One more about school stuff

If you don't like hearing people brag about their kids, then this is not the post for you. In fact, this is probably not the blog for you.

Along with all of the end of the year activities came some awards.

Emma was inducted in the National Junior Honor Society. You have to have good grades, leadership experience and plenty of service to be a member. They had a nice (extremely long, pretty boring, but still...nice) ceremony at the school that ended with candle lighting.

Then, for the second year in a row, she got the citizenship award. One girl and one boy in each grade are chosen by the teachers...and they chose Emma. Sad I didn't get any photos. Last year her homeroom teacher called to tell me about it (it's a surprise for the students) so I could make sure and be there. This year no one called so I assumed she didn't get any awards this time and didn't go to the assembly. Silly me, should've known. Love our Emma.

For third grade they hand out certificates for perfect attendance and honor roll (for being on it the whole school year). Josh got both. He was proud and surprised about the perfect attendance one. He brought the certificates over to me and laughed in a this-is-so-crazy-i-just-can't-believe-it laugh and said, "I was absent two times!" Ha! Love him.

For fifth grade they have a big fancy deal type of night since it's their last year at Rocky Hill and all that. (Incidentally, there's no awards or anything for first grade, so nothing to report on Lydia this time.) They had a long slide show first, followed by the fifth grade musical, where Ben played a knight, but was the understudy for the lead, King Arthur. (In the days leading up I kept asking how that other kid was feeling. Sick? Losing his voice? Broken knees? Anything? No? oh well.) Turns out Ben was in the spotlight plenty later in the evening so it was probably good not to be the star of the play too.

After the play it was time for awards and there were many. First, three of the special area teachers (art, music, and gym) chose one girl and one boy from the entire grade to award for outstanding achievement. Guess what? All three chose Ben as their boy. It was almost surreal to hear his name again and again. Bonus: I heard two different moms around us whisper to their husbands how much they love Ben, such a nice boy, he's my favorite, so humble, etc, and one of them leaned over to me and repeated her praise. Then the librarian gave awards to the three students with the most AR points. Lucky for us she took the top three and not just one or two, because Ben had the third most AR points in the school so another medal/certificate combo for that. Then. Each of the homeroom teachers gave out awards for who they considered their top students in each subject. Ben's teacher chose him for science. (He later said he was glad he got that one, it's his favorite.) About this time one of the teachers called Ben out on winning so much and started calling him Michael Phelps (most of the awards came with medals too). Then he got certificates for being on honor roll all year and another one for being in the Continental Mathematics League. Finally, just to round out the evening, he got the Presidential Scholar Award. He was the most decorated fifth grader by far. When we walked out to the car at the end of it all, he couldn't make it two steps without being high-fived by his friends or congratulated by their parents. Best part: he really was humble about all this. He was genuinely surprised, the only awards he knew about ahead of time were the honor roll and presidential one. He just wore a shy smile and said thanks to everyone. Love.that.kid.