Just want to update an earlier post

Well we still have the guinea pig Riven who I take care of but the hermit crabs did not last the month.

Kid is eating us out of house and home. AYCE sushi is my friend.

No apartment sale.

Well blogging is apparently not my thing

as it has been quite a while since I posted. Russell is turning 12 next month. So 12 going on 21. He still thinks he is smarter than us and maybe he is.

This year he is in the sixth grade and we have tuitioned him into a neighboring school district with better schools. I was very unhappy with his fifth grade experience and so was he. He is actually doing work this yesar and trying to get good grades. You can see the difference in attitudes at this school from the teachers and administration. I actually feel it is money well spent as you can see that they are spending their money on the kids and teachers supplies. No begging for paper or pencils this year. Everything including his grades is on the computer. The teachers have whiteboards. the kids get books to take home plus another book to use in the classroom so they don't have to carry the books back and forth. No condescending to the parents either which I hated at his other school. The principal always took the teachers side. Here well I don't have complaints about the teachers but get a vibe that I would be taken seriously. When I did have concerns about Russell his guidance counselor (yes they have them) was very helpful. Plus they have librarians and an open library. His last school had art and music but no librarian. I am all for electives but think the kids need a library with current books to learn from more than art. This school each year different electives. So music in 6th grade but not 7th, instead home ec. I can live with that. As long as he has phys ed he is happy. Music is available in high school, you elective choices there.

So in a sign of maturity, Russell just wants a few friends over for his bday to play xbox, eat pizza and sleep over. A cheap party for once. next year the bar mitzvah.

Long time since I posted here

Russell is now 10 years old and in the 5th grade. He has gotten so big. Still smart and still athletic but now he has attitude and talks back. Not real sure how to handle that. Other days he can be my sweet boy still. Funnily enough although I am still called russell's mom some of them have taken to calling me by my first name so i guess I am getting my identity back.

Yesterday he bought himself 2 hermit crabs. This is in addition to Riven the guinea pig who I mostly take care of. I am refusing to do anything for the crabs but know that won't stick. I did not tell my mom about them as she would yell at me for letting him buy them. But I did stick to my guns and made him pay for them and all the accoutrements.

We had dinner yesterday at UNO. I thought we would be safe there from the boys obession with seafood. Little did I know they now have lobster and shrimp scampi for about $19. So he got that, a smoothie and an appetizer. What are we going to do when this kid is a teenager and finishes all of that plus more. Buy two entrees? Granted he was hungry from soccer practice. If we had gone to the chinese buffet my choice all 3 of us could have eaten for what we spent on Russell's dinner alone.

I am getting worried that we won't be able to sell our apartment this spring and move next year to get Russell into a better school for 6th grade. Time to start finding out about private school open houses to cover all bases and tighten our belts.

Reading up 14 points!

Well school is over and Russell started camp about 2 weeks ago. His reading score DRA went up from a 20 at the beginning of 2nd grade to a 34. Break out the champagne! Or caviar. Russell is really into fish eggs right now. His russian heritage is shining through.

Not much else going on. Just work. Trying to restart my diet or eat correctly before I go to the doctor and get blood work done next month.

My friend has invited me up to MA for her son's joint high school and college graduation parties but I don't really like to highway drive so not sure what to do. Bus and train schedules do not work for me this time.

Well back to work.

Captain Underpants is my hero.....

Wow. It has been a couple of weeks since I blogged. As noone is reading guess it doesn't matter. We did not trade in Russell's nintendo for a dsi as gamestop would not take it without a serial no. did not matter that I had the original receipt. Instead we bought him a new cd player/boom box for his room and a couple of hot wheel dinosaur games. And more books. I finally found something he likes to read "Captain Underpants" series. he read the first book in 2 days. And this is a boy who hates to read. I can never get him to pick up a book. So here is to Captain Underpants and its author who got my boy to read a book.

Russells' Birthday

Tomorrow is Russell's birthday. He will be eight years old going on thirteen. We are having a family party and then Sunday he and his best friend J, his cousin N and his friend A are coming with us to Rye Playland. The kid loves roller coasters and this is what he wanted instead of a big party with all his friends. We brought cupcakes to school.

He loves roller coasters so much that when we went to Disney this past February I actually rode space mountain with him. Did I mention I hate roller coasters? And my dad rode that really scary one at Animal Kingdom that goes backward and he feels about roller coaster pretty much the same way I do. Thunder mountain was not that bad but that little roller coaster in the back of magic kingdom was pretty scary too. My dh did not ride any roller coasters but he did do the teacups, twice.

Russell wants a Nintendo dsi for his birthday. His best friend J just got one. They traded in the ds lite for it. We are going to do the same. Although I regret buying the thing in the first place. Sometimes I think the nintendo ds was invented by the d*v*l. It is like crack for kids. I had to take it away and hide it for a week once. I have not bought him anything else yet. He now wants a wii too but I think we will wait.

This morning

As always this morning we were running late. I asked Russell why his flutaphone wasn't in his back pack. He said first he wanted to give me a concert so he played "Lean on Me" and then sang it. How could a mom stay mad even when she was going to miss her train again?

Then he droppped his birthday cupcakes and blamed me. We were driving his friend A to school and I scared her when I screamed his name as they began to fall. Oh well. She said her heart stopped. When did second graders get so smart?

When I finally got to the train I realized I forgot to give him money for the mother's day sale. Called his dad (who should be paying for my present anyway), crisis averted.