happy ending

It was the last day of his first year of school. We stayed all day, even for after-school care. He played and played today, so much so that he was more exhausted and more filthy than I think I've ever seen him. It was bittersweet today--I'm so glad it's summer break, but I think we're really going to miss it! I'm going to let him go to 2 vacation bible school programs in another week and a half, one at our church and one at the church that's walking distance from the house (and where his preschool teacher and music teacher attend and will be helping with VBS). We have some things planned, but he just loves school. When we got out to the car, he told me a bit sadly that he was going to miss Mrs. Linda. She's been an incredible teacher! He came home with a bag full of sentimental things--handprints and a poem, a photo album of his year, and another poem on a page with his pictures at the beginning and ending of the year. He's grown so much!! He also came home with another perfect report card. I'm so proud! He was proud, too, and had me read every bit of the progress report to him. I wonder if we'll meet his summer goals: to learn to tie his shoes and "to finish learning to read." He can sound out many words. His teacher recommended that I teach him the "sight words", so I suppose I'll have to find out what they are and work on that! I'm more a fan of phonics, but I want to also teach him the way his future teachers will.

We released the school butterflies today, and Dennis enjoyed watching them go. We have 3 cocoons in our habitat at our house--it was so amazing to watch them grow from tiny little specks to big fat caterpillars and then harden into chrysalids! I wonder when they'll emerge. I hope we get to do lots of nature exploration this summer (and I'd love if some of that happened at the beach!).