here are a few snapshots from the presentation the kids put on for us.

My Budding Ecologist

Today Piper and I went to Emaline's gifted school see her and her classmates give their Kindergarten Presentations and be a part of the Ecology Festival they put together.  I could not believe the fantastic work they did putting their projects together!  You would have no idea these nine kids were kindergartners and not high school students with the amount of research and preparation they did.  

First was an awesome skit they participated in to show what we can do to reduce, reuse and recycle.  Emaline played a flower and butterfly to show what happens when we take care of the Earth.  The second part of the festival was seeing the artwork that they had made about Air, Land and Water.  Great pictures and paintings of land and sea animals and plant life.  The also make dream catchers and totem poles as part of their art projects.  Such vivid imaginations!  Finally we were ushered into their classroom to hear their presentations on their specific part of the environment they researched and how to better that portion of the Earth.  Emaline and her friend Sophia had Air, Land & Water.  They made posters of how to lessen the amount of pollution we put into these areas.  The also made an aquifer and were testing it to see how ground and water pollution takes place.  Em did a great talk on air pollutants and how we could stop burning fossil fuels.  She also wore her Pocahontas costume to convey that Native Americans used everything they found or caught and never wasted.  Yeah, I don't know how she came from this uterus.

Her classmates did equally thorough projects on Food Chains and Helpful Insects.  It truly was amazing to see how excited they were to do these things on their own!  The gifted program in our school district is absolutely fantastic and Emaline loves it there.  I can only hope that Piper can have a chance to learn there too.