Encouraging Words

My oldest niece has recently been overcoming her fear of water. Her grad one class has started swimming lessons and she absolutely loves it (provided she doesn't have to get her face wet of course). She's been begging my sister to take her and her brother and sisters swimming altogether. Considering my sister just gave birth to her 4th child, this won't be happening any time soon.
I told her that I would take her and her 4 yr old sister swimming over summer holidays. She was placated by this idea and excitedly ran over to her sister. "Auntie's going to take us swimming! You're going to sink like a ROCK!"

I almost fell over I was laughing so hard.

A Special Visit

I got a wonderful surprise at lunch today: a visit from a former student & his family! It was so great! He was by far one of my favs from last year, just the cutest, sweetest little guy. He was also a complete enigma. His family and the team at school had been trying to find a diagnosis for him since he began the program at 2 1/2 yrs old, he's in Kindergarten now. We never did get a diagnosis by the time he headed off to Kindergarten last year, so we were all really worried about him. It was amazing to hear how well he's doing now! His mom said he's been asking about myself & my EAs from last year all the time. He begged her to bring him for a visit to Mrs.R's room! *melt*

It means so much to all of us at the school to get any kind of update once our kids leave the program. We always wonder & worry about how they're doing after we send them out into the "real" world of "big kid" school.

Man, I needed that today!

Sidebar:

He was telling me how old he is now & we had the following hilarious convo.

J: I'm 6 now. How old are you Mrs.R?

Me: I'm a lot older than that, J.

J: You 67?

Me: Ummm, no. Not quite.

J: You 99?

Me: *laughing*

J: You 101?

Me: No, J, I'm not 101. I think I'd be in the hospital if I were 101!

J: Nooo! You 14?

Me: I like that one best. Let's go with that one!

The Reptile Guy

Just a few pics of the Jeff, The Reptile Guy who came to our classroom with just a few of his "pets". He brought half a dozen snakes, several lizards and one giant Saharan tortoise named Crush. He was personal fav! Apparently in the summer he lets Crush wander the yard "mowing" the grass and eating all the dandelions. He's 45 pounds and not even full grown yet! So cool. The kids had such a great time petting all the animals & learning about them. Not a single one of them was even scared of the huge boa constrictor!