Winter Band Concert

We always appear to be late in finding out about Tony's band concerts, but I think we are ahead of the game this time. The Winter Band Concert is at his high school on Wednesday, March 3rd at 7pm.

Making Valentines

Emily has been hard at work on her Valentines for her class. She is making "ipods" for each of her classmates. You take a box of sweethearts and cover it with construction paper and then we added Hershey kisses to the end of strings for the ear buds. On Family Fun's website they had a template for the front dial and screen. I thought they turned out cute and Emily's happy with them. We stuck a sticker on the back and Emily did the To:/From: dealio on them and she's ready for Thursday's party!!

Band Performance

Brian went to Tony's band performance last night and video taped it. I have uploaded it for anyone that wants to see it. (If you get these updates emailed to you, you are going to have to visit the website to see the video http://www.donatokids.com/blog)

Tony points out that this is not their entire set as they still have another song that they are working on and will add.

At the beginning Brian has no clue where Tony is, but he eventually finds him.

No Mono

Kristen does not have mono. Whew!

She went back to the doctor's and the test had come back negative. As did the strep test. They do not really know what she had.

However, the fever has broke and she is starting to feel better, so she is back at school. Now she just needs to catch up from what she missed.

Kid Updates

Just thought I'd give a quick update on the kids.

Tony: Just returned from a week at band camp and the strangest thing is happening ... he is enjoying band this year. Like really, really, really enjoying band. He had a ball at camp and has nothing but positive things to say about all things band. It is confusing, but good to see. I sent a schedule of his football game performances to many. If you want a copy, please email me.

Kristen: Finally got the all clear on her foot last week when she went to her follow-up appointment. She is cleared for all physical activity, so bring on soccer. She and Tony should be playing on the same soccer team this year and games will be on Sunday afternoons. We will keep you updated as soon as we know the schedule (although, this league isn't always forthcoming with details).

Also, Kristen got her stitches out on Friday and her finger is healing well. Hopefully we can keep her in one piece for the remainder of the year.

Emily: Emily is wrapping up summer camp. I can tell that that novelty has wore off. She started off the summer by wanting to go to camp every single day, even if I was home from work. That isn't the case anymore. I can barely get her there on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesdays. I think she is ready for the change of pace and for school to start.

One quick Emily story - last June we went to the the Dublin pool and we discovered that in order to go down the water slides, Emily needed to pass a swim test which was swimming in the area that the slides dump into. In June, she tried it twice and could not do it. I was surprised, but figured we'd do it again later. Due to the weather and the trip to Myrtle, we didn't make it back to the pool in July. We went back in August and Emily wanted to try to take the swim test again. We decided to try it on our own before the lifeguard test and I figured out what was going on ... there was quite a current in this area. Which I guess is why they require the test. But Emily did it twice and could not make it across. I figured she would give up the idea, but as soon as the whistle blew for break Emily announced she was going for the swim test.

I was hesitant to let her, but figured that I should let her go and let it play out. She went for the test and I was nervous for her and wondered how it would play out and if she would be disappointed. She started across and had no problems, but that was with the current. She started back across against the current and she kept going and going and going and going! SHE DID IT!! She made it across and got her wrist band so that she can go on the slide. I was so proud of her. (And so glad I kept my mouth shut and let her try.)

The kids start back to school on August 25th. I think Emily is ready. Tony is getting there with the band schedule. Kristen? This is going to be a complete shock to her system.

Last day of school

Tomorrow is the last day of school! I can't believe that this time tomorrow we will have a junior, freshman, 2nd grader and a Vinnie. Two years from now we will be celebrating Tony's high school graduation. It's going so fast, I'm afraid to blink!

Emily's Fieldtrip

Emily's class went on a field trip on Friday. They went to Stratford Ecological Center in Delaware, OH. It focuses on teaching kids to respect nature. It was a fun field trip. Emily got to clean and dry an egg that a chicken had just laid, feed chickens, pet goats, see pigs and cows, see a prairie where they foster plants and have a man-made pond, check out the greenhouse where they pulled up swiss chard, beets and carrots right from the ground and let the kids taste them. Of course, Emily's favorite part of that was to use the beet to paint her face.

Emily had a great time and wants to go back again sometime.

February Homework

I didn't get a picture this month, but Emily's monthly homework was to "make a poster about someone you love". Anyone want to take a guess at who peppered Emily's poster?

Why it was VINNIE, of course!! Emily did her whole poster about her baby brother. She was quite proud to take it in. They were going to share them today and she was so excited!

Grades are in!!

Tony & Kristen received their report cards last week. Oh my goodness, they did so well. We are really proud of them.

Tony
English II - B+
Spanish II - C+
AP US History - B+
Biology - A
Chemistry - A-
Algebra II - A-
Band - A
GPA: 3.619

Kristen
Spanish I - A-
Algebra I - A-
Exploratory Art - A
Language Arts - A-
Science Seminar - B+
Social Studies Seminar - A-
GPA: 3.668

Expert Extravaganza!

Emily's homework assignment for January was to share something that she felt she was an expert at ... and she selected playing the wii. I think that Grandpa Donato has helped bolster her confidence a bit. LOL

Brian videotaped her and we put it into a slideshow. So, our first grader has a DVD to turn in for her homework. Oh how the times have changed.

November Project

Emily's November project was due in school today. They are studying the food pyramid and she had to create her favorite healthy meal using the pyramid. Emily? A healthy meal? This should be interesting.

Let's just say I hope that her teacher doesn't make her actually prove that this is her favorite meal. She did good with chicken, apples and strawberries - she will eat those. But it was a bit of a stretch when she selected broccoli and salad as the veggies.

She was happy with the end result and that was what counts. The picture was taken this morning as she was heading out the door.

Kristen's DC Pics

Previously, I had promised pictures from Kristen's DC trip once she pulled them off her camera. Well, she went through them last night for her project and we uploaded them this morning. I am sure she can give you the details of what each one is, but it certainly looks like they covered a lot of ground in the few short days that they were in DC.

http://picasaweb.google.com/jcdonato/KristenDC#slideshow

School bells still ringing

Kristen just returned from her 8th grade trip! Sounds like they had a great time. They left early, early Tuesday morning for Washington D.C. They saw the sights for 2.5 days and then came home Thursday night and returned home early Friday morning. Sounds exhausting to me, but Kristen had fun. If we get to see any of her pictures from the trip, we'll share them with you.



Emily had another school project due this week. She had to build a creature out of leaves. We took a walk on Thursday night (some things never change, I still procrastinate) and she picked up a bunch of leaves - thank goodness the weather cooperated.



Emily was picking up leaves talking about body parts and this and that and I couldn't figure out what she was talking about. But she had a plan. We got home and she put all the leaves on her poster board and it was a caterpillar! We ended up using some construction paper to define it a bit better, but she did a great job. She had to write a story which is below it and I was going to share here ... but I forgot to write it down before she turned it in. Whoops!

Grades are in!

It is time for the interim grades to come home for the kids. We are proud as all of the kids are doing well this year.

Tony has taken a heavy load this year and is learning a bit more about having to work for grades. Nothing wrong with that lesson.
Algebra II - B-
AP US History - B
Band - A
Biology - A
Chemistry - B+
English II - C
Spanish II - B+

Kristen is continuing to show that she is quite the little student!
Algebra - A
Language Arts - A
Science - B+
Social Studies - A-
Spanish - B

We had Emily's parent/teacher conference last night, but I am running out of time so I'll try to come back later and update.

Emily's First Project

Emily had her first project due last Friday. In first grade, they have a project due each month (and a heck of a lot of homework in between). In September, they had to do a poster all about them. I printed out a few pictures that Emily had talked about and then asked her to pick some for her poster. She picked ALL OF THEM! LOL And made it work. She was thrilled with it and loved getting up in front of the class and talking about herself - go figure!