{fourth grade rendezvous}

Hard to believe my Kaden is a fourth grader. I have such vivid memories from fourth grade...and from before then -- memories that literally seem like they happened yesterday. Crazy how fast the time flies. Although I can't believe I am even remotely close to being old enough to have a 9-year-old, what a BLESSING it is that this particular 4th grader still ADORES having his Mama involved in his school activities. Love my angel Kaden and am especially grateful that he is always so anxious to have me involved in his classroom and school events. I was so happy that he came home one day a few weeks ago and immediately asked if I could help at his 4th Grade Rendezvous. My goodness...did THAT take me back. I remember my OWN 4th Grade Rendezvous. Crazy. Whenever my little ones come home with permission slips for school activities or field trips, I immediately sign up to volunteer.....without a second thought. Being involved in their school activities is such a blessing for me. And as long as they want me involved....NOTHING will come in the way of me being there.


Kaden's teacher is such a sweetheart. I sure love and appreciate her. She and the other 4th Grade teachers organized such a fun Rendezvous for these great kids. Groups of 15 kids rotated through about 6 different stations, including a cooking station, Chinese jump rope, knot-tying, sewing (making finger puppets), other games and the leather and bead station, which was the station that I was assigned to. It seems that fun and simple games and crafts are such a lost art for these younger generations. Many of the other mothers and I were laughing at how these fun games that the kids were playing, were not only games that they played "in the olden days," but were games that WE grew up playing. :-) So many of us think that kids from this generation aren't able to find pleasure in these simple things...and that they NEED the video games and "bigger and better" electronics. But the truth is, I think we ENABLE them by giving them all of these "bigger and better" things....when they ARE, in fact, completely entertained by these fun "old school" games. In fact, watching these young kids play these simple games was so inspiring. Where I had thought that they would be bored after all of the "high tech" games they play on a regular basis....these young kids completely ATE UP these fun and simple games of our youth. It was so much fun watching these kids so focused on learning to tie knots, sew finger puppets, make homemade butter....and laughing at how much fun it was to play Chinese jump rope, "button, button, who's got the button," tug-of-war,etc....and make homemade leather keychains. If anything, I'm wondering now if OUR GENERATION is to blame for our kids being addicted to video games...simply because it's EASIER for them to entertain themselves that way....instead of US being involved in TEACHING them and PLAYING with them. Either way....I loved watching these young kids and it reinforced my desire to do even MORE "hands on" activities with my babies than I already do.

After helping 6 groups of energetic 4th Graders make hand-made leather keychains, all of the Mama volunteers were able to make one as well. Yay! I decided to make one for Jeff....using the snake leather stamp and green beads (his favorite color). Not exactly a work of art, but not bad, considering I had about 87 seconds to make it. LOL!

As much fun as it was working with all of these great kids, I feel so blessed to have been able to be there with my sweet little bud.....and so touched that he was so anxious for me to be there. I can't even put my love for him into words. I feel so richly blessed that God sent Kaden to me. I am so honored to be his mother and am happy that he still wants me to be so actively involved in his school activities. Life is good. ;-)