Last Day of School!

Today is Christopher's last day of school, and while he is excited to start summer and especially swim team, he is sad to be leaving his friends and these two fabulous ladies pictured above. Mrs. Masoner and Ms. Makona helped Chris make this year amazing--full of fun and learning and creativity. As a former teacher, I am in awe of the incredible work that they put in this year for all the kids. Chris learned so much, grew so much this year! People who think teachers have it easy should meet these two fine educators who never stop working and loving the kids and never stop learning themselves! 

We attended the end of the year awards ceremony this morning where Christopher received an award for his geography bee score...

Mr. D (our principal) said that the scores of the students gave Pembroke Hill a first place performance nationally for this grade level! (This is a nationally given geography bee). Also Chris and some other students were recognized for their Great Brain Projects!

Each kid told the audience about their project. I don't know about you but I would have been shaking in my boots at Christopher's age if I had to get up in front of everyone and talk! I'm so grateful Pembroke Hill is making this public speaking thing such a priority. Chris is getting very comfortable in front of a mike!

Here is our boy with his two awards...

So sad to see this year end, and we are so proud of our Christopher!

Merry Christmas Daniel Tiger

This is one of Jonathan's favorite books to read. It doesn't matter what time of year it is! He reads it really fast in this video so some of his articulation is hard to understand unless you know the story. But this is an example of what reading teachers refer to as "reading with expression!"

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0lYK9R0RMc4

Enjoy Coca Cola...

Yesterday at Target, Chris and I found a "Chris" bottle right above a "Jonathan" bottle so, of course, we had to take a picture!

Piano Recital

Today was Christopher's spring piano recital. He did a great job playing Night of the Tarantella and we played Amazing Grace together as a duet. It was so fun to play along with my boy! Here are videos of both performances...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KvsNBLXO88M

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GjhBQ2_5XWo

Jonathan also did a wonderful job sitting through a whole lot of performances until we played at the end...

Pretty Much Done

With the exception of a few small things, our patio project is done! Here are some pictures of the front and back, sod and all...

And I took the fence down in the back that we were using to keep the bunnies out. It seems like the coneflowers are "pokey" enough to keep them away and I sprayed some lovely smelling stuff around to ward them off...

Happy Birthday Daddy!

Yesterday was Brian's birthday and he requested pizza at Pizza 51 for our dinner. It was delicious and the boys of course brought their craziness to the table!

Daddy's second request of the evening was Betty Rae's for ice cream. Yum! As you can see from the look on Jonathan's face, he thoroughly enjoyed his chocolate ice cream...

And Chris was engrossed in his waffle cone filled with smores ice cream!

Daddy (and the rest of us) had a very tasty birthday!

Catcher

Chris got his first opportunity to catch at his game the other night! He only caught for an inning (they all take turns trying out the different positions) but I was very proud to see him in the same kind of gear I wore for years! He said he liked it a lot and that it must be very tiring to keep crouching down and getting up all the time for an entire game!

Speaking of baseball, Brian and I got to go to see the Yankees play the Royals last night at Kauffman Stadium to celebrate Brian's birthday. It was a fun night out and the game got in just in time before the big storms hit!

Yesterday morning, we joined my nanny friends, Tiffany and Amanda, and their kids and took the streetcar down to the River Market. It was a fun morning! Jonathan loves the streetcar and brought his little stuffed sea turtle (also known as Zippy) along for the ride.

Dancing Boys

We are big fans of Lin Manuel-Miranda in this house. Of course we've been listening to Hamilton for seven straight months and now we are checking out his other show, In the Heights. The boys particularly enjoy a song called "The Club." Here is a sample of their dance moves to this song. The other night we were out on the patio listening to it and I swear Jonathan was showing some good salsa moves, but alas, I had no video of that. Here is the next best thing...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pxpvuKWXOns

True Story

And I'm going to go out on a limb here and say both of my dogs are smarter than the president. So, there you go. (Thanks to Brookside Barkery for displaying this and other witty tee shirts!)

Lunch on the Patio

Someone is very happy to be eating lunch on the patio!

Year Two of the Vegetable Garden

Chris requested a gnome for his vegetable garden so a gnome he got! We worked today on the vegetable beds and herbs (not pictured). Here is our new tomato/zucchini bed. It's always so funny that the gardens look so sparse when first planted but from our experience last year, we know what happens as the summer goes on! We have two full size tomato plants and one cherry as well as 2 basil plants (good companions to tomatoes apparently) and two zucchini. And obviously our anti-bunny chicken wire fence system!

Here is my bed, which includes lots of lettuce, swiss chard and eggplant as well as a couple mini sunflower seeds. I am still waiting to find a couple good kale plants too.

Chris chose eggplant, peppers, cucumbers, and cantaloupe plants for his garden this year. We will also pick up some larger sunflower seeds and possibly strawberries along the way...

It was gorgeous outside today so we got to eat on the patio and listen to Moana (J's request)!

Garden Time!

It's Mother's Day weekend and in Kansas that means it is officially safe to plant! I was told last year (after losing several of the veggies I planted in April) that the best thing to do it to wait until Mother's Day when our area is free and clear from the threat of frost. Yesterday was beautiful and so I got out to clean up the vegetable beds (which were full of clover), build a new, bigger veggie bed (for tomatoes and zucchini) and to plant a few new perennials. It felt great to be out there again! The boys wanted to go out in the garden this morning so we started making our plan for the rest of the day...

Here are the old beds from last year, cleaned up and (mostly) clear of clover. At the far end you will see the new bed. Our plan today is to pick up a few things at the garden center, mix up new soil and go to the farmers market to check out their selection of vegetables. We probably won't get everything this weekend but I definitely want to find some lettuce, chard, and kale. Updates to come!

Great Brain Project

Today, Christopher presented his "Great Brain" project to his class. The Great Brain is an optional project that students can choose to do and it gives them a sense of what it means to do research and give a presentation. It is very cool because when a kid does it, they get to choose their topic so it is something that interests them. As we all know, Chris loves things related to space travel. He did a great job presenting to his class!

Here is a video of his presentation...

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49gIY3YJhc0

After where I stopped the recording, Chris got to take questions from his classmates and he also received feedback from his teacher and from us as well! Congratulations to Chris on completing this project. Jonathan joined us for the presentation too. Here he is before it started. He has the undivided attention of the ladies in Christopher's class!

Later this morning, we joined some friends at Sky Zone for some toddler time jumping. Jonathan loved it for awhile but, like his brother used to, when he gets hot he gets miserable! I've never seen the boy sweat so much and then the tears began to flow. It was fun while it lasted!

Here are a couple randoms pics too. This is Jonathan and Evelee (Mackenzie's baby) during Christopher's piano lesson yesterday...

And Jonathan found himself a nice little cubby to hang out in during Christopher's batting lesson the other day!

The Chen-Pariso Clan

While seeing Hamilton was definitely the highlight of the weekend, Chris and I had a wonderful time with our friends, the Chen-Parisos! Whenever we visit with Chrissie and her kids, there is a lot of laughter, craziness and tons of food. Chrissie and I have been friends for almost 25 years and it is wonderful to have a friend that you can act like a 16 year-old with when you are both approaching 40. Chrissie and I exposed the boys to some of our Les Mis and Phantom singing as we drove back from the city one evening. They all looked at us like we were nuts but it's important for them to hear these things!

Chrissie and Jason took us to a delicious Chinese place in Chinatown where we stuffed ourselves with food and mango smoothies. This was followed by a visit to a Chinese bakery where I think we bought up at least half the store!

On Sunday, we visited the Field Museum of Natural History which was very cool. They boys (and Mei Mei) posed and dabbed in front of Sue the T-Rex!

A fun weekend was had by all!

What Time is It? Showtime!!! Hamilton!

Christopher and I took a trip up to Chicago this weekend to (wait for it, wait for it) see Hamilton! We also visited Chrissie and her family and that will be the subject of another post. We have been listening to the Hamilton soundtrack (non-stop) since October and we finally made it up to see the show live. I was excited and, as you can imagine, someone else was equally fired up!

It was so wonderful to share this experience with Chris and it did not disappoint! The show passed all our expectations. The acting was wonderful and, after listening to the music so much, it was great to see the dancing, acting, and facial expressions that went with the music we know so well.

I've seen many Broadway shows in my life, but this surpassed them all! It is a work of genius and there were times during the show when I had to pinch myself to make sure we were actually watching it. We are so lucky to have seen it. Definitely the best birthday present ever!!

Sea Life

We went with Noah, baby Christopher and our other neighbor, Lyla, to the Sea Life Aquarium downtown this morning. It was a lot of fun! We haven't been since Christopher was 3 so it was nice to return and see the fish exhibits through Jonathan's eyes. It's really a great, small aquarium and not too busy so it's easy to keep track of three boys who like to motor through the place! 

We got to see all kinds of fish, eels, seahorses, a sea turtle, sharks and sting rays. Jonathan got to touch a horseshoe crab and starfish, but his favorite was seeing the jellyfish that seem to glow in the dark. It was a great morning!