- Parties galore - with Teddy’s birthday just a few days before Zach’s and also Adrian’s birthday, we had 3 parties in 4 days, including Zach’s
- So fun to celebrate with the neighbors on Teddy’s birthday
- It was an unexpected treat to have Coach Liam (Zach’s goalie coach) join Adrian’s party and lead the kids in fun soccer games
- Finally, Zach’s party was a lot of fun. Everyone made it except one kid, so it was a great turn out!
- He has really enjoyed his gifts, particularly the Bopit, the Sports Illustrated graphic novels.
- We had dinner at the Melting Pot to round out the birthday celebration.
So much Harry Potter! He dressed up for piano lessons on Tuesday, then for story book character day, for trick or treating, and then to go with Auntie Em for the Forbidden Forest!
Thanks to Beth for lending Zach some additions to flesh out his Harry Potter costume (wand, scarf, and robes).
- Piano is still a work in progress. He enjoys going, but struggles to push through the challenge of practicing. He still seems to pick songs up amazingly fast.
- Walks to school in the morning continue to be a blast. It can be a huge crew (Teddy, Jewelle, Cora, Aidan, Tom, Milo, Adina)
- Playdates with Tom, though all the days off in Oct and Nov meant there were hardly any Fridays in school! Teddy and Jewelle have come over a fair amount and Cora too. Multiple playdates with Adrian.
- Playdate with Owen E. They played soccer and had fun writing poetry at the library
- Battleball game has remained fun, but we also got a new collaborative game for his birthday that is fun, and he was excited to play Harry Potter Monopoly.
- Time with Grandad at downtown Air and Space and Udvar Hazy
- Hot chocolate stand - almost no takers; I think they made $9
- Lots of listening to audiobooks and Tom Petty, Green Day, and Frank made a birthday playlist for his party!
- Reading: Zoey and Sassafras, Mr. Wolf’s Class, Sports Illustrated graphic novels; book fair books: Evil Spy School, Diary of a Pug, Sparks!
- Since it’s getting colder and drier, he’s had a few nose bleeds.
Orthodontics
Started with expanders and after stalling out a couple times, we realized that Zach wasn’t wearing the expanders properly. Frank said he should have paid more attention. We were demoralized and discouraged. But, we realized other kids must have this same challenge, and the orthodontist was very understanding and told us it might take 2-3 days to move from one expander to the next. It would have been nice to have heard that or grasped it from the beginning.
- Lots of time off in November
- Zach brought home a good quarterly report despite hearing that he and his teacher have continued to have challenges. He sad he was proud of how hard he has worked on reading and writing, especially his essays
- We continue to talk about positive relationships and how the take time and work. We heard from Sra S. that she and he were still struggling, so now we discuss how he’s doing to work toward positive relationships every day. And I told him, I don’t expect you will always get it right, and sometimes it might not be your fault! Sra S. visited Ms. G.’s class to observe
- Zach is doing well with his morning routine of school work from 7:15am-7:45am. Go Zach!
- We went to see Ms. Goodman's play and ran into Athena, Cora, TJ and family and then talked to Lauren about how wonderful Ms. Goodman's performance was!
- New good friends are Leland and James, who both came to his party.
- Ms. Goodman has a special job for Zach…turning on a lamp that is too high for lots of the kids. She’ll tell him, “Zach, do your thing.”
- Ruby Bridges Walk to School - I tried to build a positive relationship with Zach’s teacher and it was hard! I had looked up fun facts about Bolivia, but they didn’t get me very far…
- Z loves the GIFs that he can insert in Google Slides
- “Tell me about your XXX” for the win. One day it was “Tell me something interesting,” and he shared that Senora Serrano complimented his school work
- The season continued with one game per weekend. We wrapped up with a win, and the tournament went well too.
- Auntie Em, Gamma and Daddy Bob, and Grandad all came to games!
- Goalie and regular practice continued into November, until just before Thanksgiving, and Zach was always keen to go.
- Coach Liam came to Zach last game, and it was too funny. Where Coach Jake says, “Zach get off your line.” Coach Liam says, “Be brave, Zach!”
- One of Zach’s team mates is from Tajikistan, and so I did a little research
- Tournament No. 2: Coach Jake set his alarm for the wrong time. All of us parents pulled together to get everyone to the right place, and Joel waited to get Jake the best parking spot possible.
- After losing the first game BIG, they played well and almost made it to the finals! It was fun to watch, and the drive to Poolesville was beautiful. The boys got together at a restaurant between games on Saturday, and we all enjoyed each other’s company.
- Zach guest played the very next weekend (and we were back in Maryland again) with the 2014 Green C team. He thought he would play goalie, but long story short, their goalie was a bit injured, so he played in goal for game 1 and game 3. The team lost all of their games by pretty large margins.
- Zach played the annual soccer game with the cousins and family in Charlottesville, and they had a lot of fun!
- Zach has gotten one goalie practice with Liam in the off season
- Strengths and areas for improvement: S = diving, picking up the ball, going after the ball aggressively | AfI = high catches, catching in general, coming off his line, and calling for the ball/directing his team
- Zach’s on the team with Coach Kevin again and classmates: Tom, Jackson, Adrian, Noah, and Lucas. They have three fourth graders: Noah, Odeon, and Muhab
- First practices and scrimmages have gone well. I enjoy getting some time to chat with the families
- I had two Thanksgivings!
- Stayed at the scone baker’s place
- Nice neighborhood to walk in
- Cousin love
- Dammann family soccer game
- Lots of family time and walks and time on the mountain
- Met up with Sam, Julia, and Zahra for lunch and some aerobee time
- Frank drove back for Zach’s expanders
- One visit to church
- Book club has been happening 3x a week for the most part. Sometimes we just read side-by-side
- Lots of soccer and soccer adventures
- Tennis ball - where we try to get a ball past each other (tennis, “rage” ball, or baseball pool ball)
Frank & Zach
- Hershey Park
- Harry Potter Monopoly
- Skiing at Wintergreen on opening weekend
- Morning school work
Family Time
- We listened to Patina
- Lots of questions about the largest countries by area and population. We learned a lot!
- New collaborative game
- Movies: Despicable Me 4, Miracle, My Octopus Teacher (half of it), and Back to the Future
- Christmas tree lighting + caroling and Reston’s Winterfest; we ran into so many soccer friends, classmates, and neighbor
Frank & Susan
- Walks have been very consistent
- Therapy sessions are valuable
- Dinner at Seray
- Watched Nobody Wants This
- Fun chatting with families at soccer practices
- Regular chats with Mary Kay
- We met Emily and Andrew’s Katherine
- Belated birthday lunch at The Maple Room with Auntie Em
- Talked to Paige for hours one Sunday
- Went to Teddy’s final soccer game of the season and ran into Alan and Beckett and Beckett’s grandparents. So fun!
- Visits with Auntie Em for me and Zach; they went to Frying Pan Park and Harry Potter Forbidden Forest
- Getting together with all Kate, Kathleen, Brian, Mary Kay, Hance and Stephen in Maryland
- Hearing from Janna and Marc G.
- Coffee with Eva
- Thanksgiving visits, especially getting to see Emily and Mom and Dad and visit with the Dammann side of the family
- Loved hearing the Quisenberry’s story about a highlight for them from the past year, and talking to their daughter Julie about being a boy mom
- Spoke a little Spanish with Juliana
- Cousin love
- Katie’s on the mend and her birthday dinner out and a date for tea
- A few days at the bus stop and good to see some old friends!
- Flowers to Liesl
- Callie has been sleeping with Zach lately
- She’s still a really vocal cat, always chatting
- She’s very attached to us; she sleeps right next to us, wants to groom us, and sometimes sleeps next to us under the covers
- Zach is training Callie as a goalie
Good Food - Mostly Sweets this time!
- Auntie Em’s white bean soup
- Lots of cookies! Peanut butter from the VanChieri’s and sugar cookies from the Jerome/Kallevigs’
- Cou Cou Rachou’s cardamom braid and kougi anan
- Great Harvest’s shortbread
- Auntie Em’s Thanksgiving meal
- Pizza with butternut squash puree at Brookeville Beer Farm
- Brownies for Frank’s birthday
- Vanina’s birthday cake for Zach
- Julian’s cake
- Great Harvest’s shortbread
Personal and Professional (Fun and Not So Fun)
- Health: caught my fall cold, weird foot problem that had me hobbling for 12-ish hours, ears cleaned out
- Spanish - some shows in Spanish (Pocoyo - kid show and Paquita Salas), some Spanish with Zach, some Spanish with Juliana and mainly doing a lot of good work with Spanish!
- Good Inside had new content on entitlement; so much good stuff!
- Overheard a little kid tell another little kid: I’m four; I used to be three
- Reading
- Our Hidden Conversations
- Swift River
- Watching
- Finished Heartstopper
- Started Starstruck
- Frank and I watched Nobody Needs This??
- Somebody Somewhere
- Listening
- Motivation 10-25
- Some Unlocking Us
- Simon Sinek
- Other podcasts for work
Not So Fun (Personal)
- Trump was re-elected; luckily, it’s renewed our focus on community and helping others, particularly LGBTQIA+ and immigrant communities and anti-racism work
- I also reached out to friends and neighbors and I’m hopeful for the community we’re investing in
- Tom Schumann died
Professional
- Leadership Institute and Aspiring Leaders are great, especially the session with my four male participants talking about emotion skills. Amazing and gives me hope as a boy mom
- Collaborating with Angela
- Getting to know Crystal and sharing my dad's squash casserole
- Culture sessions on Cultural Awareness and Belonging
- Angela’s professional development session on “Owning Your Career” was really good! I used ChatGPT to catalog some professional skill fits around my top five strengths
- Google AI resources
- Strengths session with the IT team - great as always; used AI exercise of suggestions of professional activities that maximize strengths
Resources
- You don’t have to be perfect to be loved
- Daniel Pink’s “On a scale of 1 to 10 how much do you want to do X.” Assuming answer is not 1, ask “why isn’t it lower.”
- Ask about a kids day…I heard there were hyenas on the playground today to get them to actually tell you about their day.
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