Happy Season and the joys of each day...

Our last snow and ice storm caused quite an irregular week of school just before our Christmas break. The kids did not have school Friday (12/12), were off again on Monday (12/15, I had school). Then we all had a 2 hour delay on Wednesday(12/17) from a new storm that hit and Friday, yet another snow, sent Jake and Shaye home mid day (12/19) while I worked my full schedule. If you don't check Steve and Shaye's blog, you should. We are all keeping updated postings for a full family report. Steve took some great photo's of the ice storm we had but my photo's are from the inside-out, sort-to-speak. While snowed in, Shaye and I baked a lot over the weekend and here are some pictures of her gingerbread house that we started last week end and finished mid week.

This holiday season has been very enjoyable. I feel relaxed, as organized as I can be and most importantly, have enjoyed time to bake, my long time hobby. Shaye is discovering all my baking tools and now takes out my stand mixer, petite cookie cutters and recipes to make her own creations. If you don't know this about Shaye, she is incredibly artistic and when she rummages through my baking tools she inevitably finds something new to create with. Jake on the other hand will pop his head in, see what's up but generally moves quickly on to his own thing. He never hesitates to give me a "I love you Mom" on his way through and so I'm happy with his brief appearances.

I hope you all are enjoying a wonderful Christmas season; that you will visit all of our blogs to keep in touch with our family. We love you and miss seeing you all and I hope that this avenue of contact keeps us in touch.

Thanksgiving

We celebrated a different kind of Thanksgiving this year. Instead of our regular wake up time (7:30'ish on weekends), we all unexpectedly slept in till 9:30 a.m. This definitely is an indication of our schedules catching up with us. The parade had already started and my 21 lbs. turkey, that I had seasoned the night before, thank goodness, was all set to go into the oven. My sister Sandy came up Wednesday night with her son Ryan and then my sister Sherry joined us for dinner at 4:30. Steve's brother Tom, his girlfriend Beth and daughter Kristy have joined us the past few years, but with only Thanksgiving off, an 8 hour round trip drive was just too much for them.
We watched only parts of the parade, usually a big part of our Thanksgiving morning tradition and had a lazy and slow going afternoon till turkey time. My sister attempted to take a family photo for a Christmas card and what a trip that was. None of us feel any one was the perfect picture. Which one would you vote for?
All in all, with five days off from school, we enjoyed a nice break to appreciate all that we are thankful for in our family.

Soccer and School Sports

As many of you know, Jake and Shaye both play soccer. This year was very different for us with both kids on the "Columbia" school teams. Jake played for the second year at the Freshman level and Shaye played for the first time at the Modified level (which is for 7th and 8th graders). So, instead of Steve or I jockeying schedules and separate cars, they each went straight to practice after school. This has been great because it cuts down on our chauffer time and the kids schedules are more under control. But, as always there is more. Shaye will continue to play on the Travel League soccer team through the winter that is nighttime and weekend practices and games.
Jake went out for a completely new winter sport and is on the Wrestling team. I will save the story of our skinny boy coming home his first week of practices to tell me he had to LOOSE weight for another time. There will be lots of wrestling stories, I'm sure. Bottom line though, he moves into his next sport through school, goes directly to practice from school and we pick him up on our way home from work and not the extra driving that comes with winter travel soccer.


To end the school soccer season, Shaye was one of two girls on her modified team recognized individually. Shaye was awarded the "Overall Team Player" award and as part of the celebration was awarded sew-on patches indicating her graduating class year - 2014. Jake was unable to go to his end of season banquet because he had three major homework projects due the next day BUT, I had to go because I was asked to help serve at the banquet. Some days seem they just don't have an end but Steve and I couldn't be more proud of both of them.

My First Grade Class

What a joy this school year is. Very different from my previous years, this year I have what is called the "inclusion class" which means I have 6 students with individual education plans or as we say "IEP's". Along with this classification, I get a full time aide who is meant to support my special 6 but she does so much more. Her name is Michelle and she loves to bake and cook and I am the recipient of her new or tried and true recipes. The other morning she brought me a delicious piece of pecan bread just because she knew I had to be at school early. It's like having a mother there to take care of me.

My school district is also known as a District In Need of Improvement - or DINI and with that comes funding to improve student performance. While that is an unfortunate standing for us, it set an agenda for reduced class sizes and my other joy this year is that I only have 16 students. This is a walk in the park and I am rocking as a teacher this year (I don't mind saying)! With the training I took over the summer at Lesley University's Literacy Institute as well as piloting a fabulous new reading series, my class is reaching levels I never would have anticipated for first graders.

They can tell you the difference between fiction and non-fiction genres, they can write stories with voice and logical sequence, they are what I tell them, "literary genius' and can have conversations with each other about stories I read aloud to them and make connections to themselves, other books and to the world.

They are very sweet and loving. I get an " I love you Mrs. Alviene" everyday and special pictures almost every morning starting our new day that they have drawn the night before at home. I feel I have come into my own as a teacher this year and it has been truly wonderful.