The Grey-White Flip

It was a big week for Henry.  He earned a new belt at jiu-jitsu.  He had to earn four white stripes and one red stripe on his white belt before advancing up.  Henry worked it out to 72 classes (which equals 72 hours).  One of the perks of earning a new belt is that the Instructor flips you.  It's a special thing. 

Henry was quite proud of himself and on a new-belt-high for a few days.  Big smiles.  To celebrate his achievement that evening, we had some homemade peace cobbler.  Caroline was our baker and it turned out delicious.  But the real celebration was this weekend.  The kids have it in their mind that one particular barbeque restaurant is really good.  Todd and I feel that it is one of those sticky feeling restaurants, but the saving grace is their bread.  The staff walks around periodically with fresh, steaming-hot, fluffy bread which is pretty wonderful.  So this weekend, we went out for the big celebration.  We all got the sausage because that tends to be the juiciest meat on their menu.  We also discovered they have some really good fried okra.  Really good.  So, maybe we can handle the stickiness.  

Josiah had a big growing week.  He randomly weighed himself one day and discovered he had gained seven pounds since his birthday.  To see Josiah's growth charts and poundage increases over the years, this was a very significant leap.  With the weight gain, we measured his height as well, and he has grown 1.5" since January.  We were all quite happy for him!  Of course Henry and Caroline wanted to weigh themselves and measure their height as well.  They're all officially over 4'8" though Caroline and Josiah sometimes still use their booster seats because they like riding high.  Not Henry.  He ditched that thing the second he hit 4'8".  

Josiah had his first assessment in his class.  They were given a time limit and they had to draw Canada with all the provinces, capitals, as well as Greenland.  He was happy to report he was the first one done.  Well....  It's not a speed test.  It's an accuracy test.  But he did well.  He got them all in there.  Now he's onto drawing the U.S. with all the states and capitals (while continuing with Canada and Greenland).  

This past week, I had to help with the afternoon care at CC.  It is only two hours.  Usually, we have a paid nursery worker, but she wasn't able to be there this week.  There were 12 kids and the noise level was crazy.  I asked a somewhat quieter kid if this was normal.  She looked at me, sighed, and answered in the affirmative.  Ten minutes before parents came to pick them up, I had the kids clean up and introduced them to the Quiet Game.  There is a 'picker' and they have to pick the quietest, most still child standing against the wall.  Then that kid becomes the 'picker.'  That's it.  That's the whole game.  They played it for ten minutes straight.  It was glorious.  And God bless that nursery worker.    I was not in our kids' classrooms this week, but other parents took pictures of the kids, so here are some of their CC pictures.

Caroline was not interested in dissecting a lima bean:

I see it...

...and I refuse to touch it.

Henry in his class:

And today.  Henry changed his church name sticker from 'Henry' to 'Hey.'