The room parent organized a fun “Junior Olympics” as a class party yesterday and I was happy that it was on a Monday, so I could help out.  Several parents volunteered to bring fruits, drinks, yogurt for the “after party” snack, and I brought some grapes.  All the parents gathered after drop off in the morning at the park next to the school to help set up.  After announcement, the teacher led the class to join us to get the party started.  The room parent introduced and demonstrated each of the six events to the kids; they were long jump, speed running around cones, Frisbees to a goalie, ball toss, hula hooping and soccer ball dribbling.  Then the kids were broken into the assigned groups; Logan was in the first group of 5 kids, and he seemed excited and ran to the first event with his group.  A mom and I then ran straight to our station to man the Frisbee toss.  That mom was holding the goal to make sure it faced the kids while I instructed the kids and timed them.  All the kids did well and tried their best.  A boy and a girl did the best, made 5 Frisbee goals in 30 seconds.  After all six groups of kids rotated through each of the events, the teacher and some parents led the kids to the lunch area for snacks.  The other score keepers and I reviewed each event scores, and came up with a boy and a girl winner for each event.  I also peeked at Logan’s scores in each event; even though he did not win, he did fine in all. Then we all went over to join the class.  Logan was sitting with his buddy, but he was in a huff sitting there with just a bottle of water while everyone was enjoying a variety of snack items.  I went over to talk with him and he claimed that he did not want any of the snacks.  I did anticipate Logan’s pickiness, so I brought him some grapes that I brought, and he ate them.  While the kids continued to eat, the room parent presented the teacher a gift from the class, and then announced the winners from the Olympics.   She made these cool customized medals and the winning kids were excited to go up to receive their awards.  The rest of the class also received a bubble wand for their good participation.  Logan was a little disappointed that he did not earn a medal, but it was quickly forgotten as he ran off to play with his buddy at recess.  All the parents helped clean up and ended this fun party.  Can’t believe Logan only has two more days of First Grade.

      Connor had another friend’s birthday party in the late afternoon.  Connor was so excited to go that he kept asking when we would leave and I finally decided that we would take off earlier to allow some naptime in the car.  These days Connor does not take naps over the weekend and he is thrilled to have quiet time instead.  He often even seems fine without looking tired.  But since Connor ran around a lot and did the ball drill for Logan at the tennis court this morning, I figure Connor would nap in the car and it happened.  After 20 minutes of sleeping, I woke him up to go to this new Pump It Up location.  For the next hour and a half, Connor had fun playing at each of the bouncy houses in both rooms.  He loved this one steep bouncy house the most where all the kids just tried to climb up to hang the flags.  The kids got lots of exercise just running up and down on it.  A couple of girls liked hanging out with Connor and they followed him even when he moved from one seat to another when it was time for pizza.  Later when the kids were sitting on the Birthday kid’s big chair, one girl was so excited and hugged Connor tightly too.  Connor seems popular with the girls.  Connor had a big appetite for pizza and cake, and afterward he wanted a balloon and he insisted on getting another one for Logan too.  We then thanked the hosts, and headed home to join the other half of the family.

    We spent a couple of hours on Saturday at the cabana club.  Both boys, especially Connor, were excited to swim.  Connor enjoyed going into the wadding and the big pool.  He was totally comfortable floating on his own with the noodle next to us.  He moved his arms and legs, and made a whole lap of the big pool.  However he is still reluctant to put his head in.  Logan had fun in the water too, but at any time when he worried that he was too far in the water or if we had let go him, he panicked.  It took Stuart a long time to convince Logan to put his face in the water but he finally did it.  After that he seemed slightly more comfortable and put his head in on his own too.  Later he even played “rock, paper, scissor” with me under the water.  We hope we can continue to make baby steps with the boys.

   Connor, Stuart and I were talking in our bedroom yesterday morning; suddenly Connor yelled “Wow” with his eyes wide open staring out the window.  We saw this big deer walking slowly toward our “barely surviving” apply tree on our backyard hill, and then it started munching on it.  Stuart decided to go downstairs to see if he can scare him away to save the tree.  Connor and I, and Logan briefly, watched the deer through the window for a long time, several minutes.  It was having a stare down with Stuart. Later it finally backtracked and hopped over the fence back up to our neighbor’s direction.

     We had a very early dinner tonight, and as soon as we were done with snack, we heard a loud bang and felt a slight shake.  Stuart and I both were nervous and checked around the house until Stuart wondered if it was another car accident on the street.  As we stepped outside, we noticed our neighbors running along the street.  It turned out that the loud noise was an explosion up on the hill.  We saw lots of dark smoke coming out behind a house that was two levels diagonally up from us.  We started hearing sirens, and there were more neighbors and cars driving by to watch the commotion.  It was quite scary as we watched different colors of smoke coming out from behind the house.  Stuart was keeping an eye on the house and searching for information on his phone.  I went into the house quickly to gather a few of our most valuable things and jackets for us just in case we had to be evacuated.  The boys and us stayed on the street and watched for a long time.  At some point, we could see flame, water being shot up and the long ladder of the fire truck.  After a long time (like 45 minutes), things looked calmer and the boys were more restless.  So I went inside the house with them to clean up and brush their teeth.  As we were about to return outside, Stuart came in to tell us that the fire was finally put out (a whole hour).  He also learned later that it was possibly an RV that had exploded on the driveway and the house was quite damaged from the related fire.  We were all glad that the fire was put out; this was definitely a very scary experience.

    The club has opened as of this long weekend, but since the weather has not been that hot we were not too interested until today.  Connor was very excited with the plan, but Logan was indifferent.  Once we walked over and settled on the lawn chairs, the boys were more interested to snack with me until Stuart convinced Logan to warm up at the wadding pool.  Connor later joined him.  Logan was happy splashing with water.  However it took him awhile to immerse his body and he did not want to put his head in.  Later we all moved to the big pool.  Logan was very nervous and held on to Stuart tightly.  On the other hand, as soon as Connor realized that he could float on the noodle, he did not want me to hold on to him, and he was very happy floating around.  Later Stuart and I switched kids.  Logan was quite nervous and did not want to try using the noodle.  I basically kept talking with Logan and offered incentive until Logan finally grabbed me less tightly.  With times, he finally let go of me when I promised to be very close by.  Logan did float around on his own for awhile reluctantly but he did raise his free hands to show Stuart and Connor on the other end of the pool.  After a bit later, both boys were done with the water.  We dried off, warmed up under the sun while having a snack.  Then the boys went off to play at the structure, and Stuart and I hit the volleyball around on the lawn.  It was a fun couple of hours we had, and hope Logan will get more used to be in the water soon.