I went over our back fence to pick some wildflowers from our neighbor's pasture and came across tons of these wild blackberries! I wasn't sure at first what they were since they were red, but multiple people on Facebook assured me they were blackberries and safe to eat. A few days later Anthony and the boys went with me to check them out and we picked a handful of ripe ones. They were a little sour, but still good!
I donated some honey to James's yoga teacher for her end of the year tea party. She asked for some pictures for her thank you post on the school's Facebook page, so I sent her these pictures of our beehives. Anthony numbered them so that he could keep better track of when he has treated them, fed them sugar water, etc...
On a day when I was helping in James's class at school, his teacher asked if I wanted to make this story path on the floor outside their classroom with electrical tape. I had a picture to copy from, so I decided to at least get it started. Once I started, I got really into it! After I had to leave to pick up Rett, I just wanted to go back and work on it some more, so I took him back to school with me so I could finish it. This is the finished product! The kids get to use it and physically walk the path when they are talking about the parts of a story.
Back in February I nominated James's teacher for our local newspaper's amazing teacher contest. I'm always so impressed with what she does for her class and the way she loves on the kids and teaches them so creatively. I didn't think anything would come of it, but then I got an email from a reporter at the newspaper that because of my submission, they chose her for the month of May! A reporter and a camera man came to the class to interview his teacher, a few of the kids, and see what their class is like in person. Me and a few other parents from the class also had a phone interview with the reporter. Now we are waiting for the article and video to come out!
The week the reporter came also happened to be teacher appreciation week, so a group of parents decided to surprise her and the class with a pizza party and a cake. The kids were soooooo excited to see pizza, you would think they never get fed! James's teacher's motto is that they are "Too Legit to quit!" so we put that on the cake.
Rett was excited for the pizza party too.
They were bouncing off the walls with the pizza, so we decided to do the cake outside so they could run around and burn off some energy. I love these crazy kids!!
Since I am treasurer of the parent/teacher organization I am supposed to balance our books once a month before our meetings. That can be really hard because I have to try to catch the principal in a time where she can go over what she has paid out/what is pending, etc.. with me so it almost never happens. I decided to just go in there and grab everything she has and just organize it myself. The principal is so busy, we decided that she would just put everything she has in one spot and I will keep it organized and up to date for her instead of trying to do it together. This was my setup trying to make sense of all the papers, receipts, and deposit slips.
James's teacher made a memory board on the bulletin board outside of her classroom with each kid having a bunch of pictures of activities they have done throughout the year. They got to choose one and write something about it for the board. James choose the picture of him holding a baby chick they hatched. He wrote, "I love this memory because it makes me happy, happy, happy!"
Watching James and the Giant Peach and eating ice cream and peaches since they finished the book as a class:
Rett's favorite thing to do when I bring him to James's class is play with their lego creation station.
The ducks are getting bigger by the day! They are quacking now and will be ready for the big pond very soon.
We got turkey chicks from our friends we got the bees from. It did not go as well as I had hoped. They were very skittish and after a few days one of them developed a respiratory infection which quickly spread to the rest of them. After that they started dying off one my one until we didn't have any more chicks. Bummer!
More pictures of the ducks loving the little water bowl we put in there for them:
The 25 chicks are doing well too!
This is life with chickens. I went to back up and they were all eating something on the ground behind the car. I had to have James jump out and scare them away so that we could leave!
I tricked Rett into snuggling with me on my bed and he was asleep in less than 5 minutes! He almost never naps anymore, so it was so sweet to get to snuggle.
James was dying to practice with his basketball at the YMCA gym, so we made a plan to go immediately after school one afternoon. He was in heaven! Rett just wanted to sit on the sidelines and watch.
James had an impromptu play date at a friend's house after school. They played with water balloons and the hose and had a great time. We are hoping that we will have more play dates like this over the summer!
