So yes, I have neglected my blog – it isn’t as if we are doing nothing these days. I have been very busy with going out and drumming up business with my new niche – land trusts. Most New York attorneys have never even heard of land trusts let alone know how to structure one so it definitely gives me a leg up on the competition. The downside of new clients is the “breaking in” period. We have to get to know them and how they work and vice versa. I am an email/IM/text girl – I like being able to carry on five IM conversations at once, emailing and texting. A phone conversation is a waste of time that often leaves one of the participants unclear later on as to what was said. A written record is always key – no misunderstandings (ok well atleast minimizes it), you can forward parts to staff to delegate work, update multiple parties with status etc. Unfortunately, some people do not subscribe to my theory of communication so my voice mail constantly builds up.
On the family end we have been preoccupied with school (report cards two weeks ago), skiing, First Communion Meetings for Matty, guitar lessons etc. It gets hectic!!! Boys’ report cards were good. Matty always does fantastically in his academics and citizenship (for lack of a better term – being respectful, following directions, listening blah blah blah). His teacher, Ms. Cavassa, can’t say enough wonderful things about him. Ryan, on the other hand, had a stellar performance academically but somewhat in the toilet on the citizenship front. He isn’t so much bad or malicious – he just does what he wants to do. So it was a difficult report card to address. How do you punish a kid who is the top student in his class but reward him when he dropped in being courteous, paying attention etc.? What a quandary. I am afraid that he is bored and that adds to the problem.
We are trying to plan a ski trip for the first week of March. Danny and I would like to take the boys out west to Colorado to get some solid skiing in this winter. Focus has to be on whats to do for kids, flight times etc. If it isn’t a kid friendly resort – it isn’t for us. So we are leaning towards Snowmass/Aspen. Snowmass recently implemented multimillion dollar renovations including a giant kid’s center. Flight isn’t too long either and there are lots of family activities. It is so beautiful out there – so wide open and majestic. Absolutely worth pulling the boys out of school for that kind of experience.
Both my boys are digging reading which makes me so happy. I love to read (haven’t necessarily done much lately except for work related) and to me, its the key to knowledge. Matty’s reading has improved dramatically – although he is reading on “M” level according to school, he reads books above that level with minimal assistance. Ryan sounds out words like a pro – I nearly fell off my chair the first time I heard him do it. He has a sound understanding of his letter sounds that he is definitely ready for phonics. This boy will be reading by the end of Kindergarten! Danny has been wanting to take the boys to the bookstore so we went last night. First, we had dinner at Ayan’s Shish-Ka-Bob at the Source Mall. The people there are no friendly and the food is delicious. Imagine our surprise when we looked over at the table adjacent to us and we see Ms. Berson eating dinner with her financee and family! Ms. Berson is Ryan’s kindergarten teacher. Everytime she spoke, Ryan’s ears perked up and he looked over because he could hear her voice. Once they were finished with dinner, we waved hello and she stopped over to talk to Ryan. It was one of the most enjoyable family dinners we have had in a long time.
We headed over to Borders Bookstore and made a bee line to the kid’s section. It is so nice with rugs etc and places to sit and read. Ryan found a couple of books and promptly sat down to read SpongeBob Atlantis Squarepantis and I had to snap a picture of him:
Matty is enjoying the Magic Treehouse series. (Hint! Hint! Everyone! Matty’s Birthday alert!) It is fiction but based in historical fact. There are something like 38 books in the series plus research books to accompany certain Magic Treehouse books. He also loved the book, “George’s Marvelous Medicine”, by Roald Dahl, upon which he based his book report project. So I suggested some Magic Treehouse research books as well as some other books by Roald Dahl. I explained if he liked a certain book, then he would probably also enjoy other books by the same author. Danny got some Disney books and we were set.
