Classic Luke -

Luke can be a real piece of work, as we have learned through the years. Maybe all kids are this way but he seems to always be saying the funniest things.

Here is a sample of the latest:

Luke has been walking around telling people that because he is 100% German (not sure where he determined this) he REALLY likes pretzels and he can eat pretzels more than other people (like when he should be going to bed or instead of eating dinner). The only thing we can figure is that when we ate soft pretzels while in the German section at Epcot, we told the kids they were German. Luke took this and ran with it. Not sure why this idea is surfacing now.

Luke has show and tell as school every Wednesday. He has to bring something in from home that is special/means something to him. During snack time, he gets up and tells the class about his item. A small group goes every day of the week so I think they have 4 or 5 kids a day "presenting". The kids can then ask questions. I love this because it gets the kids into public speaking early on, I've noticed St. Phils does a lot of these types of things. I digress! Anyway, one week Luke brought in a baseball he got during our trip to Kaiwah, SC when Luke went to a minor league baseball game, the Riverdogs, and got a baseball from the mascot. It was a great little item to bring in. I asked him how it went when he came home from school and if anyone had any questions for him. He said, "It went fine, I told people it was a baseball I caught from Big Papi at a Red Sox game. Everyone thought it was really really cool. I couldn't remember the real story so I told them that one." Of course they all thought that was cool, catching a ball from the most popular Red Sox player would be quite a story....if it was true!!!

This week, Luke decided to bring in his soccer metal that he received last week at the end of the season. Again, I asked how it went and if anyone had any questions. Luke said, "It was good, only Johnny asked a question. He asked if it was real gold that my metal was made of. I told him it was."

The teacher must get a good laugh during show and tell...at least when Luke is up.

Soccer -

Soccer season ended last weekend.  Kids had a great time although I'm not sure this is either of theirs favorite sport.  They mostly liked seeing their friends at the fields.

Here are some pics throughout the season.

Halloween -

Paige had a Halloween parade/performance at school the day before Halloween.  They all dressed up, put on a little show, sang some songs and had a little party in her classroom after.

Paige decided to be Minnie Mouse this year.  She negotiated with me as we are standing in the costume store.  "Well...if I'm going to be Minnie Mouse can I wear mascara.....and lipstick....and blush?  I have to wear all those things or I can't be Minnie" she said.  Needless to say, she was VERY excited to dip into mommy's makeup bag for the day.

Lookin' the part before school for sure.  Luke got to wear his costume all day.  They went to a nursing home in the morning to sing Halloween songs and had a party in the afternoon.

 Minnie and the army man -

 Best buds!  Our last Halloween in Padanaram :(  Sad because this is something we love in our neighborhood.  Apparently our new neighborhood gets 100ish treaters, not bad but we'll have to adjust as we are used to five times that here in the village.  We will also miss our friends.

 Havin' fun with friends at the pre-party

 The aftermath, Luke (and to a lesser extent Paige) quickly went to work sorting through his candy when he got home.  Everything was organized and put into piles, he is his mommy's son!

Then he wrote down on a paper what he had before putting everything away.  He did a re-sort the next morning.  Great quality control Luke.  Bose will hire you for the annual inventory count at the warehouse.

Paige began sorting but ran out of steam after a while -

Paige's school performance

Luke's class -

Spelling Test -

Luke had his first (of many!) spelling test today and he got 100%!! We are so proud of him. I'm probably most impressed considering I am a horrendous speller (I think I learned how to spell Halloween last year). There is hope for Luke though, maybe he got daddy's genes on this one. From here on out he will have a test every Tuesday, ten words and two sentences to write. Here were his test words:


and

at

had

can

cat

man

Halloween

fall

bad

maps



His sentences were:

Halloween is in the fall.

The man had big maps.



He is graded not only on the spelling but use of upper/lower case, punctuation, and handwriting.



He needs work on his handwriting (another one of mommy's troubled subjects - daddy's too I'm afraid)



I remember coloring and cut/pasting mostly in first grade but this is the real deal. He also has book reports ones a month and a monthly reading log.



He loves science and math and has always done well in those subjects. He has had a take home science experiment already this year. Math worksheets throughout the week.



In social studies he just finished a unit about his neighborhood/community/state/country/world. He had to make a map of his neighborhood and again aced his test on this subject which I thought looked hard for first grade.



His least favorite subject is reading. He told me once that "all the girls like to read and they are good at it but the boys don't" Not sure that is entirely true but we do work on the reading the most. He reads a book to me every night before bed on top of his school reading work. As we explained to him, reading isn't going away. The quicker you learn the better off you'll be!

The downside of sending your kid to catholic school....

Luke: "I don't want to eat this pork. I don't like it. It is not good."

Mom: "Oh no, it is very good. You will like it. You eat it."

Luke: "Mommy, you and I have different feelings. You might like it but I do not and that is OK. I learned this at school."

Oh boy!