Two weeks down.

This week at Big School:

Josh drew a self-portrait while observing himself in the mirror. I think (of course) that his was one of the best in his class! His teachers put copies up on the wall outside the classroom. I will try and take a picture tomorrow so you can see that I am not completely biased about that. 

EDIT: Here is his finished portrait

And these are some of the others:

They made a class graph of everyone's names organized by the number of letters in each.

They read The Very Hungry Caterpillar by Eric Carle. It was one of Josh's very first favorites (thanks, Grandma Katie). Then they experimented with colors and patterns by making caterpillar pictures.

They learned about the number zero.

One definition of zero

Is the mathematical value

Between positive and negative values

They Might Be Giants taught me that.

They made an Age Collage. Josh chose three popsicle sticks and three blue feathers. Blue is his favorite color, by the way. And this was also picture day! Can't wait to see how they turn out.

In his Mandarin class they learned some new songs and I was really amazed to hear him randomly sing them to himself throughout the week! I convinced him to let me take a short video. I will try to link it. http://youtu.be/EWAJe_yPe5o

The newsletter this week said that the results of the previous years Mandarin comprehension exams showed that all 20 of the pre-k students not only passed - a passing grade is 120, they all scored above 166 and two students even achieved perfect scores! My suspicion is they were already Mandarin speakers though, but I am planning to ask. 

Josh also got to meet the Librarian and was excited to point her out to me the next day when we saw her in the hall. I don't know her name though, because he called her "the library guy," but she remembered his name, which I found impressive.

Friday was the first home football game of the year, so all the students and teachers wore their school tee shirts. I really wanted to take him to the football game, but kickoff was at 7, and we have been trying to stick to the schedule as much as possible.

Here are a few shots of his classmates, he is in the background of each of these:

Violet (she has a twin brother in the other class and on older brother in kindergarten this year).

Lucas

Tessa and Violet. Josh is in the time-out chair. When I asked him why he said that he was playing too rough, I am so not surprised.

Tessa again, she has the first class birthday and turns 4 this week! Josh's will be the next birthday we celebrate in the classroom.

Another photo of Laney.

Josh and Lucas on the slide.

He loves his big school! At dinner, we have a family tradition that we each get to say what our favorite part of the day was. Tonight Josh said his favorite part of today was big school... It's Sunday. I am so glad he is thinking happy thoughts about his days at school. On Friday, I said that I was going to meet him for lunch and bring him home to take his nap. He immediately protested and said that he wanted to stay at big school the whole day!  

I guess all that time worrying that he wouldn't handle a full time program was not necessary. That is a wonderful thing!

Bonus: 

For those of you who made it through that entire post, this is a clip of Josh singing his favorite new song... http://youtu.be/T0KqBpGeJzA

Big School!

Since making the decision in February to send Josh to preschool this year, I have had extremely mixed feelings. I am so happy to admit that after his first full week, I could not be more certain that we have made a fantastic choice for him. Josh is naturally outgoing and quite extroverted (gets that from his father, for sure)! He has needed more daily interaction than I have been able to offer - all my character voices sound basically the same, and I am not nearly imaginative enough. He made fast friends on the first day, and he is noticeably thriving in his new surroundings!

Here are some photos that his teachers uploaded to the class website today:

This is Kipton - Josh's number one new buddy. Josh loved making this cloud painting and told me all about dipping the sponge into the paint before pressing it to the paper!

A sandbox inside the classroom - how cool is that!?

That is Miss Jodi, one of his teachers. I love how approachable and confident she is. I am amazed at her multitasking skills, and look forward to getting to know her better as the year goes on.

This is Laney (short for Delaney) and she is one of Josh's friends that he met over the summer. She is observing Big Red, the class Beta fish - Josh is building a shelter in the background.

And by the way - how have I never heard of a Promethean board before?? That's one on the back wall.

The best part of this whole week has been the conversations Josh and I have in the car on the drive to and from school. It's about a 23 min drive and I park so that I can walk him in/meet him at his classroom. Eventually I will let him hop in and out at the curb (maybe), but for now I really enjoy getting those extra moments with him.

On the drive the first day our conversation went sort of like this:

Josh: Tell me a story about Grandpa when he was a baby.

Me: One time Grandpa played a trick on his sister and told her that a ghost named George lived in their closet.

Josh: But that was when Grandpa was a baby in your tummy?

Me: Grandpa wasn't a baby in my tummy, I was Grandpa's baby. You were the baby in my tummy.

Josh: So you were a baby in Grandpa's tummy??

Me: No, babies are only in tummies of mommies - I was a baby in Marmee's tummy.

Josh: Oh. Well how do babies get out of the mommy's tummy?

Me: Well, when babies are born they come out of the mommy's tummy.

Josh: I know that already, but HOW do they come out?

Me: (nervously) Um... Well, there is this place called the birth canal... And when babies are born they go through it. (I know... What a terrible answer, but this was the last conversation I expected to have on the morning of the first day of Pre-preschool...)

Josh: But where is it?

Me: Um... It's inside of mommies... 

I can't remember how I managed to change the subject, but somehow I was able to distract him from this line of questioning. Needless to say, I was ill prepared for that discussion. Going forward, I have to prepare discussion topics in advance!

Here is a snapshot of his sweet little face that I hurriedly took the morning of his first full day of Pre-preschool. I love that he was holding on tight to his beloved Mellobear. He gets to nap with Mellobear everyday.

Oh, and he really loved that spikey hair! He pointed it out to every person we encountered as we walked to class.

And a couple more for good measure:

I'm invisible, you know.

Throughout most of March and April, Josh's response to my expressions of caution regarding dangerous things (like falling into the freezing cold pool) has been, "It's okay, mommy. I'm invisible, you know." 

I thought he was trying to say that he didn't have to be concerned about danger because since he is invisible the danger can't see him so obviously he would be perfectly safe.

 One night, however, while he and Drew were playing ninjas I heard Drew say, "you can't get me - I'm inVINCEable!" To which Josh replied, "I'm invisible too, you know!"

Your Mom Goes to....

Epcot!

We had breakfast with Belle and some of her Royal Pals in Norway. We did not get to see Anna and Elsa because the wait was 4 hours... and I was not gonna do that. We did catch a glimpse of Anna from inside one of the gift shops though. 

I managed to get a couple cell phone shots as the other princesses came to our table. I apologize for the poor quality. Josh was quite shy, which was surprising since he seemed to be so not shy with the other characters. Sleeping Beauty was super cute while trying to get him to warm up, but I have to say Ariel was my favorite.

So adorable!

Sneaking a peak...

Josh was hiding behind my chair. There was an elephant on his shirt and the elephants trunk was raised up over its head. She was explaining to him that when the elephants come swimming with her, they raise their trunks up like that so they can breathe while they're under the water. I thought it was very clever of her, but Josh wasn't as impressed. P.s. Drew happened to be wearing an elephant shirt that day too!

Happy Birthday, Marmee!

My sisters and I went in together to cover admission for my mom as her birthday gift. We were a day early, but she was driving back to GA the next morning. Josh was quite uncooperative for this photo op, but at least we managed to get this shot. I was really glad to have the chance to spend some time with my mom in her favorite park. It was a gorgeous day, and we got to relax and enjoy Napoleons (her favorite pastry) at the bakery in France. I hope it was a memorable birthday for her!

Outside the French bakery. 

The Florida Cousins

We are lucky enough to live next door to the Hales and the Wilsons here in Memphis. Since they are cousins, they often talk about going to "the cousins house" or having movie night with "the cousins" and Josh thinks of these dear friends as his very own cousins. (I do too)...

 But, he was incredibly excited to get to spend a bit of face time with some of his biological cousins during our Disney trip - these guys, and the Utah cousins!

Drew's sisters live in FL and were crazy awesome enough to drive 4+ hours to meet us for a late lunch at Animal Kingdom. Melissa (on the right) and her youngest, Cason, have season passes, but Marcy (left) and her youngest, Havyn, don't. So they weren't even sure if they would be able to join us in the park. Don't tell anyone, but we were able to get Havyn in by using the pass of one of Melissa's other kids. Melissa also happened to have a 10-day no expiration Park Hopper pass that she randomly found on a previous trip to Magic Kingdom. She had held onto it "just in case" and it actually still had 5 days available! Marcy was able to use it and we got to spend some extra time together. We also convinced them to stay over that night and go with us to Magic Kingdom the next day! We had such a blast.

The sibs went for a grown up ride while the kiddos and I spent some time together digging in the Boneyard. I happen to go way back with that place. I spent many hours digging there while working as part of the Paleontology Staff during my semester in the Disney College Program.

Marcy is a Kindergarten teacher, and just before they left to drive down she fell on the playground at school and gave herself a nice shiner! I did my best to photoshop it out, but I'm an amateur. She looks lovely anyway! Havyn and Cason were such perfect little darlings, and I am jealous of how well behaved they are. Melissa and Marcy need to write a parenting book! By the way, this is one of the rare times we manged to get Josh to look at the camera and smile simultaneously.

 

The boys got to hang out with Buzz.

 Recently, we were at the mall and saw the Easter Bunny. Josh said he didn't need to get a picture with him because he already took pictures with him at Disney World... haha!

The Harmony Barber Shop on Main St. will style hair and add pixie dust for just $5! We got Josh's hair cut there, but he wasn't happy with the experience (he never is...) so we got as far as the spiked up style, but no pixie dust. Cason and Havyn both loved it, but the photographer didn't get any shots of Havyn. She looked totally cute though!

I think I have a similarly posed photo of these three taken about 10 years ago. We need to make sure it isn't another 10 years before the next one, okay!?

These two cousins were SO adorable. It is awesome that they are such good buddies. I wish that Josh could spend more time with them and all of his other cousins regularly. Too sweet!

As we were leaving the Magic Kingdom to say goodbye to the Aunts and the cousins, we just happened to run into this little lady. What a special surprise!

Josh was just waking up from a nap and tired of having his picture taken, so he missed out on the Tinkerbell photo op. But these two certainly made this a charming encounter.

I had such a delightful time getting to visit with Melissa and Marcy! We did a lot of laughing and day dreaming about future family reunion trips to Walt Disney World. I also loved getting to know my niece and nephew, and Josh had a ball with them. I am so thankful that those two wild and wonderful sisters decided we were worth the crazy amount of drive time it took for them to come see us!