a Hot Dog party

The twins had a party at school today for Valentine's Day. A Hot Dog party. I wised up this time and signed up to bring juice!! Only juice. If you recall, last year I felt guilty about having 2 kids in the class and signed up for 2 items. One was sandwiches which ended up being more stressful than I wanted. You can read about it here if you are feeling like a flashback. You will also see that was the first day he wore his brown "work shoes like Daddy's". Well, he loves those shoes. He wears them as much as his sneakers. He'd wear them every day if I let him. Some days, I just think bucks with sweatpants is a touch too geeky. He calls them his 'work shoes' and I will surely be buying a new pair when he outgrows these (soon). Stride Rite James. Yay ebay!

It's funny to see what toys we have out at 8:30 am. On the table: a Mr Potato Head, stuffed Lady from Lady & The Tramp and Carl has a Matchbox car.

Back to the Hot Dog party report. Turns out, the kids both ate well. Not awesome, but considering the menu - hot dogs, grapes, carrots, dip, chips and heart shaped cookies - they did pretty good. Both ate a whole hot dog. They may have been the only 2 in the class who did. I know the other kids at Gretchen's table were too busy calling each other names and kicking each other to eat. Miss Diane did say to eat your fruit, carrots and hot dog before you ate your chips and cookies. I did not give Gretchen a cookie on her first plate, but I did give in and give Carl 4 chips. Which he promptly ate first. Good listening, Buddy! But, knowing he wasn't going to want a cookie for incentive, I told him he could have more if he ate the protein. He ate that and all his carrots, too! So, I gave him more potato chips. Gretchen earned a cookie, too.

At the end of the meal, I was helping Carl gather up his garbage when I noticed Gretchen was over talking to Miss Diane. I thought it was something trivial... and tattle tailing. The teacher then spoke to another child while his mother listened. I still thought it was trivial. Well, turns out, this kid BIT Gretchen. Nice. Oh well. She does look sweet, right? And the kid hadn't touched his hot dog, carrots, grapes or cheese. He was probably hungry. I guess sometimes, her incessant tattle tailing is OK.

The kids got Valentine's from their friends, too. Each child had decorated a white paper bag to bring home their cards and goodies. I believe it is a federal law to create these white paper bag Valentine's holders. Good to see his teachers are on top of these things.

The funny part is each child was encouraged to write their classmate's name on the envelope and also to sign their own name inside. Then, this morning, the teachers made the kids put the cards they brought into the proper bags. We got home with several of Gavin's cards in Gretchen's bag and a few of Cora's cards in Carl's bag. Hopefully, on Monday, Cora and Gavin's moms will be bringing in the cards for Gretchen & Carl that they inadvertently brought home.

I hate to keep bragging on my kids, but again, I am shocked that the kids do not know the spelling of all the names of their friends. Three years ago, both Carl and Gretchen were reading the names off cubbies and other signs in the classroom.

And... one mom approached me and got in really close. Kind of worried me. Then she asked, "Can Carl read?" I said, "Yes. He's been reading for quite some time now." I should have told her since before school started last summer at least. But, she said during her parent teacher conference when they were discussing pre-reading skills, Diane said, "I only have one child in the class who can read." And this mom said she and her husband were discussing it that night at home and both guessed Carl on their first guess. I wonder what about him made them know it was him? Hope it was good. He then showed off a little by reading the chart filled with "P" words for the week. I loved having him back it up!

So, back to the Valentine cards. The kids were encouraged to sign them by themselves. There are 14 kids in the class plus 2 teachers, 2 directors and 3 therapists. So we started this about a week ago. Gretchen addressed all the envelopes except hers one day with me. She put stickers meticulously on each envelope - deciding which child would appreciate which design and also planning for which stickers should be saved for inside the cards. I cut, bordered and added the photos to the front of each card. Then, Gretchen started addressing each card's inside. All this time, I was dreading Carl's signature portion of our week long assembly line of cards. Well, on Tuesday, we told me "I want to make Mackenzie a Valentine." Gretchen had already done it, so I said, "Just sign your name, Buddy". remember, this child gets weekly OT therapy for his handwriting motor skills. He is not a fan of writing. But, he insisted he wanted to write "Dear Mackenzie, Happy Valentine's Day. I love you, Carl." These were tiny cards... I talked him down to "Dear Mackenzie, I love you, Carl". He decided he wanted a heart sticker instead of the word "love". He literally said, "I need it to be I heart you. That means love." Here's the back of the card:

That was all he would write that night. I begged him to do another one for his therapist. Please, just one for Andrea - she's the OT! She needs to see this writing. Nope, nothing doing. "I only love Mackenzie." Well, I waited until last night to ask him to sign his name in the other cards and surprisingly, he wanted to write "Love, Carl" in them. And - he willingly wrote "Dear Andrea, I love you, Carl" as well as one for his teacher Miss Kelsey, and 2 other therapists. He also signed the cards for the directors. And he wrote a card especially for Gretchen! He wrote more in hers than she wrote in his! He probably has a sore hand today from all the writing!!

Here are the envelopes they addressed to each other. He only wrote "Gretch" on her envelope. And it was the last envelope he did for the night - he was losing interest. But, when he did her card, he was fairly focused. It reads "Dear Gretchen I love you, Carl"