On Thursday, Connor’s class wanted to celebrate the birthday of Johnny Appleseed, so the teacher recruited parents to help.  Since I had not yet volunteered in his class and Connor often asked me about it, I decided to take some time off from work for it.  I arrived early to their class in the morning just when the kids were marching out for recess.  Connor smiled at me and we held hands briefly as I passed them.  Throughout the recess, Connor periodically looked into the classroom and waved to me.  When the class returned, Connor finally came over to give me a big hug.  Then for the next hour and a half, the teacher had the kids divide into four groups and go through four stations, making a paper hat with apples decoration, language art, science and math.  A dad and I were in charge of the math one where we had the kids guess the size and the height of an apple, and how many seeds inside their apple.  The kids were interested and relatively engaged.  After each round of our table activities, the kids always asked if they could take bites of the apples and they really enjoyed the quick snack.  It was fun to finally see all Connor’s classmates and interact with each of them.  Connor was happy that I was there, and he must have come over to hug me several times whenever there was a break.  After the morning activity, the kids were led out for lunch.  The other parents and I walked by to say final goodbye to the kids before I returned to work.  The class also had a chance to have several different apple snacks throughout the rest of the day.

     There was a dragon boat race festival at Treasure Island this weekend that I had considered us going to, but driving up there would definitely be a chore.  As I was not too motivated myself, the idea got turned down easily by Stuart.  Instead we decided to play tennis on Sunday morning.  It was a very hot day, so we managed to leave by 9am to play for an hour.  This time Stuart focused on Logan while I did drill with Connor.  It seemed better this way and both boys did well.  Stuart and I had a good workout playing against each other too.

    Since Michelle and Ted decided against going up to Treasure Island as well, we made plan to visit them in the afternoon.  As soon as we arrived, Logan and Connor were ready to go into their pool.  Mckayla and Marcus got ready quickly and all eight of us went into the water to play.  Both Logan and Connor were on the noodles, and they could almost move as freely as the good swimmers Mckayla and Marcus.  We played for quite awhile until Stuart thought it was getting chilly.  One by one we all got out and cleaned up.  The kids had a snack then they were excited to run off to play while the four of us sat and enjoyed a seafood dinner.  Finally we had the kids sit down to have their share.  Connor had joined Marcus wearing his Star War costumes, but basically all four kids seemed to play together the entire afternoon, playing with all sorts of things.  We had periodic tattle tales from all of them, but nothing major came out of it.  It was Sunday night, so we called it a night a bit earlier.  We thanked the hosts and came home to wrap up the weekend.

     The boys had their soccer games on Saturday.  The schedules were partly overlapped, therefore again we had to divide and conquer.  Connor and I did sneak in a few minutes of Logan’s game before driving to his.  Logan as well as his team did not seem as aggressive as previous, but did better in the second half.  They lost the game 4-1 but Logan did come within a few feet of a goal.  Connor did fine in his; he was running around in the heat.  He was happy that he had a couple bigger kicks.  Since it was hot, we went for swimming in the afternoon.  The club is now closed after the summer, but we had signed the waiver and we could continue to use the pool until end of October.  As a result of the closure, the pool was quite empty.  The water was very cold upon entry, but once we were in, it was fine.  The boys both did fine, and seemed to go through the water faster.  Logan became fond of floating with the noodle and was happy moving around on his own.  Connor is getting a bit too brave with water at times.

    After we cleaned up, we waited for our guests Rohan and his family to arrive afterwhich the boys were off to play in the house and later in the backyard too.  Connor periodially changed himself into different costumes.  Later, they came in and joined us to have dinner.  They had a great time playing until toward the end, when Logan and Connor started coming to us a few times to complain about each other not being nice.  At one point, Connor even cried as he said he tripped on something Logan put on the ground.  They returned to play fine until it was time for the Gopals to go home.  As we were getting ready to read at bedtime, Connor asked me for a paper and periodically asked me to spell words for him.  At the end, he presented this note to me and daddy.

      After dropping the boys off to their classes, I went to Art Vistas training.  I spent an hour and a half there learning the first three art lessons for Connors kindergarten class.  I also met and chatted with the two moms who will be my partners for the year.  I then went for grocery shopping and took a lunch break at home to relax a bit before heading back to school. 

     I showed up at Logan’s class before 1pm to be a classroom helper.  The class was very quiet as they were listening to the audio and following through on their books.  Logan was focusing on it and did not look up at all.  The teacher immediately asked if I minded making some copies for her as her copy helper was out.  Logan finally noticed me and gave me a wave.  I was gone to the office for awhile to make the requested copies.  When I returned, the teacher had lined up some math papers for me to grade.  It was nice sitting down grading while watching the class action.  One of the girls was the Star of the Week and she was given some time to share her personal things with the class.  Afterward the teacher read and had a discussion about a book.  Then they were led outside to run a few laps to get some exercise.  I took a peek; Logan was chatting with a classmate and periodically they seemed to be running fast racing with each other.  When they returned to the classroom, the teacher talked with them about a science topic.  By then, I had to quickly finish grading the remaining papers, so I could rush to pick Connor up.  I also met up with the two moms to discuss the upcoming art lesson dates with Connor’s teacher.  Finally Connor and I hung out for a little bit at the nearby park before picking Logan up to go home.

    In the afternoon we had Connor’s soccer practice, so he and I left after the boys finished their homework.  When all the teammates arrived, the coach started talking with them to begin.  A couple of kids were not paying attention and one of them kept kicking Connor’s ball away.  Connor retrieved his ball, but it got kicked away again.  Since there was no parents helping today and I could not stand the kids not paying attention, I walked up to them.  The coach quickly welcomed some help and Connor was happy to have me there with him.  We started some drills; a few boys were definitely full of energy and it took some efforts to keep them on track.  Whenever there was a water break, Connor would tell me that he would go get his own water and he did not want me to return to my seat.  We did a few drills and a scrimmage game at the end.  The rowdy kids tired me out and I was happy that the practice came to an end.

   Stuart and I wanted to take a walk after dinner last night, but surprisingly Logan suggested that he would hop on the bike instead.  Their bikes are still without pedals, so the boys are learning to glide or balance on them.  Logan suddenly seems more comfortable on it and not as afraid to glide.  Today we did it again and as I was following behind him, I counted up to 16 while Logan glided on the bike with his feet in the air and balancing with the handlebar.  Both Stuart and I are very pleased with what we saw.  Logan even suggested that we can try putting the pedals back on the bike soon.  Connor is cautious as well and he had fallen yesterday, so he became a bit more scared.  But even Connor is making a little bit of improvement today, so we are quite excited.

    The boys had their games on Saturday.  This time their games were close to each other and so Stuart and I had to divide and conquer.  Connor and I left the house first for his.  When we arrived, Connor did not want to warm up with his teammates but wanted me to play with him instead.  I finally convinced him to stick with the team.  Once the game started, Connor had fun and somehow he was in the game a lot and only sat out at the very beginning.  He ran around and some good contacts with the ball.  When the game was over, all the kids were excited for snack time.  After Connor got his share, he immediately decided which one he would save to share with Logan and which one he would eat on his own as Logan would not like them.  Then we swung by to check out Logan’s 2nd half of the game.  Logan just sat out of the game when we arrived.  The weather was so strange that it was actually chilly, so before long, Connor and I decided to leave to go home.

    Once Logan and Stuart returned home, Logan changed out of the gear to get ready for his classmate’s party.  This was a meet and greet party hosted by one of his classmates for the entire class; when we arrived, we realized that it was not a very good turnout, only 7-8 families were there.  The host family owned a 8-acre land and so the guests could roam around in their huge backyard.  Many guests were busy playing with zip lines while some kids swimming or playing in jumpy houses.  Logan was obviously not interested in the ziplining, and instead he played at a swing and with a big rope.  Finally he did find someone to play tug-a-war with that rope with him.  Later Logan warmed up more, and played water gun and crawled inside an obstacle course with some classmates.  At the end, he wanted to play with the motorized motorcycle, but unfortunately it was out of battery.  By then, we had been at the party for over an hour and a half, I talked Logan into going home instead of waiting for the host dad to charge it up.  I was hoping to see and meet more of his classmates at the party, but in the meantime, we met a few.