Josie's end of preschool concert!

Another year down. Josie officially finished preschool...for good! I have such mixed emotions about this. It's nice to be done with another school year (for her - the boys still have a few more days), but this means she's officially a new kindergartner and I'm. Not. Ready.

 

Josie is so many things. She's smart, she's sassy, she's confident, she's outgoing, she's funny, she's independent...all things that tell me that, not only is she ready to move on to kindergarten, she's going to OWN it!

 

She had a really great year in preschool this year. Mrs. Monserez (her teacher) is my favorite. I have absolutely LOVED the preschool that we've had out here and am truly sad that Sammie will never get to go here. We also found out that this was Mrs. Monserez's last year. She's retiring and said that this class is very special to her because it's the last class she'll ever teach. I can't tell you how much Mrs. Monserez has meant to us (particularly to Noah - he still talks about her). Josie's grown and learned so much this year. I have loved watching her progress.

 

At the end of every school year, the kids perform in a little concert. Last year, Josie was the standout star performer and I was kicking myself because I recorded NONE of it. I made sure not to make that mistake again!

 

While, she wasn't quite as much of a standout as she was last year, she was definitely one of the most prepared and loudest and entertaining kids (I'm serious - you can hear her over most everyone in almost all of the songs). I posted the videos of each song at the bottom of the post. I realize that you probably won't watch them all, but you should watch one or two - they're pretty short and Josie's pretty entertaining!

 

Here's Josie getting her "diploma" from Mrs. Monserez.

Josie and Mrs. Monserez.

Sammie was totally entranced by the performance. Justin is trying to convince me that Sammie will be ready for preschool this fall but I'm not so sure. Once my baby (my BABY) starts school, there's no going back. I know it's totally selfish, but I'm just not ready to let her go yet!

Me and my girl after the show. Love this little ball of energy!

Justin and Jo.

First song: Sing, sing, sing:

Second song: Down by the Bay (this is one that Josie really loves - she's the loudest voice in this song - this one is one of my favorites):

Third song: Counting song:

Fourth song: Miss Mary Mack (her voice in this one is also the loudest - if you can hear it over the stick tapping):

Fifth song: Our Sticks (again, that loud voice - that's our Jo - she's also quite the hip shaker!):

Sixth song: Rain Song (she takes an interesting bow at the end of this one):

Seventh song: Rainbow Song:

Eighth song: Oh Mr. Golden Sun (I like this one, because all the kids are just belting it out, but you can still here Josie's voice over everyone else for most of the song. Plus it's cute!)

Ninth song: Musical Instrument song (Jo knows how to get down to the music of a maraca!):

Tenth song: Square Dancing! (And if there's one thing that Josie does better than singing her heart out, it's dancing her heart out!) *Also, I should mention that we're really glad that we had her wear leggings under her dress this year - her curtsey could use a little work.*:

Eleventh song: Can't catch the name of this one, but it's short:

Twelfth song: Skidamarink a dink:


So basically, I have the best girl around and I'm incredibly glad she's mine! I love everything about this little diva (even the things that frustrate me sometimes) and am so grateful to watch her perform. I look forward to watching many more concerts from this young lady in the future. So proud of my little preschool graduate. Next stop: KINDERGARTEN!!

Beatlemania!

Clayton had his second grade concert this week. The theme of their concert was 'The Beatles'. It was the cutest concert I've ever been to (and I think all of his concerts are pretty cute)! The kids were told that they could dress in 60's attire to help them get into the mood of the concert. Since we don't have a lot (or any) 60's stuff around here, I went to Goodwill and fashioned this outfit for him. I spent $1 for the whole thing:

I used an old pair of jeans that he already had but never wore with some scrap fabric for the pants, the shirt was from Goodwill ($.50) that I turned inside out and hemmed so it would fit him more snug, and the vest was made from another Goodwill shirt (another $.50) with scrap fabric sewn to it to make the fringe. I used that same scrap fabric to piece together his headpiece and the sunglasses were a pair that he already owned. If you look closely at it you can see the bazillion mistakes I made, but from this vantage point - and at the concert - it looks dang awesome! I'm trying to convince him that this would also be a very cool Halloween costume!

On to the good stuff. When we walked in to the concert, I turned the camera on to snap a few pictures and soon realized that my batteries were dying! YIKES! I was having a small panic attack. So, in order to conserve the batteries I took zero pictures before the concert. Then, once it started I only took video of portions of each song (**I got most of each song, but not all**). I wanted to get as many of the songs as possible and if that meant not getting the end of each song, I was willing to risk it. I did get the last song in its entirety, so that's good.
One more thing. As I was recording, Josie was sitting next to me. She was constantly trying to climb into my lap. I say this because you will see the camera jump and jolt at certain points because she kept bumping my elbow - hard - in her attempt to get up on my lap. When she finally succeeded in getting up there, she kept messing with the camera itself. So I apologize now if these videos make you slightly sea-sick (hopefully it's not too bad though!).
A few things to note: 1. Watch the girl standing next to Clayton. She's fairly entertaining. 2. The big kids dressed in dark glasses and jackets are the 4th graders who were being 'bodyguards'. They took their jobs very seriously. Cute. 3. You can tell when Clayton doesn't know the songs so well because he touches his face or scratches his hair. A lot.
Without further ado, I present, Beatle-mania:
I enjoyed this concert immensly. I realize that, most likely, only grandparents and aunts and uncles will be watching these videos (especially after my glowing review about how shakey they were) but watch at least one. They're not long and the sight of several 7 & 8 year olds singing the Beatles is sure to put a smile on your face. I'm so proud of my little hippie. I have Beatle-mania for sure!

Clayton's Concert

I have SO much to post about and the trick is knowing where to start. First, we had been computer-less for about a week, which was kind of nice but it's pretty great to have it back. (What did we do before email!?!) Second, my 30th birthday ROCKED! I think 30 is going to be pretty awesome. Third, Vanessa and I went on an amazing road trip to Boston! I have so many pictures of that trip and I plan on doing that in my next post (so you have something to look forward to). But, what I decided to start with is Clayton's concert!

I know I've mentioned before how much I love Clayton's school. The class sizes are small, the school is so open and parent-friendly, the teachers (especially Clayton's) are wonderful and loving and very accessable, and they love to give the kids opportunities to showcase themselves! Last night they had a concert for grades K-2. Each grade level sang a few songs and then they sang two songs all together. Even though we didn't find out about this concert until the day before (thank you Clayton, for never bringing paperwork home), we were all really excited to go. Clayton was excited to be the center of attention, Noah was excited to 'go to school', Josie was excited just to get out of the house, and Justin and I were excited to see Clayton perform.

So, without further ado, here is a clip from the concert - I'm NOT a videographer so if you get motion sick, you may want to skip it. It's about 6 minutes long, so you don't have to watch it, but it's pretty great (says the biased parent):

Justin's favorite song of the night: The Cat Came Back. My favorite: Tingalay-oh. Noah's favorite: BINGO. Clayton's favorite: Magic Penny (which we didn't record, but it's his favorite because, 'it's the shortest').

Clayton is in the front row on the far right. Yes, he is wearing snow boots. He had left his shoes in his classroom and there wasn't enough time to grab them before the concert started. Ah, my little Napoleon Dynamite...

Noah just looks so into the music here. What a great audience!
After the concert we decided to celebrate Clayton's musical debut with ice cream at Friendly's.
Clayton knew that he wanted chocolate ice cream with M&M's in it.

Noah wanted chocolate ice cream in a cone. He didn't eat the cone, but he was pretty happy with his choice. I now present to you the BEST. PICTURE. EVER. Ladies and Gentlemen, the Joker:
Josie was pretty happy to share with me and Justin. However, whenever I tried to take her picture, she got this crusty face. (It's okay girlie, I would be frustrated if someone tried to take my picture with ice cream all over my face too.)
It was a great night. We are so proud of our fidgety singer (if you saw the video, you know what I'm talking about). He sang so well and so loud! I'm really glad that we found out about this concert! Great job Clayton!