Emma's 5th Grade Graduation

Today was one of those fun life changing days.   Our oldest daughter Emma graduated from elementary school today.  What was even more fun was to watch her represent her class by saying a speech about the 6 years (kindergarten through 5^th grade) she had been at Woodside.

 

Emma recieving her 5th grade promotion certificate.

She has grown up to be such a lady!  She was very well composed on stage and I would be lying if I didn’t say I shed a tear or two when she was handed her promotion certificate.  I am taken back a bit that middle school is right around the corner.

Emma opening a card from a brother and sister in our congregation.

Emma's first grade teacher Mrs. Holmes.

I never went to one school straight through, attending five different schools by the time I was finished, so for her to relate her experiences with kids and teachers (some who were in the audience) for each grade at Woodside was pretty awesome.  

Emma's friend Jasmin since 1st grade.

Unfortunately, next year we have decided to move Myles and Sophie to an elementary that is much closer (1 block away instead of 5 miles away).  This will mean getting used to new teachers and reestablishing a good parent –teacher-student relationship that we had done at Woodside.  The good news is that the middle school is right across the street from the elementary so the kids will be able to leave at the same time.

Myles' Kindergarten Promotion

I can’t say enough about how awesome the kids teachers have been, from Mrs. Holmes and Hutchenson, to Robinett, Mrs Brandt, to Wilmoth, and not to leave out Mrs. Cattalini.  They have been great partners in teaching our children at Woodside.

Emma's 5th grade speech:

You can also find it on YouTube here: http://youtu.be/Nj2lDaIOLVA

And Beth's recap is found on her blog here. 

May Shasta Trip

 So we were able to get up to Shasta this May!  It has been so warm this year, and with the lake already down 30 feet, we thought it would be a great trip for some fishing and swimming.  However, as you probably figured, the rain did make a brief showing early on the trip which meant that is was in the low 70's  - too cold for a lot of swimming but the fishing was great.


In all we caught eight fish - 7 bass and 1 huge bluegill that went after a casting lure.  We went old school with using a long rapala crank-bait a green perch crank-bait handed down from my grandfather. All of the bass were in the 10 to 11 inch range (stuff we would have kept on the houseboat) but we returned to the fishery.

Camping was wonderful, full of my stick to your ribs classic breakfast (bacon and sausage patties, and pancakes and hash browns cooked in bacon grease), hot dogs and S'mores for dinner, and a lot of relaxing.

The campground was pretty empty.  Thursday and Friday we didn't have water, the camp host had been cleaning the water supply in prep for the holiday weekend.  But that was OK, we got some water at the local store in Lakehead and were good to go.

Out to get the Green Perch lure.  Sophie caught two Bass of it.

We are planning another trip in August, which will be all about the swimming.  However, with the heat this year and the current lake level, I am also now opening up to the possibility that we may need to find an alternative.  

I am told that since CalTrans requires the lake to be at a certain level for the Antlers Bridge construction that it can't go too low and as low as we have seen it at Antlers.  Let's see how CalTrans fights off the farmers and PG&E when it comes to their water needs.

Emma pretty happy at this point, Sophie had two fish on her.

All in all a great camping trip! You can find more pictures of the trip on our picture site here.

Emma's second fish.

Got to love the classics.

Even Myles caught a fish!!