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Learning to Love Winter – Winter Activity Programs in Schools
We moved to New Hampshire when Ryan was starting first grade. We were eager to move right away, and so we looked everywhere to try to find an affordable house rental in a good school system that was within commuting distance of Concord/Manchester. We ended up in a sleepy little town with a tiny school, right next door to Mount Sunapee. The town wasn’t the right place for us, but the tiny little school was fantastic. One of my favorite things that the school offered was their Winter Activities Program – for four weeks in January/February, the kids spent the second half of every Wednesday either skiing, ice skating, or…
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Resilience
Resilience. That is the word that has been bouncing in my head this week. As a therapist, it was a word that came up frequently when writing therapy goals and progress notes with clients. It is also one of the behavioral standards that kids are rated on at Ryan’s school. What does it really mean though? Imagine walking across hot coals. If you cry and scream the whole way across, but then keep on walking and are willing to try it again, are you resilient because you bounced back? Or not resilient because you cried and screamed? Do you need to cross the coals without flinching in order to be…
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Lunch Cards
When Ryan was in first grade, he kept asking me to send something special in his lunch box. He even brought home a book about napkin origami from the library in an attempt to get me to try it. My origami skills are non-existent, so instead I started sending him notes. My original notes were very simple, basically saying “Have a great day! Love, Mom” with a smiley face. I couldn’t keep sending the exact same note every day though, so I expanded the notes to jokes. Every night after Ryan went to bed, I sat down and Googled a kid joke (usually related to something he and I had…
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Back to School
Ryan started fourth grade on Monday. It really seems like they grow up overnight, check out the difference between the first day of third grade and first day of fourth grade. I can’t believe I have a fourth grader already! When he was just a little preschooler, school seemed so big and scary. Each year he has grown more and more and become increasingly independent. Usually Ryan likes a little bit of extra support and hand holding. Not this year. This is the first year that he didn’t ask me to walk him to class. In fact, I asked him (several times actually) and he was insistent that he wanted…
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Creating a Back to School Command Center
It is hard to believe it is already time for Back to School! Summer seemed to fly by this year. In getting ready for a new school year, I really wanted to create a create a more organized homework station/command center for Ryan. Looking on Pinterest, there are tons of creative ideas. I would have loved to come up with some new creative idea that was super Pinterest-worthy, but instead I have created a pretty basic homework station. Here is what we have: I picked up blueish paper and pen holders from T.J.Maxx. I wanted to keep pens/pencils/markers easily accessible and have a spot for any important papers or library…
