sat, 3/6...day 65

It was a beautiful day, definitely feels like Spring. The lawn needed mowing again - already!

As Tynor was running the lawn tractor around the front yard, Cory found lots of sunny yellow dandelions in the back to make a bouquet for me.

I can't help thinking how my days of receiving spontaneous flower bouquets from the backyard are dwindling quickly. Makes it a little bittersweet to receive the offerings now.

I worked hard inside today, despite the lure of the sunshine and warm weather. Cleaned out a whole lot of stuff and packed the van for a run to Goodwill.

It feels like such a small drop in the bucket. But since the bucket (our house!) is overflowing, picking away at it is essential or we're going to remain buried.

Progress is progress!

fri, 3/5...day 64

I saw this bumper sticker on a car in the Little School parking lot this morning. Very clever.

And I wholeheartedly agree.

thu, 3/4...day 63

Today was my spring observation day in Cory's class. I still find many aspects of the classroom frustrating: how academically-focused their classroom is, how they spend time lined up waiting for plan book writing to be "approved," how loooong their meetings are, and how little time (relatively) they have for free exploring and really digging into projects and play time.

But Cory is handling it pretty well, so...it could be worse. Just four more months...

After I observed, Cory proudly gave me a tour of the classroom and pointed out interesting tidbits: the calendar he's in the process of making, the bread tab counts (they've gathered several thousand more this school year!), Chinese New Year posters, and the growth chart, where you can really see how much taller he's gotten this year.

Later when I came back from my conference with his teacher, the kids were outside having gardening-with-Lisa time. They were busy digging out weeds from the garden patch just outside their classroom, getting ready for spring planting.

wed, 3/3...day 62

For some reason, I really love the design on this shirt. Wish it would fit Cory forever, but alas (and yay! :-), he's growing so fast right now. I think he's gained a couple of inches just in the past few months. Everything is suddenly getting too small.

But happily, this shirt still fits him. If just barely...

tue, 3/2...day 61

As we were leaving the house this morning, Cory found a red bike taillight that flashes and he was enthralled. Had to take it to school for sharing, and along the way, experimented with using it as a "flashlight" in the car and here, after school, to light up a daffodil.

Always the little scientists, these young kids.

mon, 3/1...day 60

We haven't watched much of the Winter Olympics over the past two weeks while Vancouver has been hosting - partly because despite being just a few hours away, NBC broadcast nearly all of the footage time-delayed by many hours. But Niall and I enjoyed watching for awhile just before he heads off to bed and I caught some bits and pieces in the late evenings too.

We did manage to see some of the big highlights: Apolo Ohno, Shani Davis, and other short-track and long-track speed skaters; snowboarders doing their thing in the Half-Pipe (Shaun White - wow!); a new event called ski cross (crazy!); fAST luging, skeletoning and bobsledding; and bits of ski jumping, cross country skiing (1-2American nordic combined winners!), figure skating, and downhill skiing (Bode Miller!). And, of course, the epic finale, the U.S. vs. Canada hockey game, which I was actually not unhappy that Canada won. A fitting ending to a successful host of the 21st Winter Olympics for our neighbors to the North.

Our local paper had a section for the Olympics every day, and yesterday, for the last day, they compiled all the front page photos onto a single page. Makes for a nice summary of the Games.

sun, 2/28...day 59

For some reason, Cory wishes his hair would stay slicked down "just like in the bath" instead of showing his charming, whimsical curls. I do remember wishing I had straight hair when I was his age, so maybe it's just one of those "the grass is greener" things.

But for him, it's also because he so adores Star Wars and he thinks that with his hair flattened, he looks like Luke Skywalker. Which come to think of it, he does - in a Cory-like way. :-)

In the first photo here, he's just had a haircut and his hair is still damp so it's reasonably flat. Note the Great Clips star sticker he managed to include in the photo too. And then in the second one, it's just after his bath where we washed all those extra hairs out so again, wet hair.

But later in the day, I dug out some gel that Kellen or Tynor used a few times years ago, and we globbed some on and slicked his hair down. He loved it!

sat, 2/27...day 58

Cory and the Giant Pancake! How little it takes to delight a five-year-old.

Imagine if I'd made him a Mickey Mouse face. :P