Two Cute Ollie Stories

Yesterday we went to Target. While we were shopping there was a group of people from Invision which is a local center for mentally handicapped people. One of the women in the group saw Oliver and fell in love with him. She came over to him in the cart and tried to say hi to him but Oliver just ignored her. I asked Oliver to show the woman the new car he picked out and he said, "No. Want get out of here." which made everyone laugh. The woman and I tried a few more times to get Oliver to comply but he just didn't want to talk to a stranger. We started to walk away and got halfway down the aisle when Ollie burst into tears. I asked him what was wrong and he said, "Want show lady my car! I ready!". So I pushed him back over to the woman and Oliver had a nice little conversation with her about his new car.

When we got home Oliver had to add his new car to his bucket full of cars. When he did so he realized that he now had two Maters (Mater is a character from the Disney movie "Cars"). He looked at both of them and said, "6,7,8 Maters! Give one to Emma." and he proceeded to hand his brand new car that he had just picked out at Target to his sister. For this story to be special you need to know just how possesive Oliver is with his bucket of cars. He can't even sleep unless it is in his bed with him! It was a big deal for him to give Emma one of his cars. Especially his brand new one.

Someone's Turning 3 This Month

This is his dream present:



He is OBSESSED with the Disney movie "Cars" and when he first saw this bed online one night he positively lit up. Bad thing is that it costs $300. Plus $100 shipping. Really, really expensive but possibly doable. Maybe.

If anyone is interested in helping to get Oliver the bed, let me know ASAP and then I can determine if this is something that we can do or if I need to come up with a more reasonable Plan B for the Boy's birthday!

International Night

Well, I have decided I need a telephoto lens for my camera. None of the photos of the performance turned out very good. And in our classic style, we ran out of video tape less than halfway through the performance. Good news is that we can order copies of the performance from the school district and they should be really nice, professional copies.

After the kids sang, we headed to Emma's classroom where she showed us a "suitcase" she had made filled with all kinds of Australia projects.

Emma says, "International Night was fun. My favorite part was singing. It was fun when we played before we went on stage. The kids in our class were being so funny. We made koalas and we made kangaroos for our hats."

Emma's Report Card

Click the picture below to view Emma's most recent report card. We are pretty proud of our girl!

100 Days of Kindergarten

Not only was last Friday "Pajama Day" it was also the 100th Day of Kindergarten. Emma's class celebrated by making "I Survived 100 Days of Kindergarten" crowns and necklaces with 100 Fruit Loops strung on them. They wrote about what they would do with $100 and drew pictures of what they would look like when they are 100 years old. Emma was positively bursting with excitement when I picked her up on Friday. I think it may have been one of the best days of kindergarten yet!

Pictures

Just some quick pix I took today. Notice Ollie's haircut and in the lower left photo you can see the bump on his noggin that he got on Saturday after running full speed into a door. He is going through a major accident-prone phase lately. Just two nights ago he knocked over an entire bowl of scalding hot soup and it spilled down his chest. Fortunately his shirt prevented him from getting any serious burns but it sure scared the heck out of Mama and Daddy!

Writing

When we had Emma's conference her teacher mentioned what a great writer Emma is. While some of the other kids will write a sentence or two, Emma fills the entire sheet with words. Here is something she wrote recently. The teacher asked the students to write about what they would do if they had a dog. Emma worked so hard on the assignment that her teacher gave her a PRIDE ticket (a special award teachers hand out when a student is showing a good example). Emma's essay reads: I would take my dog to the park and I would take she to the slide then we would go to the ice cream place then we would go home then we would play hide and seek and then we would get my dog in the tub and then we would watch TV and we would watch "Polly Pocket Movie".

Dentist Appointment

I took Emma to the dentist yesterday. No cavities. This is a big deal since she has had at least one cavity at all of her previous appointments. Poor kid has her mama's teeth.

Emma's Conference

Emma has known her alphabet since she was 2 and learned the sounds the letters make soon after. So it came as a big surprise when at the Parent Teacher Conference last September we were told that Emma had failed the "Initial Sounds Fluency" part of the DIBELS test. Badly. In one minute's time Emma was able to point out the beginning sound of three words. Only three. When they retested her, she got a zero. We were pretty puzzled since Emma went into kindergarten knowing all of the letter sounds and even how to spell and handful of words.

We had our second Parent Teacher Conference of the year last Thursday. Tree and I met with Emma's teacher and one of the first things she went over were the results from the DIBELS testing. As we went over the "Initial Sounds Fluency" part she reminded us about Emma's 3 and 0 and showed us where they were on the chart. Then she showed us Emma's most recent test score. A 106. The teacher said when she inputted the score that the computer asked her, "Are you sure that is correct?". Emma got the highest score in the whole kindergarten for that part of the test. I have to admit, we were pretty dang proud.

A Blog is Born

So, I have been seriously slacking when it comes to sending pictures lately. And I haven't been the greatest at emailing about school conferences, doctor's appointments or even about the super cute things these two do on a daily basis. I am hoping that keeping a blog will change that. This will be a place where I can post photos and tell stories and keep everyone informed.

So, bookmark this site and check back often for updates on the amazing adventures of Emma and Oliver! Those kids are nothing if not entertaining so stay tuned!