Samantha's Kindergarten Graduation and Last Week of School Before Summer

Samantha: 72 Months, Week 4

Aedan: 37 Months, Week 2

With this being the last week of school, we had a lot of fun things going on throughout the week. On Tuesday all the kindergartners had a celebration field trip at Sherman Park. We left for the park shortly after arriving at school, and the plan was to spend most of the morning there, have a picnic lunch, and then most kids would be picked up at the park to be taken back home. All the kids had a wonderful time running around and playing at the park that morning. It was beautiful outside, perfect weather to enjoy time outside. Ben came to the park with Aedan as well, and I mostly posted myself near the edge of the cliff where some of the boys were digging and playing in the sand. I wanted to make sure they didn't get too far down the hill, as we weren't allowing the kids to go down on the beach near the water. We went under the sheltered area for the kids to eat lunch and shortly after that Ben took Aedan and Samantha back home for the afternoon. I went back to school with the other teachers and paras to do some work in preparation for kindergarten graduation that evening.

Samantha was very, very excited for graduation that night. She had been practicing her songs every day for weeks now and knew all the words by heart. I was so excited to watch her perform, and of course I was extremely proud of how much she had learned and grown throughout her year in kindergarten. I kind of had to do double duty as a parent and employee that night. We got there a little early so that Ben could find good seats and so I could help all the kindergartners get their caps and gowns on. Once everyone was up on the stage ready to go, I didn't have too much of a job anymore, so I took a seat out in the audience so I could watch Samantha sing and take a video of her performance. They did four different songs. The first was a march led by Mr. McBride, a song sung to the tune of the Addams Family theme song, a little finger play poem called "Five Spring Flowers", and then a song called "Ready to Go." Some of these videos are slight repeats of each other because Ben and I were both recording from opposite sides of the gymnasium. However, as I was recording, my phone ended up running out of storage space, so I had to stop recording. At the beginning Samantha has a little bit of a grumpy face because the boy next to her accidentally poked her in the eye with the corner of his graduation cap. But as soon as the music started, she got right into it. I love how she knew all the words and the motions, and she was trying so hard to stay with Mrs. Wilkinson, the music teacher, who was leading the songs. I also love how she danced along to the "Ready to Go" song at the end, bopping along to the rhythm of the song and smiling. She seems to be a natural performer, not really having fear of being on the stage in front of people. Maybe we need to get her into more acting/music classes and performances. I could see Samantha really enjoying being a part of a local theater production or something like that. Anyways, here are some great pictures and videos of Samantha's kindergarten performance.

After singing their songs, it was time to hand out the kindergarten diplomas. I realize that having a graduation from kindergarten is a little silly, but I was pretty proud of my little girl as she walked across the stage to receive her diploma. She loved her teacher, Mr. McBride, and his personality was perfect for her, just the right mix of silliness and seriousness. I'm sure she will remember him and his impact as her first teacher for years to come.

Here are some pictures of our little kindergarten graduate with her cap, gown, and diploma. :)

After filing out of the gymnasium and getting their graduation attire taken off, the kids got some cookies and water to drink. Then, we took the chance to get Samantha's picture taken with her kindergarten person that she made as well as with her teachers, Mrs. Corbiere and Mr. McBride. I thought about not including all the pictures of her and her teachers, but they were too expressive and indicative of his personality and his interaction with her. One of his goals for Samantha back in January when she transferred to his class was for her to come out of her shell a little, to become more confident and even more out-spoken. I really appreciated him saying that because I can see that part of her personality being a lot like mine; however, I want her to feel confident in herself and her abilities, I want her to feel comfortable being smart and knowing the right answer, I want her to not be shy and not be afraid to challenge herself and do things that may be scary or difficult at first. I really feel like he helped her come out of her shell. In fact, he also made a comment that she may have taken it a little too far out at times, dishing out the sarcasm and jokes just as much as he would give them to her. You can see the fun way they would interact through the succession of pictures. What a fun way for her to end her year in kindergarten! :)

Even though Samantha had her graduation on Tuesday evening, she had to go back to school on Wednesday for a regular school day. In fact, there was even one kindergartner who was confused on where to go when they came in to school on Wednesday morning. I think they honestly thought that they would be in a first grade class since they had graduated the night before.

Thursday was another half day of school for Samantha with field day lasting most of the morning. Again, we had perfect weather for it, and they had all the games set up really well for the kids to rotate through that morning. They were more simple games for the kindergartners, like ball and frisbee toss, bear and crab walks, a filling the barrel with water game, and other things like that. They were all easy games to learn and explain, and the kids were all having a great time playing and having fun. Samantha decided to take the bus home that day since I stayed at school to help Ms. Cornwell get things wrapped up around the classroom for the end of the year. She hadn't been on the bus for awhile since I worked there and she would just get picked up after school with me, so she was excited about being able to ride with her friends again. That afternoon Samantha got a hold of Ben's phone and took a whole bunch of really silly pictures of herself. She cracks me up, so I had to include a good assortment of them.

Friday, June 9 was a big day as it was Samantha's and my last day of school. It was just a half day, mostly with finishing up activities, cleaning, and packing up. At Bahweting they send the kids off with playing the song, "School's Out for Summer" as the kids walk out of the building and then as the buses pull away, all the teachers stood on the sidewalk and blew bubbles. Samantha got to help blow some bubbles and enjoyed being a part of the action. However, as soon as the buses pulled away, I think the realization of what was going on finally started to settle in. She leaned into me and started crying. She was really sad that school was over, and she was especially sad about not being in Mr. McBride's class anymore. She gave both Mr. McBride and Mrs. Corbiere hugs five or six different times before leaving that afternoon. She just couldn't get enough of a good-bye in. In face, Mr. McBride said, "Don't you start crying now, or you will make me cry, too!" Samantha loved her year in kindergarten. She grew, she was challenged, she was loved and cared for, and she thrived. I'm so glad that Samantha's first experience in school was so successful even though I was worried how it would go before the year even started. Samantha is looking forward to another good year in first grade.

I have to share this picture below because it was a present I received on the last day of school. It is a cake decorated like a hamburger from the aunt of the student that punched me in the stomach a month or so ago. He was running when he was carrying the cake and he tripped and fell which caused it to smush a little inside the container. I thought it was pretty funny that she wanted to get me (and my family) a whole cake for putting up with her nephew for the year. It was a sweet, but hilarious gesture.

We decided to celebrate the beginning of our summer vacation by going on a family trip together on Saturday. Since we have a state park pass, there are a lot of places that we can get into for free. It was supposed to be a nice day, so we decided to head to Tahquamenon Falls State Park on Saturday. However, as we started driving there, the rain chances greatly increased. We thought we would miss the rain, but more popped up. Since we were already almost to the falls, we didn't want to turn around and go back, so we decided to go to the Shipwreck Museum instead. We had always wanted to visit that place and took advantage of the rainy weather to do an indoor activity.

However, when we arrived in the parking lot and got out of the car, we were immediately met with a swarm of mosquitoes. Because of the rain and being so close to the water, the mosquitoes were really bad. We couldn't get bug spray on us fast enough, and even with bug spray we had to keep swatting mosquitoes away from our face and off our body. After paying for our entry into the museum, we walked around a little bit and followed the boardwalk down toward the water. It's amazing to live so close to Lake Superior. It's beautiful, big, but also can be very unpredictable, as we learned about while discovering more about all the shipwrecks that have happened in the waters of Lake Superior.

The shipwreck museum was really well done. We got to see the living quarters of the lighthouse keeper, watch a little show, and see a museum with a description of the Edmund Fitzgerald. Samantha heard about this shipwreck at school and was really interested in learning more about it. We spent a couple hours there, and it was definitely worth the visit.

Once we were done at the museum, the weather had cleared up and we decided to head to Tahquamenon Falls after all, eat our picnic lunch, and walk around a little bit. Aedan and I went with Chicago Grandpa and Grandma last fall, but he hadn't been there since then. It was fun to walk around, enjoy the beautiful weather, and experience a fun family day trip. Here are some pictures from our afternoon together at the falls.

We were all pretty tired from our day out. We brought blankets for the kids so they could nap in the car, and it didn't take very long for them to fall asleep. I tried desperately to keep my eyes open as well, but I didn't last very long before I fell asleep as well.

The rest of the evening we spent just hanging out and the kids played outside quite a bit because it still was so beautiful outside. I filled up Aedan's water table, and he really enjoyed splashing and playing in the water. Izzy enjoyed trying to get at the water as well. It's fun seeing the two of them interact.

On Sunday we had a pretty typical morning with church. Ben ended up staying for the second service to lead the small group for the 4th and 5th graders so the kids came back to the house with me and then we went back to pick Daddy up after he was done. While the kids and I were at home we did a couple things around the house and started working on lunch. That afternoon a storm was approaching the eastern U.P. and right at the end of Aedan's nap, the power went off. It was strange when it went off because the storm hadn't even reached us yet. We decided to take advantage of our time to go outside before it rained, and we actually ended up wandering over to our neighbor's house because they were playing outside in their back yard. Samantha loves to play with our neighbors any chance she can get, and sometimes stalks them a little too much by always noticing them when they are playing outside and wanting to join them. They have a fun play set in their backyard with a swing and slide, so she had a lot of fun playing on that. After awhile, we decided Aedan was awake from his nap, probably because of the power going off, meaning his sound machine went off as well. Aedan was also very excited to be able to go to our neighbor's house to play. The kids all had a fun time climbing, sliding, and swinging, until the dark clouds got too close, we started hearing thunder, and we felt light sprinkles of rain. Once back safely in our house, we tried to figure out what we were going to do for dinner. We really had nothing to eat, and we couldn't cook anything on the stove or microwave since the power was out. However, most of the town was probably out of power as well, so we thought about going over to Canada to go out to eat. But then, about 5:00, our power turned back on again. We waited awhile to see if it was just a fluke, but it seemed like it was going to stay on, so we started making our eggplant pasta dish for dinner. We had the eggplant cooked and the tomatoes ready to go when the power went back out again. We had no idea how long it would be out for, and it was already 5:30, so we decided to get in the car and drive around our town to see if the power was out everywhere, and if we'd have to cross over the International Bridge to have dinner. However, it seemed like quite a few businesses along the business road were still open, so we decided to have Buffalo Wild Wings for dinner that night. Wings always go over well with Daddy, and they have a pretty good selection of kids meals.

When we got back home our power was still out, but luckily it stays light enough outside in the U.P. that we were able to get the kids tucked into bed without needing flashlights or anything. We hoped that the power being out wouldn't bother them too much in falling asleep. Situations like this make it difficult when our kids are used to sleeping with sound machines and fans on. They aren't used to falling asleep in a quiet room, possibly hearing the noises from Ben and I (and Izzy) out in the living room. However, shortly after they were in bed, the power turned back on again. Ben went into their rooms to check and make sure they didn't have any random lights left on. Samantha was already fast asleep, snoring away, not even noticing that the power turned back on or that her closet light was on. Aedan, on the other hand, was not asleep yet, but was very excited when his sound machine and ceiling fan turned back on. When Daddy went in to check on his light situation, Aedan said, "They came and fixed my fan for me!" We were all glad to have our power back.

It was definitely a different feel being home on Monday and not going to school. Ben took advantage of his time to go to campus and get some work done before leaving for our vacation on Thursday morning. The house needed to be cleaned, so I decided getting that done before leaving would be a good idea. Samantha and Aedan played with Legos fairly nicely for much of the morning, and then after awhile I put on the Trolls movie for them to watch so that I could get more done without having to worry about them fighting or arguing or Izzy attacking them while they were playing.

Daddy did take the kids on a quick trip to Meijer to pick up a few things to get through the rest of the week at home before leaving for vacation. Here are the kids riding on Sandy.

Throughout the morning, I was talking back and forth with Christy about a play set that was for sale on a local online site for Naperville, right around where Christy and Matthew live. I have been looking at play sets on and off for the last year, since moving into our new house, because I know the kids would really love having something like that in our back yard. However, I didn't want to pay hundreds of dollars for a new one, but I also wanted a nice enough one that they could enjoy it for awhile and not outgrow it right away. I found this one in the picture below being sold for $100. I thought that was a great deal, and it looked really nice and in pretty good condition. We were able to contact the owner, and Christy and Matthew were willing to go check it out, take it apart, and bring it up for us the next time they come visit this summer. Hopefully, we can figure out how to put it all back together again. :)

(Blog about June 6-12, 2017)

Fun In and Around Sault Ste. Marie

Samantha: 72 Months, Week 3
Aedan: 37 Months, Week 1

It was definitely nice having Memorial Day off from school this week. Going back on Tuesday didn't seem too bad because I knew I only had two weeks left of school. The end was near and the next two weeks had special events sprinkled throughout which I knew would help the days pass by quickly. On Tuesday, Ben returned some library books that were due, and Aedan decided he wanted to stay and play for awhile. He was enjoying himself there, especially since he hadn't been there for awhile. I will have to get the kids back there sometime to get them signed up for the summer reading program and to check out some new books since we now no longer have any books from the library.

Tuesday was a normal day of school, but on Wednesday we had a special bowling trip with our fourth grade reading buddies. However, in the morning there was just a lot of misbehavior. The kids and the schedule at school was crazy, and our own kids were pretty tired in the evening from fun, full days. However, with each passing day, I was more and more ready for a break, ready for summer to start.

Ben had a more low-key morning with the boys on Wednesday. They played at home. Ben took them to Meijer to pick up a couple things that we needed, and then he took them to lunch at McDonald's. They both ate their food really well and were then able to play for awhile together. Aedan napped really well the day before, but it took some work to get him calmed down enough to sleep that Wednesday afternoon. Every once in awhile he will refuse to nap, but not very often. He is a really good napper, which I am so grateful for. Samantha was terrible at napping consistently when she was three years old. Now if this wonderful napping can only continue on for awhile, especially once our new little boy arrives in mid-September.

Thursday was a normal day of school in the morning, followed by an exciting afternoon. All the kindergarten classes were going to ride the buses over to Project Playground to play and enjoy the beautiful, sunny afternoon playing outside with their friends. I found out that the lady I had lined up to watch Izzy for us while we are on vacation wasn't able to watch her any more, so I began frantically scrambling to find someone else to watch her for the two and half weeks while we are gone on vacation. I called a few places, posted on a couple Facebook groups that I am a part of, and hoped that something would turn up soon as we were only two weeks away from leaving to drive down to Upland.

Ben and Aedan had a fun day just hanging out and playing. They went to the bank, but Aedan just loves to play outside in our backyard. Izzy likes playing out in the back yard with Aedan just as much. Ben sent me a message saying how well Aedan and Izzy get along. Aedan loves her, and it is so nice being able to let them just play in the back yard together without much need to interject. Aedan has gotten so much more comfortable around dogs; it's amazing. Back just a few months ago he was afraid to go near a dog, and now he is perfectly fine with Izzy getting up in his face and licking him. She often will jump in his bed and try to steal his teddy bear which he calls Happy Bear now. Every once in awhile he will be in a grumpy mood or Izzy will be particularly jumpy, making Aedan cry and scream for Izzy to get down and leave him alone, but those instances are few and far between. I am glad that we got Izzy when we did. I think she will be a perfect dog for our family, and with her growing up with the kids, they will know each other well, and we won't have any issues with snappiness like we did with Roscoe.

This was a busy week with things wrapping up at school, but for some reason I didn't seem to take many pictures during the week. However, Ben did take some cute pictures of Aedan when they went out together on Friday. He wasn't sure exactly what he was going to do, but after doing the weekly grocery shopping, Ben decided to take Aedan out to the Point Iroquois Lighthouse. They were able to climb up inside the lighthouse this time, which Aedan found to be interesting. Look at that gorgeous view of the lake behind him! He makes some silly faces when we attempt to take pictures of him. :)

Aedan and Daddy spent time walking around the boardwalk, playing down on the beach, and throwing rocks into the water. Here are some more pictures of their morning together.

On Friday our special event of the day at school was the last drum dance social of the year called Jingtamook. This is a big deal at JKL Bahweting, and Samantha was really looking forward to it. The weather was perfect for it, allowing them to set up for it outside. They had special guests and an announcer, chairs set up in a circle with a couple large drums in the middle, and they even let the kids have snow cones as a special treat. Samantha sat by me for a lot of the time. For some reason she didn't seem to want to dance that day, but was just happy sitting next to me or even cuddling on my lap. Toward the end, she finally decided to don a scarf and dance around the circle for a little while, so I was able to get this little video of her dancing at the Jingtamook.

On Saturday and Sunday, there was a fun opportunity for us with there being a free weekend for many of the tourist locations around town. As long as you had identification showing that you lived in town, you were allowed to get free tickets for the Soo Locks Boat Tour, the Tower of History, the River of History Museum, and the Museum Ship Valley Camp. Many of these things we wanted to do regardless, but we weren't too keen on spending a lot of money to take the whole family to something we weren't sure they would find tremendously interesting. So once we discovered we could do these things for free, we were eager to take advantage of the opportunity.

Ben looked up the schedule for the boat tour and discovered that the first boat was scheduled to leave at 10:00, so we decided to get there a little before that time to get tickets and get in line for the the first boat. We got there in plenty of time, and we had beautiful weather. Do you see that beautiful blue sky? The boat tour was a lot of fun and lasted about two hours. It was a little difficult keeping the kids interested and involved the whole time, but we got to go on the upper and lower deck, watch a freighter pass us by, and watch the boat go up and down in the locks. We were amazed at how quickly we were raised and lowered as we went through the locks. The tour took us over to the steel plant across the river in Canada, and we were even able to come back through the Canadian locks. Ben and I found the tour very interesting, and we were really glad we took the chance to do it as a family.

The boat ride was over around noon, and we debated what to do next since it was lunch time and the boys needed to take naps that afternoon. However, we figured it would be quick and easy to visit the Tower of History. We got to get in for free and took the elevator ride up to the top. Again, this was a something we wanted to do, but we didn't really want to pay a lot of money just to ride up to the top. The kids thought it was pretty interesting because the tower stands out so much in town. It was pretty windy up at the top, and Samantha and Aedan were pretending like the wind was knocking them over. Here was the view from the top. It was pretty cool getting this perspective of our town.

Since the boys were getting tired, we decided against stopping for lunch somewhere. We just went home and had leftovers before getting the boys down for their naps. Luckily, we got them to nap, but they didn't sleep as well or as long as usual. We just let Samantha have quiet time in her room. Unless she is super tired, up really late, or feeling sick, it's better not to make her nap because then she has a harder time falling asleep at night.

After dinner that evening, we decided to head out to the Locks Park to walk around for awhile and let the kids run around the park, explore, play, and let Samantha climb trees. We made our way over to this stairway where the kids found tons of little caterpillars. The kids played with caterpillars for a long time, and I was so proud of Aedan for being willing to let the caterpillars crawl around on his hands. Normally he is pretty afraid of bugs, but since he saw Samantha playing with them and not being afraid, he decided they were pretty fun to play with himself. At one point Samantha had seven or eight crawling around on her hand. I love just watching the kids explore like this. After being cooped up and feeling like the winter was so long, I love finally being able to spend time outdoors. I love these pictures of the kids. They were so proud of their caterpillars. :)

Sunday was another day where you could take advantage of free things around town, so after going to church in the morning and having an early lunch and nap time, we decided to go to the Museum Ship Valley Camp before it closed at 5:00. It was an old freighter ship that they turned into a museum, and again, we got to visit it for free, so we figured even if we didn't spend much time there, we wouldn't be losing anything. It actually really surprised us with how neat it was. They had a lot of exhibits and information. There was a scavenger hunt with questions for the kids to find the answers to as you toured around the museum, so I asked Samantha if she would like to do that. I knew doing something like that would be fun for her, and it would help hold her attention and keep her interested in learning and discovering instead of racing through the museum. We walked all around the ship, both on the inside and on the top deck. We saw the engine room, as well as where all the crew and captain would live, work, and sleep. The kids found it all pretty interesting, and we ended up staying at the museum for close to two hours. I'm definitely glad we came to check it out. Samantha really finds learning new things exciting, and she really was interested to hear about the Edmund Fitzgerald that sank. I love her curiosity for the world. It's so fun now that she's getting to an age where we can really engage with her about things like this, and she will actually remember what she learns.

June 5 was the start of the last week of school. I was so ready for school to be over and was thrilled that it was finally almost the end, that it was almost summertime. That Monday I was the main teacher in the classroom because Ms. Cornwell was gone on a trip for her son's graduation. There was another sub coming in my place to help me out, which I was grateful for. It's nice to even just have an extra person to help with any problems that may arise. I wasn't particularly looking forward to being the one in charge for the day, especially since there weren't very well laid out plans, but I knew I could do it. I had trouble with one student right off the bat because he didn't take his medicine since the nurse ran out in her office. She had already notified the mom about needing more medicine, and she hadn't brought any in for him yet. However, he was being very disrespectful and disruptive to the rest of the class, so I had to take him down to the dean during writer's workshop. I sent a message to his mom, and she actually brought some in for him shortly after that, making our afternoon together much better. The day actually went pretty well, and I felt like they did work pretty quietly and were respectful to me. It helped to remember how much I like being in charge of my own classroom and how you can shape the behavior of the students through your presence, interaction, and expectation of the students. It has been a good experience being a paraprofessional for the last five and a half months, but when I decide to go back to work full time, I'm pretty sure I will want to enter back in as a classroom teacher in charge of my own classroom.

(Blog about May 30-June 5, 2017)