Little Picasso

Luke has been doing a lot of his learning and projects on things and animals related to the rainforest. Most of those involve the toucan, but this one is a little different!

Little Picasso

Brooke did this in art class at school over 2 days. As a 6th grader she doesn't bring home a lot of art anymore. We were happy to see this one.

Botherhood

Brotherhood is sometimes writing in journals and listening to tunes together before bed. 

Little Picasso

Luke is working on art that relates to the rainforest. Lots of animals … and lots of colors!

More Teeth

I don't remember losing teeth as a kid. And I certainly don't remember losing teeth as a tween. But, the last two years in Brooks life I feel like have been filled with nothing but tooth trauma. There are two reasons for this, her anxiety and her stubborn teeth. Her teeth have been slow to fall out and hesitant to leave. Last year she had to get one pulled out that refused to fall out. So, she's already hyper sensitive to the issue. I also never really thought about how much anxiety could be triggered by the process of losing teeth. And it sure has been a trigger for Brooke. She's had a molar that has been holding on for weeks. Today it got to the point where it was hanging by a thread, minutes before she had to leave for practice. This created sheer panic. She couldn't go to practice with her tooth almost out and couldn't get the tooth out and only had minutes to figure it all out. Eventually she got to the point where she basically ripped it out of her mouth. That's a pretty big deal for a kid who so anxious about losing teeth. In this case, fear of missing practice was greater than her fear of losing a tooth. she got it out in time and made it to practice literally with seconds to spare. When she got home I finally got a look at where she lost a tooth. You basically can't even tell, because the new tooth is around 90% grown in!

St Patricks Day

The kids really love St Patricks Day ... and I'm not 100% sure why. But, it's probably one of their favorite holidays!

Last night the boys set up a Leprechaun trap, orchestrated primarily by the Ryan. But they're getting much more critical of these magical holidays recently. The trap, which has had cash in the past, was filled with cookies. They all ate them ... but there were some comments made. Luke complained about not getting money but was happy with the cookies. Ryan noted the cookies looked pretty familiar. Brooke just shoved the cookies in her mouth (they were her favorite) and didn't say a thing.

When they were little we told them if you don't wear green ... a leprechaun will pinch you. And I think that lesson stuck. Both boys picked out green shirts last night for school today - although only one physically went today. Even the Brooke made sure to wear a green shirt for her virtual classes.

Everyone had a good day. There were mostly smiles across the board. Guess we were lucky.

First Day Back for Ryan

Wow its been quite a year. There is a lot of drama about the CPS return and most families opted not to return their kids to school. Ryan has 4 kids total in his "pod," out of a potential 15 (1/2 the class). He was so nervous in his return, its foreign to him now. He has not set foot on campus since March 13, 2020. At that point we were told we'd be taking a 2-week break from school to help combat virus spread ... and here we are.

He had a great day, although he struggled with endurance. Over the last year he's been getting up whenever he wants, tuning out whenever he wants, snacking whenever he wants. Basically, doing whatever he wants, whenever he wants. So while he had fun, he admitted he was bored at times and felt pretty exhausted. Which just adds to our validation that returning is the right thing for him.

Little Picasso

Luke has been learning about the Amazon Rainforest and one animal that has intrigued him is the toucan. Today during his asynchronous learning time he watched a how-to video and drew this one. He was VERY proud of his work!