Sam's First Day at Kindergarten

God answered our prayers, and Sam once again was selected to be a student at McLean Science and Technology Magnet Elementary School. August 17th was his first day. He has a new Transformers backpack, and Sunday night we went to Walmart and found a new lunch bag, and food that Sam agreed that he would eat for lunch. (Many of you know that he is quite a picky eater and has had the same thing every day for lunch over the summer - he calls it "the usual" - cooked pasta and red sauce). School begins at 8:00 and is over at 3:10. After the usual interrogation after school, Sam told us he was done answering questions. We now have an agreement that he will make a preselected noise when he is tired of answering questions. He says his favorite times are recess and P.E. ("that means physical education, mom."). As part of the Science emphasis, there is a specific classroom for science, which also houses 4 pets. Sam was very eager to tell about that class. Sam bought a new bath towel for rest time, and he says that he has been falling asleep during the rest time. I wouldn't doubt it at all. He is hoping this week that his class will get to visit the library. I asked him last night if he had made any new friends and he said, "Mom, I'm friends with everyone in my class." So much for a mom worrying if he has friends to play with or eat with.

Sam has recently gotten into legos. Specifically the Power Miners.


He does pretty well building them himself. Each one comes with a pretty easy to follow instruction book with step by step instructions. Last Wednesday, Sam told me he needed to write a book, it was to be 14 pages long. So I ripped off 14 pages from a note pad. Sam wanted some of the words to be pictures (like he had read in a Spongebook book - I think it is called Rebus), so I wrote the words and drew the word pictures, and Sam did all of the illustrating. Sam wanted to take it to school Thursday. He showed it to his teacher, Mrs. Kennedy, and she let him sit in her chair and read it to the class. Apparently she also wanted him to read it to the principal, but when Sam went to the office, she wasn't there. There is always one more Power Miner kit that he needs. He loves going to the Lego website and watching the videos there.

Family Trip February 22 Atchison, KS

We started our trip with a stop in Overland Park, KS to spend the night at a Fairfield Inn that was less than 6 months old. Probably THE nicest hotel stay we've ever had. After dinner at Sweet Tomatoes, we headed back to the hotel for the best part of staying in a hotel. The swimming pool, and hot tub.

We took this family portrait before we left our wonderful hotel room to head up to Science City in Kansas City, MO.Ben tried out the musical drums.
Ben and Sam riding the crocodile.

They are posing by the puzzle they put together. I can't remember exactly what it was a puzzle of.

Posing in front of the dinosaur. Compare this with our visit in February 2007 with our friend Joey Hudson. http://samshaffer.blogspot.com/2007_02_01_archive.html

To celebrate Dental Health Month, the Science center was offering free teeth checks for all the kids. They also made an impression of the kids teeth which we keep in case we should need it to identify our child. The impressions also have the kids DNA, as well as scent in case they are lost.

We left Science City and headed to Atchison, KS to take in a basketball game at Benedictine College where my Uncle Hugh is the Chaplain of the Basketball team. Ben loved the popcorn, and into the game for most of it...

As long as he got to sit where and how he wanted to.

Uncle Hugh is loved by the team, as each player came off the floor, they came over and gave him a hug before sitting on the bench. It was very touching to see how much he means to the team.

Sam and Ben trying out the sweaty player chairs.

After the game, Uncle Hugh took us back to the locker room which has been named in his honor. Someday they will have a nice plaque instead of a piece of paper. But the honor is all the same.

After the game, we headed back up to the bishops suite for a rousing game of Ice Cream Scoops of Fun. One of Ben's favorite games.

Then off to our room (#2) with the special yellow spreads for the kids, for some movies and leftover cookies from Sweet Tomatoes.

On Sunday after Mass, we took a short walk on campus and took these scenic shots.

One big happy family. What a great time we had.

Breaking the Wishbone

We had turkey for Christmas this year. We kept the wishbone for the kids to break. We tried several times over January and February to break it, but it never broke. Here is the final result.

Ben sings happy birthday to Elmo

Elmo's birthday is February 3rd according to Sesamestreet.com. Ben really loves Elmo and thought we'd make him a birthday cake out of Playdoh.
Sign out

Meet the Cousins

On January 24th we traveled to Hutchinson to celebrate my Aunt Shanna and Uncle Herb Soukup's 50th Wedding Anniversary. Sam and Ben had a great time meeting their relatives (the children of Kristin's cousins...whatever that would be.)

The girls, Paige and Rachel had a blast playing with Ben. I did not get any video of Sam and Ben Soukup playing "Monster get you" with a pink finger puppet that Sam brought.

Ironically there were 2 Benjamin Lewis' there, our Ben and Ben Soukup. Hopefully we'll get to see the cousins again before the 75th Wedding Anniversary party!

left to right. Benjamin Lewis Soukup, Paige Soukup, Benjamin Lewis Shaffer, Rachel Barrett, Sam Shaffer

Ben's Favorite Things (including singing about God)

In preparation for Ben beginning BSF in January, I started singing this hymn to him at bedtime. The other day he wanted to sing with his microphone, so I suggested God is So Good. So far BSF seems to be going well, and he doesn't seem to mind that I am outside his classroom in the hallway, catching glimpses of him participating in class. What a blessing that he is enjoying learning about God, and we pray that this lasts a lifetime for him.

Here Ben models his 3 favorite things. Bob the Builder, WuShock, and Elmo. Most days he brings out a video with "melmo" that he wants to watch. Thankfully, the videos are somewhat educational, and Ben is beginning to learn his alphabet, numbers, and colors.

Ben got a PlayDoh Ice cream maker kit for Christmas. Here he is serving Bob the Builder and Elmo. Ben did this all by himself. I only helped Bob by putting a dictionary on the chair so he would be tall enough to reach the table.