Nate's latest

This fall Nate has been on an Upward Flag Football team at a church down the road. He has had practice one night a week and games every Saturday morning. In the beginning he was a little too easily distracted and unfamiliar with the game. But Nate has really worked hard and has improved a lot over the last month. At his last game he got three flags in a row and ran the whole length of the field for a touchdown! We just finished the season and we are so proud of him. Go Nate!
Well, we're nearly halfway through the semester now. Nate's first grade year is going pretty well. We are using a Heart of Dakota curriculum for 5-7yr olds: Little Hearts for His Glory. We are also in a homeschool coop/support group that we get together with for educational enrichment classes as well as field trips. Already this year we have gone to a nature park, the apple orchard, a honey farm and next week we are going to a dairy farm. I am teaching paper-crafting to his class at our homeschool group and we're having fun doing that together.
I will say that the excitement from the first couple of weeks of school has worn off now. Most days are good but we've had some days that had a little too much drama for my taste. Nate is incredibly smart. He is usually very eager to learn but sometimes he can be a perfectionist and he gets frustrated when his work is not up to his own standards. I am still learning how to help him when this comes up. We often have to have talks about adjusting our attitudes and choosing to have a good one instead of being grumpy.

Lately Nate has been really into creating his own "movie". We mostly listen to movie soundtracks in the car. Our favorites are the soundtracks to Dan in Real Life and Miss Pettigrew Lives for a Day. He will make up parts of his movie based on the music. So a song will come on and Nate will say: "This is when the spy is chasing the bad guy who robbed the museum", etc. He has cast all his friends and family as characters in his movie. Except me, Nate says I get to be the director. ;-) He is so creative and a lot of fun!