Journaling

Collin got to take the class stuffed animal, Bevo, home for a few days and then write about it.  One afternoon, Foard came over to play and they included Bevo in what they did.  Collin wanted to write about it and this is how it turned out:

He did, of course, take a picture with Burke.  I asked if he liked Bevo or Burke better.  He said, "Burke!"  Fortunately, Burke did not chew up Bevo before he had to go back to school.  I would not want to explain what happened to Bevo to his classmates.

Visitor in Our Bed

At least once or twice a month, we find Collin in our bed when we walk into our room to get ready for bed.  Talking to Collin about it later the next day, he says that he loves the cold, fluffy down comforter we have on our bed.  He loves to snuggle up in it because it's "comfy and cozy".  I agree that the comforter is comfortable which is why it's on our bed.  What's not comfortable is having a 7-year old wiggle butt in our bed.  He looks too cute to move but we are quickly reminded that he moves around throughout the night and snores....LOUD. 

The other day when I was not feeling well and laid down (for what ended up being the night), Collin crawled into the bed after Daddy tucked him into his bed a few hours later.  I admit that I really liked having him beside me.  I felt better just a little bit because of it. 

9 Weeks Report Card

Collin's first report card came home this week.  Looks like he is hanging in there as expected.  The numbers are not surprising based on what we learned from the parent-teacher conference.  he does really well with math, science and social studies.  He is doing fine with reading, writing and spelling and is performing at a level expected for 1st Grade at this point. 

The teacher wrote on his report:  Colin is a hard working student with great skills.  He participates in class and is a great addition to our team.

School Picture

Our handsome little guy sure is growing up!  He brushed his hair the morning of the pictures, being careful to part his hair where he wanted.  Looks like it stayed until at least the pictures were taken.  Love this guy!

7 Year Check Up

Collin had his 7 year check up.  Here are his stats:

• 3' 11" (26% of his age group)
• 50 lbs (40% of his age group)
• BMI 15.91 (60% of his age group) - No kidding.  The kid is dense and much heavier than you would expect him to be.
• Blood Pressure - 90/54 - really good

The doctor said Collin looks really good.  She asked questions and Collin answered most of them even though she was asking us.  We were happy for him to take an interest in the appointment.  She does want him to drink more milk or have more dairy than he currently does.  He prefers to drink water and sometimes juice over milk.  So, if he does not increase his dairy, and cheese does not count because he would be just fine if it did, she wants him to take a multi-vitamin that includes at least 400 mg of Vitamin D.

He does still wear a pull up at night because he still sleeps so hard that he would not wake up if he has to pee and would sleep in the wet sheets.  The wetness would not bother him.  She said that boys can take longer and it's not a matter of changing his sleep pattern.  He will eventually learn to get up and pee during the night but he could be 12 years or older and, at this point, be embarrassed to spend the night at a friend's house.  She gave us several suggestions of what we can do to help him at night that we will start working on.  Mainly, we have to wake him up, turn the lights on, have him walk on his own to the bathroom to pee and then have him go back to bed.  Eventually, and it will take some time (12 weeks or more - yikes!), his brain will wake him up at night during the same time at night.  She also suggested a bed-wetting alarm to wake him up when the sheets get wet.  I don't think this will work for him because of how soundly he sleeps. 

Getting his blood pressure taken.  He knew what this did because he saw this used many times with Grandma H.

More Soccer

The Thunder did fantastic during the game tonight.  The boys were passing, calling out to each other and focused playing as a team.  They were spread out and not following the ball everywhere.  Very strategic with most of the moves.  Even though this was a 6pm game, the boys played like they were well rested.  Collin mainly played defense so he was not in a position to make a goal.  However, there were several times that he kept the other team from scoring. 

Here are some action shots from the game:

Parent Teacher Conference

We met with Ms Davis this afternoon to talk about how Collin is doing in class so far.  She said that he is a real sweetheart and she enjoys having him in class.  He listens really well in class and is not easily distracted.  He is helpful to others especially when they have questions.  She is surprised at times when he does get upset or has a tear in his eye.  He is sensitive and caring especially with his friends.  When she was finished, we said that she probably tells all of the parents this.  She said that she that is not true because there will be some different conversations for other kids.  He really is a pleasure to have in class.

Reading

• He is at the level expected
• He writes full, detailed sentences which is really good for this point in class.  He even uses punctuation correctly.  However, he only writes about Burke unless she asks him to write about another subject or the class is supposed to write about a certain topic.
• He is good with reading comprehension but does have trouble recalling what happened in the middle of the book until she give him some reminders and then he can finish question.
• His journals do not generally include pictures.  She would like to she him have more illustrations.

Letters

• He still has trouble with "q" like he did throughout Kindergarten.  She was not too concerned with this.
• He struggles with the more difficult combination of words as expected. 
• He has been getting an 85% - 90% on his spelling tests.  He uses "I" and "E" interchangeably

Math

• He is where he should be in math
• He forms his numbers well
• He should try to count in groups instead of one at a time

Overall, she had some really great things to say about Collin.  Chris said all he heard was that Collin is a lot like me.  Duh!

Great Day Off

Collin and Dad had a fantastic day off yesterday.  In the morning, they met up with Hawkins, Foard and their Dad to hike through a local park we have not been to before.  Collin was really excited about hiking but had hiking mountains and rocks in mind and not walking on flat surfaces.  Dad helped him understand that their our not mountains where we live so our kind of hiking is through woods on flat trails.  He did understand had had a good time.  Along the trail, the boys pointed out the animals and insects they saw.  They found a massive spider web with a spider in the middle waiting for food.  Then, they saw two garden snakes to the side of the trail.  Ummmm....no thank you!  The boys took a break and climbed on a tree with really cool looking branches.

After hiking around, they stopped at the river to look for alligators....and they found several.  One was over 8 feet long and just starred at them.  Fortunately, they had a safe place to watch the alligators from.  They then went inside the park office to check out the animals they had inside.  The weather quickly turned to torrential rain, so they left the park.

After lunch, they all went to the movies and watched Alexander and the Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day.  It was a great movie.  Even Dad said he really enjoyed it.

The younger boys then watched Hawkins' football practice before everyone went their separate ways.  Dad and Collin went to Target to look for more Halloween decorations for the front yard.  I was still at work when Dad sent me a text with these pictures.  I can see they were really focused on the decorations.  Looks like fun though.

Time to eat dinner, so they went to Taco Cabana for quesadillas and chips and queso.  That's a great way to end a fantastic day with each other. 

Later when I got home, Collin told me that he was happy to spend time with Dad and he had a good day BUT he was excited about going to school.  He did not understand why he had to have the day off. 

He did have a great day today at school.  He said it was "awesome"!

Being Creative and Entertaining Himself

We have been busy on the weekends between sports games or practices going through things at Grandma H's house and getting ready for a garage sale.  We generally spend over 3 hours at a time because there is a lot to go through.  Collin has been there with us all of these times.  He did go through his room and decide which toys to bring home which was all of them. That only took 20 minutes....and then he was bored.  He thinks it's like when we are home and hopes one of us can play with him.  We explain what we are doing and that we are not playing or relaxing either. 

He has done well trying to entertain himself.  He has watched movies, read or played with some of the toys. He has also gotten creative and made a yarn maze (see previous post), colored or played with the Play Doh.  This morning, he spent some time designing and making a rainbow, cloud and pot of gold.  He explained the blue dots are gold because he did not have gold Play Doh. 

I love the details on the cloud.

Football

Well, the boys did not win but they are playing better together.  Because our primary Running Back broke his collar bone, Collin and another team mate were the primary players running with the ball.  Collin does not run as fast or aggressive on offense as he does when he is trying to get a flag but at least he not knows he can do it and can practice it more. 

He did great on defense and pulled several flags.  Only Hunter pulled more than he did. 

Yes, I did get some pictures before the battery ran down. 

Collin is in the back ready to get a flag

Running on offense

Lining up.  Collin is #3 in the back. 

Huddle after the game.  Colin is wearing the yellow cleats.  Easy for us to find him on the field.

Fall = Sports....and More Sports

With Collin enrolled in football and two soccer teams, there is not much time to do anything else....but we enjoy it.

Saturday, I raced in the Race for the Cure for breast cancer.  I ran with the boutique hospital where I went for my mastectomy and reconstruction.  I was torn though because I was missing Collin's football game where I knew he would be playing Running Back and Wide Out.  He FINALLY was fine with running with the ball and really liked it.  Anyway, his game started at 9am and I knew I would finish the run around 9:30am.  I finished the 5K run and then ran to the car to make it to the game and see him make two plays that won the game for the team.  He pulled a flag the first time and then made the other team's Running Back run out of bounds.  I am glad I did see the last play because he was so excited to tell me about it and knew that I saw him do it.

We left that game to go to his soccer game with the Thunder.  They played a GREAT game.  They won 5-1.  These boys play well together because they pass and call out to each other. 

After the game, we went to lunch and then Collin went to Elliot's birthday party.  Elliot is one of his friends at school.  The party was at a local Tae Kwon Do place.  Collin followed directions from the Master and really had a great time.  So much so that he asked to sign up for classes.  Now, remember, he did take Tae Kwon Do and hated it.  He even asked Daddy to not pay for it anymore because he was wasting his money. 

We got up early Sunday, stopped by a donut place and then went to Grandma H's house to continue to go through her things and clean it out.  Collin did a great job go through his room at her house sorting through toys.  He even made a "Timmy and Leah" pile.  He did get bored and found a large ball of yarn.  He made a maze through the entire house by unraveling it as he walked around.  Here is a picture of the yarn around the couch.  It's hard to see it but the entire house looked like this.  Hey, he was occupied and having fun.  This bought me an additional 45 minutes of going through the drawers in her room.

After lunch, we went to Collin's other soccer game.  They lost mainly because they were not playing as a team, calling out to each other and passing like his other soccer team does.  At least I remembered to bring the camera and get a few shots of him in action.  He is in white.

Collin is chasing after Carson

Still chasing after Carson but catching up

Carson and Collin at is again

Collin's turn to get the ball

After the game, we went to have his team pictures taken for his other soccer team, Thunder.  It was a beautiful and VERY sunny day.  After the individual pictures, the boys lost focus walking over to take the team picture.

We went back to Grandma H's house so Aunt Lisa and the family could stop by and see if there was anything they wanted for their house.  Aunt Lisa was really surprised at the amount of books, wall pictures, towels, sheets and kitchen things she liked and wanted.  While we were looking around, the kids played well together.  Leah wanted to insert herself a few times which aggravated the boys. Eventually, they did all get along without too much fussing.  Tyson did great and loved being held by all of us. 

Leah, Collin and Tyson

We came home close to 8pm and I was asleep in an hour.  We did A LOT this weekend but did it together as a family making great memories.

Lunch with the Crazy Boys

I finally was able to have lunch with Collin at school Friday.  I am not sure if it was because it was Friday, they had sugar for their snack or if it was something to do with the moon....but the kids were crazy.  Topics were:

• how many teeth everyone lost
• who had candy in their lunch - no one did
• what was their Halloween costume

....and then the A&M vs UT chant.  Jack knows I graduated from UT so he always asks me if I am a Longhorn.  He was wearing his Longhorn shirt.  I showed the Longhorn sign and then said "nice shirt".  That did it!  Several of the boys started chanting "Aggies Rule, Aggies Rule" and then the girls chimed in....and then the other table started in.  The teachers and I got the kids to calm down some but they were still crazy until it was time to go. 

Here are Collin, Brody, Sebastian and Jack.  I sure did feel sorry for Ms Davis and the afternoon with these kids.