End of School Celebrations

It's that time again! The time when the school year is winding down and SUMMER is just around the corner. We get to celebrate a job well done; a year full of learning; a successful step in our educational journey. We have a few end-of-school traditions and even though they were slightly adjusted because of sickness and scheduled surgeries we still ended the school year with a bang. (It almost killed me to keep with our regular school routine even after the public school kids were out of school, but it just made sense to keep our routine up until the boys surgery, and then to maintain it after so that we would have a routine to stick to while they recovered instead of just being sad that they couldn't go to the pool.)

Here are the end of school pictures:

Austin, age 7.5, end of 1st grade

Lydia, age 10, end of 4th grade

Caleb, age 5, end of preschool

First up is Caleb's Preschool Graduation. He was in Miss. Jessalyn's neighborhood preschool and it was a great fit for him, while being close enough for me (and giving me some good homeschooling time with the other two). He also had an Upstart preschool graduation and David was able to take the morning off to come with us.We loved celebrating him together. 

End-of-Year Readathon

We started the day by going to the Library, then David took the rest of the day off of work and we came home and read books to our hearts content. It was a great afternoon. 

End of School Cones

Once, Lydia read about this tradition from the German culture and we have now adopted it. We choose to do these "school cones" at the end of school and they are filled with surprises and things for the summer (instead of preparing for school). 

Last Day of School Ice Cream Party 

Our neighbors, the Rossels, throw an ice cream party for the school kids as they walk home from the bus on the last day of school and it's one of my favorite traditions. 

And last but not least (and actually, the first end of school celebration chronologically this year)

LAGOON DAY! 

David and I took the four oldest, while Jenna watched the four youngest, and had the greatest day. We were at the park as it opened and we closed it out that night. The kids had been saving their money and they spent it all! Candy, giant stuffed animals, necklaces, slurpees, etc.. it was the best day of these kids lives. They were at such fun ages for the rides and we really just had a great time celebrating the end of the school year doing something that they have been looking forward to since the day after we went last year. 

Summer, here we come! 

End of Preschool

And just like that... preschool is out for the summer!

During the last couple of weeks leading up to the end of Lydia's preschool, she kept asking me if I would come and watch her during the gymnastics portion of her preschool. The few times that I was able to come she was always SO excited to see me watching from above. 

One of the days when I went to pick her up, one of the other kids had brought kittens for his show and tell. Lydia begged for my phone to take a picture of them. Also- I might be the most sad of all that Ms. Alyson won't be Lydia's teacher anymore. She was so kind and such a good teacher.

On the very last day of preschool they had a Gymnastics program where the parents got to come and watch what the kids were working on. It was so fun! While we were waiting for the program to start, Lydia asked her teacher if Austin could come in with her, so he got to go in an play with play-doh which they both loved. 

Lydia did great at her program!

Afterwards, the kids got to play on the gym equipment which they loved.

We celebrated after the fact by going to McDonalds for lunch. We drove past McDonalds every day at lunch time and Lydia asked to go all.the.time. I always told her that we'd do it at the end of her preschool and she held me to my word. 

We are so proud of everything that she did and learned this year. I can hardly believe that she is headed to kindergarten in the fall. I cried when I dropped her off at her first day at preschool and was almost in tears on the last day, too. It's been such a special time to drive with her to preschool, walk in with her, and give her a big hug and kiss before letting her run into her classroom. She's still at the age where she frequently would run back out of the classroom to give me one more hug to tell me that she loved me, and that's one of the sweetest feelings in a mom's life. It's nice when you make the right decision about things. We didn't feel great about having her go in the fall, but having her do this particular preschool for the last half of the year was definitely the right choice. 

Lydia, we're proud of you and love you so much.