Last Day of School!

I always like to compare pictures from the first day and the last day of school. See how much the kids have grown (or not!). Riley doesn't feel like he's grown much, but I got his physical form from the beginning of the year, and he's grown 4 inches and gained 20 pounds! He's not a little boy anymore, that's for sure!

Regan's school has a "5th Grade Walk" where they line up all the kids and teachers and then have the 5th graders walk through the school for one last time and everyone waves and high fives them. They played the song "The Best Day of our Lives" and there wasn't many dry eyes in the place. I was surprised at all the little girls bawling their eyes out, but I was almost one of them when I saw my baby walk through that curtain. Of course, she wasn't crying, she and her BFF Piper were calmly walking through (last ones too) and laughing at all the people who were crying!

Anyway, another year in the books. Next year is the beginning of middle school for Regan and Riley will be a sophomore.  Oh, and Regan won a reader award and A and B honor roll for the year! So proud of my girl!!

Updates...

Well, it's been busy the past few weeks.

For starters, Riley was bench pressing and dropped a barbell on his nose and broke it. Got a call from the school trainer, so we rush him down to Dell Children's to find out there's not much they can do, but for us to wait for the swelling to go down and go to an ENT. So we've done that, and they tried to straighten his nose back out but it didn't work so now he will need surgery. His nose is still pretty crooked, but he can't breathe as well right now, and there's still a lot of pain, so as soon as school is out, he will have to have surgery to try and fix it. Boys, they sure keep you on your toes!

David had a class to take in Houston, so I went with him and we left the kids in the very capable hands of Uncle Matt!! It was fun to get away for a few days and not have to worry about feeding dogs or feeding kids. I dropped David off at his class at Rice University and went to the Holocaust Museum, to the movies, the bookstore, a cafe, just had some fun alone in my home town. Then at night we would take advantage of the hotel hot tub, and got to eat at some great restaurants. We stayed over and extra day too, and found and awesome chocolate shop in the Galleria where David bought my mother's day gift! He knows me so well!

Now it's the end of school rush, with awards and parties and tests every time we turn around. I am more than ready for school to be over. Riley had his AP Human Geography test, and they've both had STAAR tests and end of course exams, and Riley still has finals coming up. I'm DONE! I am ready for summer, and I know they are too!

HHS MCJROTC

That's a lot of initials! Hendrickson High School Marine Corps Junior Reserve Officer Training Corps. (I think).

Anyway, this was Riley's first day to wear his "uniform" to school. They wear the full gear one day a week, and have PT one day a week. He looked so handsome in his uniform! He did get a bigger hat though, because this one was a little small.

Hawks v. Raiders

Welcome to Texas High School Football, right? It was 100 degrees still at 5pm, HOT! And one side of the stadium is shaded, the home side thankfully, but everyone sat together to be in the shade anyway. It was Riley's first real freshman football game. I can't say I understood all that was going on, but you could tell it was a first freshman football game! There were fumbles, dead balls, etc. But, they all did great and there were some good plays. Riley is number 8, wide receiver and corner back. His undershirt kept coming un-tucked so you can tell which one is him because it looks like he's wearing a light gray fanny pack. I was surprised that most of the players seemed about his size. I always worry that he's going to be the smallest kid out there and get hit hard, but I think he's caught up with the boys his age (some of them) so he didn't look very small out there. Until the varsity football players came to watch the game, now those are some big boys! I dread our food bill if Riley keeps this up...

Anyway, here are some pictures from the game.  Here he is in the center, holding on to the other guy:

 Talking to the coach:

First Day of School

Can you believe we have a High Schooler?! I can't, that's for sure. Riley is starting his freshman year at Hendrickson High School, and he's pretty excited about it. He has a block schedule, meaning he has 4 classes each day. ROTC, football, French and Algebra, then English Pre-AP, football again, World Geography Pre-AP, and Biology Pre-AP. Some days he has to be at school early (7:30am) for football or ROTC, and most days he has football after school too, till 6:00pm, making for some very long days! He's excited about the new school, new schedule, and new opportunities. He will be starting math tutoring soon also. I found a math tutor that used to teach physics at Brentwood Christian School, which is the school I graduated from!

Regan started her last year of elementary school! She also has a new teacher, she's new to the school also, so we had no idea about her, but Regan was excited. She said she made the first day go by super fast, so that's a good thing! Regan is on Safety Patrol this year, and she will join choir again, and I think her friends have finally convinced her to join the dance club, and I'm working on her to join the photography club! She will also be getting math tutoring this year, we want to make sure that STAAR test in the spring is not going to be an issue for either of the kids!

So here are the obligatory first day of school pictures!

HHS MCJROTC Camp

Those are a lot of initials! It's for Hendrickson High School Marine Corp Junior ROTC (Reserve Officer Training Corps?) Camp.  It was a week long, morning camp where he met other kids that will be in ROTC this year and they did drills and practiced their marksmanship and stuff like that. He really enjoyed it and it was a nice break from football camp!

He won a drill competition too, because he's in Sea Cadets also and already knew how to drill. So at the end of the week, they did a little graduation ceremony and I brought his friend Yash with me so he could see him graduate, and then I dropped them off at the movies to celebrate.