March 2011: What are they doing now? - Page 2

[A-time-to-live]

Miranda, that's wonderful!  Congrats to Erin!!!!

DD just turned 2!  It was very exciting because birthday parties are just about her favorite thing and we had a lovely one for her at the park.  On her birthday she woke up and told me "You are the goodest mommy in the whole world."  :-)  She has developed all kinds of new interests in the past month - probably most notably puzzles.  She can now do 8-10 piece jigsaws - haven't tried anything more complex than that yet.  The most exciting news for our family though is that I am pregnant again!  We haven't told her yet but, strangely, the other day she lifted up my shirt and started asking me if I had "a baby in there."  I've mentioned being pregnant in front of her a couple of times but I didn't think she would know what that meant.  I am definitely looking forward to telling her and talking to her about it - when I'm a little more confident that things will go well....

Edited by A-time-to-live - 3/14/11 at 3:20pm

[jtjt]

My 5 year old is really interested in anatomy this month.  We have bought him a few books on the human body recently.  He can now name all of the body systems and their functions and many of the of organs and their functions.   He can now do 2 digit addition and subtraction in his head.   He still loves to read, and he will breeze through a 100-130 page book each evening and be able to answer specific questions about what he read.   He is bored to tears in school, but we are working on changing that.  We just started state capitals.  He corrected an animal education person at the zoo this weekend when the incorrect species of a tarantula was given.   He then went on to tell a room full of people the differences between mandibles and antenae and the difference between venomous and poisonous. 

My newly 4 year old finally caught on to sound blending.   Its like a light bulb went off!!!  He can now read basic Level 1 books and loves reading Dr. Suess books to his little sister.   He has taken an interest in the drums.  We enrolled him in a music class last week.  He is doing well so far :)  His vocabulary is improving and catching up to his brothers :)  It is so adorable to hear phrases like "compare and contrast"  coming out of such a tiny mouth.  

My two year old is a complete mama's girl and I love it!   She loves to paint and do any type of art project.   She is just now learning to recognize her letters and her letter sounds. 

[loraxc]

(Posted this in the wrong month accidentally before.) DD is going to the gifted magnet school next year! She participated very actively in the decision and decided she wants to switch because she wants to learn more. I'm nervous about the new school and sad about leaving the old one, but also proud of her and excited.

[Tigerle]

Originally Posted by loraxc 

(Posted this in the wrong month accidentally before.) DD is going to the gifted magnet school next year! She participated very actively in the decision and decided she wants to switch because she wants to learn more. I'm nervous about the new school and sad about leaving the old one, but also proud of her and excited.

I am glad you feel good about the decision - sounds like it is the right one for your family.

Will you keep us posted how it goes? I mean about positive stuff happening, too (I hope it will happen for you, anyway!) I could use a few positive school stories...
 

[loraxc]

Yes, I definitely will. I think (?) there may be only one other person regularly posting here who has their child in a full-day gifted school (they just aren't that common), so I'm aware that my experience will be of interest. I have heard a ton of good things and have high hopes about the actual school, but change is hard for DD, so I anticipate some bumps.

[ellemenope]

Congrats A time to live!  My 31 month old would LOVE to have a little brother or sister right now.  She is so ready.  She even persists on figuring out how it will happen.   DH is away for a few months and I let it slip that it could not happen until he got back anyway.  She just ran with that.  She now runs around explaining that daddy has something inside him "we" need to make a baby. 

In the past few weeks...

• One of DD's favorite activities has been to take her letter cards separate them into a "bowel" pile and a consonant pile, make every single CVC word possible, sound them out, and then declare each a real word.
• She has also committed to memory at least 50 sight words.  Maybe more. 
• I heard her say this in the car the other day to her cousin:  "You need to stick these really hard up on the window, otherwise they might blow away."
• She told me that snow melts into water in her mouth, so "snow is just made up of frozen water, see?"
• Out of the blue she asked me why water never goes bad like milk.  Then she related how her milk spoils when left out back to last Halloween when we had to throw away her pumpkin "because it got moldy.
• She has been going to sleep all by herself now for a couple of months.  I tell her that I need to get my "work" done and I will be back to check on her.  Last week I said I had to do dishes and went into the den to watch TV.  After 45 minutes I heard a sickening cry from the kitchen.  When I entered she asked, "Why are you not doing the dishes like you said?"  Since then she has been super leery about anything I say to leave her at bedtime. 
• An employee at the children's museum we frequent whom we see a lot had just always assumed DD was three, and wanted to know her birthday and everything after I told her she was not.  We were participating in a story time, and on three or four separate occasions she remarked how old DD seemed for only being 2.  She kept thinking really hard about it like it would then all make sense.  My 25 lb child was doing nothing too shocking which is what perplexed me.  Then the woman took me aside and said I had to take her to the exhibits for elementary aged children upstairs sometime soon.

ETA:  Today we visited the nursing home to celebrate my grandma's birthday.  The dog greeted us.  In the elevator I asked my mom and dad what the dog's name was.  I had forgotten.  They told me that Parker, the dog I remembered, had died a couple of years ago.  All of this was said in hushed tones in a crowded elevator.  DD was standing at least two feet below everyone else.

A couple of hours later, in the car DD was quiet for a long time and then asked, "what was the other dog's name?"  I told her the new dog's name, the one she had petted and loved so much today.  "No, the other one," she said, "the dog that died."  Oh boy.  I told her his name.  She then asked why he died.  I told her he was probably really old.  Then she asked, "Is he in the dying place now?"  This all from a 2 year old that we thought had been completely sheltered from the 'd' word.  How does she figure all this stuff out? She seemed to already have such an astute understanding of the idea. 

Edited by ellemenope - 3/16/11 at 1:26pm

[tuesdaymom]

dd 21 months old in the past couple of weeks has been telling me she sees letters everytime we go out shopping. So I explained that letters make up words. She says to me oh yeah what they say. Lol to cute! So for the past 2 weeks every night she wants to make words with here fridge lett ers And the bath letters.

Last week sitting on the potty she tells me out of no where today is Saturday I say no today is wednsday she pulls her pants up walks over to the sliding glass door and says today is Friday no today is Tuesday I say no honey today is wednsday she says ok today is wednsday andwalks away. I didn' know she even new the days of the week. We never really went over them just every once in awhile I would say what day iy was. Sorry for the bad typing on my phone. Love all the proud stories

[pranava]

DS will be 2 next week and he is oh so close to potty trained!!  Woohoo!!  I'm guessing we're about a month away from completely accident free day and night.  He's been pulling out all the stops to prolong bedtime lately.  There's "read it again", "I need a drink", "I need to go potty", "Do you hear that?" , once I leave the room it's a loud fake cry and then "I feel sad!!"  Now how do I ignore that one!  I can't - so back to his room I go. 

He's also been pushing chairs around to create an enclosed space and then declaring the space "This is my house!  Want to come in my house with me?"  He drags his stuffed animals in there and they have conversations.  It's so cool to hear those conversations becuase I get a good look into what and how he's thinking.

[heidisue]

I'm so excited to find this :) I have been struggling with the feelings of what to do with school and so on and I was feeling so alone. Thanks you guys.

So, I'll break the ice here! My son is three. This week he learned how to play "Ticket to Ride" (which I am pretty excited about since now I have another person to play with, LOL). He started writing letters for when he "plays mailman". Some of them are copies of his books and some are in his own words, all legible though. He wants his own email and I'm considering it. He can type out an email fairly quickly and loves to get them from his Aunts and Grandma/pa's. He does ask how to spell some of the words still. "His" email can just as well be mine if they use his name as the subject. I was pretty proud with how fast he picked up the keyboard (computer keyboard - not musical).

[MJB]

Coming in late. My gifted son (5, in K) is enjoying school a lot now. He isn't getting much in the way of challenge at school (although he gets 3rd grade reading work) but he's really opened up and become more outgoing, which is awesome. He has been reading a lot at home (last week he read Bunnicula and The Invention of Hugo Cabret, along with his reading assignments for school and some picture books). He just got promoted from U6 soccer to U8 and scored a goal in his first U8 game.

My oldest son (8/2nd, bright, but not gifted) had his first swim meet last night and didn't do terribly. He's really great at soccer (also U8) and scored 7 points last week and 2 this week. At school he's in the highest reading group for his grade but is struggling with writing still-- he reverses letters, misspells words he knows, and it's almost entirely illegible. His teacher asked the counselor about testing him for dysgraphia but I haven't heard back about that yet. 

My baby (8 mos) is crawling everywhere, signing "more" and "food", clapping, pulling to stand and cruising. She seems pretty typical to me and it's crazy to think that my middle son was walking and talking at her age! I like that she isn't racing through babyhood. 

[dessismama]

Originally Posted by moominmamma 

Thanks all for your kind words about Fiona's violin performance.

This just in: Erin was just accepted into Canada's National Youth Orchestra. She's 17 and the age-range of the orchestra is 16 to 28. The majority of professional orchestral players in Canada use NYO as a major part of their training. It's a 10-week intensive college-conservatory-like training program from June to August with 8-12 hours of programming / lessons / rehearsals a day, BIG repertoire, staying in university residence, travelling on tour to perform. And even better -- it's entirely funded, full scholarship. Students need only bring spending money and food money for their tour days. All the instruction, room and board, is free otherwise. A program like this would likely cost $6000 if we had to pay for it. So this is huge! She is over the moon.

Miranda

Wow, Miranda, this is so AMAZING!! Congratulations to Erin!! Wow, wow, wow!!

And Fiona is doing so well!! I truly enjoyed her performance.

[dessismama]

My 11 year old is now composing the third and final part (which is actually the second movement) of his piano quintet. He has been working hard on technical cello exercises (Popper etude 9), and is getting ready for orchestra auditions in late April and May.

Here he is playing the Prelude to the 3rd Bach suite:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BJDArjgILao&feature=channel_video_title

Tomorrow we are hoping to see Larry Lesser perform all 6 Bach suitesin a 3-hour live concert!! DS is super excited about it!!

9 year old DD is producing a lot of crafts and continues to write poetry. Now she has a poetry journal. She LOVEs lacrosse practices and we look forward to her games in April.

5 year old DS brought home a stellar report card from K, and he continues to make huge strides on the piano.

[St. Margaret]

Nevermind baby wriggling again sigh

[ollyoxenfree]

I'm posting late here this month. We were away vacationing in New York city for part of it. It's been lovely reading about all the wonderful things that so many are accomplishing, congratulations! 

We had a terrific, but exhausting, time in NYC. We've visited before and the kids love the city. It's interesting to see how quickly they become comfortable in a different city. They figured out the transit system with hardly a second thought.This time we visited the Museum of Natural History, one place we've missed before. I'm always surprised at the things that my children will find fascinating - never quite what I expect. I thought the galleries we saw were kind of quaint and old-fashioned. For those who have never seen it, there are lots of displays and dioramas, but very few interactive exhibits, at least in the areas we were in. As we went through it, I expected that they might be bored, but they weren't. DS said he liked the old-fashioned feel of the place. DS spent longest at a huge cross-sectional cut redwood that was hung on one wall. The tree had started growing in 550AD and was cut down in 1891. He read all the exhibit information on it and gazed at it for quite a while. He just turned 18 y.o., so maybe he was struck by the passage of time displayed by that massive crosscut. For his one of his birthday gifts, I bought him a big Star Wars lego set he found at FAO Schwartz and seemed to be reluctant to put back on the shelf again. He built it that evening in the hotel room. Another gift was tickets to a concert by the Pogues on St. Patrick's day - definitely not for juveniles! NYC is a great place for an asynchronous giftie to explore his different interests.

Back home, it seems like it's a mad rush now with school and extracurriculars. DS is focusing on calculus, because he's learned that if he doesn't, he makes silly mistakes and his grade slides. His marks in the subject are all over the map - almost perfect sometimes and barely a B at others. This past weekend, a local college radio station program interviewed him and his bandmates and highlighted their demo disc. They had a great time and it was all good publicity for their upcoming shows and possibly more fun than studying calculus. 

DD is very busy preparing for 2 drama performances. She's a drama major at a performing arts school and their class show is coming up soon. She's also getting ready for a production with her extracurricular theatre group in the sping. She's also making plans for the summer.  For high school credit next year, she has to take a civics class. She wants to travel back to NYC for a course credit - the group we're looking at visits the U.N., and expects the students to build volunteer experience etc. I think we will make that happen for her because I think travel and personal exposure is a much better learning experience than reading about it in a classroom. 

[physmom]

It looks like DH and my days of spelling out words we don't want DD to hear are numbered.  Today she figured out that B-E-D=bed and apparently has it has a sight word too (I noticed it in her Mandeline book, pointed to it, and asked her what it was.  She gave me a look like "come on mom" and said "bed") so not around bedtime when we start her routine she starts screaming "DD NAO go B-E-D"! (no that's not a typo she just likes mixing languages)

Otherwise we've been having a lot of conversations. She's been having a hard time dealing with my miscarriage so we've been talking about that a lot.  She really, really wants a baby brother or sister and is trying to figuring out how babies get into bellies and the such.  It's a conversation that we have to have multiple times per day. 

She also in preschool now and is trying to figure out where here friends go when they're not at school.  Mommy, do they go to work? Mommy, are they at a conference talking to people? (note: when we travel and spend the night anywhere besides at home we tell her we're at a conference) Mommy, they come swimming? Mommy, they come to DD's home?

[aishamama]

Today my son said something soooo sweet that I had to share.  I was taking him to school and he was asking me what the hardest material is in the world, and I told him I'm not that sure maybe concrete or steel depending on how it's made. He asked me if it's possible to break the hardest material. I said yes it's possible, though it can be difficult. He was quiet for a few minutes. Then he said, "Mama I wish everything was made out of the hardest material in the world." I said but sometimes we 'need' to change their shapes or bend/break etc. He said but even still this is what I wish. I asked him why and he said so no one ever gets hurt from crashing their cars. I went on to explain about seatbelts etc but his heart is so soft and caring for other people that it just melts my heart.

[aishamama]

=) yes...I'd say you're right; your days of spelling things out are definitely numbered. We went through this and my son started spelling things too to join in what he calls fun. Then he started writing me dear mama letters with crazy big font lol. It's all so cute. 

Originally Posted by physmom 

It looks like DH and my days of spelling out words we don't want DD to hear are numbered.  Today she figured out that B-E-D=bed and apparently has it has a sight word too (I noticed it in her Mandeline book, pointed to it, and asked her what it was.  She gave me a look like "come on mom" and said "bed") so not around bedtime when we start her routine she starts screaming "DD NAO go B-E-D"! (no that's not a typo she just likes mixing languages)

Otherwise we've been having a lot of conversations. She's been having a hard time dealing with my miscarriage so we've been talking about that a lot.  She really, really wants a baby brother or sister and is trying to figuring out how babies get into bellies and the such.  It's a conversation that we have to have multiple times per day. 

She also in preschool now and is trying to figure out where here friends go when they're not at school.  Mommy, do they go to work? Mommy, are they at a conference talking to people? (note: when we travel and spend the night anywhere besides at home we tell her we're at a conference) Mommy, they come swimming? Mommy, they come to DD's home?

[qandrews]

OK, so my daughter is a child psychologist, mothering 2 little ones herself (one is a newborn).

My son is 25 and he is doing his post doc as a professor assistant at a known university.

I just recently got the chance to see him present a seminar at a math conference and was

so proud! His peers and other professors have told me how exceptional he is. Good feeling.

[dessismama]

Originally Posted by qandrews 

My son is 25 and he is doing his post doc as a professor assistant at a known university.

I just recently got the chance to see him present a seminar at a math conference and was

so proud! His peers and other professors have told me how exceptional he is. Good feeling.

Wow, 25 and a math postdoc already!! This is pretty incredible--you should have all the good feelings!! I am a mathematician by training but currently spend most of my time teaching intro math classes to 120+ college students a semester,,.. No time to play with math!:(

Welcome--it is nice to "see" someone with grown gifties!!

[Greenmama2]

Hmm, no April thread yet?