Open House

An on-top-of-it Mom would have had Open House on her calendar for weeks, right? Well, an on-top-of-it Mom I guess I am not! The boys came out of school on Wednesday telling me all the projects they were finishing that day for Thursday's Open House and I was literally like, "Come again?" I made them each tell me three times and I still sought proof through the school calendar as soon as I got home. How in the heck did I miss the memo on that one?

Luckily I did not miss the actual event which ended up being an incredible display of hard work and improvement for both of my boys. I'm so proud of them and so happy that they are loving and learning and excelling within Westwood's walls. They have such great teachers, such great friends and they are such great kids. What a special night meant to celebrate them! 

Oh, and bonus: Dad snuck out of the office and joined us. WOO-HOOOOOO!  

Mr. Lesner is the perfect teacher for Everett, and from where I'm sitting the other 20 kids in his class as well! I don't know how he so gracefully juggles this wild brood of students but he somehow makes each one feel like the most important person in the world. He's very in tune with them academically, emotionally and physically and I love how he constantly is finding ways to reward their great work. Just this last week he gave Everett an award in front of the class for his great handwriting on his homework. It was the first award of it's kind, "just for me because my handwiting was weally that good" and you would not believe how hard he has been trying to keep writing neatly ever since. The power of a teacher is no small thing, and seeing the newfound motivation in my Evie is proof. Everett adores him, and it's not hard to see why.

As soon as Chase and Everett saw each other they immediately started playing hand-clapping games. I didn't even know they knew how to do them, but they were all smiles and so was I. It was just so, so cute.

Everett was REALLY proud of this research project he did all by himself in class. I can't believe my little Ever Knight is old enough to be doing research projects, not to mention brilliant ones like this!

^^^These are a few pages from some of his published stories and I loved them sooooo much. First graders are the best, and I love that so many of them mention cousins!

Ms. V is thoughtful and kind but also expects the best out of her students and pushes them to excel. T is no exception, and it has been so great watching her challenge his thought process, allowing him to grow and learn. She invites him to broaden his scope of novels, recommends activities she thinks will nurture his brain and asks him deep and meaningful questions. She loves that she can joke with him and says that he understands her humor in such a mature and wise way. She sees T as an academic, but more importantly as a compassionate, goofy, ever-and-eager-to-learn little boy. T loves Ms. V so much, but I don't know that he could ever appreciate her as much as his mother does.

The pictures he picked out to decorate the cover of his writing journal. This kid loves his family and that's pretty obvious from his choices!

We were two for two on stories about our massive girls vs boys pool fight in Santa Cruz this summer. I guess it was really meaningful and memorable to those boys of ours, which makes me so happy (except I think they got some of their facts wrong--girls are awesome, dun, dun, dun, dun, dun dun dun!)

Talmage was the last family in his class to make Los Angeles his home. I don't know why but this shocked me. This area seems so transient to me, but for a lot of his friends their Los Angeles roots run deep.

Talmage's poem, written as if he's one of the first immigrants to Los Angeles from Mexico. Of course he's dreaming of a trillion dollars, but does T realize that he couldn't buy Pokemon cards in the 1700s?

Neither one of these is perfect, but both selfie and picture show something that we definitely want in our blog books--our family of six at Open House!!! Good job boys, I'm so proud of you.