Busy week....

This week, all of the lessons started back up again... after having a nice week off last week. Ice skating at Polar Ice, Suzuki piano at Ms Karen's studio , gymnastics, and tap/ballet with Ms. Jana. Jasmine has a new gymnastics teacher for the summer... Miss Megan. All of the kids love her. AND.... Adam, Aaron, and Addis are all in gymnastics at the same time with Jasmine. Addis is in the 5-6 yr old group. Adam, Aaron and Jasmine are in the 3-4 yr old group called Fireflies. I guess we'll find out the name of the 5-6 yr group when we get there in the fall. So, that's 1/3 of the pre-school class in gymnastics together on Thursday nights for the summer. It's good that they all get to see each other again. Addis is in ice skating on Friday nights too- same time as Jazzy. We also see Addis with his parents and Kiera with her mom very frequently at our new gym.


Megan helping Jasmine do a hand stand on the balance beam. Adam watching.
Jazzy wearing a pig hat at the hop scotch!
On the balance beam.
Hopping across the "tumbling- run" with Adam nearby.
Waiting for the reward- a hand stamp at the end of class.

Preschool Graduation Presents from Grandma and Grandpa

Lifetime Fitness Swim Party...

Big swim party mostly for kids today at Lifetime Fitness- our new gym. The gym has just about everything you could want.... endless equipment, great selection of classes, indoor and outdoor pools, indoor tennis courts, open 24 hours, lots of extracurricular activities, a restaurant and spa.... The only place they fall down quite a bit is the kid's club hours and snippy people who work there. The computer gives you a non-erasable demerit if you are "late" and then it suspends your membership for 2 weeks if you get 3 demerits. Really crappy for what we pay to go there. Being a "commoner", I was able to get a moment with the "king" (the regional manager) about that issue. He said my "issue" was a "non-issue"!! Anyway, today they had a big swim party in the outdoor pool, a bouncy house, huge water slide, burgers, slushies, hula hoop contest, and..... Kiera from Jasmine's class was there. So, Jazzy had a friend to play with in the water.

Ms. Karen's piano party....

Every 4-5 weeks, Ms. Karen has a party/recital for her "little students" only, No parents allowed... hence no photos. Jasmine got to play one line of "Twinkle A" with Ms. Karen's help.

There is usually a theme to these piano parties... for example, the kids got little Easter baskets last month... little bags of Christmas toys in December, etc. This party was two hours, so I was trying to think of things to do. I went grocery shopping... which takes all of 15 minutes, but I stretched it out to 30 minutes by looking at every single item at Trader Joe's. Still 1 1/2 hours left... so I went to Kohl's right next door to Trader Joe's and bought a couple of work out shirts.... and still got back to the party a bit early. It's way to hot to just sit in the car and read which is what most of the parents do when it is cooler.

So, this month was a big pizza party for 15 little kids. There was a stack of 8 extra large pizzas sitting on the counter!!!! When I walked in to pick Jazzy up, there was a mass of little boy bodies wrestling on the floor- lots of screaming and yelling. Jasmine was sitting at a table with some other little girls with a piece of pizza on her plate. However,.... in the kitchen was a large chocolate fountain with a huge table of strawberries, bananas, marshmallows and cookies. Jasmine's face was covered with liquid chocolate, and it was dripping from her chin. Her plate was full of marshmallows. I said, "Jazzy, what did you have for dinner?".... She replied "Chocolate covered marshmallows"!:))) We are really going downhill on our diet here! Wish I would have had the camera....:)

Last day of pre-school.....

Yesterday was our last day of preschool:( We had a big "ice cream social" party, and had a "graduation" where each child received a big file of art work they had done during the year, including handwriting comparisons for each month of the year. Mrs. Slama made a collage of photos of each child. It's on to summer camps and then kindergarten in the fall!

Coloring

Focusing on a magnet.

At the sensory table.

The entire class ready to sing a song for the parents.

A plate made by Jasmine earlier in the year, as well as a few of the items in the folder. When Jazzy was asked what her truck would carry if it could carry anything.... she drew a rainbow:)

Just found some photos on the Kianh Foundation site..

Kianh Foundation is a volunteer organization who provides volunteers for the Hoi An Orphanage. Due to the corruption and change of Orphanage Director, they are no longer there however.
These photos are of Jasmine when she had only been in the orphange for a couple of days.

Field trip to Dairy Queen.....

The parents of one of the pre-school students from last year own a Dairy Queen. All of the kids got to "tour" the Dairy Queen. The most fascinating part was to get to walk thru the big freezer:)! Then each kid got to go behind the counter, choose their ice cream and topping, and "make" it themselves.

Kinley, Jasmine and Addis enjoying their ice cream
Making ice cream drawings with Mrs. Slama and Margo's mom.
At the "sensory table" with Kinley, Josephine, Jasmine, Kiera, Margo and Madelyn