First Day of School - Fourth Grade Edition

Here's Zara in her first day of Fourth Grade, which also happens to be her first day at St. Anne's-Belfield School. Amity, not to be excluded, is wearing her own STAB sweatshirt to mark the day.

Zara's 9th Birthday, Observed

Zara has a summer birthday, which means she's either at camp or her friends are all away when her birthday proper rolls around. This year we only celebrated 2 months later, which is way better than last year's 7 month lag. The "birthday" girl elected to roller skate with friends (several parents donned skates too, but alas, I have no photographic proof of that!) and eat chocolate pudding pie covered generously in real whipped cream.

First Day of School - Gan Shemesh Edition

Amity began her last year at CBI Preschool today. She is in the Gan Shemesh class (Hebrew for "Sunny Garden") which basically means she's in (pre-)Kindergarten. They take a lovely Reggio-inspired approach (just like the rest of the school) but with the added emphasis on "Skills" (reading, writing, numeracy, etc) and no naps, and Amity is smitten. She gets to do more of what she loves (you should see this kid write, she's ready to compose a novella) and less of what she doesn't (sitting/laying quietly on a mat while your friends are just feet away) and we couldn't be happier. The icing on the cake, as evidenced by the last picture, is that her BFF Amaya is also in her class. Looking forward to a great year, though I do confess a bit of melancholy as CBI Preschool has been such a big part of our life since Zara started 6 years ago...

Sunny-sitting

Sunny's family went to the beach for the weekend, which meant she got to hang with us! We all enjoyed having a dog in the house (we've been dog-less since Polar was placed a few months before Amity was born), and Sunny seemed to enjoy the ridiculous amount of attention the kids gave her. Thanks for visiting, Sunny!

BRIMS Camp: The Parting Glass

An excerpt of Zara and friends singing "The Parting Glass" as part of their BRIMS camp production, "The White Gander."

Fiddle Kid Session

A bunch of former BRIMS kids, now fully adult-ified, happen to converge upon C'ville round about the same weekend in August, so Lori and Joe hosted an impromptu potluck dinner and session. What with us having little(r) kids, we couldn't stay all that late, but also noticed that people were tending to linger over food and not much music was being played. Ever our youth leaders, Z and O took matters into their own hands, and with bows a blazin' they started their own mini-session. Wes was the only "grown up" who'd join in (you see him here on bodhran, though I believe he played whistle, too) so he gets props for playing with the fiddle kids, too.

Sister Swim Lessons

One of Zara and Amity's favorite games to play is "swim team." Here Zara's the coach and Amity's the swimmer. Between the under 6 swim team this summer and sister coaching, Amity's now able to swim across the "middle pool" all on her own. My prediction is we'll have 2 JSL swimmers next summer!