A blog from a working Mommy about her fun, crazy, very busy life that is filled with a hard working husband, two handsome sons and an adorable daughter.
He's grown so much since September, both in height and in maturity. He still struggles sometimes with keeping his cool when he's mad and easily gets his buttons pushed, but he's also slowly learning how to walk away when he realizes it's easier to do that than to argue. We are so so very proud of the little man that he is and love watch him grow and change month by month and I can't wait to see what Grade 1 will hold for our big guy!
Here are the comments from his report card:
James has improved in the area of self-control since the last reporting period. I had noted that he needed to breathe or count to 10 before reacting and he really has calmed down and rolled with the punches better than I would have expected. He is a bright boy who is meeting expectations in all areas of the curriculum. He is especially gifted at expressing himself orally with a very good vocabulary and is a valuable member of all lessons and discussions. It has been an extreme pleasure to teach James and watch him grow this Kindergarten year. I look forward to seeing him amaze everybody in the school years to come.
And from Mr. Fisher:
You are the best drummer! Have a great summer, James! * This is cute because last week he took a video of James drumming to Gracie on the playground and he played it at the assembly....James was super pumped to be the last clip in the video :)
And another cute first/last day of school photo comparison!
I'm hoping to do a big Kindergarten post with some photos from the year in the next few weeks!
Just 2 more days of school and we are officially moving on to the big scary world of Grade 1. Today was James's teachers last day of the year so this post is about the card he made her and also has the video that we made for her with videos of most of the kids from the class. There are also a few photos that I took of James and Mrs. B throughout the year. I hope to do a big Kindergarten wrap up post at some point over the summer too!
James's card that he worked very hard on...and then his butthead brother spilled milk all over it! We just wiped it off and he proudly took it off to school to give to Mrs. Butula
I loved his picture of him and Mrs. Butula hugging. He nailed their glasses...don't you think? Oh, and I love his rainbow shirt that he had to draw too!
First picture together - September Meet the Teacher night
PJ and Pancake Breakfast Morning - December
One of me and Mrs. B too! I've known her since I first moved to town when I was 6 years old. They were our neighbours and I played with her son Marc when we were kids.
Field trip day - June
And today...hard to say goodbye! We had a good year and we were lucky to have her as James's kindergarten teacher!
Big huge hugs!
Look how much James has changed since September!
And of course Jordie had to get one with Mrs. Tula too (just this morning he figured out how to say Mrs. Butula) :)
Thanks so much Brenda for a great year and I hope you enjoy your awesome vacation!
Here is the video that I did with the kids as a year end gift for Mrs. B. We were lucky enough to stay in the classroom for a little bit this morning and we got to watch it with the whole class too :)
Very busy days and evenings has made for no time or energy to do any recent blog posts, but this one was in my draft from almost 2 weeks ago so I decided to write about it now.
I spent an hour in James's classroom and worked on the kid's scrapbooks. While I was there working away Mrs. Butula told the kids to go and sit at a table with people that make them feel calm. Well of course my three favorite little men came to sit with me and it just brought a huge smile to my face. I love these 3 little ones so much!
After a bit of scrapbook work I took these three little guys down to the kitchen so they could help make some smashed potatoes with Mrs. Agius.
I got back to work and realized that I had forgotten about this sticker that Brenda had put on my shirt for me. I didn't notice until a coworker asked me what it said :)
There you have it, just a random short post just to get back into it. I find when I've been away from the blog for a few days (or in this case almost 2 weeks) I need a small post to get me started again. Now I'm off to the cabin for the weekend but hopefully when we return on Sunday I'll have some time to do our May monthly memories post (how the hell is already almost the end of June though?!?!).
Another month down and so many more memories captured for me and my 3 J's. It included my trip to Alberta, barfy sick kids, lots of t-ball, busy evening meetings for me, visits with friends and family, a special 3 year old's birthday, a preschool orientation and a really low key Mother's Day.
This party was so much fun to put together and yes it was a fair amount of work, but it's work that I absolutely love doing. Seeing the look on his face when he saw the decorations and the cake was enough to make me smile ear to ear. We did a quick fun scavenger hunt game and then just let the kids go wild in Nana and Papa's back yard while the adults visited and ate.
We are so thankful for our awesome friends who helped us celebrate our Jordie boy. Our closest family friends were all there and Jordie couldn't have been happier to have his best buddies there with him. PLUS we had the added bonus of his Reimer cousins being there too which was just a total blast for everyone. It will definitely be a party for us all to remember!
Here are the many many photos that we took of the party!
Starting off with the sign that was supposed to be a banner but this was easier to do!
He was just the cutest Marshall ever on Halloween last year
The night before the party the Reimers arrived and I put them all to work helping out!
Doesn't every kid want to help decorate the goodie bags for their party?
Ready to go!
Teresa was awesome and made this Tic Tac Toe game poster so much better than I would have!
Of course the kids wanted to help with it too
You should have seen the look on my mom's face when she heard I wanted to cut the cheese, meat, sandwiches and watermelon into bone shapes! :)
I tried to do it but she told me to get the hell out of the kitchen and she proceeded to do it all
Even Jimmy got involved helping
Decorations
Jordie showing Papa all of the Paw Patrol pups in the decorations we put up.
The next morning this little guy was up super early and just raring to go to Nana and Papa's for his party!
Even more food preparing...and even more bone shaped food!
Jordie was given this cardboard castle from the Reimers for Christmas and that very day we decided we would set it up for his birthday party in May and let him and his friends go to town on it. It just so worked out that the Reimers happened to be in town because it was the long weekend!
These two were thrilled to set it up
Auntie Teresa rigged up the doors so the kids could pull them up and not let people in
I really like this picture of Jordie and his Auntie
He got to be the first to draw on it!
And a good one of him and his cousin
hahahahahaha...his eyes match his googly eye pajamas in these 2 pictures
All set up and ready to be played on
Of course James couldn't wait to play it...even if his brother had no idea how to actually play
He's dressed now and ready for his friends to arrive
Attempted some family photos before the party
He got into the cheezies almost immediately after they hit the tabe
Big hugs for Annie Ya who was luckily able to join us for the first hour of the party before she had to go to work for the day
More of the decorations and the awesome bone cake that my friend Kelly made for me!
My friend Kelly did an awesome job on this cake! All I did was bake the cakes and throw the toys
on it....she did the rest!
Happily showing Papa his cake
He wasn't big into drawing on the castle, but he did love pulling up the drawstring doors to keep people out (especially me!)
I LOVE this picture of these two!
Such big smiles
Now Maddie's here and she loved the castle too!
And Blake loved the yard castle too!
Time for the Paw Patrol scavenger hunt game!
The kids got a sheet with the pictures of the pups and they had to find the 6 bowls in the yard that had the copies of the badges and then they had to match them up. The game only lasted a few minutes but the kids all said they had fun!
Such a cute picture of Maddie!
Time to eat!
And of course I snuck in a little hug too
Maddie is such a friendly little one that she happily sat with kids she didn't know to eat her lunch
Ms Gracie with Kelly
I don't remember taking these next few pictures and I think Jim must have had the camera
at this point. He definitely has a soft spot in his heart for the little girls in our world.
Aaaaawwww....what a pretty little smile!
hahahahahaha....sorry boys! Uncle Jim was clearly in charge of the camera at this point!
Such beautiful little eyes
Only adorable babies are allowed on Diesel's dog bed
Time for the cake!
I love our smiles in this one
It was heavy!
Happy Jordie found his favorite Chase toy
Nana said no cake on the deck so they all had to sit down on the grass
Happy Kaleb
James was excited because Quynn agreed to eat the rest of his cake
And there she goes!
Adorable Shayne loving her cake
Another beautiful photo of Maddie
And Livie
After his cake he wanted a cupcake (and because the big kids got both he thought he should too!)
This is why I love doing theme parties...it's for these kinds of smiles!
Two of my favorite kids
The next two photos are probably two of my favorites!
Lukas finished off his cupcake in no time!
These two big kids didn't look to be having too much fun!
Sorry Dane-O...definitely not the best picture of you buddy!
Jordie playing with Baby Gracie
Time to hand out the goodie bags as kids were leaving
These 3 have been buddies since they were born and we try to get a picture of them at least once a year...I would say this one is definitely a keeper!
These two are just the absolute cutest couple in the world
Big hugs
Look at how tightly her arms are around his neck
And here's the money shot!
Such love
Checking out the goodies in his goodie bags!
Big hugs for Lukas and Quynn
Sharing his chocolate with Nana
Now big hugs for Shayne
Adorable smiles
Party is cleaned up and time to open his cards with his toonies in them
Super cool 3rd birthday Rubble card!
Funny enough the boys asked me to take a couple pictures of them out on the deck
This is absolutely my new favorite photo of my boys. I love that they are holding hands in it and that was totally on them...I didn't even notice it until that night when I uploaded the photos. This one will probably be blown up big for my wall very soon!
Action shots
It's 2 pm and it's time for snuddles from Papa, then home for a nap
We're back at N&P's house for dinner and back playing in the castle some more
I also love these four photos too!
And this adorable video of us too!
Hands down, my favorite kids show ever and I am so excited that I finally got to do a birthday party for it. I thought last year it would be for James but he loved TMNT instead and last year I knew it would be the last year I could do Bubble Guppies for Jordie so I went with that with every intention of saving PP for this year :)
This was the cut out logo that I used on the top of the cake!
Wow, if you got all the way through that post...good for you! I really do these posts more for me than for anyone else but if you enjoy seeing stuff like this too I'm happy you kept at it. I know that years down the road I will for sure look back through these posts and my biggest dream is that one day my boys (and maybe future daughter-in-laws) go back and look through them and smile knowing how much I tried to give them the best that I could.
