Soccer Banquet and a Halloween Party

Caitlyn has finished the soccer season. They had a banquet on Saturday and the kids were allowed to wear their Halloween costumes. It is supposed to rain here on Halloween so I am glad that she was able to get another chance to wear the costume without having to worry about wearing a coat with it.

The coach gave all the kids trophies. And Cate is chatting nonstop about getting her very first trophy. Anyone that will listen to her gets an earful about how this is her first trophy and how excited she is.
Here she is with her trophy and Maya (her new best friend).


Here she is in her costume. Notice the smile. Her newest "thing" is that she doesn't want to show her teeth when she smiles. And when I ask her to, I get this weird looking face. Not sure what is going on with that, but hopefully she is out of it by the time school pictures roll around.


We also went to a Haunted House after the banquet. She was just dying to go to one...so we finally caved and took her. I picked one that I knew would be short, both waiting in line and walking through the house. So we chose the one at the police station. It took all of about 37 seconds of her being in there before she cried and said she wanted to leave. Luckily, the entire thing was only 2 minutes long. So I held her and kind of stayed back from the group so that everything coming out would scare them and not us. When it was over, she said it wasn't that bad, But I don't think that she will be asking to go to another one anytime soon.
Here she is outside in line for it (again with the goofy ass smile).


Other than that, not a whole lot going on in our worlds right now. Parent teacher conferences are coming up in a couple of weeks. That should be loads of fun. We got the note to sign up for them telling us that each will last about 8 minutes??? Most ridiculous thing I have ever heard in my life. But I will go along with the program and if my conference "just happens" to last longer than the 8 minutes, oh well.

Courtesy of my Papa

REVENGE

An old man and woman were married for many years, even though they hated each other. When they had a confrontation, screaming and yelling could be heard deep into the night.



The old man would shout, "When I die, I will dig my way up and out of the grave and come back and haunt you for the rest of your life!"



Neighbors feared him. They believed he practiced black magic, because of the many strange occurrences that took place in their neighborhood. The old man liked the fact that he was feared.



To everyone's relief, he died of a heart attack when he was 68. His wife had a closed casket at the wake. After the burial, she went straight to the local bar and began to party as if there was no tomorrow.



Her neighbors, concerned for her safety, asked, "Aren't you afraid that he may indeed be able to dig his way up and out of the grave and come back to haunt you for the rest of your life?"

The wife put down her drink and said, "Let him dig. I had him buried upside down......."

Mr. T

This has got to be the funniest thing I have seen in a loooong time.

Catching Up

Well, I met with the teacher the day after the "incident." Without rehashing everything, let's just say that she now knows to take my daughter's complaints seriously from this point on. I also think that I scared her just a little bit. A few days after I met with her, I emailed her a question and also wanted to let her know that Caitlyn would be going home with one of her friends and her mom. The email that I got in return was disgustingly nice. Over the top nice. The kind of nice that when you read it, you know the author made a conscious effort to be nice. But I am so okay with that. As long as Caitlyn is reaping the benfits of my visit, that is all that matters to me.

We dog sat for Magee a couple of weeks ago, and I am just now getting around to uploading the pics from his visit. Caitlyn loves when he comes to stay for a couple of days. Matt on the other hand....well, let's just say it makes him thankful that we have cats and not dogs.

Here's the girl with Magee doing what they both do best.


Matt's football season is almost over, so he will be home in the evenings again. Which is good? I get so used to him not being home that it is strange when he finally is home before it's dark.

Caitlyn is gearing up for winter. We had some snow showers here last week and she was convinced that there was going to be no less than 8 feet of snow. See for yourself....she is all ready to go and frolic in it.....

The Kindergarten Teacher

So I figured when Caitlyn started school that I would have a leg up on most situations because of my profession. This hasn't proven to be true so far this school year. Let me just say that I am less than pleased with the kindergarten teacher. We'll take this point by point....the last, which happened today, has completely pushed me over the edge.

1. Caitlyn learned to write her name in all capitals. Now I know, I shoudl have taught her to write it using lower case letters. However, capital letters are easier for children to write. Incorporate Caitlyn's weakness in fine motor skills and it is no surprise why she learned capitals letters first. The teacher wants their names in all lower case. Fine, agreed. When my child writes her name at the top of the paper in all capitals, what purpose does it serve for the teacher to circle it and write her name in lower case letters OVER what Caitlyn has already written? Here's my thinking, since you're rewriting it anyway, just write the damn thing yourself. Secondly, how can she see the way it's supposed to be written when you have written over what she has already written and now it looks like a bunch of chicken scratch??? But this I can get over...we are working on it at home.

2. There is an assignment that is completed a few times a week. The children are to cut out squares with pictures on it and paste them in sequential order. Fantastic activity. Unless you're Caitlyn. She cuts fine. However, the pictures that are on the edge of the page, she doesn't cut that edge out. The piece of paper is still in a square, just has a little bit of the edge of the paper left attached to it. She hasn't cut the heads off the people in the pictures, she hasn't torn the paper, it's nicely cut...all but that damn edge. Teacher's note on every friggin one of them...."poor cutting skills." Actually my child has saved herself some time and been very resourceful if you ask me. Not to mention, the goal of the activity was sequencing, NOT cutting. Were the pictures in the correct order? Yes! then let's move on please. But okay, I will work on that issue as well.

The next 2 points are warranting an email to the teacher, cause I don't see how I can work on them at home without the proper information from the woman.

3. There is a behavior system in place in the classroom. Fan freaking tastic. All classrooms for the most part have them. There is an incentive chart in Caitlyn's folder and she gets a smiley face, sad face, or in between face each day depending on how her day was. Now we got this beautifully written note about carrying this plan over at home and helping the children to get smiley faces, etc. Caitlyn got an in between face yesterday. When I asked her what it was for, she had no clue why she didn't get a smiley face. She did know that she didn't have a good day, but couldn't tell me why. Now I ask you this, how in the hell am I supposed to discourage whatever behavior warrented the in between face when I don't know why she got it??? Yeah that part about the communication between home and schools regarding behavior wasn't in that beautifully written letter.

4. This is the one that has me the most pissed off. Caitlyn woke up this morning and told me that she had a headache. I figured it would go away a short time later and she would be fine. I left work early today, cause I am feeling liek shit courtesy of Matt and Cate passing their germs to me, so I went to pick the girl up from school. She came out and right away told me that she still had her headache. I asked her if she told her teacher. "Yes." I asked what the teacher said. "Oh now your head hurts?" Which I thought was an odd response, so I asked Caitlyn if she had told her teacher that something else was bothering her. She said she told the teacher that her stomach hurt her, to which her teacher replied she shoudl try going to the bathroom. Fine, would have probably been my response as well. But when she mentioned that her head was hurting shortly after she said her stomach was hurting, your response is snarky like my kid is lying???? And here's the kicker, she came home and threw up and had a temp of 102!!!! So needless to say, my child expressed her issues and wasn't taken anywhere near as serious as she should have been.

I am fuming about this last one. Why in the hell would the teacher, at the very least, send Caitlyn to the nurse??? What in the hell do they send kids to the nurse for if not an upset stomach and a headache? I guess if Cate puked all over her damn room, she may have thought twice about being so quick to assume that my child was lying to her.

So needless to say, an email has been sent, and if no response is given within 24 hours, the woman is going to have an irate parent on her hands.

Ahhhh the joys of being "that" parent that usually irks the hell out of me during the school year.