Bring Back Pluto as a Planet!

Q. Why did Mickey Mouse go to Outer Space?

A. He was looking for Pluto.

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Pluto Demoted to Dwarf Planet, Seven Dwarves Complain

Coming on the heels of the demotion of Pluto to a dwarf planet, the Seven Dwarves issued a short press release: “Although we think it's DOPEY that Pluto has been downgraded to a dwarf planet, which has made some people GRUMPY and others just SLEEPY, we are not BASHFUL in saying we would be HAPPY if Disney's Pluto would join us as an 8th dwarf. We think this is just what the DOC ordered and is nothing to SNEEZE at.” As Mickey’s faithful companion, Pluto made his debut in 1930-the same year scientists discovered what they thought was the 9th planet. (from Magically Speaking, Augusut 28, 2006)

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If you want to join our coalition to Bring Back Pluto as a (not-dwarf) Planet, let us know by posting a Comment.

1st Project of the Year

Make a travel brochure for two states.

Do a diagram / picture of the state
Facts on state (capital, population, date of statehood, cities)
At least two interesting places to visit
Fun facts (state mascots, bird, tree, flower, etc.)

States picked: Kentucky and Virginia

1st day

Well, that was easy. Kids getting up by themselves, eating breakfast, getting dressed, ready to go on time. Snapped a couple of traditional pictures and we were out the door. We went through the car line and teased about the "boo hoo" parents dropping off their kindergarteners and all the cars parked on the side of the road and those circling the parking lot looking for a place to pull in while we just zipped right through the car line!

I failed 5th grade school supply shopping!

Armed with the school supply list, I headed off for Target this morning to get the few things I didn't already have on hand, including a protractor. Imagine my surprise when I reached for the protractor on the shelf only to see that what I was thinking was a protractor was, in fact, a compass.

Orientation

Getting ready for orientation this year was different. Different than the previous years. In the past, I would be crossing off the days on the calendar, waiting for Friday afternoon when we'd finally get to see who would be teaching our children for the school year. Would we get who we wanted? Would our children like them? Would they like our kids? Would we like the teacher? Would the teacher like us? I'd be ready to go at 11 o'clock even though orientation doesn't start until 12:30. I'd double check that the kids had matching clothes and their faces were scrubbed so they could make a good first impression on their teachers (well, really, so that I would make a good first impression as their mom, bringing clean, well-groomed children to meet them rather than the boys that they are). I'd put on make-up and fret about what to wear and did my hair look ok. And watch the clock. And watch the clock. And watch the clock until it was 12:20 and then I'd rush everyone out the door so we could be there right when the class lists were posted. Kinda like waiting for the casting announcements to be posted for a play - waiting to see if you get the coveted lead.

But this year was different. I don't know if it's because we've done orientation so many times before, or because this is our 5th grader's last year in elementary school, or maybe just because I had a headache this morning so I took a late-morning nap and didn't wake up til just after 12. But even then, I didn't rush; I didn't even check to see what the kids were wearing. We left home about 12:45 and got to school to find that the classes were posted and there weren't big crowds in the classrooms.

I think this is going to be the best school year yet.

New Meaning to "Climbing the Walls"

38 days til School Starts

I checked the calendar today and we're over half-way through the summer already. The boys get 80 days out for the summer, and we're down to only 38 left til school starts. How did the summer go by so fast???

It's been a good summer. Our summer babysitter ~ oops ~ I mean our "summer child care provider" has been awesome, fabulous, unflappable. She has taken the kids to swimming lessons, the movies, Chuck E. Cheese, museums, bike riding. She has played too many board games to count, and supervised baking cookies, biscuits and cinnamon rolls. She comforted the kids when we tragically lost our cat. We're going to miss her when she has to leave.

But we still have 38 days! We have a couple of trips still ahead and plenty of days to just hang out at home before we have to start finding backpacks and lunch boxes, sharpening pencils and labeling glue sticks.

Working as a family at WDW

Ever since I can remember, N has wanted to drive the train at the Magic Kingdom in Walt Disney World. Z has wanted to drive the monorail. They are planning to move to Orlando after high school and do the Disney College program.

By the time Z is graduating high school, I'll have 4 years left until I could retire. GradeSchoolDad will have already retired. We were talking at dinner last night about how when the kids move out and I retire, perhaps we'll move with them to Orlando.

We could get seasonal jobs (meaning NOT during the hot season) at WDW and work with the kids!

So we got to talking about what job would be a good match for each of us. The kids decided that GradeSchoolDad would be perfect for a guide on the Jungle Cruise. He can tell scripted, corny jokes with the best of them, and he'd look pretty good in the costume!

For me, they rejected every idea I came up with (Snow White? nope, I'm too old. Running 'it's a small world?' - nope, they think I'd get crazy pushing the button and waving all day. Ursula is an animatronic and I don't have enough arms anyway.) But then it came to us -- I could be a tour guide!

You know what? I really like that idea! I think I'll put it on my list of things to think about for when I get closer to retirement.

And you know what else? I'm confident that both boys will have a chance to experience their dreams.

Double Digits

What a ride the last decade has been! I'm now the parent of a pre-teen; a double-digits boy; a 10 year old! Amazing!

When he turned one, we had a big blow-out of a party, not so much to celebrate his birthday, but to celebrate the fact that we survived our first year of parenting. Seems like we should be having a bash today to celebrate our first decade!

Instead, he's getting to pick out what he wants to do today. He wants lunch at the Mexican restaurant because we always eat Mexican on his birthday. He's a homemade-burrito boy - tortilla and refried beans with salsa, salt and a squirt of lemon juice. He has to make it himself at the table. We're still sad that Tia's closed.

His gifts include The Magic Kingdom Game, Clue, the New Super Mario Bros. game for Nintendo DS, and a pocket watch with a train from Disney.

Dinner tonight will be at the American Cafe, mostly because they have a fabulous Chocolate Chip Martini for dessert!



Ah - how great to be 10!

Scrabble

Want to know how well your kid is doing with spelling and have fun at the same time? Break out the Scrabble game and have a go at it.

You don't have to keep score (although come on - you know you're going to add up your own points in your head and hope you get the Triple Word Score - even if you're playing against your 3rd grader). Just start with learning how to use the board - the whole board! That's the challenging part for new Scrabble players ~ seeing how to not box the game into a corner.

"Junior" Moments

Our just-finished-2nd-grader asked "What comes after J?" His now-in-5th-grade brother told him he should just sing his ABC's to figure it out.

A few weeks later, the same just-finished-2nd-grader wanted to know if it's been April yet this year? His brother sighed and suggested we send him back to kindergarten.

I shared these stories with a friend who said that perhaps he was having a "junior moment."

School Projects

Why is it that kids put off their projects until the night before they are due, even when you remind them and set things out for them to do it? Why is it that at 8:30 at night you're googling for color pictures of Paul Revere only to find out that project isn't really due tomorrow - it's not til next week? Why can't you ever find a glue stick when you need it?

Another year, another round of FCAT

Why is it that standardized testing is so important? Why can't it just be that the kids have a different activity for the day that just happens to be the standardized test, rather than all the build up and hype that is created ~ and often results in unnecessary stress on kids who have no reason to be stressed?

Ugh.

I'll be glad when it's the middle of March.

Thoughts from Guidance

My family is special to me because they sometimes go with my sugettsgens.

I show I care for others by cleaning out some dishes.

It took courage for me to go up over 5 meters in mammoth cave with my family.

Education is important to me because I can be ready in the futre to go in collge.

The Turkey Story

by 3rdGrader

Only to be read in November.

Once upon a time there lived a turkey. The turkey saw 50 turkey hunters and the turkey was chased and ran into the rain-forest. Then the turkey crashed into a mouse size hole witch lead to a cave. It's home to many bear. 2 billon to be exac. Next the turkey went to a discise store and found a lab suit and ran to a scince place.

The turkey found a shirnk ray and a unshirnk ray, shurnk it and to the unshirknk ray with it and ran to the cave and went inside. The turkey found lots of dead stuff way in the back where no one has been before, the turkey found a gun. But instead the turkey fired a bomb and made a turkey size hold and the turkey used the unshirnk ray but it didn't work so the turkey ran back to the lab and returened to it's reglaer size before the turkey had a chance to escape the 50 turkey hunters. In a sec, the 50 turkey hunters were dead and the turkey had them for Thanksgiving diner. That's why no one shere that turkey.

The End.
P.S. Don't kill turkeys.

A two-wheeler

"Guess what your son did," is how 3rdGradeDad greeted me as I came in the door yesterday afternoon. Oh no - that usually means someone's hurt or something's broken. A quick look around the house didn't show anything out of place, beyond the usual, that is, so I was curious.

"He rode his bike by himself down the street and back, twice."

Woo-hoo! We've been waiting for the day when he would be interested in riding his bike. He's had it for a year now, and the training wheels came off about 8 months ago when he asked to take them off. Since then the bike has been collecting cobwebs.

Today he took me outside to show me that he can ride. He still needs some help getting on and balanced, but then he can go. And he's still learning how to brake to stop, but hey! He's riding!

Lost... and found!!!

Before our 3rd grader was born, the women at our church gave us a hand-made quilt for him. The quilt has been a part of his entire life, providing warmth, comfort, protection for him.

And then in May, we realized it was lost :( Gone. Nowhere to be found.

Retracing our steps, the last place we remembered seeing it was on a family trip to Walt Disney World in March. Checking with them, we found that we were too late to reclaim the quilt if we had, indeed, left it there.

We were hopeful that perhaps it was at Grandma and Granddad's in Kentucky, but it didn't turn up there, either.

Sigh.

But all was not lost... Imagine the joy we all felt when 3rdGradeDad felt something weird in the foot of his sleeping bag last Saturday, and instead of being something gross, it was the quilt!

Whew!

All is well.

3rd Grade Volcano Project 

Station Wagons

Last night, my 3rd grader was reading The Boxcar Children #3 when he stopped and asked me a question.

"Mama, what's a station wagon?"

I hesitated and then told him to go ask his Dad; I didn't want 3rdGradeDad to miss out on this classic question.

It got me to thinking about how much we take for granted that we know from our own childhood and experiences, yet our children don't know because they are growing up in a different time. I remember riding in the way-back seat of our neighbor's white station wagon, facing backwards with my friends while the window was rolled down. I remember joking around about station wagons with wood paneling - the ultimate car you didn't want your parents to own.

Now it's all about SUVs and mini-vans and pick-up trucks with four doors.

By the way, I did answer my son's question; we did what any parent would do - we looked it up online. If you haven't looked at station wagons in a while, there are some classic models in the gallery at StationWagon.com.

Ghost Busters

Our 3rd grader is interested in the weather, particularly during this crazy hurricane month we've had. As long as it's not thundering and lightning, the wind and rain aren't scary. But he's more excited about being able to catch ghosts when the lights go out.

Armed with a flashlight and the hand-held dirt-vac, and accompanied by his little brother, whenever the lights go out, he goes streaming through the house in search of ghosts. The flashlight is to catch them in the light; the vacuum is to suck them up, and the little brother is for carrying the equipment. Last week during Frances, the two of them rid the house of 4 ghosts in a matter of moments.

With Ivan coming today, I wonder how many more ghosts will be caught, and I'm wondering if he remembered to put the vacuum back on the charger. Which reminds me I need to recharge the GameBoys...

Laughing Stock??

Third graders are an interesting breed. Sometimes so confident and sure of themselves; other times insecure and needy. And how quickly they can go from clingy and sad to being ready to take on the world, bouncing from place to place.

This week had its high points and its bumps for our 3rd grader. Getting his name in the smiley face with a check mark beside it meant lots of smiles at the end of the day; it's the teacher's way of recognizing children who make good choices and show RAKs (Random Acts of Kindness) to their classmates.

But then there was the night he cried himself to sleep because a girl at lunch told him he was "being gross" because he dipped his grapes into his yogurt. He reported that she told "everyone" and now he felt like a "laughing-stock." First of all, when I was in 3rd grade, I don't think I even knew the expression laughing stock.

So we did what parents everywhere do; lots of hugs, reassurance that he's a good kid, and talked about what he could do to make the situation better. Things like sit somewhere further away from the girl, make sure he's using good table manners (and there's nothing wrong with putting his grapes in his yogurt as long as he's not making a mess), and ignoring rude comments from someone else. We talked about how 3rd grade girls don't like 3rd grade boys very much and often think all boys are gross (though I don't know if that's true any more). And we talked about how maybe the girl doesn't know how to be a friend and that he could be a good example and be nice to her and show her how to be a friend.

I don't know if any of it sank in, but the next day the lunch report was better. He sat with a new friend in his class and the girl was a couple of tables down from him. He said someone else dipped their lollipop into their yogurt and she said that child was gross. I asked him how that made him feel, and he said that he didn't think it was gross and why couldn't he have a lollipop in his lunch box.

So all is well.

A 3rd Grader's View of Himself

From a school assignment, all spelling is his.

Ten Words That Best Describe Me:
eat, sleep, play, tv, video games, sarperner, new things, learn, do thing I'm sopes to do.

Five Things I'm Most Proud Of:
fast runer, good learner, good listener, good reader, mather

My Favorite Foods:
brer ice cream, pizza, shred chese, smothe

My Favorite Things To Do:
School, play on playground, read, takodo

Something Everyone Should Know About Me:
more than a hundered dollars, read a lot, play vidoe games

Three Things I Hope to Learn This Year:
Amrican revolusion, how a tornato froms, the amrican flag

Myself As A Learner:
I always watch tv. I'm curios about how things work. I understand tv. I explore by talking. I enjoy with others. I am someone who is pround of my work. I like to read about avnchers. I like to write about myslef. I like to watch Nickolden. I like to learn about the past.

Baby germs!

Did you know that if you touch or hold a baby, you have baby germs for up to 2 hours? And those baby germs can be spread through touching? And that 8 year old boys are allergic to baby germs? And that 3rd graders know how to tell time and won't let you touch them for a whole two hours after holding a baby, just so you won't give them baby germs?

And babies aren't just newborns and infants; babies include toddlers and small three year olds.

And baby germs can turn a 3rd grader into a green-eyed monster, full of jealousy if Mom gets baby germs.

I explained to my 3rd grader that I will always love him, but that I love to hold and play with babies, too. And that no matter how many babies I touch, the love I have for him will cancel out all the baby germs in the world. He's not buying it, yet...

A week later

One week down, 35 to go. 3rd grade got off to a great start in spite of the newly implemented no t.v. / no video games during the week rule. A couple of complaints of "I'm bored" and "There's nothing to do" but he found something to do without me having to entertain him. That's what little brothers are for.

Bubbles on the back porch; board games in the playroom; and Walt Disney World in the living room. The boys figured out how to work together and play together.

I'm most excited about his desire to read. After bed time the other night, he was sitting by his door where just a little light was coming in through the crack, and he had Harry Potter and the Sorceror's Stone out. I asked what he was doing, and he replied, "You know, I'm in 3rd grade, so reading's gonna be my thing now."

We're reading every day. He's reading the Boxcar Children to me, and I'm reading A Series of Unfortunate Events to him. We want to see the movie this fall, but before we do, we have to read the books. We finished the Austere Academy (#5) today.

Nearly the beginning

It's Saturday, 10:45 p.m. and my nearly-3rd-grader just drifted off to sleep. How in the world is he gonna get to sleep early tomorrow night? School starts Monday, bright but not too early, thankfully.

Summer has been a blast - this has been the best one yet. An 8 year old with a 6 1/2 year old younger brother is a good mix. They played together without much need for me to watch, referree, etc. But I think they are both ready to go back to school. I know I'm ready for them to have a routine!