After 4 long years, Olivia finally got her braces off and her teeth look beautiful! The picture doesn't even do her justice. Just beautiful. So, in the past year, she has been able to stop her growth hormones, stop wearing her back brace for scoliosis and now get her braces off. And she gets new glasses next week!
He became a manager at AgVantis and took over his boss's job in January. He doesn't program as much, but he seems to enjoy his new position.
I just finished my 3rd year at Kidslink. I started as the administrative asst, but this past October, one of our lead teeachers moved out of state pretty unexpectedly. I don't know how we would have found someone, had them take the classes, etc needed to teach her class, so I taught the 4 year old MWF class. My 5 days in the office then went to 2 days and I taught the other days of the week. It was a lot and difficult to switch back and forth, but I loved it. I had the most amazing kids in my class. I have a degree in elementary education, but I had never taught my own class until this past year. Next year I will be going back to the office, but I think I will miss teaching. It was a lot of work though. I spent every evening and weekend planning lessons, prepping crafts, making things for each theme, etc. That is probably the biggest reason that I never updated this blog.
Can you believe that Olivia finished 8th grade? She is off to high school next year. She has had kind of a rough year. She didn't have any friends in her classes except for Charlie, who she has been friends with since 2nd grade. Unfortunately, he is going to a private school next year and Olivia will miss him so much! She finally made a new friend named Emma in PE and she transferred out mid semester. She found out Emma was in her lunch and finally she had someone to sit with. Then her 5th hour changed at semester and she was back to having no one to sit with. It really bothered her this year. Especially in classes where they always have choose a partner and she's the last one standing. I wish teachers would think about that more carefully.
Olivia is in no hurry to drive, so even though she will be 15 in August, she is waiting until next summer to take driver's Ed. Olivia does things on her timeliness, so we are respecting that in regards to driving. I don't want her driving before she feels ready to.
Olivia has always written stories. . .even before she could read and write. She would tell me her stories and I would write them down. But now, at 14 1/2 years of age, her stories have improved even more. Here is page 1 of book 1 of the Mist. Academy series.
Yeah, she's currently on book 5 and they are so good.
Abigail finished 3rd grade and she had a rough year as well. Her anxiety really worsened this year to the point that the school had to call me when she was having an anxiety attack. They were incredibly bad. One time she was hyperventilating so much that her lips started to turn blue. She is a perfectionist who is very gifted. They have been wanting to go through the testing for gifted, but her anxiety gets in the way. She has gone to a therapist for almost 2 years and we felt we had nowhere to go. After waiting 5+ months, we got into a child psychiatrist and she had to go on medication. I don't feel the least bit ashamed of putting her on medication because when you get to that point, it's a necessity. It has really helped us get our Abigail back. But another thing has probably helped her even more and his name is Colton. They were in class together and he had such a calming effect on her. He even made her a stress ball one day. They have become great friends this year ( and she just might have her first crush on him ;-) He's a great kid. Hoping they are in the same class next year!
Anyway, I will post some pictures from the past year in a bit! Hope you are all doing well!
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