Playdates, field trips and parties!

Okay, it's mid-June and this month has already been jam-packed!!!  The kids have all been on play dates this week, I've accompanied Blake on a field trip to John Jantzen Nature Centre, Em's had a Teddy Bear Picnic at school, a Father's Day fun night with her class and their Dads and a school 'beach' day!  Oh, Em also had a birthday party at Galaxyland and Blake and his friend Ryan (together with their moms) put together a comedy routine and auditioned for the school talent show!!  Annnd 3 on 3 began today :)  It's been fun y'all!  But July is just around the corner and we're racing for the finish line!!!  Talk to you soon :)

John Jantzen field trip

Lacrosse Wind-Up

This weekend wrapped up Blake's 1st Lacrosse season!  He had a great time and fell in love with yet another sport ;)  Blake learned so much and picked up the game quite quickly.  He was a force to be reckoned with out there!!  He wants to play next year, so we'll see how he does moving up a level!  The next level is a lot quicker but I'm sure he'll be up to the challenge!  We ended the season with a tournament at the East Soccer Centre and lunch with the team on Sunday afternoon.  We've all enjoyed the lacrosse season, Cal and I really enjoyed watching and learning the game and as happens in team sports, the siblings also make friends and the girls made a few great lacrosse friends who they'll miss!  We'll try to plan some play dates with our lacrosse friends over the summer :)

Year end tournament photo and medal and cake at the lunch party :)

Hula-Hoop-A-Thon!!

On Friday Blake and Emerson's school had a hula-hoop-a-thon with all funds raised going towards the Boys and Girls Club of Edmonton.  When the memo first came home, I thought this sounded silly and I wondered why they didn't just do a good 'ol Jump Rope for Heart fundraiser for the Heart and Stroke Foundation!  I was wrong.  This event was AWESOME!!  The teachers and youth leader's did an amazing job, planning a super fun and well-organized afternoon of hula'ing!!!  Each grade had to hula to a certain number of songs (preschool - grade 1, 1 song; grade 2, 2 songs, etc.).  The crowd got involved doing the wave, starting a congo line and a whistle blew after ever $100 raised, while a YL ran around with a sign depicting the amount raised!  It was so much fun, I'm glad we went to watch and ... participate ... yes, I was called up to hula!! lol! Turns out hula-hooping with an adult hoop is much easier than hula'ing with a dollar store hula hoop!!!  Now best of all, our school raised nearly $8,000 for the Boys and Girls Club of Edmonton!!!  Way to go, Ecole Bishop Savaryn School!!

Blake in the middle (orange t, no hat)!

Goofing around ;)

Congo line!!

Girls turn, lead by one of Blake's classmates :)

Reese's Kindergarten Orientation

Reese had her kindergarten orientation this morning ... yes, I'm serious.  I can.not.believe.it. In September our baby will be attending kindergarten!  She's kinda an old hand at kindergarten, seeing as she's been in the classroom numerous times, sees Mme. Sina 2-3x a day and is at the school 2x a day!!  It really was no big deal to her ;)  And kindergarten is only 1 more morning a week, as compared to preschool.  So, she'll do great!!  She is going to try riding the bus home on the afternoon kindergarten bus.  Hopefully it goes okay!  That way I will only have to go to the school two times a day vs three!!  Reese and I have been doing some school work.  All I can say is she is STUBBORN!!  Like, really.  I think we all say our children are stubborn and I think all children are stubborn to a certain degree ... Reese takes it up a notch ;)  Good thing is, she tends to follow direction and listen better to non-family members!!  I've already joked with Mme. Sina that she will have her hands full next year ;)  At home right now, we're mostly working on letters and numbers.  She's doing great but we have to work in very short spurts!!  I have no doubt, she is a smart cookie, she just has a different learning style from Blake and Em.  And that's okay, it's just not as 'easy' for Cal and I!!  Orientation didn't bring us any new info, seeing as this is our third time around ;)  But Reese enjoyed hanging out in the classroom and it was nice to see some of the faces who will be Reese's classmates next year!  So now Reese is successfully orientated and ready to start Kinder in September :)

Cuteness overload, heading to orientation!!

Listening intently!

Play On!

This past weekend was spent at the Hockey Night in Canada Play On street hockey tournament at WEM!!  Cal entered a team in this tournament last year but we were a little unprepared for the competitiveness ;)  So this year, we were ready!!!  The boys had a great tournament.  We didn't win but each game was very close and a few games we were up and lost in the last few minutes :(  The team we lost out to in the semi-finals, went on to take silver!  So although we lost, we were right in there and happy with our games!  The best part of all was spending the weekend with friends and making new friends!  Saturday night a few of the players and families got together for a BBQ and we had the BEST time.  We were up late that night and played at 8 am the next morning ... so needless to say, everyone was ready for a quite Sunday afternoon ;)  Here's a few pics from the weekend:

#4 ready to go!

The NorthSide Kings!

My boys

Blake, Emerson and Reese with Louie the Lion

Brag alert!!

When I picked Emerson up from school on Friday her teacher pulled me aside.  I thought I was in for another story of Emerson's imagination at work but she wanted to talk to me about Emerson's love of learning!  Mme. Sina told me that Emerson was a very smart girl!  A few months ago she asked me if we speak French at home.  I told her we didn't.  She then asked who Emerson's converses with in French.  Again, I said no one!  Mme Sina was very surprised, she said Em has picked up French so quickly and can understand everything she is saying.  Then on Friday she told me that Emerson is often the first one to answer her questions in class and often the only one to raise her hand to answer the question!  She said she has expressed a great interest in reading and Mme Sina has been working with her on both French and English reading, even though in FI Kindergarten, reading instruction is not part of the curriculum.  I was so, so happy to hear this and very proud of Em :)  I know she's a smart little cookie but it's great to hear this type of feedback from her teacher!  Everyday she comes home talking about everything she's learned in school that day - just this week she said to me, "Mom, did you know the whole world is made of molecules?  Tiny, little molecules.  All made of different things.  Even us, Mom!"  We will be keeping up with learning this summer and I can't wait for grade 1, she's more than ready for the challenge!!  

Signed,

1 proud Mom :) 

May wrap up

Oh May ... oh may, oh may.  You have been a whirlwind of fun and insanity!!  May's been very busy.  And I hate to always talk about how busy life is but yeah, it's busy.  And May was busier.  But all good :)  So there ya go, busy but good ... no complaints, just facts ... lol!

With the Preschool board elections happening for next year, School Council elections and wrap up, planning of the teacher's appreciation luncheon, Preschool graduation/year end party, power skating wrapping up, Cal away at the end of the month, a street hockey tournament, a quick road trip to SK with my parents and sister, finale week at the dance studio, recital day, a few birthday parties and lacrosse, we were on the go wayyyy more than usual!!

A huge thank you to my parents who helped us out here and there this month and allowed me to still attend all the events/meetings/whatever else was on the calendar, while Cal was in Calgary!  Life-savers as usual or maybe I should say sanity-savers?!  A few good friends were also a great help and at these times I am always extra thankful for our 'villiage'.

I had a great trip to SK with my parents and sister.  Lindsay and I rode in the back of the truck, like the good 'ol days!!  I thought I'd sleep more and maybe have time to write out thank you cards to the sponsors of the school spaghetti dinner and silent auction, but I did neither or those and the trip seemed to fly by!  It was great to see some of our Smith family and I'm glad we were able to celebrate Michelle and Austin's marriage! 

While I was in SK, Cal and the kids were at the Road Rage Street Hockey Tournament in St. Albert!  Blake and a few friends formed a team and participated in this tournament and will play in the upcoming Play On tournament at WEM.  Sounds like they had a blast, the weather was hot and the snow cones were cold!  Cal said the girls were great and thankfully Reese didn't get lost (she's prone to that.).  Our good friends the Weaver's have a fabulous Mom/MIL who lives with them and loves our girls and thankfully she (aka Nanna) had fun with the girls on the sidelines and said they were great!


June's calendar is looking blank compared to May's and I am looking forward to slowing down, just a bit ;)

~ Tracy