Concert

Tonight was Elyse's last Middle-School Band Concert:

(She does plan to continue band in high school, next year at Archer)

Elyse at the Sneaker Ball

Tonight, Elyse went to her school's "Sneaker Ball" (or as I call it, the shoe dance) at Archer High School, the high school she will be attending when she finishes up with middle school. Here's a picture Anna texted to me after she dropped her off:

Throwback Thursday: My First Grade Class Picture, 1973

You might be able to tell this without my pointing it out, but I "fixed" the letters on the sign in Photoshop. It says exactly what the real sign said, but I replaced the text, which was too blurry to read in the original picture.

This is my first-grade class picture from about a million years ago – actually, not too far from fifty years ago – at Bethesda Elementary.

I'm the rather dour looking one on the front row, far left (as you're looking at the picture, but far right from the perspective of those of us on the other side of the lens – though I realize as I type this that I may not have known right from left at the time.). I don't know why I looked so unhappy to be there; maybe I was, even though I remember first grade happily and not in a way that explains my expression.

Our teacher, the only adult in the photograph, was Mrs. McDowall. She was an old lady – old, at least, by 1973's standards of "old"; society's standards, and my standards, for what constitutes "old" have changed a lot since then. I'm only a few years (I believe about six) away from the age she was in this picture, and I don't think of myself as "old." Not really, anyway; sometimes, in fact, I forget that I'm not still a teenager. In any case, I don't think someone in their early 60s is considered "old" in our culture anymore.

Actually, not everything I've written above is completely true: I do think of myself as "old," at least sometimes, and sometimes I refer to myself that way. Even if I'm really not, I sure feel old sometimes. And looking at pictures like this doesn't help. (Sigh…)

So, anyway…what I most remember about Mrs. McDowall is that she rewarded us for correct answers on (I think) math problems with a couple of M&Ms from a can, like a Maxwell House coffee can but with the M&Ms logo on it – did such a thing actually exist? Maybe it was just a coffee can and I am misremembering. But I can see her going down the aisles between desks and doling out M&Ms as she looked over our math problems, and in my memory, she was doling out those M&Ms from a big black tin can bearing the M&Ms logo. Maybe I'll do a quick Google search to see if I can find evidence that such a thing actually did exist.

Here's something else I remember about first grade: at some point when I was in Mrs. McDowall's class, my family went to Stone Mountain Park, and I was allowed to get one item from one of the gift shops there. What I chose was a small toy pocketknife; I don't know if it was actually sharp – probably not – but I believe the blade was real metal and it looked kind of real, despite being only about an inch long and having a red plastic handle. I took it to school; I don't think I was showing it off, and I'm sure I wasn't threatening anyone with it, but Mrs. McDowall confiscated it, as I now realize she should have, telling me I could have it back at the end of the year. I don't know if this happened near the beginning of the school year and I held on to the promise of getting my knife back for many months, or if it was near the end of the school year and it was only for a few weeks or maybe even days. However long it was, when the last day of school finally came, I reminded her about the confiscated knife and asked for it back. She remembered, or at least pretended to remember, and searched through her desk and a supply cabinet, but couldn't, and didn't, find it. She never found it! I never got it back! I think she mumbled some vague apology and went about with her life. I guess I went about with my life, too; I don't care about the knife now, and probably didn't just a few hours later, but I still remember.

Looking back, I realize that Richard Nixon was president when I started her class! Watergate was still some months in the future (and I wasn't aware of it when it did happen). It was a different country then. In 1973, you could buy a toy pocketknife in a gift shop and take it to school and not make national news; you just had it confiscated, and lost, and you never got it back. Which now that I think about it, wasn't a bad way to deal with the issue.

Looking back at the picture, I can say for sure that at least two of the people shown here are no longer living; Cynthia Drummond, in the top row, died of cancer a couple of years ago, and Angela King, also in the top row of this photo, died of a heart attack about a year ago. I know about their deaths because of social media; as far as I know the rest of the people in the photograph are still alive.

It was a long, long time ago. I remember it well, but I also don't remember it at all. Sometimes it's difficult to believe that I was even alive in 1973. I'm glad I have photographic evidence like this to prove that I was.

Elye's Band Concert

Tonight was Elyse's Spring Band Concert (which also doubled as the students' final exam for Band). Before the band concert, Elyse and I went and watched the Chorus concert in the lunchroom (which was very nice, but I'm not posting any pictures from that since we don't actually know any of the chorus members.) Here are some of the pictures I took of Elyse's concert (which, as you can probably guess, was in the gym):

This shows the flutes popping up during a piece called "Popcorn"

This is the band teacher, Mr. Jones

(Some of these pictures are very grainy because I cropped them from much larger pictures.)

Elyse is Moving On Up

 Today was the "Moving Up" ceremony for the fifth graders at Elyse's school. It's a sort of graduation to recognize that they are moving up from elementary school to middle school.

Here's Elyse receiving her...actually, I don't know what is in that red folder, but whatever it is, this is Elyse receiving it from her teacher:

Congratulations, Elyse!

Breaking News

(Elyse made this on her phone this morning.)

Thanksgiving Feast with Elyse

Today was the Thanksgiving Feast at Elyse's school. Here's a picture of the two of us in the cafeteria:

First Day of School 2019

Today is the first day of the new school year! Here's Elyse, about to go down the bus stop:

Jessica's School Portrait

A few days ago I posted Elyse's school portrait; here's Jessica's:

Elyse's School Portrait

This is Elyse's school portrait for the second half of the 2018-2019 school year:

(And yes, we did pay for the digital rights so we can legally post it...not that anyone asked.)

I posted the school portraits (for both girls) from the first half of the year back in October.

Jessica and Elyse's 2018 School Portraits

First Day of School!

Today is the first day of the 2018-2019 school year!

It's also the girls' first day at their new schools since we moved, Jessica's first day of middle school, and Elyse's first day riding the bus. Many firsts for us today!

I didn't get good pictures of Jessica--she's not so into that--but here are some pictures of Elyse leaving the house, waiting at the bus stop, and getting on the bus:

(She didn't take her cell phone to school, she just wanted to get a picture of the bus.)

She was very excited about the first day of school (which of course is great, but a little surprising, since she hasn't always liked school in the past), and VERY excited to be riding the bus.

I think Jessica was excited too, in her own way, but she expresses it differently, and also the pre-teen nonchalance and blase attitude sometimes show themselves at times like this.

Snow Days!

It snowed last night, and school--every school that affects us: Gwinnett, Rockdale, Gwinnett Tech--was cancelled for the day!

This is what we woke up to:

Not exactly a Winter Wonderland, but an inch or so of snow, enough so that Elyse could go outside and build a small snowman on the patio:

(Jessica didn't get to go outside because of her injured ankle, but she did sit by the sliding glass doors and communicate with Elyse via walkie talkie.)

It wasn't truly a "no school" day; officially it was a "Digital Learning Day," which means the kids had school assignments on their e-class portals. Here's Elyse working on hers:

There's a famous line in a "Star Trek" episode where a long-lived character says to Captain Kirk, "Immortality consists largely of boredom." So do snow days. I don't know that either Jessica or Elyse would agree with that, but by the late afternoon we were all going stir crazy.

And tomorrow (Thursday, January 18), because today the temperatures are not s'pose to get above freezing so all the snow and ice will be here for a while and therefore the schools will still be closed, we get to do it all over again!

Thanksgiving Feast at J.C. Magill

Today I went to the girls' school to have lunch with Elyse for the second grade Thanksgiving Feast!

The turkey and dressing and gravy was pretty good, especially for a mass-produced school lunch. The macaroni and cheese was also quite good; I only ate a little of it because Elyse kept asking if she could have some of mine. I didn't eat the green beans, of course; I just felt too self-conscious going through the line to not get something that seemed like a grown-up choice. I should have just asked for double helpings of macaroni and cheese.

Elyse's Field Day

Today I went to J.C. Magill to spend some time with Elyse for her grade's field day:

STEAM Night at JC Magill

Tonight we went to STEAM Night at the girls' school to participate in some Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics activities, and also to eat ices from one of the food trucks parked out front. (I wish I hadn't had supper at home so I could have gotten something from the Mac the Cheese truck.)

That's Mrs. Elrod helping the girls make their paper airplanes; three years ago, she was Jessica's first grade teacher:

(She was trying to make the Eiffel Tower, but it wouldn't stand up.)

Jessica is the Frank Lloyd Wright of toothpick-and-marshmallow design:

This stack of books wasn't part of any STEAM activity, I just liked the looks of it. Coincidentally, this classroom is Ms. Redd's, Elyse's Kindergarten teacher, though she was in another room tonight.