The Reports are In!!

This past Thursday we had the kid's conferences with their teachers where we received their first report card for the year. We were pretty certain as to how Matt did but with Emily we had a few concerns.

Third grade here at the kid's school requires them to have a homeroom teacher who does grammar and writing and then they have to switch teachers and classrooms for Math, Reading & Spelling and Science & Social Studies. Emily biggest struggle this year has been in reading.....she fluctuates in her grades and most of that fluctuation has to do with comprehension and inferring within stories. She has had a few tests of concern so I did meet with this teacher and she will be starting with tutoring, which is provided free of charge from and at school, one day a week for 20 mins. after school. The tutoring will focus on the inferring aspect.... what also helps is that this school term is learning how to infer and get nonfactual information from stories so she will be having major exposure to this issue. She did end up with a B in the class.

Math which is normally her menace has actually gone very well. Since our conversation with her teacher on Back to School night at the beginning of the school year, Emily has been attending the after school tutoring session on Monday's. She had all A's & one B in the class until a recent test where she got her first F. UGH!!!! We did realized that on the test all but one of the incorrect answers was the same math function she did not "get". I spoke with the teacher prior to the meeting and she told me not to be concerned that Emily's average with all the tests and quizzes taken that she had a solid A grade in the class....and she did. We did talk to her again on conference night and she told us that if Emily is struggling in any areas that she is usually at school early and late several nights beside tutor night and Emily is more than welcome to go to her for extra help.

The area of "work" that each of her teacher's expressed is getting Emily to come to them when she has a question or doesn't understand something whether it is during schoolwork or test time instead of her waiting for them to read the panic and upset nature on her face. She has been making small improvements since the beginning of the year though.

All in all her report card was mainly B's and a few A's which is pretty solid for the first marking period of 3rd grade with the curriculum and classroom changes.

Matt is doing very well having received all A's in his first marking period of first grade. His teacher is very pleased with his progress and he is doing very well in class. Matt loves to charm her!! Matt's area of struggle at this point is that they have just started reading comprehension and that is a new area for him..... his penmanship is also a little messy. When it comes to math though, he learns it once and it is in his head.....he has amazing recall. Also, his reading skills are improving and he loves reading!!

So, it was a very successful first period of school. I have to say though that one of the things that has helped the most is having Dave available for homework time......I don't know how I would have been able to help both the kids with their homework without it taking all night because of the work load for each child and the material needing to be covered. Daddy saves the day!!!

My Sous Chef

Matt has taken a "liking" to helping in the kitchen when it comes to baking. On this particular day, I made some Pumpkin/Carrot Muffins...... lets just say with him as a helper I don't really have any work to do in the area of clean up. Matt really puts himself "into" it.

Every time now when I am making/baking anything I always here a little voice behind me saying "can I help?"

The holidays and cookie baking are going to be very fun this year...... Matt is going to be one happy boy... and I can only imagine the joy and full belly he will have after all the "clean up."

The Tooth Fairy Came!!

Woohoo! Matt has lost his first tooth. It took a while for him to finally pull it out. As you can see, the permanent tooth was coming in right behind the baby tooth - just like his sister.

I think his motivation to finally pull it was that my good friend, Debbie, told him that if it came out within a certain period of time that she would take him to the movies - that was last Saturday. Sure enough on Monday, on the way home from getting his hair cut, he pulled the tooth out on the car ride back home. He said "I have something"... I turned in my seat and there was the tooth in his hand. I knew he was a little too quiet....he also didn't have his DS to occupy his hands. Next sentence out of his mouth was "We need to tell Ms. Debbie so she can take me to the movies". He NEVER forgets!! The tooth fairy did come and he was more than happy to have his tooth taken.....unlike Emily who requires the teeth and the "reward".

Here We Go Again

It is official, my crafting has turned into a business. On December 4th, my friend Debbie and I are participating in our first ever vendor fair. The kid's school had a vendor fair last spring and they decided to do it again only this year it is in December. So, I am back up in my craft room making photo cubes, frames and I've started making decorated letters and words now too! This last week the time the kids were at school (3 of those days only half days) had been spent crafting and my days will continue that way until the fair. I've also started making and decorating for a few birthday parties too. So maybe, just maybe this love of crafting I have may turn into something that profits a little green - that would be nice!! I am very excited to see where God takes this.

Changing the Look

With the change of my hair style, I decided to change the look of the family blog too. I know, I know.... "you haven't been blogging in a long time". Well life got crazy with the beginning of school and then there was our current life change with Dave's employment. New things are starting to happen here at home with the kids and myself so I thought it was time to get back into the groove of blogging. This post is only to inform you of the changes and to start looking at the blog again.