Where have we been????

No where, everywhere, mostly work for DAMOM.

Vern has really changed in the last few years. Here he is last year when he earned his Eagle Scout. Very proud mamma!

Here he is going to homecoming.

This photo is from and Mom and Vern day at an art/science exhibit. 

Would you believe Vern is now a junior in high school???? He loves his x-box and you-tube. He does not like school but manages good grades at my insistence. 

I hope some modeling agency reads this blog and picks him up for a gig or two as I think he is very handsome :-)

Vern does trap shooting. I'm hoping to get back to blogging and will be able to post some photos of his shoots and how that all works. We shall see how my work goes...

Ending 6th grade on a good note.

Here we are at the end of another school year. Vern is SO excited to be done with 6th grade. I think he ended the year with 2 detentions within 2 weeks of school getting out.  We both are glad school is out and Vern gets some time to do other things. He will be kept busy this summer.

Before getting on with summer I wanted to brag about his report card. I was pleased that Vern did indeed try and ended the year on a good note.

English                B+
Social Studies     B+
Science               A-
Math                   B
Physical Ed        A+
Choir                  A+
Music Apprec.   A-
Foreign Lang     B+

If you know Vern please congratulate him either in person or via the comments section. He deserves it!

Now it is onto fun summer time activities.  Summer is just starting and he already had a dog over for a week to play.  This week he is spending at his dad's house and next week starts his time as a helper for vacation bible school.  More updates to follow!

School is almost out...

On last post you saw I was not so happy with Vern. I have not posted much as we have been working hard to get through another book and working on his priorities.

I am happy to report that we just finished a book last night. Now he has to get the report written, turned in and approved in order for it to count toward his final grade.

Vern has a big summer planned with camps, vacations, and volunteer work. I will have a lot to write about as we ramp up to summer. Now if only the weather would warm up!


I thought I would include some recent photos.

Here is Vern doing one of his favorite things. Lounging in the lazyBOY with his remote. We have this priority to work on...

Here he is at his spring concert from school. He is standing beside his best friend. We asked him if he got in trouble a lot in music if he sat that close to his friend. He averted his eyes and said "Sometimes".  At least he is honest!

Vern Worries

Vern worries of late:

"Mom I am fat!"

Me: "NO you are NOT! You just need to eat healthy food instead of junk food."

"Mom I have that s word! Look at me."

Me: "what?"

"You know where your back is in an S shape. Look at my back it curves in!"

Me: "Ohhhh, you mean scoliosis. No your back would need to form an S shape left to right. The s shape top to bottom is very normal."

"Mom, I don't know if I am good enough to make the bad basketball team next year."

Me: "You will do fine."

"Mom, I can't get to sleep!"

"Mommmmmm I hate my clothes."


I think Vern is getting ready to blow into puberty soon. Hang on!!!

HAPPY 12th BIRTHDAY!!!

Happy 12th Birthday Vern!

Today my baby turns 12. He is having a birthday celebration month! Last weekend we went to big brother John's college to visit and went out for pizza for this birthday celebration.

This morning for his actual birthday, we had a big breakfast of eggs, sausage, juice and milk. We followed this by opening his presents.

He has yet to celebrate his birthday at his father's house.

PLUS, he wants to have cake for this birthday with his grandparents!
Yep, Vern is celebrating with a birthday month.  It's OK Vern GO FOR IT and I hope the entire month is fun-filled.

Love,
Mom.

WANTED!

WANTED: IPhone 4S

Will someone buy this for me?

Just look how much I need this.

Please? I will be your best friend forever. I promise.

Progress Report

Vern brought his progress report home the other day. He has solid B's and one C.  That is GREAT!!!

We are not having the roller coaster grades and can tell he is trying. Most times he loves to be lazy but if you get him to focus he does great. I believe he could be a straight A student if he just decided school was worthwhile.  The medications he is taking seems to be making a big difference. Not to mention the light is back in his beautiful blue eyes.

I don't think anyone has discovered the secret to get kids excited and thinking school is worthwhile. Some take to it naturally while others would rather be doing anything BUT school.

I have been reading Alex Rider books to Vern this fall. He loves them. They are books about a 15 year old boy who is like a 007 James Bond character. Last night we read about river rats climbing on this kid. I could barely get though it but Vern loved it. His eyes were as big as saucers!  THAT is the kind of engagement I want him to have for all his subjects in school.

I will keep working on that. I also need to keep better attention of Vern. I have been slacking off not making mental notes of the funny things he does each day to record in this blog. BAD MOMMY...  Yes, I have been working on other blogs. You can always go read those if you are bored with these. :-)

Don't Stop Believing

So we were driving in the car one day and Vern was listening to his Ipod.  One of his favorite songs came on and he began to sing out loud. Now remember he is the only one that can hear the music. He loves the song so he is singing LOUD and he sings like he is tone deaf. Also note 95% of the kids at his age sing like they are tone deaf so this is nothing bad against Vern, it is just how kids are.

The song is Don't Stop Believing by Journey. A good old 80's rock tune.  Here is how the song is supposed to start out:

Just a small town girl, livin' in a lonely world
She took the midnight train goin' anywhere
Just a city boy, born and raised in south Detroit
He took the midnight train goin' anywhere

A singer in a smokey room
A smell of wine and cheap perfume
For a smile they can share the night
It goes on and on and on and on

Here is what we heard from Vern:
 
Just a small town girl, livin' in a lonely world

She took the midnight train going anywhere
(great job Vern)
Just a sweaty boy, born and raised in south Detroit
He took the midnight train going anywhereeeeeeeeeee
(hubby and I look at each other and begin laughing - yes our dirty minds took over)
A singer in a smokey room

mumble mumble mumble perfumeeeeeeeeee
mumble smile mumble mumble
mumble on and on and onnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnnn

The rest of the song progressed in that same manner so you get the picture. Now this may not seem so funny reading it but hubby and I were loving it. It was just one of those moments where you LOVE your kids to death because they make you laugh! It was precious and I never want to forget it.

Happy 11th Birthday Vern!!!!!

HAPPY 11TH BIRTHDAY VERN!

He couldn't WAIT to open his presents. He had present time #1 at his Grandma's last Sunday. He loved the black football from Uncle Jim and the playing catch time.

He had present time #2 the morning of his birthday at my house. These are the photos from that. We are having his birthday meal: sloppy joes, green beans, and french fries on Saturday.  He also wants a chocolate cake, with fudge filling, and chocolate frosting. Zowie is he my son or what?!?!??!?!

Yes that is his breakfast in front of him. Chocolate soy milk and a sausage patty with syrup. (Yuck)

Presents #3 are still to come from his aunt in Missouri and my parents. Both of those will arrive in the mail later this week.

I am thinking he is liking his birthday!

Harvest in Iowa

Vern finally got to go back to the farm for harvest. He had been looking forward to this for a while and I am very glad everything worked out and he was able to go.  Vern headed up on a Friday night. Grandpa and Grandma met him at the 1/2 way point. He jumped out of the car with his stuff and hopped into their car ready to go!  It was Grandma and Grandpa's 47th anniversary!

I got a couple updates during the weekend. Saturday Grandpa had to call and tell me how Vern ran and jumped in a tractor at his first opportunity. It was a great time to ride tractors, haul grain in the semi, and combine the corn in a huge combine.  It was extra special that the weather held out and he was able to do a lot of things outside.

Vern's quote: "It was very exciting at first but after a while the combine got boring."  I don't think he ever got bored with the semi.

Sunday morning Grandpa and Vern went for a ride around the neighborhood. Vern got a little worried with no particular destination at hand. He asked Grandpa "Where are we going now!?!"

I sent the camera and didn't get any photos of Vern combining or in the truck but I will share ones that he took during his fun weekend at the farm.

Vern likes self portraits.

Here is a shot of combining corn.

Here we have the tractor hauling in the grain.

Here we have the grain pile where all the farmers store their harvest. It is HUGE!  The picture really doesn't do justice to how big it is.

Here is the conveyor/auger machine that can unload a semi in something like 8 minutes. 

Here we have Miley. She loves sitting in the lawn chair. She is the complete opposite of the dog we have! Vern loves all dogs and had a great time playing with her.

She really is a pretty dog.

Here is one Vern just HAD to take when I went to find the camera. His quote after taking the picture: "Your SOOOO pretty mom."  Made me melt.

Vern was a great kid and wrote the farmer that let him tag along a very nice Thank You.  I appreciate the family that let Vern see a great perspective of farming today.

Game 1

Dear Football Fans,

I know you have all been waiting for this post. It was game one of the season. I do have pitures of Vern playing this game but his heart was not in it. We had a pep talk about this so we shall see if this week is better. 

The team lost 6-26. I was pleased with a score though.  Here is a photo of him during warm up.  He is #55 again this year.  He wasn't big enough to even be a striper so technically he can carry and touch the ball if he wants to. The coaches have him as center as he has experience at that from last year. I hope they move him around a bit.

Can we say HOTTER THAN HADES?
My gawd, it was hot, humid, only an occasional slight breeze and lots of nats to bother us. I roasted and yes caught me a good sun burn.

Here is one of the coaches giving a pre-kickoff pep talk.

Vern had to put up with some hard, illegal hitting. The kids are not supposed to lead with their helmet but Vern got it in the stomach multiple times.  He never could give coach a shirt number so the kid never got in trouble. I think that pretty much took the wind out of his sails the rest of the game as Vern didn't have any big plays.

Here he is lined up on defense.

Vern played virtually the entire game except when he got hit hard once and the coaches put on a neck brace for a while. He was one tired, sweaty boy when finished.

Here he is lined up on special teams for a kick-off.

See you next week,

DA Mom.

Together time

Vern and I got to spend some quality time together and I have to say it was nice.

Over the weekend Vern was having multiple nose bleeds. These come and go and are difficult to stop sometimes. After this weekend's 3 inch clot, I thought it was time to visit the doctor with our vacation soon upon us. Neither of us need major nosebleeds on an airplane.
So I made the family doctor appointment for 8am and Vern came to work with me! He enjoyed missing some school and was the B-E-S-T little man. He read quietly, met my friends when I showed him off and was very polite. (Hey that is one of his spelling words this week. --- Oh I digress.) We had a great time together. Then it was off to the first appointment. Like expected the family doc recommended we go to an ENT to get it looked at.

The nurse said there was an available appointment down the street at 10 am. I took it so I didn't have to incur more driving and time off work. We came back to work until it was time for the second appointment. I did some work and Vern watched, jabbered, and did a bit more homework. We both were happy!

Next we were off to the ENT. The appointment went very well. Vern was brave and did a great job holding still for the procedure. I was so proud of him! After the appointment I dropped him off at school and I went back to work - both of us smiling.  Item to note: there were at least 2 different people (nurse and lunch ladies) that I remember talking to about Vern's beautiful eyes.  He knows how to use those eyes too, with those long lashes. ZOWIE.  It is one of his best features.

Then at home last night after dinner and his jobs were complete, he asked me to go for a walk. I, of course, said yes.  We walked. We talked. He HELD - MY - HAND.  I was mush. See how he can melt even a hard-core mom like me.  I am sure that will get him through life.

Signed,
The proud, mushball, loving my son Mom.

A Great Story

I am giving full credit for this blog to VERN.  He wrote the following Thanksgiving story and I had to share.  What do you think?

There once was two boys going to get a turkey for Thanksgiving. There was a turkey family getting a human for Thanksgiving.

So the two boys wnet to find a turkey and also the turkey did the same thing.  The turkey had a sling shot and a telescope.  The two boys had a shotgun.

The other boy said, "Why do we have to pick out a turkey?"

"Dad said so. I will go down this trail and you go down that one."

So the turkey saw one of the humans and the turkey shot the sling shot, hit him in the head.

Then the turkey took him home and ate him.  The End.

Author: Vern
Age: 9

Vern Ramblings

This is going to be one of those rambling posts that may go no where or somewhere. The mom is just in one of those moods...

I've been worried about his nose/sinus. He is still very full of goo even after the round of antibiotics and medicine. He takes Claritin for allergies anyway so its hard to give him any more medicine. I have been giving him cough and cold medicine and using Vic's at night. It seems to help him sleep if nothing else.

We are trying the list thing. That is going so-so. I still feel like I am saying do the list 50 times. If I don't "nag" he just goes off and dwadles. I plan to do some more tweaking of this to see if I can get better results. I'll keep you posted.

He did take the initiative this week to do his reading!!! He wants to attend the reading party and you must read 1 hour each week to earn your way into this party. Since this is the last week of the month he has almost made it and has actually been asking to read. Small but good steps.

We have been reading Diary of a Wimpy Kid book. I enjoy sitting through the torturous session of struggling to read  the words just because the book is so entertaining. This poor kid gets into all sorts of predicaments and its just funny.  Example: Greg is the kid and Rodrick is the older brother. Rodrick was going to give Greg $.50 to tie his shoes standing up. Greg bends over and Rodrick shoots him in the rear with a paint gun. Greg goes to tell his dad about it but dad wants to stay out of it and just tells Rodrick to pay Greg the money. Well Rodrick tosses the $.50 on the ground and Greg goes to pick it up and Rodrick shoots him in the rear again!

Told you it was going to be a rambling post. I'll end until next time.  Give your kids a hug!!!