Author Archives: Vale

Oakland A’s Fans

21 Apr 2011

Oscar temporarily switched allegiances for Tamir’s birthday party last weekend.

And, in an unexpected big-boy move, he declined the offer of my presence at the ballpark. I believe this to be his first “drop-off” party. (cool! and so very adventuresome!)
With Tamir’s parents Amanda and Barry, and surprise guest Ms. Ruth, the kids Barted to the game, ate hotdogs in the sunshine, and watched the A’s cruise to a 5-1 win over the Tigers.

We broke out the face paint for a little pregame Green and Gold:

Jacob chose his hand instead (clever I thought):

{insert photo of kids at game here.}

After the game, we re-joined the group at Tamir’s house. Lucy was rooting for the A’s too!

Here’s Tamir after blowing out the candles on the yummy cake:

Thanks for a fun day at the ballpark! Happy Birthday Tamir!

It’s A Girl!

15 Apr 2011

SO happy for the good news! Congratulations to Lauren and Brendan and family!
Lauren is Kiera’s sister. They live in Boston, which has never felt so far away as today! This morning they were blessed with a sweet baby girl, April Elizabeth. (Elizabeth is Lauren’s middle name.) The word is she has red hair and blue eyes. Welcome to the world little April!

Photo of flowers by Gertrude and Mabel

Room 5 Quilt

14 Apr 2011

Its done! Amanda has done a terrific job. We’ll be auctioning this beauty off to raise money for Clarendon. If you want to take the quilt home it might cost you – but you won’t know, unless you come to the Clarendon Auction this Saturday night! And if you’d like a last minute raffle ticket – let me know!

Here’s the way the kids contributed to their quilt:
We started by asking them to draw a tree. Amanda, our art teacher Ellen, and I all agreed that ‘nature’ might be a good theme for the quilt. Beyond the tree, the kids were invited to add other fun natural elements.
The line drawings were done in pencil, on canvas that I taped to cardboard at the suggestion of Ellen. That was genius because then the kids had a flat surface that was easy to work with. Then Amanda and I traced the drawings in Sharpie.

(click to see larger)

In Room 5’s art class, Ellen provided us with some terrific fabric crayons that the kids used to color in their drawings. We limited their color palate in the name area, to attempt a more cohesive look, but also to give them a parameter they had to work within.

(click to see larger)

After this step, I removed all the tape and ironed the squares so that the heat would lock the color in to the fabric.

(click to see larger)

Finally, Amanda took home all of the squares (22!) and began sewing the quilt. She sourced the fabric, cut, battened and sewed it all together. I’ve made a quilt before, with the help of my mom, and let me tell you it is not easy! I think she rocked it:

(front and back)

So come to the auction and bid on this baby!
What a wonderful keepsake of the kid’s first year of school.

Lucy’s First Two Word Sentance (and other word developments)

13 Apr 2011

“Where’s Dada?”

(In the bathroom brushing his teeth.
You have to close the door to do it in peace, because Lucy is obsessed with it.)

Kiera said she swore she heard a ‘Where’s Georgia’ last week.
So I’m certain that the girl is actually, finally, learning to talk.
Other new words she knows are:

hot
up
two
hi
dog
poo poo

I guess Oscar isn’t the only one working on short little words (he’s reading them.)
In Oscar’s world, these are called “sight words” and you should just know them on sight, skipping the need to sound them out. Oscar got a 100% on his sight words assessment at school.

Reading is so exciting! Omi reports that Oscar read to her last night, Make Way For Ducklings. It’s definitely one of his favorites. (He has pretty good taste in books! I credit Laurel Hill.)

Speaking of ducks, the other fun new Lucy sounds are the farm animals!
We have a collection of Schleich plastic toys that help a lot.

Lucy can do the sounds of a pig, a cow, a duck, a dog, a cat (‘no’ in the tune of ‘mew’), a rooster (that’s a fun one!) and you get the idea. She has by no means mastered them, but we’re all enjoying the process.

We haven’t been to any farms recently, but now I see we should! Omi & Opi’s place in Sebastopol should help – there’s some cute animals up there. We’ll be doing a weekend there soon. And a lot this summer I hope.

Lucy has made one other sentence; a long one. It goes like this:
MommyDaddyMommyDaddyMommyDaddyMommyMommyDaddy.
She sound super conversational when she does it, which is Cuteness! Wish I had a recording.

Last, she has learned the sign language word for “more”. (You tap all your fingertips together – I think!!)
Well, we’re going with it. Lucy requests more of things easily, and I see she would have been a wonderful kid to do sign language with. It suits her (more physical than verbal). I just never had the motivation to learn it. And of course now it’s a case of third kid syndrome… They get what’s left. :) Maria Kelly is terrific with signing, and both of her girls enjoyed it before they were talking. Shall I learn another word, and teach Lucy? which word? suggestions?

Update:
Some more words that I should clarify/have in the Lucy record:
-cheese (heavy emphasis on the chee)
-peek a boo (heavy emphasis on the boo)
-nim nim (This is good for all food and any bottle – if she wants any liquid from a cup she makes the tisk tisk sound with her tongue)
-baby (two words, bay and bee)
-shoes (come out more of a “choose” – looks like she’s a fan of P.P.!)
-the lion’s roar is her best animal sound and don’t you forget it.