Stories to Remember

It's been awhile since I jotted down some of the stories that we would like to remember.  Life seems to keep going faster and faster; it's hard to take the time to write these memories down.

Ethan's language skills are pretty good.  However, he still mixes up the order of words, the tense of verbs, or the exact ideas he is trying to get across.  We usually can figure out what he's trying to say, but some of his first attempts bring smiles to our faces ... such as "I very much love you."

When Matt and I are covering grown-up topics at dinner, Ethan will sometimes rest his head on his fist, sigh, and say "I had to mow a lot today.  Cuz the grass was long."  Apparently, that is his attempt at telling us about his work day.

When we unpacked the nativity scene a few weeks ago, Kate was especially excited to be able to use the figures for her story-telling.  As Ethan watched her take out the animals and stable, he got really excited and asked "Where's the farm truck?  Wait, I'll go get a farm truck!"  I suppose the nativity scene does look a lot like a farm.  However, Kate was quite adamant that there be NO trucks in the nativity story.

Speaking of Kate, she attended the birthday party of a friend a few weeks back.  Up until now, birthday parties with Kate have not been my favorite activity.  Last year, she would cling to me and not participate much with her peers until the last half hour.  I was fully prepared for a repeat performance by dear Kate this fall.  However, she jumped right in (figuratively and literally) this time around.  After about 10 minutes, I asked her if it would be okay if I left to go run some errands.  She said yes!  This mom went to Target by herself and then grabbed some dinner from Chipotle by herself before returning for the last half hour or so of the party.  Way to go, Kate!

The other day after school, Kate was relaying some of the day's events and activities.  In reference to the math enrichment teacher who visits Kate's classroom a few times a week, Kate said "She tires my brain out!"

This past weekend while I was helping Kate with her shower, she was telling me about a promotion the local radio station is doing.  "You know how they keep talking on the radio about that date night?  Where they give you a gift card and you can spend it on anything you would like to do for a date?  Well, I was thinking ... (at this point I was thinking about how sweet it was that Kate though Matt and I should have a date night) ... it would be fun to have a date night just you and me.  We could go to a movie together or something like that."  I suppose she is still pretty egocentric in her thinking :)

Anna came home from school on Monday telling us about an award she received at school, but she didn't remember a lot of the details.  After a little digging on our part, we learned she was chosen to receive a "Super Star Award" in the category of Positive Leader.  She was recognized as "a student who consistently demonstrates positive traits as a leader among her peers" who "influences others to follow her positive example".  Every few weeks at Anna's school, several dozen kids are chosen to receive a variety of awards, ranging from academic achievements to behavior recognition to athletic ability.  We are all very proud of Anna and her positive influence on others.

Lastly, Anna will be taking on the role of Mary in our church's Christmas program this weekend.  The tradition in our church is for a 4th grade boy to be Joseph and a 4th grade girl to be Mary.  This year there are no 4th grade girls so the role was offered up to the 3rd grade girls.  Of the six or seven third grade girls, only two were interested in being Mary.  When more than one child wants the part, their names are placed in a hat and a younger child draws out the chosen name.  Anna's name was picked.  One of the coolest parts about this whole thing is that Anna was treated by the other kids and adults as just another kid ... no special treatment.  The other cool part was later in the morning when the girl whose name wasn't chosen told Anna how happy she was for her.  (She'll get to be Mary next year, when she's in 4th grade.)

Besides those stories, we are working through our first major colds of the season here.  Matt, Ethan, and Anna have had the worst of it so far.  Although colds are still trickier for Anna than they are for others in the family, this one at least seems to be easier than the colds of last year.  We all seem to know how to deal with them a bit better.