Just before fall break, Harry had “crazy hair day” at school. He was having fun while I made the ponytail, but when I hairsprayed the sides out like that, he said “I don’t like that” and I said, “dude, that is hair spray in there, you will just have to wait for it to wear off.” He wasn’t too happy with me and wouldn’t pose for a photo, but I took one anyway. Must have been okay, he didn’t come home all traumatized or anything, tho’ he did hand me the ponytailer as soon as he saw me.
Harry made me this wonderful card at school for Mother’s Day and I just love it. In case you can’t see it, it says Mom, important, huggable, beautiful, happy, funny, short, good, love, hugs, mom.
I always did think that being short was one of my *best* qualities!
This is something I almost never do. I was at my local scrapbook store, About Memories & More and I found a little chipboard book by Jenni Bowlin and I instantly knew what I wanted to do with it. That hardly ever happens, I typically buy stuff just because I like it and hope that I have a use for it somehow. Anyway, I wanted to make a small book about Harry’s 2nd grade teacher in Reno. He adored her rigth from the start and was very sad to leave her class. I wanted it to be something he could look at without getting out the big old scrapbook albums.
Harry had a great time this morning in the fresh powder. Considering we’re raising him for veal, he stayed out there quite a long time and loved it. I was a wimp though and took pictures of his first run and then got the hell back in the warm house!
When we last got to IKEA in May, they were having a Kids Day and there was a very nice Caricature artist there named Susan Johnson (artbysue@sbcglobal.net). Somehow, the line was only one kid long when we walked in, so we wrangled her into doing both boys. George sat pretty well for only 7 months old at the time. Sue asked them what they liked to do, so Harry is building a Lego raft and Georgie is playing with blocks. I don’t recall George ever really getting into blocks, but I imagine that’s what Harry told her that he liked to do.
We were so thrilled to find out that Harry LOVED his 2nd grade teacher this year. He was truly excited to go to school everyday and did his homework without any fuss. He was happy and thriving until we found out that due to decreased enrollment, they were going to eliminate one of the 2nd grade classes, and you guessed it, it was Harry’s class with Mrs. Martin. She is normally a 1st grade teacher and got bumped back into 1st grade and Harry’s class got split up between the other 2nd grade classes. He’s back in a team teaching class, which I think is incredibly stupid. One teacher teaches the class while the other grades homework and does paperwork. I’m not impressed with the idea.
This photo was taken on the last day that Harry went to Mrs. Martin’s class. What a sad day for him.
Harry left this for me on my desk. He thought it was so cute, he knew I would like it, but wanted to make sure I didn’t eat it. So like him, the sweetest little boy on earth.
Today was registration at Harry’s school. After being in a two-teacher, very full class last year, I asked for him to be moved to a traditional classroom. He is not a needy kid, but all that chaos didn’t work for him. The whole idea of having two teachers seemed to make sense at first until I found out that in practice, it meant one teacher was teaching ALL 37 kids while the other teacher graded papers.
All spring semester, they insisted that my son could hardly read and then when they gave him a standardized test, he suddenly “could” read above grade level. I wasn’t impressed. It told me that he was not going to excel in that environment.
Here’s a video of Harry getting a principal’s award at school. His reading level went up a whole grade since January. I kind of knew that he would just suddenly “get” reading since that’s exactly how it happened with Steven. Way to go Dude!
For as long as he has needed haircuts, Harry has just HATED them. When he was little, he cried throughout the whole ordeal and then when he outgrew the tears, he just became uncooperative. He would hold his head at funny angles and slump down; generally try to sabotage the haircut. After four months of letting his hair grow (and I really thought it was kind of surfer-boy cute), we finally took him in because he just wasn’t keeping it clean enough. Well, he must have gotten lucky because the stylist knew just how to chat him up and he was Mr. Personality for her, talking a blue streak and sitting like a little statue. Now he says that he ALWAYS wants his hair short.
