Trying...

Brave seems to be the theme around here these days. Baby Bear has always seem to fear the water. She hates not being able to touch the bottom. This past week at school her class started swimming lessons as part of the Phys. Ed. curriculum. I was worried she would have a terrible time, I couldn't have been more wrong! Baby Bear has turned into a regular fish!

Baby Bear also lost her third tooth today! It takes a lot of courage to let someone into your mouth with kleenex. Here she is showing off the new space, and the reward she got for being so brave!

Happy Earth Day!

Three Things At Once

Thank you to Grandma Bear who sent Baby Bear a big bag of Easter treats! They are being enjoyed sparingly, or at least that is what I thought until I caught sight of the chocolate bunny. (Baby Bear was told she could eat just the ears.)

Baby Bear is (finally) on he verge of loosing another tooth! She lost her first 2 within days of each other last summer. You can see the one on the bottom right is ready to let go anytime. There are also 3 more that have decided to abandon ship in the near future. Baby Bear told me today she wants to have a no teeth smile for her spring school pictures. So, with that as our goal I better go dust off the pliers.

Baby Bear spotted this really cute skirt in Old Navy last month, and really wanted one. I would have bought it for her if it hadn't been almost $25! So in secret I dug through my fabric stash and came up with this handmade version of the name brand thing! She LOVES it! She wore it to church the last 2 Sundays. I am grateful I have the talent to make her pretty things, and save Papa Bear a few bucks too!

It is spring! We have enjoyed very much being out in the warm sunshine! Baby Bear has decided she wants to learn to ride her 2 wheel bike again. She learned how 2 summers ago, but after a rough tumble she was bike shy for a long time. We are excited for her to learn too. We would like tips and ideas from anyone who has ever taught a nervous child to balance and ride a bike! Comment away!

Going Visiting

It was Spring break here this past week, and I knew we had to do something! So plans were made and Baby Bear & I went on a grueling 6 hour drive to Fort McMurray to visit my older sister & her family. Our trip started out well, got to Edmonton just fine, then things got hairy fast. We got lost! Really lost, it took way longer than it should have to get out of the city. After frantic phone calls, we made it onto the 2 lane highway and it was simple to find our way after that. We enjoyed the drive after we found our way. We enjoyed the sunshine, the muddy roads, and the very dirty car we had when we got there. We enjoyed playing and singing with our family. We enjoyed some excellent cooking, and too many treats. We had a good visit and we share with you some pictures of our trip!

Report Card Time

Our school division does not give our quarterly report cards like they did when I was a kid. Now a childs progress is shown in a portfolio of work the teacher collects. Examples of all subjects are shown. The idea I am told, is to minimize comparing children to each other and I guess that is supposed to eliminate competition or something. I am not sure I understand exatcly what they are doing. I would understand letter grades much better. 

Our parent teacher interview was tonight, so we 3 Bears went to the school to look over the portfolio. Baby Bear is doing very well in school. Her teacher says the only real area she needs to improve would be less talking during work time, and being better at counting by 5's. Well the talking thing, if anyone has ever met her you will know what I am talking about. The teacher pointed out, that Baby Bear still completes her work, and does it well. My biggest concern is her talking disrupting other students. We can work on that.

 

We were told over and over how amazed the teachers is by Baby Bear's reading level,

 and her comprehension is equally as good. That I like to brag about a little bit. She is a super reader, and like me (I hope), can read a whole chapter book in an afternoon. Granted the books Baby Bear reads are about 120 - 150 pages, but I still think that is pretty good for a newly 7 year old bear. As a reward for such a great report, we visited the book fair that school was having, and bought 2 new books. I was happy when Baby Bear passed by the begining reader books and the character books to select a slightly harder chapter book. Good Job Baby Bear!