what happened to fun field trips?

you know a museum, a ball game, the zoo or an amusement park? 5th grade field trip is to a place called Biztown, it's a Junior achievement thing all the kids get jobs & work for the day...um won't they be out in the real world getting jobs soon enough? or as David pointed out being "wage slaves"
C piped up that this would be fun and I told him I would write that down and remind him in 20 years when he was getting up & going to work everyday!

excuse me while I am "THAT" parent for a moment

very extremely proud looking over C's TCAP scores to see he was really smart/super amazing smart level okay maybe it was just advanced...except math which was merely proficient (my mother & aunt will be disappointed he may not be the math geek they were hoping for) My point being waaay proud of my baby. Evidently his teacher told him that if they still had the TAG (talented & gifted) program at his school he would have been in that. The problem now of course is keeping him interested, engaged & finishing his school work in class so he can live up to these lofty scores..not always the easiest task we have found out through the years *sigh* because quite frankly standardized testing doesn't mean squat at the end of the day

how about you pay me & I won't beat 'ya

came across a parent today that suggested paying their kid to do their homework...I am guessing they are at wits end fighting the homework fight but rewarding a kid for something they are suppose to be doing?! um hell to the NO. I cannot even fathom...start taking stuff away or grounding or take away the extra curricular stuff but paying a kid to learn no wonder kids are more and more entitled. Guess I'll just continue to be mean mommy

spent the day walking in someone else's shoes

and that would be literally not figuratively.....

Started my day out as I do each Saturday this semester heading to lab except this week I was a little fuzzier than usual and had the added task of dropping the dog at sleep away camp for the night because we had planned on being out of town for the day & night. Got to campus walked into the building looked down and oh dammit sandals on my feet breaking rule one of lab-no open toed or open heeled shoes I also had coffee in my hands breaking rule two but that situation was easily remedied. I got stuck wearing the junky sneakers left in the classroom for such nincompoops that forget rule #1. Then of course our out of town plans were thwarted by the torrential down pours of the day sending us to the bowling alley for an afternoon of well bowling leaving me once again not in my own shoes

the bestest cake in the whole wide world

carrot cake seriously. I have no idea who first thought hey let's shred this vegetable and bake it in a cake but sheer brilliance I tell you. I freakin' love carrot cake but not with nuts & raisins that just mucks up the cake. Who needs all that crap in their cake? in my trail mix or yogurt fine okay but leave it outta my cake. And believe you me me carrot cake without the nuts & raisins can be difficult to find. The European bakery I worked out in high school may have made the very best carrot cake ever. Well they made the best cakes ever anyway but the carrot was my favorite, although the mocha was good and this another cake I have never seen or heard from anywhere ever again was a furstpuchler, don't know if that is spelled right but it was a yellow cake with layers of chocolate, strawberry & vanilla butter cream an layer of pineapple preserves and maybe raspberry preserves with a hard chocolate shell. I take that back I found it in a cafe in Mainz Germany but made with ice cream instead of butter cream.
So over all the bake sale at the school carnival tonight was pretty crappy a surprise as the bake sales over at the Primary school were always pretty amazing. Perhaps if they were a little less concerned with having an International flair they would have had a better showing?! I made my spice cake & a basil swirl bread which was a new recipe & looked good, so good I might have to make us one this weekend, after I buy another rolling pin I could not find ours and rolling out dough with a soda can is doable but not so easy.
Right the carrot cake C decided he need to buy something to bring home to daddy and he settled on the carrot cake and I am glad he did it doesn't have nuts & raisins...yummm

snow day

hmmm yup did not get one. Shocking I know. Good thing I made my nine bazillion cookies last night although I believe I caused a rift in my marriage by telling David he could not sample any. Yes I should have made an extra batch but I had exactly enough for the teacher's cookie exchange. I suppose I will make more this weekend. So back to the snow day or rather lack there of.. I still turned on local news this morning because lack of snow is not necessarily an indication of school cancellation C anxiously watched with me and got excited when he saw Knox County scrawl across the bottom only to have his little hopes shattered at it being Knox County KY
maybe next time buddy...

the parent-teacher thing

with well C's teacher-I'm doing fine at at school & seeing as my parents live in CT a parent-teacher meeting would be a little difficult to coordinate, but I digress.
The short version of the problem is C is not finishing or in some cases doing his work in class and when given the opportunity to take it home and finish he well did not do that either. He also tends to be very chatty & disruptive in class. This first came to light a couple of weeks ago we hoped to avoid the go to school meeting and thought we had resolved the issue in emails, C was talked with, punished, allowed to make up his work etc. The next week he had a great week there were just a few worksheets that came home Friday to finish and he got A's in his weekly folder. Great we thought problem solved. But no last week it was back to slouching off, talking during class times, work not turned in etc, he was getting a zero on 1 writing assignment but is heading to a lot more zeroes if he does not start turning this stuff in with no opportunity to make up the work. So more talking, more punishments and we have to go have a meeting with the teacher.
I am really hating this part of parenthood and yes in the grand scheme of things this is not such a big deal it is only 3rd grade but it has me very stressed out. He does have new glasses and the teacher moved his desk closer to hers which will hopefully help plus my mother gave me some ideas and the teacher seems willing to help so I hope tomorrow goes well. I must admit some amusement to the whole permanent record which has been floated about several times now-for God's sake could they not come up with something new? I promise my 3rd grade permanent record has not to date affected my life at all!

15 years old

just children, boys, really babies one ends his day in a pine box the other a jail cell.
This morning's shooting has let me very disturbed and unsettled.

random vacation Thursday

-girls night out last Friday was fun! caught up on lots of old & new gossip
-someone should have brought a yearbook we totally forgot a few folks here & there
-talk even made it's way around to our 25th reunion in a mere 2 years! really 25?
-if there are only 2 pieces of shrimp calling it chicken & shrimp piccata is misleading in my opinion
-my hometown is so very different and in some ways still the same
-Bronx Zoo is still fun this many years later
-don't have a burger at the zoo seriously yucky stuff
-C of course got an airbrush tattoo, panther this time
-I have no doubt what he will do first thing on his 18th birthday
-luckily is has not been too hot here-no central air
-read 3 1/2 books so far
-have enjoyed doing very little all week even though it drives my brother crazy
-miss D & superpug and I look forward to seeing them tomorrow
-still hate living so far away from my parents!
-don't check your work email on vacation unless you want to be annoyed!

the pox

and yes I did have the chicken pox as a junior in high school. My mother had exposed us to pox as little kids-this was back in the old days before there was an immunization for it-but my brother turned up with it in 7th grade and passed it right along to me-oh joy.
I had to put off my license test(or re-test actually, perhaps another story for another day) and in fact when I did get my first drivers license I had pox marks on my forehead. On the upside I got a week off from school-or did I? My mom taught at the very same high school I went to, lucky huh? Lucky that she could bring me my work each and every day I was home sick. ...and even better I remember taking a test on the kitchen table that week!

girl's night out hits the road

yes I got in touch with the girls up in Yankee land to organize a night out on the town, such as it is I'm telling you not much going on up in Danbury...
So I had lost touch with hmm pretty much everyone over the years but we reconnected around the time our high school reunion was being planned it was the 15th? oh alright it was the 20th let's not quibble over a few years. The past few years we try to organize a girl's night out sometimes it works out others not and honestly this past Christmas I didn't let anyone know we were up, it was the holidays we had family stuff they had family stuff no big deal.
I hadn't given it too much thought till this afternoon while I was busy trying to look busy and I emailed the bunch of them got responses quickly and everyone seems game which is great. Unfortunately there has been a whole lot of what day and where? now I can pick a day but I have no idea of the where, I think Danbury is still a good locale for everyone but specifically where who knows?
C of course wanted to know why my friends were all going to be in CT at the same time we were