Clark's Last Day of Kindergarten

 Kindergarten was amazing for Clark. He really thrived under the structure, and learning that it offered. He had an incredible, loving and dynamic teacher. We are looking forward to Iris having her in another year.

Chilling on the Kindergarten Tree

Super hugs for the best teacher ever

the kids and Ms. Hellman

Clark's 5th birthday!

Clark had his fifth birthday party at the Kensington Volunteer Fire Department (the same scene of his 3rd birthday party). The theme was "super heros" and it was a ton of fun! 

We had a very long, snowy winter. School was cancelled a lot. We were trapped indoors a lot. So, we used those snow days to make some super awesome stuff for the party. 

 

we made a pinata out of a paper grocery bag

construction paper, glue, scissors.

everyone helped.

and Clark picked some cool pictures from Pintrest to glue to the sides of the Pinata

and filled it with candy!

on the day of the party, we dressed in our Superhero Best

enjoyed our friends!

two cakes!

and ate some delicious ice cream cake!

family love

Clark is 5!

 There was a fire station tour, a pinata, and all the kids left the party with superhero capes and masks!

Clark's Theater Class ~incomplete video loaing

~ they are having issues with the video loader. I'll try to re-upload the videos later.~

This Winter, Clark took a theater class called "Super-kids in the City" at Imagination Stage. He really enjoyed it. Each week, they worked on developing their character (Clark made super-villan, "Electricity Man") and learning about the characteristics of heros, such as perseverance, team work, courage, creativity, confidence.  He earned a badge for each of the characteristics that he demonstrated, and the badges were stapled to their super hero capes.

He often came home with fun games we could play. They were games with making and mimicking funny voices. Games where we made funny poses, or pretended to do something (mix a cake, eat chocolate, drive a car). 

This is an object improv game. The kids went around the circle and pretended the object was whatever they wanted it to be. Some other things it was: an ice cream cone, a car, a raincloud, a megaphone.  

The Debut of Electricity Man!

 

This is the story the kids developed over the course of the semester, using their characters that they developed. Clark is electricity man. 

 after the video stops, Clark and the other bad guy go to jail, and Clark has a conversion. He says, "I'm sorry I was bad. I want to be a good guy now." and the good guys take him into their fold.  Then the other guy falls into a pit where he eventually turns good too. The End.

This was a quick thinking improv game.

While it isn't fantastic acting from this bunch of 5 year old boys, I think they had an incredible amount of fun and really developed their imaginations during the class. 

I'm proud of Clark for doing so well in this class and for really enjoying himself.

School starts again

It's that wonderful time of year when the air gets crisper, pants are worn, and we sadly say goodbye to summer. 

Clark started school last week at St Raphael's Nursery School. He's in MWF mornings. His class is full of many of the kids from last year, but 10 boys and 5 girls! 

Clark amazes me. I really like his age. He is constantly making up songs, jokes and stories. His content frequently includes "poop" or "pie face" or "pickle pants" or other silly things. 

His latest joy is setting traps around the house. He has made girl traps and mommy traps. He has made bad guy robber traps to keep us safe. Today he was playing and kept getting caught in his own traps by an "evil king who drove by in his castle mobile" 

He is constantly making up games and has lots of fun ideas. 

Clark memorized my phone number just by hearing me say it on the phone or at the grocery store. 

He really wants to learn to read. He uses his finger to follow words on the page and enjoys participating in some very early readers where a sentence has a few pictures in it. He likes to read to Iris and now to his new frogs. 

He saved up his chore money to buy two tiny frogs. He gets a nickel for every pair of shoes he puts away, every cup he finds wandering around the house and returns to the kitchen, and for every night he wears underpants and is dry the next morning. 

He's a pretty great kid. We love him so much and are very proud of him. 

Next week is his superstar week at school. On Friday we will get to go into his classroom and introduce ourselves. I'm also going to read a story. We are all very excited! 

The Precious

Here are some Clark highlights from 2013!

Climbing

Banana Phone! 

Playing with kitties at the pet store!

My brave boy got a vaccine!

Getting head stuck in the stairs!

Coloring and making faces

Clark Bunny and Jimi, his friend from school!

Finding flowers and celebrating Spring

I love his coloring with this coat.

Swinging! 

Climbing again! 

Listening to music on his CD player

Life is fun and learning

an amazing thing is happening at our house...

our kids are growing!

Clark is learning so much, and has become such a ... boy... a child... 

he's not a baby anymore

he's not a toddler

and sure, he's a preschooler, but he's.... learning so much!  

He can trace letters and write words when he does it. 

He can read the words

Clark

Iris

Mommy

Daddy

Buzz

Fly

Chapter

Stop

Dog

Cat

Yes

No

The kids LOVE it when Tom gets home from work. They climb all over him, and he doesn't disappoint. He picks them up, throws them around, lets Clark (and often BOTH) sit on his feet as he walks around the house.

They are constantly looking for physical challenges like climbing, balancing, hopping, jumping, hopping, and twirling (is that a challenge?) 

except, I don't like jumping off at the end! 

Being the best parents in the world, we let them jump on the bed - and climb on the head board - and often into the window frame to jump off of it onto the bed. 

One day, these monkeys will be bumping their heads, but so far, they've been pretty injury-free. 

Here's some more climbing. 

And on icky days, trapped indoors...

we learn in other ways. 

I recently went outside of my comfort zone and made a sensory bin. 

Its rice, and there are things hidden in the rice...

you can see a pile of hidden treasures in the middle bottom of the picture. 

They scooped, poured, and moved the rice around for hours one snowy afternoon. 

it is a wild ride... this parenting.. but these kids are simply awesome.  

Clark's 3rd Birthday Party

Fire truck cake!

We had Clark's 3rd birthday party today. It was incredible. We rented a room at our local Fire Department and invited our friends to come eat yummy foods and a fire truck cake!  The kids played in firetruck costumes, with fire truck toys, in a fire truck popup house, play with a fake burning city,  colored, and got to wear firefighter hats! We even had a tour of the fire station by Fireman Dan!

I don't know why we are laughing, but we are. This non-Greenwell is Mary, and her daughter Josie who is 3 months older than Iris and considers herself Iris' babysitter/keeper/bestfriend/2nd mom.

Little Fire Truck House and friends.

Kids playing "nicely"

Owen playing sweetly by himself. Driving fire truck over to burning city to save the day!

Mr. Precious! (that's John Paul over in the corner. Hasn't he grown?!!)

Lots of friends. Will Clark and his mom, Katie are in the front.

Fireman Dan demonstration

Fire station tour.

Watch how fast he gets dressed!

High Fives for the Fireman!

Happy Family!

Touring the ambulance.

Checking out the Ambulance. That girl in pink is little Bernadette!

Clark drives a firetruck with Iris by his side!

I'm driving the truck!

Happy Birthday time!

Blowing

Blowing

Gone!

We did 3 candles with 1 to grow on. This was an Averill tradition, but not a Greenwell one. It turns out about half of our guests did it too, and half didn't.  If you watch the blowing out the cake photos, Iris is blowing too!

We've been talking about this firetruck birthday party for months, and I'm so glad the day was finally here. It completely fulfilled all of my own dreams for an awesome birthday party and I'm pretty sure Clark and everyone else loved it too! 

I'd like to thank "The Cake Boss" for inspiring our fire truck cake. I'd like to thank Tom for buying and prepping all of our delicious gluten-free food. I'd like to thank all of our friends who came to have fun with us today. Finally, I'd like to thank Clark for making my dreams come true by being my baby (although he would say, "I'm not a baby, I'm a boy!"), and for turning 3 and allowing us to have this awesome party!