On two separate Saturdays this month, Alan has been invited to work on crafts at the apartment main office. First he made a snowman out of two plastic pumpkins (check out the batman hat!) on December 1st. Then today he mixed together paint to decorate an ornament.
The snowman has been sitting outside our door all month, under the sign that Alan picked out to decorate the front door, while the ornament is hanging on our tree. We look forward to holiday arts & crafts like these all year long!
At Alan’s request, this year we put up Christmas lights for the first time. We have them on the living room and bedroom windows, and Alan loves them! He got the idea from our upstairs neighbor.
Alan’s second-to-last week of summer break was jam-packed with fun activities. It was a true representation of what a great summer weekend should be like.
On Friday night we returned to the baseball field to hit balls for the first time since before Alan’s surgery. Alan was hitting mostly everything I pitched to him and ran the bases several times. He was thrilled to get back on the field. Afterwards, as we were packing up, Alan happened to see Ella from Mrs. Russo’s class at the park with her Mom and sister. Alan stopped to play with them for a while on the playground, and then they chased fire flies together. Ella also gave Alan an orange wristband to go with the friendship rock from earlier in the year. After going home, we played chess and also continued to work on a car that Alan, an engineer in training, started to build out of a box. 🙂
On Saturday we began the day at The National Sports Collectors Convention (The NSCC). After lunch, Alan and I stopped by the annual summer carnival at Golden Gate Gardens and participated in a cake walk and played a ball toss game together.
Afterwards, I took Alan to his friend Josh’s house to play for a couple hours. Somehow the day was still just beginning though, as the highlight of Alan’s day was going to see Tyler and Carleigh. First they played in a bounce house at Katie’s graduation party (where a photo was snapped of all the cousins), and then they played at Grandma Debbie’s house. They ended up having a good four hours together in the two locations. Alan let his cousins drive his “box car.” 🙂
On Sunday morning we headed back to The NSCC, before spending the rest of the day at the Indians game. Lastly, we closed the weekend with one final game of chess!
Next weekend — the final one of summer break — figures to be another fun one too!
First grade – Part III – edition of the Top 10:
-Playing MBBL baseball! (Practice kicked off this past Saturday – photo above)
-Texting. Yes, it’s true. Particularly with Dad, Mom, Grandma Debbie, and Shane. Alan loves sending emojis!
-Playing cards with Grandma Debbie, Tyler, and Carleigh
-Hiding rocks in the snow outside the Golden Gate Gardens apartment and creating a “treasure map” to document how to locate them
-Hanging out with friends – Josh, Noah, and Brady in the past few weekends alone
-Championship races on the Super Ultimate Garage racetrack! (still a huge favorite)
-Dancing to Kidz Bop music at school — and later watching the classroom videos that Mrs. Russo posts on Twitter
-Racing cars down our long hallway
-Ice Skating and Swimming
-Building train cities! (photo below)
Today Alan decorated this cookie at our apartment complex’s holiday gathering for kids. Alan chose Grandma Debbie as the lucky recipient! It was her early Christmas present.
Alan wrapped up the Summer Reading Program today and got to pick out a free book at the Mayfield Library as a prize. Alan chose The Berenstain Bears’ Moving Day, which was fitting since we moved to a new apartment this weekend!
Alan has been a huge help this weekend — he even helped assemble the bedroom drawers. We christened our new place by playing games of Go Fish, throwing [soft] balls down the apartment’s long corridor, and shooting hoops on our mini-hoop above the bedroom door all weekend long. I think we’re going to like the new place very much.