Last Week as a First Grader

It's hard to believe we're already done with this year and Evie only has one more day of being a first grader.  I remember when we took her the first day, as she started a new year at a new school where she didn't know anyone.  I was so nervous for her to be in a new place, with no friends unlike the last 3 years she was at the same Montessori class, and with a new teaching style.  But she has really blossomed there.  She's learned reading and writing, of course, and lots of science too - she is captivated by learning about animals and planets - but she's also learned how to recognize qualities of good friends and when you have to make choices about whether a friendship is worth continuing or not.  She's learned about how to deal with being the new kid and finding her place in a group.  I'm very proud of her for getting into the gifted program in recognition of her academic excellence, but I'm more proud that she is growing socially and finding ways to be kind to everyone even as she draws boundaries about friendship.  That will protect her heart in the future, but she knows how to still show kindness to everyone.  She is such a treasure.

I forgot to mention a couple of weeks ago that my Dad said when he took her into the donut shop per their usual Tuesday afternoon schedule that a woman came up to them while he was reading her a book, and the woman said, "That's a special child."  It is amazing to me that so many people recognize something old-soul-y about my sweet girl.  She definitely is something special.

This week we started our Thursday tradition that we are going to enact for this summer of going to the library to check out some books.  Evie found a mystery and went upstairs to read it.  She got through a couple of them in about 20 minutes.

Friday was Field Day, Evie's first experience with Field Day, in fact.  If you don't know what Field Day is, it's basically an all-outdoors day where the kids compete in different physical challenges like water balloon toss, relay race, three-legged race, etc.  Evie said it was her new favorite day of the year.  She spent quite a bit of time the day before practicing her cheer she created for Ms. Gray's teams.

Ms. Gray, Ms. Hughes (the student teacher), and Evie

Saturday we spent part of the day at Putt-Putt.  Evie kept up with us very well with the mini golf, and she and Seth went on the bumper boats.  I declined to get wet.  She and I did a roller coaster simulator and the go-karts instead.