Last Day of School

Jack's last day of kindergarten was two weeks ago.  For the end of year show this  year they did Seussical Jr.  Jack sang two songs with his class and his costume was a tie-die shirt and a felt bowtie.  Here he is belting out one of the songs in front of the Cat in the Hat.

After the performance we went back to Jack's classroom where his teacher Kerry gave all the kids a certificate of completion.

Obligatory last day photo in front of the sign.

 Now traditional last day of school trip to Kane's.  Chocolate honeydip is serious business.

Among the pile of papers we brought home on this day, this was a good one.  

"My favorite thi[n]g about school was math."

I also enjoyed Jack's interpretation of A Starry Night.

- S.

Strawberry and TJs

School is over for Jack and he had his first week of camp.  This past week he was home with me two days out of the week, so I'm back to having to convince him to run errands with me.  We went to Trader Joe's and happened to pick a nice cashier who let Jack behind the counter and he got to scan our entire order.  He got an extra long strip of stickers as payment.

Unrelated but noteworthy, Jack ate a strawberry off his strawberry plant last weekend.  Noteworthy because this is the first time we've gotten ripe fruit off a strawberry plant before the birds (or other animal) got to it first.

Upcoming posts: Jack's last day of school/end of year show, Father's Day, and the Salem Pride parade.

- S.

Weekend

A busy weekend with lovely weather.  Friday Jack had a playdate at the park with his buddy from school.  Saturday the first s'more of the season happened.  Sunday we made it to Salem Willows, early in the season for a change.

Giving Salvi a push.

Always a thumb up for s'mores.

Probably the last year he can squeeze into this ride.

Learning about pinball.

 Though it doesn't look it, he was pretty excited about getting this prize.

- S.

Long weekend

We all had four days off for Memorial Day weekend.  We did a lot of yard work and planted some flowers and veggies.  The weather was a mixed bag of cold and rainy or hot and humid.  On one of the hot and humid days we took a break to get some ice cream.

Richardson's, good to the last drop.

Jack found a dandelion patch out back near the cows.

This is his disco pose.  I dunno.

 We made sure there will be plenty of dandelions next year too.

- S.

School, hikes, ice cream

 A few weeks ago Jack had a dude afternoon with Dad and went on a hike with John and Nate.

I'm not sure how much hiking actually happened, but there was probably a lot of investigating. 

 And there was ice cream.

We also recently went to the Spring Spruce Up at the school playground.

We put together a see saw.

The Spring concert was a week and a half ago.  Jack's class sang four songs, and there was a lot of dancing/movement to go along with the songs.  Here he is on the far left doing I don't recall what.

Jack has about three weeks left of Kindergarten.  Today he asked the first grade teacher if he will have homework next year and apparently she replied, "Of course!"  Jack seemed neutral about this revelation.

- S.

Lately

Way back during April vacation, Jack and I went to the Lynn Museum for their free family day and stayed for Curious Creatures.  We saw some turtles, a rabbit, a snake, a flying squirrel, and a chinchilla as seen above.  Jack was ready to go when the tarantula came out and I agreed.

Now that it has finally been warm out, we've been trying to clean up the yard.  Jack has become quite adept at using the big clippers and took out a large (mostly dead) azalea by himself.

And he looks cool doing it, of course.

The following week we cut down a tree out back and Jack helped cut up the branches.

 When not doing yard work, Jack has been building with Lego, playing with the "Bruder house" that Nana built, or watching Pink Panther cartoons which he recently discovered on YouTube.

Jack has also started swim lessons again and seems to enjoy it so far.  He has about five weeks of school left, has been signed up for various camps for the summer, and is on track to start first grade in September!


 - S.

Hike

We have been to the Ipswich River Wildlife Sanctuary for a handful of events at this point, but have never taken advantage of the hiking trails there.  Saturday morning we did just that since the forecast for the rest of the weekend was pretty dismal.  There were some nice surprises and we will definitely be back.

Starting out.  All sticks are lightsabers or guns.

We climbed to the top of the observation tower,

discovered a makeshift shelter,

and checked out the rock grotto.

Jack and dad took the hard way to the top.  I took the stairs.

- S.