Conquering Kindergarten

What can we say? We are proud. Finn rose early every morning to catch the 7:25 a.m. bus and took it to and from school the whole week. In the process he made some new neighborhood friends: Xavier 2nd Grade, Caleb 2nd Grade and Nick 2nd Grade (they are some of the kids in shots barreling down the hill on cardboard). His teacher is wonderful and we’ve been working on identifying words (currently family member’s names like Fozzie Dog at home, hence the drawing). Thursday night was in the 80’s and we fell in love with the school as Finn practiced soccer and as we watched the world’s largest Vaux Swift colony in the school’s dormant chimney. As hawks attacked, the birds persevered and got into the chimney. Friday morning we attended the Community Assembly at Finn’s school and felt at home as the music teacher taught us sign to accompany the 500+ kids and parents in “This Land is Your Land.” It gave me hope as McCain gained ground on Obama, that our country might wise up and look beyond the fear tactics of the Republican camp and elect a guy that might lead our country so that we are seen by the world as a clever colony of birds, rather than as hawks picking helpless birds off one by one. By the end of the week Finn (who had one eye bigger than the other like his mother when she's beat) had figured out his cheer, “Kindergarten rocks. Kindergarten rocks. We love school from our hair to our socks. We’re the new kids and just you wait. We’ll show you that Kindergarten’s great.” We are looking forward to week two. Hildi’s pretty close to mastering the cheer too and of course wants to put on her backpack everywhere we go and wants to ride the bus too . . .

More soccer, swifts