The Busy Life of a Kindergartener

Wow!  Why do you let me go so long without posting?!  LOL  Late-January New Year's resolution: post regular updates on this family that I love!  I've listed some new topics on the right-hand side of my blog.  I'll try my best to stick to these and give you updates on what's going on with us... hold me to it!  Of course, we'll talk about my favorite topics: Joey and Abi.  But I'll also try to keep you updated on the other happenings and passions in our lives: faith, food and family fun.

So it's Tuesday = update on my eldest, Joey.

The school year is absolutely flying by.  In addition to full-day Kindergarten, he has Catechism Tuesday nights, gymnastics on Thursday nights and soccer on Saturdays.  Add some pretty intense Kindergarten homework into the mix and it makes for one busy kiddo!

And I'm being serious... Kindergarten is the 1st grade of yester-year.  Joey can already read, write and do simple math and we're barely half-way through the school year.  Tonight's homework was to write his numbers by 5s and 10s to 100.  Tomorrow's homework is to read a book aloud to us.  And Thursday's is to draw 4 pictures starting with the letter "e" and write a sentence including that word.  Honestly, I'm not even sure we did that in 1st grade.  The work seems intense for a 5 year old, but he's able to handle it all and is doing well academically.

Today's homework

Joey is also making a lot of friends.  Everywhere we go, he runs into someone he knows.  There's a boy from his class in his Catechism class, another boy from his class in gymnastics, another boy from school on his soccer team, not to mention the dozen or so other kids from his class that he sees in passing and at the endless birthday parties that take place on Saturdays.  It's wonderful for him though... he's sweet and likable and he's as excited to see his friends as they are to see him.

Joey and his friends in the class' Country Christmas Program

A few months ago, I started helping Joey's art teacher on Thursdays.  It is such a joy to get to know all of Joey's classmates and to see him in action.  The art teacher is so sweet and allows me to bring Abi along and lets her participate in the art projects (THRILLING for a 3 year old!  Did somebody say paint?!).  Several weeks ago, she took them on a virtual "spelunking" adventure, where they explored a cave in France on the computer and learned about cave art.  Then last week, they drew their own cave art.

Joey's cave art proudly hanging on the fridge

Dave and I are so proud of how well Joey has adjusted to full-day school.  He's learning a tremendous amount and is very happy.  It begs the question of how we'll keep him busy in the summer.  I have 4 months to figure that one out!