It was a good, good day.

Until last Friday, I thought that the thing I loved best about my oldest two sons was that nine times out of ten, they are able to urinate into the toilet without getting so much as a drop on the floor.  A close second to that would be their solid grasp of sarcasm, without which, most of our conversations would end in confused looks or hurt feelings.


On Friday, I drove, (hallelujah), to pick up the boys from school so we could go pick out snacks to take to the ball game that night in Salt Lake.  I asked them how their days were, and boy, was I a proud Mama when they told me.  


Ethan had used all his Bull Dog Coins* at the Bull Dog Store to purchase me a necklace.  He handed me that red-beaded Mardi Gras necklace with a radient smile plastered on his cute, little mug, and I wore it all day with as much pleasure as if it had been a string of genuine pearls.  Ethan also told me that there was a little boy at recess who had no one to play with because his legs don't work very well, and that he had asked that boy if he would like to play with him, and together they played tag, until the "outside duty" came and told them that tag was not allowed.  (Seriously?  No swings, no tag...what's next?  And I know it sounds odd for Ethan to ask the boy who's legs don't work well to play tag with him, but it's the thought that counts.  I hope the recess aid caught them quickly, or that poor boy might have spent his entire recess hopefully chasing my 6-year-old all over the playground and never gotten close to catching him.)  


Cameron beamed when he got in the van and told me that he had passed his math facts and moved onto subtraction.  I was just as proud as he was, because the kids have 2 minutes to get all 36 addition facts correct, and, as of a week ago, Cameron was taking 2 minutes and thirty seconds to pass all 36.  On Friday, he got them all right in one minute, thirty-two seconds.  He has worked his tail off to complete that, and now he is one of very few in his class that has moved on to the next level.  I am extra pleased with his success, because I went to his class and tested 8 kids, and only one of them passed, while the others were struggling to get 15 correct in the two minute period.  I'm not saying he's better than the others, I'm just very happy that he doesn't have to struggle with math while he's having to struggle with reading.  It was a painfully happy moment to find that he had passed, and his confidence is taking off!  He then told me that he had played four-square with 6 other kids at recess, and I almost cried.  Every day I ask Cameron who he played with at recess, and his answer is always the same:  "I mostly played by myself."  That is agony to a mother.  So to hear that he had been involved in a game with his classmates was the best news I could have gotten that day.


Today, I am a very proud mother, indeed.  And it has nothing to do with bathroom cleanliness.

*Bulldog coins are pieces of paper they earn in Ethan's class to be spent every other Friday in their classroom store, where they can choose from an array of trinkets and prizes.