Last book club

Our last book club of the year was yesterday.  We have really enjoyed this book club.  It may be the final one.  The lady who ran it this year has moved south of Atlanta and does not want to run it anymore.  No one stepped up to take it.  I was very tempted to but did not.  (Shocking, right?)

This month the kids picked a nonfiction book and dressed as that character.  Eric has always loved the book we read last year about Thomas Edison.  He started his own mini lab at home after reading the book.

The above picture is Eric with his book.  We love the books about the childhood of famous Americans.  They are fabulous living books.  I know.  Living books sounded weird to me when I first heard it.  But, we love them.  They are not like text books.  They are interesting conversational or narrational stories about a person or subject.  Almost all of our school books are living books.  

Here's the whole book club group.  We met at a nearby park.  The kids played for hours after.  It was so nice.  So fun.  

Each child stood in front of the group and presented some facts about his character.  Then the children guessed who he was.  The books were put on the table behind the presenter to help the children infer who it was.  

Dry land/new gear

I love our dry land coach.  She is simply amazing.  She really takes the time to know the kids and reach each one at his level.  She watched a lot of swim practice yesterday and sat down with Eric before dry land started.  She asked him if he thinks while he is swimming.  (I love that she already knew to go there.  Of course the child is constantly thinking.  He invents most of his games during swim practice.)  She then said when they are doing sprints, he should imagine he is racing an opponent up a rope ladder.  Oh, Sheri, we love you so much!

I had to giggle during dry land practice.  We have new windows at the pool, and practice had to be stopped so the kids could watch a rabbit out the window.  

The area outside the window is going to become an outdoor patio.  It is under construction right now.  

E needed new prescription goggles.  His previous ones were a lower prescription and were incredibly scratched.  I'm not even sure how he could see out of them.  Here is my super silly fella in his new goggles.

We finally got the boy a swim backpack.  All the other kids carry them, but I have just always carried his gear in my swim bag.  No more swim bag for me.  

I know it looks huge, but his fins and kick board barely fit.  Sure makes him look tiny, doesn't it.  

Straight A

Eric only had one graded class at his school this year.  I got his final grade today, and he ended the semester with 100%.  Very proud of this kiddo.  He did great as a 5th grader in this 5th-8th grade class, coming in mid-year.

Last day of class

Today was Eric's last day of class.  He has loved going there this semester, and we are signing him up again tomorrow.  Hope we get all the classes we want.  Since the kids have been so good about wearing their uniforms all year, today was a wear what you want day.  Eric chose a new outfit I had gotten him at Target.  Had to buy the boy a new wardrobe.  He won't stop growing!

How adorable does he look in that!  

He had a play this morning where he was Louis the yard teacher from Wayside School.  

I took a picture of his buddies from lunch. He calls them his group and really enjoys these three children.  

We ended with some play time after school with several of his friends.  

Egg drop

In STEM class this semester, the children were studying parachutes and airplanes.  Their end of the year assignment was to make a parachute that could drop an egg from the second floor with no additional padding - without cracking the egg.

The boys worked on it.  Made a great first attempt.  Made some modifications.  Then went back to the original design.  

Eric's was the only one that did not crack.  The others all cracked on the first attempt.  Eric's did not crack after two attempts.  He was very proud and excited!  He was declared the winner.  

Swim meet SUPER SUCCESS!

This boy.  This boy rocked his swim meet today.  I mean blew it clear out of the water!

He got his personal best times in all 5 events that he swam.  Wowzers!!!!

Placements aren't nearly as important as that.  However he did place well also.  At this meet they give a ribbon for your placement in your heat.  E got 5 first place ribbons.  

I've never been anywhere where they focus on  your place in that heat.  We all know that really doesn't matter as the people in your heat can vary.  But, that is what they did, so that is what he earned.  He was happy to get first in all 5.  

He swam the 25 backstroke.  He has not competed in that one since he was 7, but it was fun to watch him sprint.  He came in 1st place overall with a time of 18.38 seconds.  

Here is the video of that swim.  I did cheer a little in this one.  I tried not to in the others.  He is on the far right lane.  

He then did a 50 yard backstroke.  His previous best time in that was from last summer on the sharks.  His time was 42.85.  Today he got a 39.09 and came in first place overall.  

Next was a 50 breaststroke.  His previous best was from last year at the sharks.  He got 53.77.  Today he got a 50.25 and came in 3rd overall.  

Then he did 50 freestyle.  His previous best time in this was 38.52 at the meet in March.  Today he got 37.10 and came in 7th place overall.  

Last was the 200 IM.  His previous best time was on the sharks last summer of 1:41.58.  Well he smashed that today and got a 1:34.97 and 3rd place overall.  

So proud of him and all his hard work!  It's fun to see it all paying off.  

I made a video of all 5 of his swims.  However the quality and length make them too long to put on here.  Sorry.  I guess you will just have to come watch him swim in person.  

Amazing Amazon trip

Eric and I went to Chattanooga today for a field trip at the Amazon Fulfillment Center.  We order so much from them, I thought it was about the coolest thing ever.  Unfortunately, I have no pictures.  They would not allow any pictures inside the center.

We felt like we were in Willy Wonka's Chocolate Factory.  Have to keep it a secret.  

That place was awesome.  And ginormous.  There were conveyor belts everywhere just constantly moving with packages and yellow tubs of items to be shipped.  Our tour guide wore a microphone, and we each had headphones so that we could hear her.  That was neat.  I also thought it was interesting that they have random stow.  The items are scanned when they come in and then placed in the next available place.  There were rows and rows of shelves filled with rows and rows of cubby type things.  Each cubby had a bar code and a letter and number assigned to it.  In the cubbies would just be random items - a board game, hair gel, a soccer ball, and toilet bowl cleaner.  It was so completely random.  But, the pickers would have a list of what to pull from each cubby.  They would put those in tubs and onto the conveyor belts where they would be sorted by order.  It was so fun to watch.  They let the kids practice packing with an empty box and then let them keep it.  Packing was interesting.  You fold the box, then push a button and out pops a piece of tape (which is wet.  it is water based, so it is not sticky.  That was fascinating to me too).  You then fold the top, push the button again, and out pops your next piece of tape.  Then you put a label on the box, and you are done.  Very cool!!!!

Here is Eric outside the Fulfillment Center holding his box. 

This was one of my favorite field trips ever!!!!  Eric and I both want to work here.  Such a cool place.  And we love us some Amazon!  (even if we do have to pay taxes on it now)

There were a couple of geocaches nearby, so we decided to do those as well.  Here was an old bunker from WWII.  I had to get a couple of silly pictures first.  This boy loves to be silly.  

The bunker was especially fascinating to Eric because we just watched The Book Thief this week.  Very good movie, although the ending was a bit :( 

He was very interested to see a real bunker after seeing the movie.  Just wish we could have gone inside.  There was one geocache here and one a quarter of a mile up the road.  Eric is becoming quite the super spotter and found both of them.