school campout & beach day

On Friday, it was the school campout at Kalia's school.
We had originally not planned to go,
since Tommy was staying with us and it was finally Erik's day off.
And I was not prepared to camp with the girls by myself.
But then I decided to take the girls to play and eat
and it was really fun! Next year we will definitely camp,
this is an early shot, but by sunset the entire grass
was covered with tents and the kids were having so much fun!
It was fun and I got to meet a couple of kids
that Kalia talks about - her other 8th grade
friend that has "yellow hair with pink in it".

They were selling Famous Dave's Ribs & Hot Dogs as fundraisers
and also yummy ice cream with real fresh fruit!
Picnic with the Butlers

Lucy & Maya

Kalia, Mrs. Coon, Taeja

Kalia going on the zipline
Kindergarteners are not allowed to go on this during recess,
so of course every single one was going on it during the campout.
With parental help for some of them- Kalia included!

It was so dark and they are using their flashlights
to find cockroaches.

Nelly & Maya
looking for cockroaches

Auntie Adrienne telling ghost stories:
about Scooby Doo rescues Strawberry Shortcake
guess who that one was for?

Maya thought this tree looked like a camel
and insisted on riding it!

Thousand Peaks
It was a gorgeous, if not occasionally blustery day!

Maya loves cruising with Kapono!

We BBQ'd hotdogs and chicken sausages,
fun times!

Tommy

It was windy, so we got the kite out,
I know there was a reason it was still in the back of my car!

Tommy, Maya, Erik & Kalia

busy week

The girls modeling their new shoes from Tutu.
Tutu sent these for Kalia to wear at school
and soon another pair for Maya arrived.
Happy girls- and they are very fast shoes,
you should see the girls run!

wednesday
Kalia is out of school at 1pm,
it was Duke Kahanamoku's birthday
and we celebrated at Duke's with milkshakes
and snacks.

Erik's friend Tommy has been staying with us this week.
Erik has been working a lot and we finally had a fun
day out on Thursday.
Ironwoods hike

Erik & Maya climbing around the rocks

Maya wanted to play hide & seek

Erik, Tommy
Maya

We have had a full week- Kalia & I picked up Tommy at the airport on Monday. Then Maya & I went with Tommy to the beach on Tuesday. Kalia had a great week at school and Maya is doing well at Auntie Carol's. Kalia got a new buddy this week. She traded buddies with Luca. According to Kalia, Luca & Cole got along like they were already buddies and Luca's buddy Crystal really likes Kalia- so they switched. So Kalia's 8th grade buddy is now Crystal and she is a very happy girl. I talked to her teacher Mrs. Coon and it sounds like it did actually happen about that way. Kalia says that she plays with her 3rd grade reading buddy Ariana at recess quite a bit as well. They had a cool puppet show on Friday and Kalia had her 1st show and tell. Thursday was supposed to be her table's turn for show and tell, but all the kids forgot to bring something (including us-although I ran it down and put it in her backpack, but she didn't see it!) So they did it on Friday instead, Kalia took some shells that we found on the beach. I couldn't believe that I forgot to have Kalia bring her show and tell- it's not really like me, but we had a crazy long day on wednesday (picked up maya from daycare and went straight to wailea), so we were gone for 12 hours, so that is my excuse.

Let's see what's going on in Maya's world. Oh, she loves her little friends at Auntie Carol's. In fact, we went to Kalia's school campout on campus the other night (more in next post) and she saw her friend Raffi right away and ran over to him- it was really cute. We've been having some fun times on our tuesday and thursday. Maya always says, "mommy can I just cruise with you tomorrow?" I guess that's what I've been saying to her. Currently, her and Kalia have been playing for about an hour very nicely. Erik & Tommy are fishing on a friends boat, so we have had the morning to ourselves.

bday = cake

weekend picnic on the grass

surfing with adrienne on tuesday
maya & joel "fishing" over the fence

"happy birthday to mommy"
thanks for the bday wishes!
the girls were just a little bit excited for...cake!

So here's the official birthday hair cut-
I FINALLY cut my 12 inches for Locks of Love,
I've only been thinking about it for 6 months

The girls had school/daycare on my birthday and after a quickie work meeting,
I got a hair cut, met erik for lunch (just the two of us!)
and went shopping. Then we had back to school night
at Sacred Hearts, uncle greg watched the girls
and we came back to put them down (it was a school night)
and watched a movie. It was a great birthday!

Cruising at the park

a couple of monkeys

today at ironwoods
we needed to get out of the house,
the girls having a snack in the crazy wind,
then slowly making our way back on the trail.
they would stop every 2 seconds
to find this soft, grey clay they like to play in.

So we are still reading "Little House in the Big Woods". Two nights ago the chapter was called "summer" and during the summer they have an abundance of milk and is therefore time to make cheese- and to make cheese they needed the stomach lining of a baby cow. My poor little sensitive girl, heard this and looked at me and said, "they are going to kill a cow? a baby cow?" sobbing tears.

What else? Last night I went to go see a movie with Celia and we thought we were going to one movie and ended up seeing a movie that neither one of us even had heard about and it was really, really hilarious- "The Change Up". Anyway, at one point (the two guys change lives and the one guy is teaching the other about having kids) and he that if your kids are acting out they "are either tired or going through a stage" everyone else's kids are overindulged, etc. etc. Anyway, Maya is tired or going through a stage right now. She has officially hit her 2 1/2 mark and she is quite the handful. Anything and everything will make her scream at the top of her lungs. To the point that I'm exhausted even thinking about leaving the house- it's such a crap shoot. Will my child or will she not scream at the top of her lungs because ______ (fill in the blank) happened. Or will she be the perfectly well mannered child and charm everyone around her. The other day, she screamed at the park, she screamed at the grocery store and then was the model child at Leilani's.

tuesday

Just a couple of notes. Kalia has been doing homework without any argument. In fact today, she told me, "Oh, I'm so excited to do this homework, Mrs. Coon told us about it."

We have been reading Little House in the Big Woods by Laura Ingles Wilder, one chapter every night with Kalia. We are all (me, Erik & Kalia) really enjoying it. At first there were moments when I could see her attention fading, but now she is really into it and asking questions about what is going to happen and why they call it "sugar snow", etc. I keep pointing out things to Kalia like, the fact that Laura didn't even have a doll like her sister Mary and she had to use a corncob for a doll! It's hard work to live in the Big Woods! The daily chore list and getting ready for the winter is serious stuff. I've been trying to see if I would be cut out for living in the "big woods" and I'm not sure, I think Erik's ready to trade it all in to live off the land:)

We had a fun morning this morning, Maya & I met Adrienne and Joel for a hang out at the beach/surf. The kids are getting so big and we were remembering when we 1st started bringing them down to do trade offs. Maya had so much fun throwing rocks into the ocean with Joel- it's not something she usually does with Kalia. Joel thought it was so funny how Maya didn't throw her rocks very far- that kid has a serious arm (joel).

Kalia drew a picture at school the other day of a rainbow and then put a sun and a cloud with rain, "because you need sun and rain to make a rainbow". Yes, you do.

monday

All the kids were playing duck, duck, goose
when I came to pick Kalia up.
I really wanted to get her in the circle- but she saw me!
Here she comes!

When we got home today,
Maya wanted to put on her rain boots
and then she wanted to go and jump in puddles.
Good thing while we were playing inside,
it started raining outside.
Things seem to sometimes work out
that way for Maya!
Happy Girl!

This week Kalia & I have been finding places to sit and do homework while we wait to pick up Maya. So far we have gone to: the library, barnes & noble, starbucks at lahaina cannery mall.

saturday

Saturday- we had a lazy morning
then headed to the beach for a surf and shell finding
great shells to be found-
kalia made this birthday cake for me.
The Butlers came down and it was super fun!

The girls sitting on my lap

Kalia making Maya laugh

Kalia making her shell offering,
we let her keep 1 shell,
but all others must be offered back to the ocean

Her offering

Well, we had a great week last week. It is a new era for the Hendrickson Household with real school and a new daycare for Maya. Kalia is absolutely loving kindergarten, her confidence and independence are definitely growing. It has been more than we could have asked for. On Friday, she had to wear her dreaded PE outfit and you know what- she liked it. She liked PE- they played basketball and she dribbled the ball! Then she wore her PE outfit all day without changing when she got home. Not only do I feel really good about Kalia being comfortable at school, I also feel like she is being challenged academically and it's fun for her. Her homework reinforces what she is learning in class and there's enough without being too much. I think we were both a little happy there was no homework on Friday (although, that was the day Erik picked up and was in charge of getting homework done). Maya is doing well with Auntie Carol also- she still is a little hesitant at the drop off, but is perfectly happy when we pick up (no sobs, as if she has been coping all day), more like "hi mama, I'm eating goldfish".

Oh- here's a little scary story. I was asking Kalia what she was talks about with her new friends at school and since she can now talk about princesses and such things (not allowed at The Pre-School at Kapalua), I asked her if she talked about princesses and she told me, "No, we talk about way cooler things than that." That's also the answer she gave when I asked about what she plays on the playground verses Pre-School. What?!? I am so not ready for this...

On a totally different note, I was asked to sit on a recommendation board to help select a new Principal for the school I do the Educator Program for at Duke's. I was sworn to secrecy, so I won't give the details, but it was really an amazing experience. I was the only civilian in a group of principals, superintendent, pta president, lead admin staff, teachers in this group and they were all so inspiring. They were all so passionate about their jobs- continually striving for change and improvement, a love for what they do and working with some major obstacles. It really made me want to send my kids to public school. I met some incredible people and I felt really fortunate to have that experience. I came home and told Erik I wanted to be an educator...but I do get a little impulsive at times. Educators rule. I know this, we all know this, but to see it all working 1st hand, it was pretty amazing.

On the flip side, it also confirmed for me that Kalia is at the right school for us right now. The kindergarten classes at this school currently have 27 kids per class with 1 teacher and I believe that the curriculum would not be as challenging for Kalia.

Kindergarten News: Day2

Day2
"Wave good-bye to your moms"

aka: go bye bye moms, see you at 2pm

Here's the News of the Day from SHS Kindergarten Class:

• Kalia made her first friend. Infact she didn't eat hardly any lunch today because "people were talking to me and I had to talk back..." More eating, less talking.
  
• She got assigned her 8th grade buddy. The smallest girl in the class got paired with the tallest boy. His name is Cole and Kalia was scared (she cried) and told me that he was a "giant". I'm sure she will get used to him- he has the same name as her cousin, who will also probably be a "giant" when he is in 8th grade.
• Homework is not fun. Each day (except for Fridays) they have reading and math homework. I'm hoping that once she is used to it and is not completely exhausted after school it won't be such a battle. I had to show her the returned homework today with the star- to prove that Mrs. Coon wants her to do this and I'm not just trying to torture her.

• They had computer science today and it was fun.

Maya and I had a fun day. We went to the park, played trains, read books and cuddled a lot. I think she really had a fun day with all the attention.

some meat & potatoes

OK, I am tired and was trying to get a quickie blog post, then make Kalia's lunch for tomorrow and wash some dishes. But 10 years from now, I will want to know more about what happened on Kalia's 1st day:

Things Kalia told me today: (By the way, she was so happy when we picked her up, not to be picked up, but that she had such a great day at school!) She was literally dancing around the ice cream shop.

1. They have a class pet or rather 3 and they are guinea pigs. Everyone in the class got to hold them.
2. She did not buy a snack today with the money in her coin purse because Mrs. Coon said that if you brought a snack ( and I had packed emergency goldfish) then you sit down and if not, then you can line up to buy a snack. I will not be packing goldfish tomorrow.
3. Taj offered her some tissues because her nose was a little runny.
4. Her cubby is where her stuff goes and you can bring a toy to have rest time with- her teacher said it was OK.
5. She recognized two girls who were at her Pre-School the year before and now are in 1st grade.
6. The playground is so cool- there is a tire swing, bars (lots more)
7. The red folder is for her homework and it's in her backpack.
8. They had another teacher come in and teach them PE and he sang them a song.
9. But the best thing is that if you are good and you earn stickers every day then when you fill up the page you get to pick something out of the treasure chest!!!!
10. Nothing made her sad at all today. (I asked what made her happy today and if anything made her sad and this was her answer for the sad).
11. There are two books in her classroom that we read at Barnes and Noble yesterday "School Rocks" and "Mrs. Bindergarten get ready for Kindergarten".
12. Maybe she will buy lunch at school sometime, since she has discovered that instead of regular milk, she could have chocolate milk instead.

Anyway, she had a great day and can't wait to do it again! Homework I had to force though- she was a little tired after school. Now I have to do my homework and make a lunch!

1st Day of Kindergarten!

Monday, August 8, 2011
Kalia's 1st day of Kindergarten
Sacred Hearts School

Getting to get in the car at 7:06am
We wanted to get there early,
since we had missed the first couple of days!

Sitting with Daddy outside of class waiting for the bell.
A little anxious!

Bell rang- time to line up on the blue line.

End of the day- here they come!

Kalia loved her 1st day of kindergarten,
we couldn't be happier!
There was another new girl today,
so that brings the class total to 13.
Kalia has decided to buy her snack tomorrow
and maybe a lunch soon.

I got to hear all about her day over some ice cream:

1st Day work from school
We had homework that Kalia worked
on as soon as we got home.
She was so tired, I knew it was now or never...

Our big girl- she really enjoyed herself at her big girl school.