The Signs Are Real

This is what I found as I walked through Jack’s room. 

Jack: You have been warned. 

Too many pens

Jack absolutely loves stationery and pens. It’s a gift he gets from his dad, and a little bit from me. We love notebooks and ink and pencils and paper and journals and writing and drawing and collecting and making piles and using half of everything and then buying more more more.

Does that mean we are creative? Or does it mean we like to hoard? Or a little of both?

Yes.

Haha.

When we go to the store and Jack says he needs to buy more pens, I think of the bins and bins of pens pencils Kranz erasers writing things markers sharpies colored pencils etc. etc. and I cringe. Can’t he just go shopping in our cabinet and find what he’s looking for?

Jack: No mom! Those pens are old, or the ink is dry, or they don’t write very well, and that’s why they’re in the bin. I need new ones.

me: but we have 4000 pens Jack.

Jack: That’s not my problem. Donate them.

So what does he do? He convinces me to buy some more pens when we are at Staples and he finds them on sale… 60 pend for six dollars.

Jack: that’s only $.10 each mom!

me: Yes I did the math. Sighhh. 

When we get home, we have the next dilemma. Where do we keep all the pens? Jack’s answer… Right on top of his desk where he keeps everything else. I prefer to have them put away and then leave a few out and accessible. And, he can put a few in his pencil case for school. There are just so many damn pens laying around.

Of course, Jack resorts to his old tactic.

Jack: let’s just leave them on my desk and I’ll know right where they are.

Me: actually, let’s put a few in your cup on your desk and then you’ll remember exactly where they are.

Jack: I’m going to forget that they’re there! There are so many other pens in that cup!

Me: I’m telling you to remember right now, here test yourself. Jack, where are your pens?

Jack: I don’t know. 

Pain in my butt.

Flashback to written punishments …

I was cleaning out Jack’s old room after moving him to the new bigger bedroom upstairs, and found this pad. Haha!

I don’t do this anymore, but had threatened it a few weeks ago. Now it’s just take away electronics. All the way.

Jack: Just because you’re making me do this doesn’t mean I’m learning anything from it. 

I wonder why I didn’t make him finish this?

Heartfelt Apology. Truly.

Words cannot express how happy we are as parents when outer child not only admits their mistake, but writes a heartfelt apology to try and make you feel better. 

I present you with version 1 and 2 of Jack’s apology letters from this morning.

I woke him up as usual, rubbing his back and his hair, telling him how handsome he is and that it was going to be a great day. He giggled and then tried to pinch the flesh on my legs and arms. Repeatedly. After I said stop. And then I told him if he kept doing it I wasn’t going to tickle him, I was just going to place my thumb under his armpit and not move it. Just the thought was enough to make him crazy. He pushed me away by shoving my face from the side in a not-too-gentle fashion that prompted the immediate loss of all electronics for the day, and the need for Jack to write me an apology letter:

Jack: (version 1) Deat Mom, You had just woken me up. You were tickling, bothering, and annoying me already. I told you to stop, but you were persistent and annoying me. So, to combat your bothersome nest, I pushed your face away. Judging by your reaction it was harder than it looked. You do tend to overreact, but I don’t think that was it. I’m sorry that I hurt you and I won’t do it again.

me: Nice try but you’ll have to do a better job at telling the truth Jack. 

Jack: (version 2) Dear mom, this morning I was grabbing your flab. You put your thumb in my armpit. Then I pushed your face. Judging by your reaction, it was harder than it looked. I just want to say sorry, and I won’t do it again.

me: Seriously?

Now, what would you suggest I do at this point? I would really like to hear your opinions. 🙂

Is he afraid to talk to me now?

I know I look like hell. I have a fever. It sort of snuck up on me yesterday or last night. Nice bronchial stuff going on also. We leave for Florida in the morning. Correction. We leave for DISNEY in the morning. (whimper)

I mean I TRIED to play tennis with him. (me with a half-hearted thwack thwack at the ball…him running to get the ball, me sitting down and waiting…then I went in the house to sit down for real). I found this waiting for me. He talks in air quotes by the way.

I ate a bug. A story by me, for Jack. With bonus photos.

This is probably going to be a longish post. Are you ready? Go get a snack. I’ll wait.

So I took a walk in the woods. Guess what happened? I ate a bug. It turned into a short story in my head and here’s the visual I had as inspiration. My two brothers and a dog:

 

Here’s the story. I wrote it so it would appeal to a certain 7-year old, and I actually had fun watching him read it. He was cracking up at certain parts which made me very happy.

Stay tuned for bonus photos at the end. Just to make sure you stay interested and up-to-date!

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I Ate a Bug

If you take a walk in the woods, you can expect a lot of different things to happen. You could maybe trip on a rock, stub your toe, see a garden snake, jump over some poison ivy, cross a fallen log over a stream, go to the bathroom behind a tree, or even run away from an angry swarm of bees because you just happened to disturb their hive. Really. All of this could happen.

All of these things didn’t happen to me.  Only one thing happened to me.

I ate a bug.

I was walking along the path, talking to my brothers. Blah Blah Blah, not really paying attention to where I was going. I must have been telling a really good story because my mouth was open pretty wide. Blah Blah Blah.

My brother’s dog was walking along with us and she is the kind of dog that will bark at anything that moves. And I mean anything. A leaf, another dog, a cat, a squirrel, a twig, a fast-moving cloud, your shoelaces! It’s SO annoying to hear Yap Yap Yap the whole time you’re trying to take a walk in the woods. How can you enjoy nature with all that racket?

Where was I? Oh yeah, I was telling a story Blah Blah Blah, mouth wide open, when something flew right into my mouth and bounced off my tongue! I made a choking coughing sound and tried to spit out whatever it was that was IN MY MOUTH. Was it a fly? Gross! Was it a flying beetle? EWWW! Was it a (gasp) MOTH??

Whatever it was, this bug was not coming out of my mouth. It had a very strange taste. It was a green sort of taste that reminded me of salad. Bugs taste like salad?? How WEIRD? But not really that bad, if you know what I mean.

Here I am, coughing and choking, trying to spit this bug out of my mouth, and my brothers don’t even hear me because the dog is still going Yap Yap Yap the whole time! After a few minutes they finally realized that I wasn’t talking anymore, and they must have wondered why I was jumping up and down flapping my arms. They stopped and stared. I must have looked pretty funny hopping around making weird coughing noises. Even the dog quieted right down and stared at me.

The bug definitely did not come out of my mouth. I tried. Really I did. So, what other choice did I have?

I swallowed it. I swallowed a bug. I honestly and truly did.

Then the weird feeling went away. Nothing was crawling or creeping or flying in my mouth anymore. What a relief! Whew!

I started walking faster to catch up to my brothers. Once they realized that I was okay they turned and went back to walking the dog. Yap Yap Yap!! She started right up again with that racket. Sheesh!

I got back to telling my story (remember, from the beginning of THIS story?) and I was starting to Blah Blah Blah again with a big open mouth. This was a really good story that I was telling. I’m sure you would agree.

Suddenly, I felt a weird sensation in my throat. It seems that the bug that went DOWN was trying to get UP! The bug that was IN now wanted to be OUT! Not only did I eat a bug, but a bug was crawling in my throat! I started coughing and choking, trying to spit the bug out of my mouth … AGAIN!

This time, it worked!

So, technically, I ate a bug. But it didn’t last very long.

________________________________________

Jack: That’s a pretty funny story.

me: Thanks. I thought you might laugh so I decided to write it down.

Jack: Did you type it?

me: Yeah, that’s what you’re holding…the printout of what I typed.

Jack: Did you write it first and then type it?

me: No. I typed it as I wrote it.

Jack: Huh? How did you do both??

me: Noooo…I was writing it in my head and I just typed it into the computer.

Jack: You should always write your stories out first in pencil. THEN type them into the computer. Then you can make corrections first.

me: Good advice.

Jack: They made us do that in school. We always had to do everything twice. What a nuisance!

Well, now that Jack is out of school, I guess he won’t have to do everything twice. Except apply sunblock. Here are a few photos from Jack’s new camp, which he LOVES.

Jack also just passed his red belt test. Check out the belt order and see how many belts he has left before his black belt. Almost there!

This weekend we went to a nail salon with my friend and her daughter. Guess who had to have his big toes painted black? Of course I had to add a skull and crossbones to them when we got home.

I took Jack to my office on Monday before camp. He got to write on my chalkboard wall, play on my iPad and have a little fun with Mom before his first day out in the woods! He decided to have an impromptu dance party by himself. Complete with breakdancing on my rug.

3 writing samples from a 7-year old

I’m still impressed by his use of descriptive words and phrases. Though I think they kinda force that out of them in class. Take a read and let me know what you think! These were all copied from Jack’s writing journal which came home with him on the last day of school. I had never seen these stories before. They certainly kept busy in 2nd grade!

1. Head-eating Cyclops.

As I approached the big haunted house, I trembled with fear. I slowly reached out for the front door knob and slowly turned it and opened it. When I walked inside, the door slammed shut!! I noticed a one-eyed cyclops eating dead peoples heads. As soon as it saw me, it raced away leaving a cloud of dust and about 20 uneaten human heads behind. When I listened, I could hear something making the stairs creak. I saw a little shadow race across the whole upstairs. My heart kinda stopped for a second. What was that??? I thought to myself. Suddenly I fell into a snake pit. Ahhhhhh! I screamed. I noticed a button. I ran to press it and a door opened! I was safe.

2. The story with no ending or punctuation or pauses of any kind.

Sometimes me and my Mom go to Florida for a week and we go to the pool sometimes and we visit my cousins for a day then we go to the beach for an hour then we go to the playground then we go back to our hotel and watch TV then go to the arcade then we play ping-pong then we go to the snack bar then we go into the pool then in the hot tub then on the water slede then we go back to our hotel and go to bed.

(Whew, sometimes our vacations DO feel like that!)

3. The Robber of Lego City

Dunt Dun Dun!! It all started with a football game. The score was 10 to 0. It was Patriots vs. Giants. Just as the Patriots got past the quarterback, a tiny claw dropped down from above and grabbed the football. Hey! Everybody shouted. The Giants noticed a helicopter with about 5 criminals in it, all laughing and pointing. We have to call the police, said the Patriots! The city’s not safe when criminals are around! 20 minutes later, 10 police were chasing the 5 criminals. They were in a red van. We need backup! A policeman said into his radio. 2 minutes later, 6 helicopters appeared out of the sky.

(I’ll have to ask him to finish that one. A nail biter if I ever read one!)

So there you have it. He wrote a very long one about a snowball fight and how I blocked all of his missiles with my snow shovel, but I don’t have the ambition to type all of that right now.

 

Jack: You’re typing this in your blog, right?

me: Yeah, people like reading your stories.

Jack: Whatever you do, don’t type the story about the penguins, okay?

me: What’s wrong with the penguin story? It’s cute.

Jack: Mom, it’s not all figured out yet. I ended it with the word “donuts” and that doesn’t make any sense. So don’t do it!

me: Okay. But now I want donuts.

Jack: You had too many sweets today.

me: Amen to that.

4 things on Jack’s to-do list

I found this note in Jack’s backpack. It must have been from his recent visit with his Dad. I thought it was really interesting. 🙂

All grammar, spelling and punctuation are distinctly Jack’s:

 

to do!!

1. Give anthony (ˆhis) bacugans back

2. do homework for life!!!

3. play lego star wars and get past Jabba’s palace and…pod race, and sebulda!! = must do!!

4. get up hill somehow  ∆#@A7.

Sh*t my 7-year old writes (about leprechauns)

HOW TO CATCH A LEPRECHAUN

image courtesy of wildearthintegration.com

The story in Jack’s class started like this. Then the kids had to finish it.

“I couldn’t believe my eyes. There was a leprechaun picking shamrock in the field next to my house. Everybody knows that the leprechauns will tell you where a pot of gold is hidden if you catch them and let them go. So all I had to do was to catch this leprechaun and then I’d be rich.”

And Jack continues:

(all spelling and punctuation comes from his story)

“I ran to the hardware store and bought blasting caps, detonaters, timers, and last but not least wire.

That evening, I hid in a tree and when the leprechaun came out for his evening walk, I pluged up the blasting cap. When the leprechaun came by the tree, I fired, then I grabed a nearby butterfly net, and quietly like a ninja, I dropped to the ground and captured the leprechaun, then I went home and went to bed.

When I woke up, not only my key chainsaw was missing, but all the chlothes on my leprehaun action figure were missing including the hat. Then I looked out the window and saw green!!!!

I took my parachute and raced to the window and jumped out the window. When I reached the street, I jumped in a nearby taxi and said “quick”!!! follow that six inch man wearing sparkly green all over him! The driver slamed on the gas pedal and shifted into 3rd gear and let me out at central park. The smell reminded me of florida.

I ran to the butterfly net stand and bought one. I hid behind some rocks, and when the leprechaun walked by, I fired. Direct hit! When I let him go, he led me to the pot of gold, and helped me carry the pot of gold home with the help of all his leprechaun friends.

We were rich!

The end.”

The teacher thought he should have added “At the end of the day I couldn’t help but think about how awesome my day was!”

Really? Is this really how 7-year-olds write? I don’t even write this well. I was shocked at how long the story was (3 pages) and that it had so much detail. Do any of you have kids this age that have assignments like this? I was impressed, but maybe it’s because it’s my son. Ha ha!

This is his first actual “long” story. I think I wrote my first story at age 8, and it was Tippy the Turtle and Pokey the Puppy. Sigh. His is all detonators and blasting caps. Such a boy.

I told Jack that I thought his story was awesome.

Jack: Yeah, I know.

The art of cursive writing

Jack: Why are you writing in code!!?? You know I can’t read that!

me: Sorry, I’m just making notes and this is the quickest way to write. I bet you can read it if you try very hard.

Jack: ARRRGGHH! Stop making R’s that look like N’s.

me: That’s what they look like. Here, I’ll show you the whole alphabet, slowly.

Jack: It all has to connect?

me: Um, I don’t think so, but I guess that’s how I learned to do it.

Jack: You mean someone TAUGHT you to do this? I thought old people were born knowing it.