Holy Cow! H-O-L-Y-C-O-W! Holy cow!

I am just bursting with pride today for my little man. Jack had won a little spelling bee in his classroom before Christmas break, and so advanced to the school-wide spelling contest for 4th and 5th graders. That was today. The 18 finalists from the classrooms were up in front of an assembly of students and teachers in the cafeteria/multi-purpose room (MPR). They had the chairs on the "stage area," a table for the judges, one 5th grade teacher reading the words, and a big scary microphone set up for the contestnats to talk into when they spelled their words. This all started at 1:30pm, it was after 2pm when I looked up at the clock in my classroom and realized I was missing it! So I grabbed my camera and took a quick walk down the halls. When I got to the MPR, there was Jack up at the microphone spelling a word that I had NO idea how to spell! And there were only 2 other boys sitting in the chairs behind him. When Jack got that word right (obstinate) one of the other boys had to sit down, because I guess he had missed his word. So it was down to just Jack and Aron (a boy in Nora's class.) The assistant principal was standing by the door and I told him I was so glad I hadn't missed the whole thing, and he let me know that Jack had already had a chance to win the whole thing, but mis-spelled a word and so let the rest of the kids back into the competition! And then with Jack & Aron, that happened again! Jack mis-spelled ubiquitous but luckily, Aron mis-spelled pumpernickel so they went on to ROUND 9! Then, Jack correctly spelled muumuu, and Aron missed his word which we can't remember right now, and then he correctly spelled geranium to win the spelling bee! The whole crowd errupted in cheers, they were all so proud of Jack, and I felt that lump well up in my throat when you just KNOW that this is one of those moments your child will always remember! The teachers and kids all wanted to shake Jack's hand. He was such a good sport and shook hands with Aron and told him what a great job he had done. They announced that Jack will move on to the district spelling bee in April, and he also will be invited to a county-wide spelling bee in February! Holy cow!!!

I am so glad that I am working right there at the kids' school. I'm so lucky that the teacher in my classroom lets me sneak out to do something like watch the tail end of a spelling bee or run out to my car to get one of my kids' jackets they left there. After school, Jack came over by "my door" where I have to be for 15 minutes after school gets out to make sure the kids are being safe, etc. At least a dozen kids came up to him while he was standing there by me to congratulate him, shake his hand, or say - hey you're the spelling bee champ! It made my day to see my little man shine today.