What did you say?

I was going to add to this and post it on Bryce's birthday last Sunday.  Oops.  I think it will do just as it is.  

The other day I bumped into Bryce in the living room, and in his typical way, he overreacted and fell down backwards onto the floor.  That was nothing new.  What he said next was.  

"Are you trying to kill me or something?!?"

I just stared at him, dumbfounded.  What?!? I have no idea where that one came from, but it was hilarious.


For the last few days, Bryce has been quoting, no, mimicking, a monologue from Charlie Brown's Thanksgiving.  He discovered it on ABC.com where he regularly goes to watch AFV reruns.  I heard him in the back of the car:

"A piece of toast? Pretzels? Popcorn?  What kind of Thanksgiving dinner is this? Where's the turkey, Chuck?  Where's the mashed potatoes...?"  It goes on and on, but I won't type it all out.  Suffice it say it is a perfect imitation of Peppermint Patty.  Maybe this kid could be an actor someday.  Well, provided someone else does the acting first so he can just copy them.  

The Pants Dance

This morning when Bryce was getting ready for school, he was being so silly.  I'm not sure what was going on in his head, but he kept giggling to himself and was just in a playful mood in general.  After his shower, he was getting dressed but he still needed his pants.  He started jumping around and shuffling his feet and swinging his arms.  I thought he was just being silly and getting the wiggles out before school.  A few seconds went by, and he walked over to where I was sitting (he was still pantless at this point) and said, "I was doing the pants dance."  It was so matter of fact that Jared and I both starting cracking up.  When he saw we thought it was funny, he starting "dancing" again.  Silly boy.  We questioned him several different ways trying to find out where he learned the pants dance.  He's been on an AFV kick lately, so I thought maybe he saw it there.  But we couldn't get any other answer out of him except, "I made it up."  So we did the pants dance and sent him off to school in his silly mood. Poor Mrs. Linda.  She's going to have her hands full today :)

STAY IN BED!!!

In the mornings, Bryce knows that he's supposed to stay in bed in his room until 7:00.  The only exception is if he needs to go the bathroom.  And even then, he's to go right back to bed.  To help with this, I bought a clock for the boys' room at a garage sale a while ago.  This led to a new obsession about times and scheduling. Homework is done at 3:30, bedtime is 8:00, etc.  Don't even thing about getting anything done even two minutes before the scheduled time!  And if one of the clocks in the house is different, we have to (well, at least he wants us to) wait until they all say 3:30, or 8:00, or whatever.  

Mr. Smarty Pants has figured out how to use clocks to his advantage, though.  A couple days ago, he came into my room at 6:38.  I told him to go back to bed because it wasn't 7:00 yet.  He proceeded to tell me that it was 7:00 on the Wii.  I send him back to bed anyway, but later that day I checked the Wii clock.  Sure enough, for some reason it was 23 minutes fast.  Smugly, I thought, I'll get him now, and I changed the clock to the correct time.  The next day, he came into my bedroom again at about 6:45.  When I told him it wasn't 7:00 yet, he replied that it was after 7:00 on the Wii.  I then informed him that it wasn't, because I fixed the clock and it's the same as the one in his room now.  He went back to bed, but reappeared at 6:58.  Once again, I said, "Bryce, it's NOT 7:00.  Stay in your room until 7:00!!!"  Without batting an eye, he said, "It's 7:00 in the blue van."  Little stinker.  He's right.  I keep the van clock ahead by 2 minutes just to help keep us moving when we're out and about.  Beaten by an 8 year old.  I let him get up.  But I fully intend on taking my phone around the house with me and resetting EVERY clock until they all say the same thing!!!

My Little Math Whiz

Only 6 kids out of 32 got a 100% on their Math test today.  Guess who was one of the 6? :) He's one of those kids that skips over all the explanation and problem solving and just gets the answer.  Before I can finish reading a question he's already figured it out in his head.  If there's ever a "show your work" requirement, we're in trouble. :)  That's all- just wanted to brag a little.  (Oh, and he got a 100% on his spelling test, too.)  OK, now I'm done.  

Family Wii Brought to you by Bryce

Tonight Bryce was playing Wii by himself as he usually does when he turned around and said, "Dad, it's your turn."  No one had really been paying attention to him, but he had set up a game of Frisbee with four players.  Each one of us had our Mii character loaded and ready to go!  He came into the room where I was blogging and said, "Mom, we need to play four players.  You and Henry come here."  For someone who is always wrapped up in himself and could happily play Wii for hours if you let him, this was a pretty big deal! We had a great game of Frisbee and then another game of Bowling with all four of us, while Charlie watched happily from the chair.  It was a fun way to end the evening right before bedtime.  Thanks for including us, Bryce! 

"I think we have a problem!"

Oops! I posted this on my Pinterest blog on accident :) Moved to the appropriate location now!

A few days ago Bryce's aide decided to move his desk because where it was situated he was able to see the class computers and was getting nothing done while other kids were using them.

Today she told me that every day since then, he says,

"I think we have a problem..."

To which she replies "What's the problem, Bryce?".

"You forgot to move my desk back!!!"

He was REALLY enjoying his view :) I'm not sure how long this will go on, but he does love the computer, so...

Struggling Along

Bryce has been having a much harder time with second grade than he did with first.  The state standards and curriculum changed a few years ago, and now everything is so WORDY.  The math pages are just sentences full of facts and word problems.  They way they try to teach the kids to solve some things is so complicated.  I know for a fact that the majority of the class is struggling to grasp the concepts, but that doesn't really help much.  Bryce has a great grasp of the concepts, and if you lay out the problem for him, he can do it in a snap.  And the language and spelling work is a breeze for him.  His aide says that he's the only one in the class that just sits down and gets his work done.  

But the big area we are struggling with is reading comprehension.  Bryce has been reading since before Kindergarten.  But it's just words to him still.  He hasn't learned to focus on what he's saying and understand what's being read.  You can ask him a question about the sentence he just read and he'll look at you blankly.  Or, he will try to look back in the paragraph and find the answer.  That is better than nothing, but the more advanced the subject gets, the more abstract it is. Anything that requires inference goes straight over his head.  I really don't know what we are going to do with him.  He may need to go back into a special ed class that will be designed for teaching and not so focused on meeting state standards.  He does get accommodations for testing, but he's getting lost in the shuffle, I'm afraid.  The only thing saving him is his full time aide.  But I don't know how long we get to keep her around.  Technically she's only supposed to be for ABA support at the school.  We have just been lucky to use her all day :) 

For now, the plan is to just see where second grade goes, and how well he does this year.  Next year, who knows?  I just don't want him to hate school.  He's so bright, and has such potential! And he's always liked school a lot.  On a brighter note, we qualified for free school lunches this year, so he's been able to "buy" lunch every day.  It is the absolute highlight of his day.  He loves to punch in his number, and go through and pick out what he wants to eat.  And it's good, healthy fresh food, too.  Every day he comes home and tells me what he picked out for lunch.  It's the little things, right? :)

Can't believe this little cutie is in 2nd grade now!!!