Ella At Last: First School Conference and Halloween Re-cap.

We endured our first parent-teacher conference last week and were relieved to learn the following: Ella is opening up. Ella is kind. Ella is following rules. Ella and her teacher have a mutual admiration thing going on. To be honest? The rest falls by the wayside. She is catching on with reading and math on schedule. She has stopped screaming for Panda in the morning. She has stopped crying when I take her in for line up before the bell rings. The success of all of this is more than I had hoped for just a few short months ago! Yay Ella! Just don't ask her if she likes school, because she will tell quickly and in a sharp voice, "No".

Moving on to Halloween catch up. Honestly, it is my least favorite celebrated holiday. I'm not into all the decorations and scary business. I can't stand all the gross candy sitting in a bowl on my counter for months, then moved to a cabinet in case future bribery material is needed. This year, it felt like we celebrated for about two weeks straight with school Trunk or Treat, our neighborhood bash, our school parade and party and then actual Trick or Treat on Halloween night. Did I mention the horrid weather we had on October 31st? Kudos to my mom and our new neighbors for trudging a few blocks in sideways rain, wind and freezing temps to get even MORE CANDY.

Glinda and her Daddy on the swings during our neighborhood party.

Look at all the cutertons in Ella's class!

You have to adore a teacher who dresses up in a Pooh costume and parades up and down the halls with her kids.

In and around all this, I finished up my 6-month tenure as co-president (my trusty partner, Mama Mo, too) for our moms' group in the neighborhood. It was a whirlwind of activity and new adventures and a huge increase in participation. We were interviewed by one of our dad's who writes for our local paper. The group got amazing coverage and our little Ella made the front page here.

Amazingly, Ella and Roz have had TWO days off in November at the same time even though they are in different school systems. We have tried to take full advantage with two sleepovers (me included because Ella is still freaked out she will 'need' me) at Roz's house. We also scheduled their flu mist appointments at the same time so that there would be less gnashing of teeth. It worked, kind of.