Aarastas and Sarsosari

 Hi.  Remember me?  It's Sarah.  I haven't posted anything on this blog since May.  Aaron has been the hero who has kept up on all the excitement that happens around here.  Blogging may not be a priority to me these days, but these cute kids sure are. 

 Arwen is 8, almost 9 and is my favorite thing ever, lately.  Seriously, Arwen has the kindest, sweetest soul.  She is still playing soccer and kicking lots of butt!  I so enjoy watching her play.  It's one of the highlights to my week.  She has an amazing coach with a stellar group of girls on her team.  She also enjoys going to Valiant Girls, which is an activity night at church for girls 8-11.  She loves it! 

 This picture of Arwen sums up my little girl lately.  After entering a lottery, and winning, Aaron and I have had the opportunity of putting Ar and Noah into a Spanish Immersion Charter School.  It's amazing.  I love it.  Spanish now makes up 80 percent of their day.  They only hear English in English class and in math class. Arwen loves her teachers and all her classmates, but has been struggling a lot.  She gets extremely worried that she won't be able to do the things asked of her, before she even tries to do it.  There has been lots of tears and heartache around here.  Most of the other 3rd graders have been at the school for the past 2 years, and have a firmer knowledge of Spanish.  Arwen worries that she is behind and that she will never catch up.  But, after meeting with her teachers, I found out she is doing splendidly.  She is an obedient child and always gets her assignments done on time and does well on them.  All of her teachers tell me that she is leader and is very kind to all of the kids in class who have a hard time with their behavior.  She is patient with them and helps them stay on task.  She is starting to become more confident and I love that!  I think I have worried about Arwen more that Arwen has :)  She told me she has a few boys in class who have crushes on her.  Oh no!  She's too darn cute!

Noah is 6, but will be 7 in just 2 weeks!  I think the appropriate words to describe Noah are spunk and pizzazz.  He is my wild child at home, but to my astonishment is calm and collected while at school.  His teachers tell me that he too, is a leader and participates a lot and is doing quite well.  He has taken to the Spanish Immersion program and is flying with it.  I love to hear the Spanish things he says and listen to all of his cute Spanish songs he sings for me.  He is doing quite well in math.  They placed him in the 2nd grade math class, although he's in 1st grade.  Good job, Noah!  Last I checked, he couldn't draw all of his numbers facing the correct directions...but I guess he is able to grasp the concepts, so that's what counts, right??  I'm afraid he spells as well as his Dad, which is not too great, to put it kindly :)  I make him do his spelling words every day, even though he insists that his English teacher says he doesn't have to.  He did come home with a perfect score on lasts weeks test, but this weeks practice tests have been pretty bad! 

 He is playing soccer as well.  Aaron is his coach.  I think they have lots of fun together.  It's hilarious to watch their games.  The kids have more fun playing in the mud than they do playing ball.  Noah has fun.  He's scored a few times this season and that sure makes him happy.  I happened to comment on a player on an opposing team who scored at least 12 goals in one game.  I told Noah that kid was a super star.  Noah ran out and scored a goal and then shouted to me, "Am I a super star, too Mom?"  Of course, Noah!  You're the best!  Noah is so neat.  Anytime things are scary or someone is having a hard time, he's so quick to suggest saying a prayer.  And I love how it always turns out okay and that he points out that it was because of his prayer.  He has such an amazing amount of faith. 

Joshua is 5.  Josh started kindergarten at our regular public school this fall.  The charter school does not have a kinder program.  Joshua loves everything about it.  He loves learning about the alpha friends and the sounds and actions that go along with them.  He tells me about all the pretty girls in class and how he likes to sit by them.  He also told me about Ivan, who is chubby.  Josh really likes Ivan, because he IS chubby.  Joshua loves when Arwen calls him chubby.  Silly, sweet boy.  I get to help a couple of times a month in his classroom.  I like to be there, but I'm finding out that Josh is kind of lazy when it comes to coloring and cutting with scissors.  I tried to encourage him to do better work, but he just ignored me.  His teacher told me that he is emotional...yes, I know!  But he's a good kid.  She thinks that by Christmas he'll have everything figured out and won't be so emotional about things.  Good luck...I've been wishing for that the last 5 Christmases! 

Joshua is doing really well at home with his reading. I asked his teacher when they were starting reading groups at school and she didn't even know if they could do them this year because they have some many kinders who don't even know their letters and sounds, let alone how to read.  That makes me sad.  He does great here, but I think he'd really rise to the challenge in a reading group at school.  Josh is playing soccer too.  He is super competitive and freaks out if the other team scores.  I keep trying to tell him that it's okay and we need to be happy for the other team, but he's not falling for that nonsense.  It's been good for him and he really looks forward to his game every Thursday night.   Josh is still my sweetheart who tells me I'm the most beautiful thing ever.  He melts my heart with the caring things he says.  I love that he's only 5 and loves to say nice things to make others happy.

 Larkin is 3, going on 16.  Seriously, that's what she tells us. All. Day. Long.  "I'm not little, I'm big."  I don't even know how to describe this little thing lately.  Here are the things she tells me quite often.  "Mom, you're old."  There are two gates you can walk through to exit Arwen's soccer field and she makes me go one way and her and Arwen get to go the other way.  "Mom you have to go the ugly way and Me and Arwen get to go the pretty way."  "Why," I ask her.  "Because you're a little bit ugly."  She's quite the character and always has us in giggles.

But I really do love this little twit.  I love how tiny she is, even though she hates to be called anything but big.  I love how she tells me that I'm her best friend forever.  I love when she's sleepy or hurt and will crawl onto my lap and let me put my arms around her and allow her to be small for a short time.  I love watching her prance around in her little leotard and tights on ballet days.  Cutest. Thing. Ever.  I have loved having her hair cut sassy and short for so long.  I mentioned that I was going to make an appointment to get her hair trimmed.  She then informed me that she is growing it out, because long hair is beautiful and she wants to be beautiful like Arwen.  I love that she has her own opinions but I will miss her sassy hairstyle.  I adore it short.  Even though she says some pretty questionable things, I'm glad she's mine!