Merry Christmas Everyone!

Thank you so much to all of my friends and family who gave me a gift this Christmas!  I love them all and want to play with all of them at once!  I am so glad I got to visit with my Daddy's family last week and I will see my Mommy's family next week!

Finding Octonauts Gup-X left from Santa!

Playing inside the pirate ship with Opehlia

Playing with all my new toys at once!

Fun weekend

Last weekend we all went to Richmond to experience the lights at my uncle's garden, the Lewis Ginter botanical gardens.  It was beautiful, but none of my pictures came out well so I couldn't share them with you.  Sorry!   This weekend my Maryland family came over and we had a pre-Christmas party!  I got to play with my cousins and eat yummy Christmas food, we even had blue mashed potatoes and green macaroni and cheese thanks to food coloring. 

When my family left it was homework time.  I am practicing my addition skills.

Holiday concert

This week Dexter had his holiday concert at school.  In the morning his class is a mixed age classroom with 3-5 year olds.  Dexter and Edward are the two Kindergartners in the classroom so they got to introduce all the songs to the parents.  They sang "Up on the housetop", "Light a candle for peace", "Chubby little snowman" and "Thank you".  Dexter did so well and thinking back to last year's concert where he was mumbling through all the songs and shy it was amazing.  This year he knew all the words, sang loudly and clearly and even knew all the dance moves :)

I hope everyone has an awesome holiday season!

Santa!!

Santa came to my mall!!  I got to meet him today and talk with him.  He didn't ask me if I have been a good boy, I guess he already knew that I am.  He did ask what I wanted for Christmas and I told him I want some Octonaut toys.  It was hard to deciede between Paw Patrol, Jake and the pirates, Mickey Mouse Clubhouse and Octonauts because I enjoy all those shows so much!  I can not wait for Christmas to get here!!

School Photos

Dexter reading "How to hide a lion" to his classmates.  Dexter often brings books to school for the teachers to read to the class.  This day Dexter read the book himself (that he had memorized) and his teacher emailed Dan and I later that day to say how proud she was of him and his confidence reading in front of his class.  Dexter is getting much better at reading and he reads us a basic reading book each night with 3 and 4 letter words.  It is so cool to see his progress!

 Dexter and his friend Edward writing in their morning journal.  They are encouraged to draw a picture and then write a few sentences about their picture every morning at school.

Dexter giving his family tree project presentation to his class.    He was supposed to say the person's name, their relation to Dexter and the state they were born.  Dexter did well, he forgot a few states but did well overall in his first real homework project.

Crafty

Craft projects are so much fun!  Friday mommy and I made a ginerbread house out of foam pieces and today I learned how to weave a pot holder!

Happy Thanksgiving!

I just spent a few days with my cousins for Thanksgiving.  It was lots of fun to play with Ben and Nicole and even their cousins Parker and Caroline.   There was a lot of Doc McStuffin and Paw Patrol play.  Too bad it was so cold we couldn't play outside for long.

Disney Practice

Next year I am going to Disneyworld, so it is a good thing I practiced meeting Queen Elsa and snowman Olaf yesterday (of course Olaf was just pretend).  We went to a spaghetti dinner fundraiser event for a little kid who has cancer.  They had great food, desserts, a live band, a silent auction and of course the beautiful Queen Elsa (who I went up to take pictures with 3 different times)

I know Elsa was just a girl wearing a costume, but I still really liked meeting her :)

Update

Yesterday I did another marathon, this time in Richmond Virgina.  It was very cold out, around 25 degrees at the start and warming up to a sunny 37 by finish time. I had a good time but I am much more sore than after my previous marathon just 3 weeks ago.  Overall I am very happy and proud of all the races I did this year and look forward to next years races!

When I came home from Richmond I was greeted with a very colorfully decorated Christmas tree - tons of colored balls, lights and tinsel!   I know the boys had fun setting it all up :)

Today we finished making our family tree project for school.  This is Dexter's first big Kindergarten project.  Last week we selected the pictures of the family and printed them out, then we wrote on the back their name and place of birth.  Then Dexter and Dan found some tree branches and we attached everyone to the family tree.  Dexter will present his tree to the school on Wednesday so we have a bit of practicing to do to remember which state everyone was born.  We have Connecticut, Wisconsin, Illinois, California, Florida, Massachusetts, Maryland and Ohio represented on the tree!

Ohio Trip

Last weekend mommy and I drove to Ohio to visit my cousins over Halloween!  It was tons of fun to play with my cousins and even Grandfather who visited as well.  I dressed up like Darth Maul, Luke was Harry Potter and Cole was a scary zombie skeleton.  The highlight of the trip was hours of XBox play and Minecraft play - I am a future gamer for sure!

School photo time

Dexter's latest and greatest school photo - I thought it would be funny to get the White house background.

Other options are basic and classroom (but the physical photos we actually have are the white house ones)

Marine Corps Marathon!

Sunday Ali ran the 26.2 mile Marine Corps Marathon.  It was an awesome race, the weather was perfect, the crowds were energetic over the entire course and most importantly Ali finished the race with a solid 10:50/mile pace!   The course was like a tour of DC - The Kennedy Center, Washington monument, Jefferson memorial, Lincoln memorial, running along the Potomac river, the National Mall, various Smithsonian museums, the Capital building, etc - if there was a monument Ali ran past it!  At one point Marine One (the president's helicopter) few over our heads.  The whole event was great!  One more race in 3 weeks and then winter hibernation can begin!

Gina, Trish and Ali

Ali and the awesome finisher medal

Various official race pictures

Fall festivals

Today my day was packed!  I went to the doctor with Daddy, went to swim lessons, went to my school fall festival, drove to DC to pick up mommy's marine corps marathon race packet, and finally came home and went to my community fall festival.  The last stop is where I got to ride a pony!  I loved it! 

October update

The past two days have been busy and super fun.  At school it was my turn to have the mystery box and my letter was H.  I brought in some pictures and items that started with H like hotdog, hamburger, house, hat and horse.

Then Saturday morning we did volunteering.  We worked for an organization called "Campaign to End Hunger" and at our table we bagged up a mixture of soy, rice, dried vegetables and protein powder.  Other tables did beans and other foods.  Dexter helped holding the bag under the funnel for each person to dump in the ingredients and also with putting the bags into larger boxes.   All the food would be given to the poor and hungry in the Appalachian region of Kentucky. 

Finally Saturday afternoon I went to my swim class and today I graduated level 4!  That means I can float on my back and front, I can fall in and kick back to the wall and I can swim 10 yards out and back without touching the ground.   I will now be a swimtot level 5 and my class moves to Saturday mornings.  As a reward for graduating I got a new Lego set with Captain America and Red Skull!  It is awesome!

Columbus Day

Dexter's Columbus hat and picture of his ships

Here is what Dexter knows about Christopher Columbus:  He sailed 3 ships and he found North America. When he was there he met Indians. His ships are called the Pinta, the Santa Maria and the Nina.  He sailed from Europe.

Have a wonderful Columbus day!

Hello October

Not much has been happening here the past week or two.  I have found an amazing new TV show called PAW Patrol which I can not get enough of - it is Rescue bots but with dogs instead of robots.   I have been working hard in Kindergarten with handwriting, reading, math and all my special classes.  I have decided to be Darth Maul for Halloween, from Star Wars, I already have my whole outfit - mask, shirt, robe and double light saber!  Hopefully I can still go to Ohio for Halloween, the city of New Albany's plan to have trick or treating on Thursday has complicated things - Mom will not find out if she can miss work until that week.

Volunteering

Saturday we spent 3 hours at the hospital volunteering for national drug take back day.  We had some police officers and DEA agents there to help us accept, bag up and take away to be burn over 400 pounds of drugs!  Our family is going to try and make volunteering a monthly event - so now we are on the look out for something we can do in October. 

Saturday night was game night, we played Scooby Doo trouble and Dexter won!

Frying Pan Park

Today I went on my first Kindergarten field trip.  There are only 4 kindergartners at school, me, my best buddy Brett, my best friend Edward, and Leah (she is not my best anything yet, but she is good at coloring).  We got to milk a pretend cow, learn about dairy farms, see lots of animals, play on a playground and have a picnic lunch.  It was tons of fun, especially since Mommy was the parent chaperon!  Every month we get to go on a field trip, and I hope they are all as fun as the Frying Fan park!

Kindergarten rocks!

This is what Dexter said he has learned through his first 3 weeks of Kindergarten:

"I am doing a lot of stuff, I did work, I played games. I did math work and language work, like sounding out words and stuff.  I was doing chains (math multiples), I was doing lots of fun work.  I have learned about Johnny Appleseed and I made a Johnny Appleseed hat.  I was listening to my teachers.  I like all my extra classes like Yoga.  We went outside to play everyday, we have 3 playgrounds. I have learned new songs as well about bumble bees and turtles. "

Here is Dexter and his new Johnny Appleseed hat, an upside down pot with apples.    Dexter also learned that he died from a cold and that he had no shoes or house.

And Dexter showing me his Yoga - This is windmill pose

Party Weekend

 Saturday was spent at Chuck E.Cheese at Edward's 5th birthday party.  Edward, Dexter and Brett are the 3 Kindergarten boys at school and are all best friends

Sunday the school had it's fall festival back to school party complete with bouncy houses, a magician and lots of yummy food and ice cream. 

But now it is Monday and it back to normal!

Kindergarten!

Don't make me leave my LEGO at home and return to school!!  This last week at home with Grandfather was so fun it is hard to return to school.  I am still at Montessori of Gainesville, so that part has not changed but now I am the big kindergartener in the class and will be asked to help the smaller kids learn the routines and lessons during the morning and then in the afternoon I will meet up with the other Kindergarteners (Leah, Brett, Edward and me) to work on more advanced work.