Wrapping Up Second Grade

June 5, 2014November 12, 2023 | patmcg

Claire finished second grade on Thursday. How did that happen? One minute, there was a month of school left, and the next minute it was over.

It was a good year for Claire. She loved her teacher, loved her school routine, loved riding the bus home, and loved her school friends. Second grade was a fun year, but with hints of growing up. I think of it as the beginning of “the later Ramona years”, where Ramona is maturing past the silly little kid she once was and moving into new challenges. (Molly is in the early Ramona years.)

Academically, Claire started the year still struggling a bit with basic reading and ended the year strong, tackling big chapter books. She learned to methodically attack challenging words and was coasting through works like “business” and “experiment” by the end of the year. She also conquered speed math (doing basic addition and subtraction quickly) and addition with 3, 4, and more digits. As a challenge, I would sometimes have her add up two really big numbers like 465,777 + 261,222, which she handled with ease. This is a long way from struggling with 9 + 7 just a few months before.

Celebrating the last day of school at Kerby Lane Cafe

This progress was due to Claire’s hard work and her teacher’s strong dedication. Claire was invited to join two before- and after-school “clubs” lead by her tireless teacher, who had adopted a baby mid-year. Handwriting club was two days a week before school, and math club was one day a week after school. Claire loved handwriting club because it was “cozy” being in the quiet classroom before most of the kids had arrived. She loved math club because her friend Susie was also in the club, and Claire usually got to go to Susie’s house afterwards to do homework and play and hopefully get a Slurpee.

On her report cards, Claire’s teacher praised Claire’s work ethic as “working hard on her handwriting and spelling” and “becoming more confident with continual math practice.” She also focused on Claire’s story telling. “Claire is a lovely story teller. She continually wows me with her word choice and plot development. She is engaged in class discussions and makes fascinating connections.”

Claire dragged piles of projects home over the last two weeks of school.

The main challenge this year was homework, which was about an hour of reading, spelling, and math. Claire seemed to really enjoy her in-school work but often struggled and railed against homework. Sometimes she would complain openly, but more often she would just procrastinate and lollygag as long as possible. I think by this time of day, Claire was tired and felt she had already done her honest day’s work and should be able to just unwind and relax. This may be Claire’s first real lesson in growing up — yes, you should be able to relax now, but sorry, you had stuff to do first. Welcome to the club. Homework had to be finished in the narrow time between the end of Claire’s school day and when we picked up Molly at 5:15, or else it got pushed to either immediately before or after dinner, both stressful times to squeeze in that extra burst of brain focus before calling it a night. Basically, 3:00 to 7:00 was a tough time of day for everyone, with homework, finishing up work, picking up Molly, making dinner, cleaning up dinner, starting baths all sort of at the same time.

The homework issue got better over the year, and eventually our afternoons were improved dramatically thanks to the new after-school nanny we hired towards the end of the year. More on that in another post.

One Night in San Antonio

June 1, 2014 | patmcg

For Kit’s birthday, took a one-night trip to San Antonio. With her job, Kit can’t take a long weekend, so we had to keep this weekend trip short and sweet. This girls had not really seen the Alamo before, except maybe quick drive by. Claire had heard a lot about it in Texas history in school, so she was interested to see it.

It was a quick trip, but we did it right. We stayed at the Crockett Hotel right behind the Alamo. Luckily, we got a 4th-story room directly overlooking the Alamo grounds. For a while after checking in, we all sat and gazed past the old stone walls at the families wandering around the Alamo grounds. For a while at night, it was quiet on the streets except for the sounds of horse draw carriages clomping by below us. It was like being in 1888 for a while. Then the San Antonio Spurs won the NBS Western Conference championship, which resulted in celebratory yelling and horn honking all through the night. This was a nice sound too, and luckily it did not wake up the girls.

Molly’s says her favorite part of the trip was the water walls leading past the Hyatt Regency to the Riverwalk (in Molly’s words, “the big water things”). She wanted to just look at the flowing water and kept asking to go back. The water walls were big enough and on all sides, giving the feeling of being sort of in the water yourself. The water was loud but had a nice calming effect. Then a series of small bridges and rivers inside the hotel lead to the Riverwalk. I have enjoyed this amazing hotel lobby since I was young, and it was nice to see Molly appreciate it too.

Claire’s says she liked the water wall too, but her favorite part was the Riverwalk, the main part with all the restaurants, bridges, tress, music, etc. It was such a quick trip that we had to do basically a quick walk through, but we covered the whole main circle part of the Riverwalk on Saturday evening and even had dinner on the river. We also stopped by La Villita and did some window shopping in the old village and wandered our way back to the Travis.

The next morning, we visited the Alamo. It was nice to just simply walk across the street and into the Alamo. We spent couple of hours in the Alamo. The girls liked poking around. Molly did get a little impatient as we read the various history plaques. Eventually Claire got worn down too. Kit was enjoying it more than anyone, which is good since this was her birthday trip.

Then it was off to the southern reach of the Riverwalk. This is the more park-ish part than runs through the old King William residential neighborhood. We explored King William and the river. People were kayaking on the river, and there were lots of joggers. This was the part especially meant for Kit. She has always said she liked this part of town and the river. Claire, who loved the more dense central part of the river, was somewhat skeptical even before we headed down to King William. “I know what’s going to happen. We’re going to walk around a look at a lot of boring old houses and not do anything fun.” She and Molly got a little sluggish on this stretch, but they seemed to have fun too. We then had an awesome brunch at Liberty Bar, I think the best meal I had in many months.

By then it was Sunday afternoon, and we had to head home. The girls really wanted to see the Riverwalk again, but we were out of time. We never even had a chance to swim in the hotel’s pool. I felt like we had at least a week’s worth of stuff left to do in S.A. (more Riverwalk, El Mercado, La Villita, Fiesta Texas, kids stuff at the Witte Museum, other museums, and so on) but normal life called. At least it’s not a far drive if we want to come back.

We didn’t do a great job with the pictures on this little trip, but here are a few.

Pre-School Report Card

May 28, 2014 | patmcg

Molly got a report card from her pre-school today. It is basically a checklist of core skills for a 3-4 year old. She did well overall, and this report is the latest indication that Molly has officially “pulled herself together”, as Kit and I like to say. On the math front, Molly can sort things, group things, count to 23, and identify all the basic shapes except for octagons. She got all check marks in fine motor for things like cutting with scissors, drawing, doing puzzles (her speciality), and even pouring water from a pitcher. Language was good too, with good skills in telling stories, asking questions, and generally using words. She is really thriving in her pre-school!

In fact, Molly only missed one area on the whole checklist. Her only negative feedback was sort of funny, actually. Molly did not get full marks for “Solves conflicts verbally and usually without violence or need of teacher.” We’ll give her a few more years on that.

Molly Dance Recital #2

May 18, 2014 | patmcg

Today, Molly had her dance recital for her second year of ballet/tap class. The theme of the show was “Circe de Dance”. Molly’s class got a five-minute spot in the middle of the hourlong show. At this point, the kids basically watch the teachers in the wings of the stage and do what she does. The big trip right now is to do a slow twirl, and maybe a little ump.

Grammy and Granddaddy got to see the big show before heading out to the Pacific Northwest for the summer.

Kit and I were luke-warm on the overly cute (and overly expensive) costume, but Molly seemed to enjoy the whole thing. Claire has wanted to do a dance recital and get a cool costume of her own for a while, but in the end she has decided that actually taking the dance class for several months leading up to the recital is not worth the reward.

Molly on stage — Molly and her class work the stage

Claire greeting Molly after the show — Claire greets Molly after the show

Working It

May 11, 2014 | patmcg

Molly in in "M" cape and Dora nightgown — Molly by her tent in her “M” cape and Dora nightgown.

Molly may be at her most adorable age right now, four and a half years old. A year ago, she was a dopey toddler. In another year, she will be a hearty five year old kid. Right now she is in the middle, no longer a babyish mess but not yet a big kid. Here is a snapshot of what makes Molly adorable right now…

Molly sleeps in a ladybug tent at night. The tent is filled with stuffed animals and about 80 magazines.

Molly vaguely resembles Mike Wazowski. Luckily, though, Molly does have two eyes.

Molly calls peanuts “peanut butter nuts”.

Molly often wears her “M” cape with a princess costume and a tiara. She calls this “Super Molly”.

Molly sincerely believes that her “M” cape makes her go faster.

Molly will only wear dresses that twirl properly.

Molly plays along with Dora the Explorer when the show prompts you for an answer. We often hear her loudly yelling things like “Purple!” at the computer.

Molly judges things primarily by their color, with pink and purple being the best colors. Luckily, this approach does not apply to people.

Molly says “No fair!” a lot.

Molly clambers a lot. She clambers into her dining chair, onto her bed, etc. (Clamber: to climb, move, or get in or out of something in an awkward and laborious way, typically using both hands and feet.)

Molly believes that the Disney princesses are real. She was initially confused by the idea of Disney World and Disney Land. Which one do the real princesses live at? Then she figured it out: “Disney World has the real people, and Disney Land has puppets.”

You will commonly find Molly wandering the house wearing nothing but skivvies and sparkly shoes, and sometimes only the shoes.

Molly always says her sister’s name as two syllables, “Cla-aire”.

Molly loves her big sister. They spend a lot of time playing and hanging out on the weekends. Yesterday, Claire went off for a playdate for a couple of hours. Molly quickly got bored without Claire around and said, sadly, “What am I supposed to do now?” Molly later stated that she really likes being with Claire.

Molly always smells good, even when she is hot and sweaty. Well, not always; she is sometimes gassy — then look out!

Claire in Class

Image | May 9, 2014November 12, 2023 | patmcg

We don’t get to see a whole lot of Claire in school, aside from the occasional class holiday musical, etc. Here is a rare picture of Claire working on a poetry project in her second grade class.

The Cat in the Hat

May 5, 2014 | patmcg

Kit took Molly to see a live performance of The Cat in the Hat at the Zach Theater. I took Claire to a birthday party at the same time. It sounds like The Cat in the Hat was very cool. They acted out all the crazy balancing of objects, Thing 1 and Thing 2, the whole nine yards. Molly loved it and got to meet the cast afterwards. Here are some photos.

1914 Style

May 4, 2014November 12, 2023 | patmcg

Our neighborhood recently turned 100 years old. To celebrate, there was a neighborhood picnic and parade. Everyone was encouraged to wear 1914-inspired clothes. We did our best on a limited time budget and ended up with something vaguely old fashioned but probably more inspired by the roaring 20’s. Claire invited her friend Susie over, and they all had a great time being in the parade plus a horse carriage ride, crafts, face painting, and just enjoying being out in the late spring weather.