My Man

Had to show you all Akorren's 2nd grade photo from Gilmore. He always makes such silly faces in most of his photos. It is hard to get him to be natural and relaxed in his photographs. It is still a "real" picture of his personality though. I look at him and am amazed at how grown up he seems. I love this 7 year old age, he likes so many things, is easy to talk to, still wants to hug and show me affection, and has his own sense of humor and creativity. I like the man he is growing into.

I just signed some paperwork to have him tested for the GT program (Gifted and Talented), his teacher from last year recommended we look into getting that done in the early part of 2nd grade for him. I have mixed feelings about it, I would love for him to get into it as I think it would help feed his interest in science and all things creative and imaginary. But I know he is not the "top" kid in his classroom. And I hate the idea of setting him up to fail. In our area we have so many (privileged) NASA kids, children of engineers and scientists that getting into the GT program seems so much harder out here. Normally GT would be the top 10% of kids in the school but since we are in such a high calibre area it seems like they only take the top 5% of kids. Kids in our district get tracked at an early age and getting into the GT program would allow him to take the upper level classes in middle and high school later. We will just have to see how and what he does with the testing later on this month. I will let it go and try not to stress about it. As his mom I just want the best for him, what can I say.
Currently Akorren is enjoying learning about the Pokemon card game. I am thrilled that I finally had the time to teach it to him this month. I loved role playing and card games like that when I was younger, so it nice to show him how much fun it can be. It makes him apply basic math and organizational skills along with some higher level thinking on which Pokemon to use and why. We will slowly be adding to his card decks and now he even imaginary plays Pokemon battles with his sisters, it is amusing to watch. This month he decided to take a break from piano. (I am a bit disappointed on this one, I really loved having a musician in the home), but the getting him to practice was turning into such a battle for us. Daddy finally put his foot down and said if you don't practice anymore you will not be taking lessons. That will give us $100 more this month to put towards something else. He still has gymnastics and at some point will play soccer (still delayed due to the hurricane) so I guess I can't feel like he is not getting do anything. I just love my man, Akorren.