Showing posts with label 17yo. Show all posts
Showing posts with label 17yo. Show all posts

Tuesday, September 20, 2022

September So Far

 September has been rolling by quickly! Here's some snippets of how it's been going around here...

9.2.22 - 

9.3.22 - 

Annah came home for a night!

Caeden has been taking his guitar places and sometimes we get to hear him play a little bit. Apparently, he recently serenaded students and teachers outside during a fire drill at school. I hear he also plays in the hallways and sometimes outside the high school office.

Sylvia was home for 2 nights and requested a  dinner at Texas Roadhouse!

9.5.22
I made a pumpkin cream cheese bundt cake and it was gone very quickly. 
I did also make 2 loaves of pumpkin cream cheese bread, which lasted almost a whole week.

I will not be bothered by finding Caeden's backpack in random places around the house. All too soon there will be no backpacks to find in random places around the house.

9.6.22
I didn't have any lessons to teach, so Jeremy and I went to DQ for supper.

Last month the water tower in Arrowsmith got painted as some repairs were finished inside it.

This month, it got repainted a nicer, calmer color of blue. (Apparently someone didn't approve of the first blue.) It was silver and had never been painted. It does look nice as you drive into the village now.

9.10.22
The marching Mustangs competed at Washington HS Marching Band Invitational today. It was 94 degrees out, very humid, and not one cloud or breeze in the sky. They had to walk a looooong way to and from warm-ups in full uniforms carrying instruments and then go right on the field to perform. One student passed out before they even made it to warmups, and others had to stop in the medical tent after the performance because everyone was overheated! It was a tough one! They did a good job though. The band is mostly seniors and freshmen this year.




9.13.22
I've noticed it is starting to look like Fall in some places.
On my way into the high school this morning...


9.14.22
More Fall. On my morning drive to work.

The neighbor's cat by our house, watching Jeremy

All grades except seniors were required to do MAP testing this week. The HS principal found volunteer jobs for the seniors to do today to earn the next MAP testing day [in December] off school. Caeden and these guys were on cleanup duty around the school grounds.

9.16.22 
Jeremy took Caeden to a glaive concert in Indianapolis! Glaive is younger than Caeden, but Caeden has been a fan of his for a while now and was super pumped about the concert. He LOVED it!


9.17.22
The Marching Mustangs competed at the Normal Marching Band Invitational at IWU today. They had a great performance and earned 3rd place and best color guard!

Here is a video of their performance. Their show theme is "Candy Crush" and includes the songs:
Sweet Caroline, Sugar Sugar, Cake Medley, Lollipop, and a mash-up of Sweet Emotion and I Want Candy. I think it's pretty fun, and the audiences are liking it too!

And crowds always love when the band does their Monster Stomp off the field!

My fall allergies really had me down this weekend, so we didn't stay to watch the rest of the bands after Ridgeview performed. We took Caeden and stopped at Moe's on the way home. I guess Caeden is now a "Queso Guru."

9.18.22
Though we haven't been active members at Point of Change, the church we were very active in planting and growing, for a couple of years, the 10 year anniversary celebration was today and the guys went to represent our family. The church was just basically given a beautiful, large, old church building two weeks ago, and today's service was held there. 

I stayed home and tried to rest up and watched the service online. 
The 10-year video made me cry. So many memories with this church, these people, in the last decade. 

9.19.22
Our weather radio went off many times between midnight and 3am, and we found ourselves in the basement for 20-30 minutes around 1am for a tornado warning.

This is Homecoming Week at Ridgeview, and today the spirit day was "Anything but a backpack." Caeden wanted to haul a dresser around school all day, but we didn't have one that would work. So, he carried his books and Chromebook in a cardboard toilet paper box!  

9.20.22
Today the homecoming spirit day was "Teacher/Student Swap," and students were supposed to dress like their favorite teacher and teachers could dress like students for the day. A lot of students dressed like specific teachers, and a few teachers dressed like any generic teenage student, or created their own student persona for the day. But TWO teachers actually dressed specifically like Caeden! 

Mrs. McCoy messaged me last night to ask if I thought Caeden would be ok with her dressing as him. I thought he would be honored and offered to bring her some of his clothes. She had already planned on jeans with frayed edges, Vans, borrowed drumsticks from Mr. Marchese, and figured out how to style her hair up to look like Caeden's! I offered a hoodie or jeans, then she asked specifically for Caeden's black and white striped shirt. I had to laugh because he has 3 or 4! I took her 2 and a hoodie. She also rocked the headphones like Caeden does most days at school. She came into the library to pose for a photo before school and she even got his posture down pretty well!

Mr. Leinweber was a total surprise, and a friend of Caeden's walked me around the school to find and see him at breakfast duty. He later showed Caeden that he'd been taking notes on his phone when he came up with outfit ideas for weeks! I really love the post-it note patches on his jeans!

Yearbook photographers got Caeden and Mrs. McCoy together in her classroom. She told me that Caeden laughed so hard when he saw her that he started a coughing fit, so she counted it a success!

She even borrowed an energy drink can from another student so she could complete the Caeden "look!"

Pretty great teachers who know a kid well enough to dress up like him! T
hey say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery...
Caeden was completely surprised, and maybe even a little honored.

All of the teachers who dressed up "like students"


Monday, September 5, 2022

Back to School 2022

8.17.22 

Caeden started his senior year of high school.

I am subbing in the library for the semester, covering a maternity leave.

8.18.10 -- Caeden's first day of Kindergarten
Most of those years went by in a flash.

He is more than ready to finish with his adventures at Ridgeview school. 
I pray he will enjoy his final year there.


8.18.22
Jeremy and Sylvia, packing up the Prius to head back to SIUe tomorrow

Annah's things have "expanded" a bit over the last 4 years of college.

8.19.22
Annah left a note for Caeden on the kitchen table.

Sylvia left us a message on the dry erase board.

Confirmation of arriving at campus:


8.20.22
Annah FaceTimed to show me her room all set up.

8.21.22
Sylvia FaceTimed while walking around campus

I zoomed in on a photo Sylvia sent me of her room and was checking out her books to remember what classes she is taking this semester (Physics, Genetics, Psychology, Organic Chemistry, just to name a few), and she thought I was noticing the coloring pages and crayons she had taken to college with her.

Just taking in a little beauty along Route 9 on a stormy Sunday

8.22.22


Good first day of Sophomore year of college!


8.23.22
Mr. Marchese has allowed Caeden to claim one of the practice rooms as "his" to work on his music projects during the school day. They are recording some stuff together as well.


8.26.22
I heard these words come out of his mouth today, "I had a good day at school!"

Caeden may have a little too much time on his hands with several study halls, and he may spend large parts of his days visiting his favorite teachers even though he doesn't have them for classes. And Mrs. McCoy may have put a note on her classroom door about when he may not be welcome.

But, she has always been very kind to Caeden. 
He even met and hung out with her son Henry at the football game tonight! 

We are so incredibly thankful for a great start to this school year!!!