Goodbye to Mr. Gan

I have really enjoyed the preschool that Nathan goes to and I think that the teachers are wonderful. There are four regular teachers with Ms. Laura being his main teacher and Ms. Heather, Mr. Michael, and Mr. Gan are the other teachers. Today the class went to the park as a fieldtrip/ goodbye party for Mr. Gan who is moving on to bigger and better things. The day included a water baloon fight, flying kites, and playing on the playground. Everyone had a great time and we were all very hot and tired afterward.

The last picture is of Josh and the water fountain at the playground. I haven't seen a fountain placed so low to the ground before and I can only imagine that it is for the dogs that may come to the park, but it was perfect for my little boy.

San Diego Trip

For Richard's vacation time this year, we decided that we wanted to spend some time at home working on projects around the house, and then spend a few day in San Diego.

Sorry, I started this post ages ago and just haven't been able to finish it and now I'm feeling that I will just bore everyone describing the trip. So here are the pictures, we had a great time. We should have done one more day in between Sea world and the Animal Park but kept it as a rest day and not visited any parks. We went to San Diego Zoo, Sea World, and San Diego Wild Animal Park and by the end of it, the kids were animaled out.

Mother's Day

Just wanted to say a quick note about Mother's Day before it got too far past. I actually felt like I had several Mother's Days last week. On Monday night, Richard took the boys out to buy me some mother's day presents. Apparently they did a lot of walking and Richard didn't take the stroller so he ended up carrying the boys at the end. They were successful though, and the boys could hardly wait to show me what they had bought and Richard and I couldn't talk them out of it. After I had admired the gifts, Nathan pulled out the wrapping paper and he and Josh wrapped them. One was done in red Christmas paper and the other in silver and gold striped tissue paper.

On Friday, Nathan's preschool class had a Mother's Day Tea which was very lovely. Nathan's teacher, Miss Laura had prepared a lovely spread of sandwiches, fruit, salad, and desserts. Most was pre-bought (I'm so glad because she does so much already) but the students did help make the sandwiches by spreading on the filling and cutting the sandwiches into shapes with cookie cutters.

On the actual day, I got some lovely hand made items from each boy, a card from each of my guys, and a new gadget from Richard; I got a satellite radio. I was really surprised about the radio as I didn't think that there were any more gadgets left to buy, but it has been a lot of fun to have. The family favorite at this point is the children's music station. I get a kick out of how the kids will hear the beginning of a song and they will shout out excitedly what song or show or movie or character it is. And today Nathan impressed me when he heard a song sung by Kermit the Frog and insisted that it was Ernie (they are both voiced by Frank Oz). I decided not to try and explain.

Kindergarten preparations

Poor Nathan got stuck more times today than a pincushion. He is starting kindergarten next year and today he had the infamous kindergarten check-up. He was a little nervous going in and that surprised me because he usually doesn't have a problem with the doctor. About half-way through the appointment he mentioned getting a flu shot a few months ago (that kid is getting a good memory). Now I knew why he was worried. I hadn't mentioned shots to him at all but he has finally gotten the connection between the doctor's office and those nasty little shots. I felt really bad when at the end of the appointment the doctor left and Nathan felt all relaxed and happy. You see, our doctor doesn't give the shots, his nurse does, after the appointment is all over. So here is Nathan, thinking that he is free and clear while I know that he is about to get the worst set of shots that he is ever going to get. I'm still trying to decide if I should have warned him a little or if that just would have made it worse. In the end he got a TB test, blood drawn, and three shots. The nurse worked quick and Nathan cried hard and loud. At the end I wasn't sure who I felt worse for, him or her. It was her second set of kindergarten shots for the day and she seemed to honestly feel bad for having to do it.

Our weekend

Since I have been off track, Nathan and Joshua have been at home with me instead of with my sister who takes care of them when I'm working. One of the really nice things about Jessica taking care of my kids is that Nathan is really good friends with my niece, Jillian. They have such a good time that even though I have only been home with the boys for a days, Nathan was going through Jillian withdrawals. So we arranged to have Jillian spend a night this weekend. They had a really good time making messes and playing games.
The pictures of the garage are an example of some of their "artwork" that they had fun doing. They stayed up way too late and work up much to early, but they had a great time. We will have to do it again soon.

The next pictures aren't old even though Nathan is dyeing eggs. I had bought an egg dyeing kit before Easter but we never had the time to use it. On Sunday when the rest of the family was in various stages of napping, Nathan was rummaging through cupboards looking for something to eat/do/play with and he found the egg dyes. I couldn't come up with a really good reason not to use it and it would keep him happy for a good half hour. He had a great time and took tons of pictures of the eggs afterwards. I like it when the kids have fun doing these types of things. I tried to get Nathan excited about helping me make my birthday cake with me but he was only interested in eating it.

Happy Birthday to Me!

I know that it's a few days late but I just wanted to comment on my birthday quickly. The actual day was rather uneventful as I still had work in the morning and class at night. I was able to come home for a few hours in between, but I spent them doing homework. My present from Richard and the boys was a new clothes hamper. It actually arrived a few days after my birthday, but I had a good time putting it together and the boys had a good time helping me. The wicker was the old hamper that I got as a Christmas present about six years ago. I wanted the new one because the wicker was getting beat up and it just seemed like it would be nice to get something nicer looking. It does throw my schedule of laundry doing off though as the bins in the new hamper are smaller. I could let the dirty clothes get to a certain level in the old hamper before having to do laundry. Now I'll have to see how much I can stuff in the new hamper before doing a load.

Off track

There are some really nice things about being a teacher; the most obvious being that for me, I get two months off every four months (I'm in a year around school). I'm just starting my next break and I have all sorts of plans of what I want to get done this time but I already feel like I'm behind. It's like I spend four months just trying to keep the house off of the EPA's most wanted list and then spend the next two months trying to catch up. I spent the first two days off getting the kitchen and living room into something reasonable and as of today, the laundry is at least mostly done. Richard came home a couple days ago and asked who was coming over because why else would we clean the house?

The picture is actually from a week or two ago when in an "End of the School Year" fit I felt like cooking a chocolate souffle. It turned out fairly well although it might have been a little undercooked; I'm not sure as I've never had a souffle before.