The last month of school is always crazy, exciting, fun, overwhelming. Everyone's trying to fit in last minute this and that, I'm trying to go out with a bang our last weeks of preschool, we've got sports, the pool opens, there are field trips and field day, and so on. This year is no exception. It's been a lot of fun and we have so much to be thankful for. In May I am often feeling gratitude for the new/closer relationships I've developed throughout the school year with the students in my preschool class, the kids' friends, the students in whichever class I've volunteered in that year, my coworkers, teachers, friends, other parents, and this year, the Chinese kids I teach as well. I have thoroughly enjoyed getting to know so many new faces and there is a bittersweetness, as I won't see some once school/work ends.
Happenings since I last posted…
Pretty weather= flying your homemade kite
Getting passionate about our new school board candidates. Julia insisted on writing her vote for her friend's mom on the postcard. She thought she was running for president and then said, "Oh yeah, I guess Lucinda would have told me sooner."
Sleepovers are the constant yearning of our kids these days…our weekends often revolve around their social time these days!
Lacrosse, lacrosse, and more lacrosse. We are finishing up a spring league and starting a summer league at the same time. Loving watching the boys and thankful for friends joining them to cut down on the driving and make it more fun too!
End of year means the little ones at preschool visit the big playground so I get to see Allie here and there.
Loving our yard and all the blooms. Julia loves picking the flowers and putting them in her and Allie’s hair.
Science night at Cameron Park! Just me and the girls while the rest went to lacrosse, but we had a good time and enjoyed seeing some friends too.
Mile Run Showdown for Gray. He was in the top 15 boys in the school so he got to run in this final race. Speedy. Love seeing his friends by his side to cheer him on!
Eno River visit and even Raven got to come and try to drag Matt around when she spotted a fellow canine. Meanwhile, Joshua was enjoying two birthday parties in one day!
Allie and a friend at church playing the piano. We also had a nice potluck lunch and enjoyed being out in the beautiful weather and catching up with friends.
This past week, Gray and I got to go on his 3 day 4H camp field trip. I was mostly looking forward to this because Matt had a good time last year and because I was tired of getting up so early and managing everything at home. It did not let me down! We had such a good time and were sad to see it end. It was really interesting going to all of the classes. I learned how to measure the height of really tall trees, how to use leaves and a classification book to identify trees, how to use a compass, classification of bugs, and more. I think as a preschool teacher I have grow to love learning even more and I was often thinking, "I'm going to teach that to my students!" I had time to chat with parents a good bit too on this trip. It was good to catch up with friends I've known a few years but don't see for more than a few minutes at a time these days. I met a few new parents and got to know Gray's teacher as well, as we shared a cabin and lots of laughs this trip.
Our cabin held girls who were mostly from Gray's class, some of which I knew and some I didn't. They were characters and I loved hanging out with them and watching their little personalities come out. One brought three hairbrushes and spray that the girls insisted had made their hair grow after the first night there! There was A LOT of hair doing in our cabin. One was so calm and collected that she expertly squeezed out and extracted a huge and deeply buried splinter from her friend's foot that I couldn't get out. One was always making little jokes and making everyone laugh. A couple would get scared at night and end up sharing a tiny bed. One girl I knew from Kids’ Night Out but haven’t seen as much lately. She came quite often when she was in kindergarten/1st grade so it was neat to be with her and see her all grown up.
I didn't sleep too well with all the snoring, coughing, metal water bottle dropping on the concrete floor, but it was still nice to not have to wake up so early.
During the day, I was with a group of 17 boys and girls from Gray's class. Gray loved the classes, especially the bug one and ones that required math. The kids were pretty good and I got to know a few boys that enjoyed walking with me from place to place and talking my ears off. I also met some new kids at meal time, when we were encouraged to sit with a variety of children. There are some stinkers in the group, but they are still pretty nice and fun kids...just can't stop talking/moving/making chaos wherever they go. It was nice to hear from the counselors how much they enjoyed our school's visit and that even the troublemakers were pretty respectful kids.
The counselors also often mentioned how fortunate our school is to have so much parent support because other schools would like to do overnight trips but don’t have enough parents to come. This reinforces my belief that using our resources well includes supporting our public schools so all kids can get a good education and have a bright future. Should those of us parents that are better connected with more financial resources pull out of Cameron Park for schools we think are better for our kids, the school would not be able to do things like send the kids on these experiences, not to mention the stress the teachers would be under for lack of support. It is hard to be a parent and hard to know what is right. I am thankful things have gone relatively well for my kids so far, so that it’s not too difficult a decision to stick with our public schools.
Gray mostly stuck with his best buddies in the group, though it was funny that towards the end he would say he didn’t want to be partners with these two because they argue too much. Ahem. Hopefully he was implicating himself as part of the issue! Anyway, I convinced him to give it a try the last class and they should all just try to control their emotions a bit better. They managed just fine as we went tearing through the woods trying to find the words to a quote taped on various trees that we had to find with our compasses. I’m not the “tearing through the woods” kind of girl, so it was good for me to get outside my comfort zone this trip. Truly, in spite of the bugs and snake worries and lack of sleep, I was just so happy to be there, having little to focus on but nature, relationships, and eating! What a nice break from the day-to-day stuff. Big thanks to Matt’s parents for keeping the other kids since Matt had to work. Everyone seemed to manage just fine!
And to finish off the weekend, the pool opened so we checked it out. Some of us from farther away than others. :) Allie did warm up to dipping her cup in but it was much too cold for her!
Next up, I finish my last two weeks of teaching. Dr. Seuss, Wacky Wednesday, Water Day, FUN! Going to miss my sweet kiddos. Gray, Joshua, and Julia have 5 more weeks of school, filled with review, testing, field day, lacrosse, graduation (Gray), choosing next year classes (Gray's doing BAND and CHORUS!), end of school parties and award ceremonies and I'm sure lots of friend time. We also look forward to a Memorial Day weekend visit from the Moores!! Good times ahead.
