This week at MES

Nicholas has shown no signs of poison ivy. Thanks goodness! Boy, he would have been a difficult little guy to be around if that had happened. Thanks to everyone for all the emails expressing concern but he's just fine.

Nicholas has had a great week at school. It was our week to bring snacks for the class. Nicholas helped me make fruit kabobs. We used cookie cutters to make heart and star shaped pieces of cantaloupe and slid them on popsicle sticks along with red grapes and cubes of fresh pineapple. Along with his artwork and activities, today he also brought home a note from Mrs. Carrico. It said, "Nicholas, aka 'Mr. Sunshine', is our delight! He accepts each challenge with gusto and always presents his best work. Thank you Nicholas for the delicious fruit kabobs. Everyone enjoyed their interesting shapes."

Although Nicholas did help me make the fruit kabobs, I'd have to say he did a lot more sampling of the fruit than helping me. But that's ok. I'm glad that he loves fresh fruit and vegetables. He often picks his little yellow pear-shaped tomatoes right off the plant outside and pops them in his mouth like candy.

Each Thursday, Mrs. Carrico sends home a newsletter about what the children worked on. This week Nicholas worked on the proper way to carry scissors, folding and cutting paper, pencil grip, push pin and metal insets, print and sound of letters, predicting story outcome, first journaling experience, a science experiment to extract color from onion skins, and counting. The Good Shepherd lesson was on Creation. I'm glad to see that Mrs. Carrico is helping him work on his pencil grip. I've tried to work with him on this but I can't determine for sure if he's right-handed or left-handed. It's a bit challenging to teach a child how to hold a pencil when you don't even know which hand to tell him to hold it in! He seems to use both hands equally well yet when he initially picks up a pencil it is usually with his left hand. This seems odd because he throws a ball with his right hand and, as far as we know, no one in my family or Stuart's family is left-handed.

As I picked Nicholas up from school today, Mrs. Carrcico said, "He's just so sweet. I would give him kisses all the time if he was in my house." I just smiled and said, "I do!"