where did the time go? when did he become this little boy ready for kindergarten? i did not want to be that mom that cries on her child’s first day of kindergarten but hello…for those that really know me, that’s like asking someone not to breathe! hahaha

tobey went through his kindergarten assessment last week and he did great! we thought we were just bringing him in to talk to his potential teacher but instead it was a meeting to go over what he knew and/or did not know. alphabet, numbers, reading words, etc…his teacher said he would do great academically!

we then attended kindergarten orientation, a meeting to assist parents in answering questions about what to expect. rules on this, rules on that, what the kids will be learning, what the kids will be doing, etc. tobey was with us and seemed just as excited as we were!

alas…the 1st day of kindergarten! ramel and i took time off so that we could both be there to bring him to school as well as pick him up. tobey woke up early enough, he picked out his clothes the night before and he ate a good breakfast. his backpack and snack/lunch bag were all packed and he was ready to go! we brought him to his class, where they lined up as they walked into the classroom. i was fine…yeah right, the minute he walked in, tears ran down my face. ramel was laughing at me and said “man, i can’t believe we have a kindergartener now!” the hours passed pretty quickly and we found ourselves at the school waiting for them to get out of class. as they came out of the class, again lined up, we made eye contact with him and you could tell he had a great day! he met some new friends but did not know their names yet…and he kept talking about what they did in school! day one was done…:)

the next couple of days were pretty much the same routine for him. he did not seem to have any problems going to and from class but we did talk to his teacher for a quick update. we were told that he’s very energetic, loves being the leader but will need to learn how to voice his words verbally instead of physically. he also tends to do his martial arts in class…hahahah…i know that’s not good and we’re working on explaining to him when it should be used and when not to use it. i know…i know…some of you are saying, uh it’s only been 3 days, give him a break! hahahah we know we just want to make sure we address potential behavior issues before they get out of hand. he’s a boy, he’ll get that way and we’re hoping this is just an adjustment period. he has met a few friends and gives us updates on what is going on in class…he still loves it! hahaha

tobey tested for his orange belt today! it was so cute! we weren’t sure what to expect so when we showed up at the martial arts place, we were surprised to see that only two students were testing! a table is set up where their instructors have them go over things they learned in class one by one and then are given marks to see if they pass. it was just too cute to watch these little guys doing all these martial arts moves and making those martial arts noises with their little voices.

(1) tobey with instructor joshua
(2) zachary and tobey testing

this past week was busy as usual but not in that hectic way it normally is. it was the kind of busy that i miss, the kind of busy where you actually enjoy the things that you are doing and don’t really feel drained from it.

progress at last! last week i received a text from ramel saying that tobey participated in his taekwondo class without any hesitation. … yay! he had trouble adjusting in the first few classes and thankfully a breakthrough occurred during this last visit. the streak has continued this week as he is now excited to go to class!

the timing was perfect as it coincided with a special trip with his cousins from stockton. venus planned the trip and it started off with us meeting them for lunch. we then headed to micke grove zoo..the kids were soooo excited! the sea lion and monkeys were popular with the 4 cousins! we then headed to fun town (amusement park next door) and spent the afternoon on a few of the rides. tobey’s favorite was the scrambler! the weather was beautiful so we spent some time relaxing by the picnic tables while the kiddos ran around and did relay races..hahaha…great way to tire them out because as soon as we got into the car..BAM…zzzzz city!

it was a pretty relaxing week - work was actually manageable and the week’s activities were enjoyable.

just when you think you have parenting sorta figured out, little kids have a way of reminding you there is still lots to learn!

preschool is pretty much year round but this year we decided to pull tobey out for a few weeks so he can have a summer vacation before he starts kindergarten. not really being keen on having him spend summer days watching tv and playing on the computer, we thought we’d try him out with a few activities.

(1) gymnastics - we enrolled him in a toddlers class and were happily surprised when his teacher told us that he was actually more advanced than we thought. she thought maybe he would be able to go into the developmental class which is an iinvitation only prep class for competitive gymnastics. although he was hesitant to join the class at first, he did great and we were told that although he would be the youngest in his class, he had no problems keeping up. he would not be able to compete til he is 6 yrs old but that was ok as long as he was learning the physical and mental skills needed. due to scheduling conflicts, we could not commit to the class so his teacher suggested he do the boys level 1 class. he is currently doing a combo of the toddlers class (he’ll learn listening and focus skills) and the level 1 class (he’ll learn advanced skills and therefore won’t be bored). although he had that one meltdown in the first week, he is excited to attend and cannot wait to get to class!

(2) martial arts - this activity proved to be the opposite for tobey. we enrolled him in hopes to teach him focus, discipline, control, etc. and our initial meeting was not ideal. he refused to put on the uniform and it took about 15 minutes before we were able to get him into the interview process where he received his first private lesson. he was very excited working one on one with the instructor and in the end broke his first board! thinking he would adjust as he did in gymnastics, we signed him up (commitment of 6 months). his next lesson would be in a class setting and papa bruno brought him. according to grandpa, he did not want to go into class and one of the assistants ended up giving him a private lesson. the 2nd class would be a little more successful. he did not want to get into the car with papa so i took him and he at first was a little scared but realized that his friend cortez was in the class which made him feel better. he attended the full 30 minutes and everything seemed great again! 3rd class - complete meltdown! he refused and never attended the class nor got any training that day. it was truly very disappointing and frustrating. his 4th class today proved a little promising. he was in uniform complete with gear but it took him 15 minutes to get on the mat and even then he refused to get into the class. stephen worked with him and finally convinced him to go into class the last 5 minutes. if he didn’t like the class altogether it would be easy to pull him out. but instead there are days where he’s ready to go and practices at home everything he learned or heard and then clams up when we get to class. he has said everything from, he doesn’t like the class to i don’t have everything to he doesn’t like the yelling as excuses to not attend. i don’t want to feel like we’re forcing him but also want to teach him that when you commit to something, you try it a few times before quitting. the karate place has been very patient and supportive letting us know that they have kids that do that sometimes and sometimes even cry the whole time or yell and scream to get their way. we are giving it one month to get adjusted in hopes that he will get some confidence in himself and not have “stage fright”. keep your fingers crossed!

(3) tennis and golf - this was a no-brainer…my whole family plays tennis and/or golf so there was no question that we would have my dad work with him. tobey enjoys it and looks forward to it every time! we hope that he continues to enjoy it!

we want him to enjoy all these activities and i know that there will be ones he will not want to do and ones he will completely embrace. perhaps it’s timing and it just depends on their interests at that time. ramel and i have realized that the first four years with tobey have been easy as he followed instructions and adjusted fairly well to whatever was thrown at him. now we are facing defiance and resistance, something very new to ramel and i so we too are learning to adjust.

we don’t want to force him but do want to teach him about making an attempt at something and the concept of commitment. some may say..hello he’s not even 5 give him a break…and that’s fine. every parent teaches and raises their kids differently, please don’t judge. judgments have that boomerang action and tends to smack those judgmental people not necessarily upside the head but in other ways…

okay..that was me venting..phew i’m done for today!

omg..the longest week ever started last friday, 6/20 when i received some bad news from one of our closest friends who miscarried. as i listened to her tell me what happened, i could not hold back my own tears. it’s never an easy thing to hear your friends be in pain, even harder to find the words to try and comfort them. all we can say is that perhaps God had a different plan and believe in that.

later that friday afternoon, i drove to tobey’s pre-school graduation..an event i thought was suppose to be on 6/27! where the heck was my momagenda?!!? it was a potluck so i prepared something quick and headed to the school. it was a hot friday, luckily we were inside for the program…then some einstein decided to put all the food outside! wtf..i mean seriously, it was like high 90’s! it was no surprise people grabbed their food and went back into the school to eat! after the program, ramel was going to drive the suv home…uh, not…the car wouldn’t turn on! the battery had died…waaaaaa! so here we were, outside 95 degrees, waiting for the AAA guy to come in 1 hour. luckily it didn’t take him that long and he replaced the battery quickly. thinking we were out of the woods, he left and when hubby started the car, he realized the AC, windows and radio controls DIDN’T WORK!!! we called back the guy he had no idea what happened so we had to drive the car to my parents house! ramel drove it with the windows closed..poor guy..10 minutes in a closed SUV that had been sitting in the sun was ugly! we were going to bring it into the dealership so i made a call…uh, ok so the dealership closed in may 2008 due to bankruptcy! OMG at this point it’s like really…really…who’s playing a joke on us? the car eventually got fixed on monday (we brought it into a AAA garage) - thank goodness it was only a blown fuse!

we then received news on sunday that one of our friends had passed away. he was only 37 years old. we were not sure at the time about what happened but eventually learned he may have passed from a heart attack as he had 85-90% blockage in one of his arteries. as we attended the viewing and the funeral this week, we saw a few faces from high school…faces we hadn’t seen in 20+ years…it’s just so unfortunate that it was through these circumstances that we had this type of reunion. i pray for his family that they will get through this difficult time…RIP Dennis Aquino.

the week started to turn around as tobey attended his first gymnastics class. he did so great! at his trial class last week, his teacher told us that she had the competitive coach check him out as tobey had shown advanced skills than the toddler class we had him enrolled in. we brought him back on wednesday to take a full class with coach paul in his developmental class but when it was time to go to the class, tobey started crying — i think he was a little intimidated. he attended his normal toddlers class then at the last half hour, he got comfy enough to do the last set with the competitive class. as his teacher and i watched him, she told me that although he would be the youngest in that class, it looked like he could hold his own! after class, the coach told us that the spots in his class were by invitation only and that he would like to see if we were interested in putting tobey in his class! he said “tobey’s really strong for his age, has good body control and is very coordinated” …that was nice to hear… (for all you haters out there that roll your eyes when you read the previous line, shame on you - find it in yourselves to be happy for others…) anyways, ramel and i will have to talk to tobey to see what he would like to do!

i also learned this week that another dear friend of ours is prego! sooo excited for her and hubby…it’s about time! i can’t wait to see her as i left before she arrived! congrats to them both!

and then to end this week…we finally got our garage door fixed! when we first moved in our garage door would sometimes keep opening and we would have to stand there for a few minutes before it would stay down. for the longest time, ramel thought it was me not knowing how to press the buttons properly..uh, really wtf? even using the remote, it would happen to me sometimes. when it finally started doing it to ramel, he goes “oh, there’s something wrong with the garage door opener.” …oh you mean it couldn’t be you dude? so we got it checked and when the garage guy arrived this morning, the first words out of his mouth were…”you’re getting a free upgrade on your garage door opener today!” turns out there was a manufacturer’s defect and he’d had to replace at least 20 garages in our community alone! he completely replaced the garage door motor and i am officially relieved!

told ya it was the longest week ever…ups and downs emotionally, i am completely drained. i can’t wait for the weekend!

tobey had his spring school program tonight. they had a short performance singing a song called “catch a falling star”. tobey was a cloud and he and the other clouds and stars danced around “the falling star”…it was too cute! our little one finally received his recognition certificate for “graduating” from ms. joy’s class! it was long overdue as he “graduated” back in september 2007. he was so excited to receive his certificate!

since it was raining outside, they decided to do the easter hunt indoors…there’s nothing cuter than seeing 50+ kids and their parents go crazy trying to fill their baskets! there is always a ton of finger foods during one of these programs so all the parents and kids ended up sitting in the cute little chairs just talking about the evening’s events.

we were still hungry when we left so we decided to stop by this restaurant that we normally drive by on our way home. it was raining pretty hard outside and we weren’t in any rush so we ended up eating at the restaurant - kalesa. edison, jenn and joshie decided to join us too! the food was good, will probably go back to try the other stuff on the menu.

our little guy L O V E S to watch MTV’s America’s Best Dance Crew. here he is trying to do a routine by “breaksk8″ - a dance crew that does their routines on roller skates!

*** his absolute favorite dance group though is the JABBAWOCKEEZ…representin’…mommy and daddy are fans too!

here’s tobey’s version of the above video!

it’s hard enough to get some time away to spend with just each other but we managed to get a few hours on valentine’s day to have dinner and watch a movie. the meal was so-so and the movie was so-so too but it was just great to spend some time with my hubby. he surprised me with flowers and chocolate sent to my work — a welcome treat for such a yucky work week. we missed the little one that night but have to admit that being able to eat and watch a movie without stopping to answer a question of “why?” and “how come?”, etc was nice…hehehe…

the only annoying thing was these s—– teen girls and boyfriends sitting behind us at the moview. they kept putting their feet on mel’s seat and their boyfriends were talking on their cell phones during the movie. i mean not just feet behind his chair but up on the seat so that the bottom of their soles were literally 2 inches from mel’s head. we shot them a couple of looks and mel pushed back on his seat but it didn’t stop them from being rude. i swear that is the part of the bay area we don’t miss..the inconsiderate attitudes of the younger generation (wow, that makes me sound old). as we saw them trying to sneak into another movie, mel just reminded me that kids like that (bad attitudes, not a care about others, obviously undeducated) were destined for what they deserve…i’ll stop there as i’m sure most of you know how that sentence will end.

tobey was sick for part of last week and part of this week so he’s been home with me trying to get some rest. he started with croup then it turned into bronchitis and a sinus infection. i tell ya seeing your little one sick isn’t fun..it’s even harder trying to figure out what he needs in between all the clinginess and the crying he got better by mid week and was almost himself again but still with lots of coughing! needless to say, it was no surprise that i ended up feeling yucky by week’s end!

we celebrated my hubby’s birthday this past weekend. we were thinking of having a quiet dinner but instead celebrated with venus, the kids, jenn, edison, joshie and edwin. venus called saying that the kids wanted to come and visit so they came around dinner time. we had italian..spaghetti and pizza..yum! the kids spent most of the night playing the WII. joshie, being the youngest, opted to try and walk around our living room..hahaha! he is only 10 months old so seeing that was awesome!

in lieu of a cake, i made a brownie cake for dear hubby. the kids sang happy birthday to him..it was too cute! we spent the rest of the night just chatting with everyone, catching up on life! it had been awhile sine venus and jenn saw each other so we had plenty to talk about! i’m looking forward to many more days like this with all the cousins!