Saturday, September 13, 2003
Benny went to a birthday party today for his friend Skylar who is now ONE whole year old. For presents we took Skylar and his sister Elizabeth swing jackets. Benny had a great time at the party, put a whoooole lot of black pepper on his hot dog, and ate 154 cupcakes. Thanks to Skylar's Mommy and Grandparents for having us over! :)
Here are a couple of shots with Benny and the birthday boy in his new jacket.
Here are a couple of shots with Benny and the birthday boy in his new jacket.
Benny starts Suzuki violin lessons on Monday!!! This is very exciting because the Academy of Music which is right down the street from us has a waiting list a mile long for beginning Suzuki students, and I was told last month that I wouldn't be able to get him in before Christmas. WELL. This and that happened, and there was one little teeny tiny opening on Mondays at 5:00, and I TOOK IT. So today we had to go get a rental violin. Benny's violin is a 1/16th size.
Here's Benny at the store. His violin is on the counter. They had a nice little area for the little kids to sit and play while Moms were filling out this and that. Benny was definitely the littlest one in the store at the time, but violins also come in 1/32nd size! CAN YOU IMAGINE? :)
Here's Benny with his violin in hand, outside the violin store and walking down the street to get in our truck.
Benny will be taking one lesson a week with a group of three other children, and also one lesson a month with all the "pre-twinklers" in the Academy. The session actually started last week, so this weekend he is learning rest position, play position, and smiling and bowing, to catch up. We made some foot charts for him to stand on and also made his poseable bandicoot do rest position and play position footprints in Play-Doh. I hope he won't be too far behind on Monday. He was very enthusiastic in the store.
I'll be posting some pictures later from the birthday party we went to today.
Here's Benny at the store. His violin is on the counter. They had a nice little area for the little kids to sit and play while Moms were filling out this and that. Benny was definitely the littlest one in the store at the time, but violins also come in 1/32nd size! CAN YOU IMAGINE? :)
Here's Benny with his violin in hand, outside the violin store and walking down the street to get in our truck.
Benny will be taking one lesson a week with a group of three other children, and also one lesson a month with all the "pre-twinklers" in the Academy. The session actually started last week, so this weekend he is learning rest position, play position, and smiling and bowing, to catch up. We made some foot charts for him to stand on and also made his poseable bandicoot do rest position and play position footprints in Play-Doh. I hope he won't be too far behind on Monday. He was very enthusiastic in the store.
I'll be posting some pictures later from the birthday party we went to today.
Friday, September 12, 2003
Preschool this week was much less dramatic. He predicted on the way there that he was going to cry, but there were no tears, in fact a big happy smile when I picked him up. He had told me "You're going to cry at preschool" a few times, but he had also received a lot of pretend calls from Mr. Steve (calling for me) and I pretended along and told Mr. Steve that Benny was not planning on crying this time. Here's a conversation I had with Benny this week regarding preschool:
Benny (while eating spaghetti): "Mr. Steve says DON'T THROW FOOD!"
Me: Were you throwing food at preschool?
Benny: No.
Me: Who was throwing food?
Benny: What was the name of who was throwing food at preschool?
Me: Was it a little girl?
Benny: No.
Me: Was it a little boy?
Benny: Yes.
Me: Was the little boy's name Benny?
Benny (giggling): No!
Here's his artwork from preschool this week:
I'm a little concerned that it seems so primitive compared to what he draws at home. When the teacher handed it to me she said, "Benny did a great art project today!" so... who knows what to make of it all?
Since she appeared to be working on shapes, we also worked on shapes at home. Here's Benny's paper and my paper (which was mostly done by Benny also, who is a very hands on teacher with me. )
Can you find a circle, a square, a triangle, a rectangle, an oval, a crescent, a star, a parallelogram, and a trapezoid? BTW I don't know what that brown thing at the top is on Benny's paper.
Here's his letter practice and his spelling paper for this week:
The words are pat, pin, pug (he told me kindly that the G was backwards), pot, pet, rob, rip (again he informed his dull mother that the P was backwards), rag, and rut. Does he spell the words himself? Yes. I don't tell him what to write. I think he got PIN wrong because he couldn't decide if it was I or E so he just put both. I don't correct him though.
AND OUR MOST EXCITING NEWS IS THIS: BENNY CAN SWIM!!!
Benny and Ms. Deanah have come great distances since we got back from South Carolina and TODAY he had a major breakthrough which was instead of sinking to the bottom when he gets tired of paddling, he flipped over and swam on his back a little bit until he was okay to go on, then rolled over on his front and continued swimming! This meant that he could rescue all five foam fish (and put them on Ms. Deanah's head -- that is their game) and everything! I was so flabbergasted I almost fainted dead away! He just looks so tiny and simultaneously so big and old when he's casually paddling around with NO CONCERN ON HIS FACE, just total confidence and happiness -- really nice. Today was the last day of this session so here is his certificate from Ms. Deanah. She said the heart sticker was "From my heart to yours, because I love you, Benny!" This is the first time he's really noticed or cared that he got a certificate but he really liked it, and brought it home and proudly showed Dad. :) YAY.
Benny (while eating spaghetti): "Mr. Steve says DON'T THROW FOOD!"
Me: Were you throwing food at preschool?
Benny: No.
Me: Who was throwing food?
Benny: What was the name of who was throwing food at preschool?
Me: Was it a little girl?
Benny: No.
Me: Was it a little boy?
Benny: Yes.
Me: Was the little boy's name Benny?
Benny (giggling): No!
Here's his artwork from preschool this week:
I'm a little concerned that it seems so primitive compared to what he draws at home. When the teacher handed it to me she said, "Benny did a great art project today!" so... who knows what to make of it all?
Since she appeared to be working on shapes, we also worked on shapes at home. Here's Benny's paper and my paper (which was mostly done by Benny also, who is a very hands on teacher with me. )
Can you find a circle, a square, a triangle, a rectangle, an oval, a crescent, a star, a parallelogram, and a trapezoid? BTW I don't know what that brown thing at the top is on Benny's paper.
Here's his letter practice and his spelling paper for this week:
The words are pat, pin, pug (he told me kindly that the G was backwards), pot, pet, rob, rip (again he informed his dull mother that the P was backwards), rag, and rut. Does he spell the words himself? Yes. I don't tell him what to write. I think he got PIN wrong because he couldn't decide if it was I or E so he just put both. I don't correct him though.
AND OUR MOST EXCITING NEWS IS THIS: BENNY CAN SWIM!!!
Benny and Ms. Deanah have come great distances since we got back from South Carolina and TODAY he had a major breakthrough which was instead of sinking to the bottom when he gets tired of paddling, he flipped over and swam on his back a little bit until he was okay to go on, then rolled over on his front and continued swimming! This meant that he could rescue all five foam fish (and put them on Ms. Deanah's head -- that is their game) and everything! I was so flabbergasted I almost fainted dead away! He just looks so tiny and simultaneously so big and old when he's casually paddling around with NO CONCERN ON HIS FACE, just total confidence and happiness -- really nice. Today was the last day of this session so here is his certificate from Ms. Deanah. She said the heart sticker was "From my heart to yours, because I love you, Benny!" This is the first time he's really noticed or cared that he got a certificate but he really liked it, and brought it home and proudly showed Dad. :) YAY.
