Wrapping things up

 The pandemic school year is over! Hallelujah! We made it through the most changing and unpredictable school year ever. 

As the year wound down the kids wrapped up projects at school they had been working on. Annie had a bridge project she had been working on all semester in ELP and they finally tested them. She and her friend, Leah, worked together on the group portion of the project, but unfortunately their bridge design didn't win. Their company was called LA Bridges and their slogan was "Making bridges from LA to New York!" Annie's individual design did great, however, and she got a $5 gift card to Target. Good job, Annie!

In ELP Ryan has been working on his toy invention. He created a foos-maze, combining a foosball table with a maze. It turned out really cool looking. 

He presented it to his class and created an advertisement for his toy.

Back home the kids put their engineering prowess to work creating Shmebu-block. 

They later improved the design and made it look like a gnome with a really cool mustache. They creature had a full digestive system. They would feed it a block, then it would drop down the "throat" until it hit a shelf they would pull out to let the block continue through the digestive system. They had something like 6 or 8 stopping points and were happy to walk you through them all. "This is the esophogas, then the stomach, the small intestines, etc." It was pretty impressive and funny.

The kids had coupons they had been saving up and started cashing in as the school year drew to a close. Ryan and Megan both had a lot of "bring a stuffy to school" coupons they took advantage of. 

Ryan was bummed when he couldn't find his dog, Biscuit's, helmet that he created at the beginning of the year, so I made him a new one. Of course a week later we cleaned out the backpack table where the kids deposit all their school stuff and miraculously found Biscuit's original helmet.

Ms. Bradshaw retired this year after 40 years. A few months ago I started working to collect a pictures and well wishes from current and former students of hers and compiled them into a book. Ms. Duncan helped out getting pictures and stuff from current students and invited us to bring it to her retirement party. Ms. Bradshaw loved it.

As long as we were there with all the teachers celebrating, we were happy to grab a picture with Megan's kindergarten teachers, Mrs. Parks and Mrs. Hager since she never got a picture with them last year because of covid. 

Mrs. Goodall has been a wonderful advanced math teacher and we were sad to hear that she won't be coming back next year, but happy to grab a picture with her. She has been so amazing with the kids.

We got a new monkey bar set finally. We ordered it in March, or maybe the beginning of April, so we were happy to finally have it arrive. Then the assembly instructions were pretty much non-existent and had one poor picture, so after a very frustrating time and a trip to Ace I finally got everything to fit together correctly. 

The kids were a bit disappointed that it doesn't have swings, but other than that they love it. They create obstacles courses and time each other to see who can complete it fastest. Megan has already gotten better at doing a pull over. (Which reminds me, just a few weeks ago she passed all the skills for her beginners gymnastics class and is able to advance to the intermediate gymnastics class. Unfortunately there's no openings in the class that fits our schedule best, so we're on a waiting list and she's just continuing with her old class for now.)

Marie moved out and into Todd and Savannah's house for the summer. Todd and Savannah left the last day of school and headed to Georgia, but the day before that, they helped us load up a Uhaul with all the bulky furniture and move it into their garage so Marie can house sit while they're gone. We felt like tetris masters, fitting it all in just right.

The last day of school Megan came out crying. She has loved Mrs. Kampleman and will miss her next year. Add to that the fact that her best friends are in a different class next year, and she was pretty bummed. I'm glad she had a good 1st grade year, as crazy as it was. Here's a picture of her class on the day Mrs. Kampleman brought her dog to school.

I asked her to snap a picture with Megan since I couldn't go in to the school to take pictures with their teachers. I really have missed being able to volunteer and be in the kids' classrooms and get to know their teachers. I'm looking forward to getting back to a more normal school year next year.

I actually asked all the teachers to get a picture of them with my kid. Here's Annie and Ms. Montagu. Ms. Montagu student taught in Rachel's 3rd grade class, so I was looking forward to working with her again. Alas, it didn't work out this year, and next year she's going back to 3rd grade, so I'll miss her again, since Ryan won't have her. It's pretty crazy that Annie is a 5th grader now. The top of the food chain. 

And here's Ryan and Ms. Duncan. This marks the end of 3 years of Ms. Duncan having one of my kids. She's moving to 5th grade so we thought Annie would have her again, but they added another 5th grade ELP cluster teacher besides Ms. Duncan, so Annie will have Mrs. Chamberlain next year. 

Ms. Duncan has been so good with Ryan. She's patient and organized and great at keeping him on track even when he's doing things he doesn't love (ie. writing). 

We love Ms. Duncan. Ryan is happy to have Derek in his class again next year (though I have to say, I hope Ms. Cady knows what she's getting into... those two are smarty pants, but also very goofy when they get together).

As the year was wrapping up the PTA board was looking for people willing to take over for them since their 2 year tenure was coming to an end. They found 3 people willing to serve, and needed a 4th so I agreed to be secretary. So like it or not, I'll be on campus a lot next year, both volunteering, and helping with PTA stuff. I'm hoping the after school activities and fundraisers are low key, but we'll see how it goes. 

For the last day of school I told the kids they could each invite 2-3 friends over for a party. Megan was extra bummed that none of her friends could come. Luckily instead she got two one-on-one playdates in the week following, one with Peyton, and one with Ali, and we have plans for more playdates over the summer. 

Annie's friends, Leah and Ava came, and Ryan's friends Donovan and Derek both came, and brought their little brothers at my invitation since their moms both work at the school and I figured they'd have more fun here while their moms wrapped things up at school. And they did. The slip 'n slide burned our luscious grass a bit, but they kids all had a good time and enjoyed some Eegees and popcorn. 

The kids watched Chicken Little, but most of the kids apparently don't have a long movie attention span, so just Annie and Rachel were glued to it for the whole show. Todd and Savannah's kids stopped by to say goodbye (and for Annie to give them each a bag of candy for the drive), then headed out to Georgia. 

The boys drifted back outside to play with the water and the monkey bars. The monkey bars were definitely a hit with the little monkeys.

When Ms. Duncan came to pick up Donovan she brought a lot of left over donuts from their class breakfast, so the kids ate donuts for dinner that night. But since they were gluten donuts, they had to eat them outside. :) 

And just like that, the 2020-2021 school year has come to an end. (Of course that sentence makes it sound like this wasn't the longest school year in history which is beyond inaccurate.)