Two Weeks Down

I've completed my second week of school and all is well.  We had our first day off on Thursday.  It was about time- we had been in school for 8 days already and needed a break!  It was our assessment day so I had to go in for 45 minutes so my teacher could see how smart we all are and the rest of the day was with mom.  Yawn.
I also came home with our first sales assignment.  I have to sell cookie dough (pretty original, huh?) to raise money for the school.  It's going to be a challenge since everyone in my neighborhood goes to my school and everyone is selling it.  If I sell enough cookie doughs, I can win a camera that squirts water!  I desperately want that camera so I will be placing sales calls to various relatives.  You know who you are- so have your check books ready!
We had a quiet weekend.  Except for Friday.  We went out to dinner and when we got back, the entire neighborhood, and I mean everyone, had gathered in the street for a spontaneous block party.  It was soooo much fun!  All of the kids were out and there were about 15 of us.  We climbed trees, rode bikes and scooters, played tag and just had a great time.  I finally fell into bed about 10, happy and exhausted.  What a great night!                                                                                                                                      I had my first tennis lesson here on Saturday and it was pretty miserable.  My behaviour was awful (it might have had something to do with my late night last night)- I was sassy to mom, to the coach. I cried, I got mad and then mom dragged me out of there early.  I think she was a little embarrassed.  But in my defense, the coach and the class was pretty lame.  It was nothing like Tucson lessons- Ms. Serena made those classes so much fun and kept us running the whole time with lots of help.  The lessons here were an hour and we spent a half hour doing one single drill and the other half hour doing another drill.  And they were boring drills.  And the coach offered helpful advice like "hit the ball Jordan", "Jordan hit the ball".  Lady, if I could hit the ball, I wouldn't be here.  Thank you.  She was a substitute coach, so we'll give it one more week to see what the real coach is like.
Sunday was a much better day.  We slept in, except for dad who was up early for bike ride.  When he got home, we headed to farmer's market and loaded up on peaches, corn, tomatoes and green beans.  Mom is so happy with the peaches- they are darn tasty!  After that, we headed to the Wildlife Museum for the afternoon.  We came home and had dinner and indulged in a home made Whopper ice cream pie for desert-  pretty tasty except I didn't like the "cold walkers" (cold whoppers)  in the pie.
Have  fabulous week and if you want any cookie dough, let me know.  The squirty camera is within my grasp- I can feel it!

Kindergarten!

Well, it was another quiet, boring week around here with nothing much to report.  EXCEPT THAT I STARTED KINDERGARTEN!!!!  

I KNOW!!  I CAN'T BELIEVE IT EITHER!!  IT WAS AWESOME!!

Whew- got that out of my system.  I really did have a great week and was so ready to start learning some new stuff.  The first day of school was a little weird (for mom) and she was exhausted at the end of it.  I had to be there at 8:30AM to drop off my loads and loads of school supplies (24 glue sticks per kid- that's 400 glue sticks.  Really?!) and meet my teacher.  I have Mrs. McKellar.  She is very nice and according to other parents, very organized.  That will be good for mom.  After that, mom and I wandered around the school dropping off paperwork at the office, at the nurse, at the kindergarten enrichment program I'm going to.  (Enrichment isn't because I'm super smart, even though I am.  Since I am in morning kindergarten, this is afternoon continuation of that.)  Then we headed out to the playground for a whole hour with all 650 of the kids and their parents.  At 10, we lined up to go to our class and the parents were herded into the cafeteria to hear from the principal.  Mom was very impressed by him and by the school itself.  Lots of parent involvement and lots of good academics.  After that, at 11, us kids got to go recess and the parents were herded back to the classrooms to meet with the teachers.  We came back in at 11:30 and were dismissed to go home.  Mom came back and took a nap while I ran the house. The only downer of the day is that dad had to fly out of town for the whole week on business.  He made sure to call me though and make sure everything went OK.

While I loved, loved, loved school, I think my favorite part of the week was riding the bus home.  Mom hated riding the bus as a kid and wasn't going to let me do it but our neighbors talked mom into it and it turns out to be a good thing.  The bus stop is at the end of our street and about 50 million kids get off at my stop which means there are about 50 million parents waiting there too.  I walk home with my friend Kylie with our moms trailing behind with the dogs.  It's all very Mayberry and good.
It's been a great start to my academic career.
Dad finally came home on Thursday night and we had a nice relaxing weekend.  On Friday night we met one of his co-workers and his family for dinner and had a really fun night.  Mr. Frank has two kids (13 and 9) and they took such great care of me all night.  Mom and dad could relax and enjoy at semi adult evening AND it turns out the 13 year old babysits, so mom and dad may get more relaxing nights out.
Saturday was a run around and finish errands kind of day but after dinner, we headed out for a short hike and watched the sun set.
I spent Sunday morning at my friend Colin's house and in the afternoon, we went swimming at the rec center.
A good ending to a very good week.  Let's hope week two of kindergarten is just as good!

Growing Up

Well, here we are on the eve of me starting my school career and everyone is all a twitter but I just don't get it.  All I know is that I scored a cool new backpack out of the deal, so it will have to be good!  I only go for about 2 hours tomorrow because there is no after care on the first day, so it will be more like a vacation day!  Mom even gets to take the day off work to keep me company.
I don't think mom is too sad about me starting.  She did, however, do lots and lots of bawling when I started summer camp at my school in June.  She probably got it all out then but we will see.  I, myself, am more than ready to start based on attitude alone.  I have been working on my verbal sassiness all summer and now have perfect mastery of such gems as: "Seriously, mom that is so ________", "Oh my god!!  That is so _____________" and mom's favorite "Duh, mom (insert eye roll here)".  That one rendered mom speechless for a moment, then she just turned and walked away.  Don't know if that is good or bad.  All this sassiness of mine has caused mom to stop and take a listen to herself and there is the very small chance that I picked some of these up from her.  But she'll never admit to that in one million years.

I had a most fun last week before school.  Mom actually had to work 5 days in a row but dad took the week off work.  He spent Monday and Tuesday dealing with the department of motor vehicles and got both cars registered and got our new license plates.  We are now official Coloradans and can drive however badly we want to, because we aren't tourists anymore.
On Thursday, we had a daddy/daughter day and he took me to Elich Gardens which is a big amusement park kind of like 6 Flags.  We had a fabulous time, got soaking wet, won prizes and rode lots of rides.  I did end up on the Tea Cup ride alone because dad was feeling a little too dizzy to ride anymore.  No matter, it was a fun day anyway.
On Friday, we had a more low keyed day and dad took me to see a movie.  We had a nice quiet Friday night, eating pizza and reliving dad's youth by watching the original Buck Rogers.  Kind of cheesy but we all secretly enjoyed it.
Saturday, we spent the day cleaning and doing yard work and then headed out to the Rockies baseball game for the evening.  I ate from the first pitch to the seventh inning stretch when we finally had to leave because mom and dad ran out of money!
Sunday, we did some last minute school shopping, packed my backpack and hit the hay early.  All in all a good week/weekend.
(Sorry no pictures- our camera broke and we haven't had a chance to get it fixed.  Just use your imagination!)