說到選國中 我家Jacob因為小學上的是科學數學實驗小學
所以國中還是從兩家實驗中學中 選了一個注重math, science的
申請也被接受了 不久前我們全家去這國中參觀 覺得跟小學很不一樣
教室跟大學沒什麼差別 也沒有小學那種溫馨的感覺
美國國中開始 學生就自己選課
所以那晚 每科老師上台輪流推銷自己的課
我在那裡拼命做筆記 結果結束之後我家老大閒閒的跟我說
mom, 我的課早就選好了 也交出去了...
是說 有沒有這麼獨立自主? 當媽的我很失落...
還好他選的就是我想"要他選的"!!!
他最期待的 除了比較高難度的數學科學資優班
還有西班牙文!!
美國真的是比較五育均衡
除了學科 要上好大學 還得各樣都好
這個國中很特別 從國一就可以選讀外語 有:法文 西班牙文 日文 跟拉丁文
Jacob覺得西班牙文是最多國家說的 加上他的好友是莫西哥人
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之前的下雪下冰 把我的車弄的髒西西
灰沙把前後玻璃弄得 我都快看不出企了
老公很忙 我又不想出去洗車
陽光滿滿的周六
我的老大說 mom, you want me to wash your car for you?
我家的老大 不是我在說 真的是個很棒的新好男人 什麼都做 而且滿心歡喜的做
我出運啦 老媽我只要拿著相機拍拍拍 20分鐘後 就有閃亮亮的愛車啦
親愛的老大 謝謝你 我愛你
p.s. 鄰居爺爺開車經過 問老大收費多少 他也想請他洗 我家憨厚的老大 想一想 竟然回答: It's FREE!!!
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每年到這時後都覺得不可思議
今年 我的大寶貝滿11歲了
問他 想不想慶祝 他說 不用出去 也不用請人來玩 就在家 跟平常一樣就好了
所以 我們沒有怎麼慶祝 除了買個大蛋糕 請婆婆Jimmy爺爺來家裡吃晚餐 吃蛋糕
婆婆爺爺給了一個大紅包
哈哈哈 怕弟弟吹他的蠟燭...
過去這一年 Jacob 在各方面 都很努力
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Jacob的學校MST(Math Science Technology Magnet School)
是數理科技實驗小學
這陣子竟然發通知回家
要發給四五六高年級小朋友
一人一台個人手提電腦
今天晚上
我帶著興奮的哥哥
一起去學校領laptop
先排隊....聽校長訓話....排隊....
終於領到一台 專屬於哥哥的laptop
每天都可以帶回家
每科老師也都會運用電腦教學
並讓學生在上面找資料 做功課
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在尚傑一天天的期待下
今天. 一早起來,
他就高興的歡呼 "woo -hoo, I am 9 years old!!! "
對阿,
真快, 我的寶貝已經9歲了.
尚傑是一個負責任的好孩子
自己份內的事
不管是做功課, 游泳
總是心甘情願的作,
不像弟弟,總是要媽媽三催四請.
個性溫厚, 關心別人.
常常都是笑容面對人事物
這點, 媽媽也要跟你學習呢.
是個好哥哥
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那天 (6/26),
一個有點炎熱,
卻在樹下有點微風的下午
我們在弟弟上完游泳課之後,
決定不急著回家,
在社區泳池旁
一大片草地上,
playground 玩玩,
享受一下悠閒的午後.
雖然鞦韆滑梯都有點上了年紀,
也不影響我們快樂的心情.
連一向不太敢盪鞦韆的妹咪,
都興奮的盪來盪去.
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This is an article written by Jacob...
I really like it...
My Family
I have a family,
There are five family members.
They are my dad, mom, little baby sister,
my little brother and me!
I and my families had been to a lot of places
and did a lot, a lot of hobbies.
Me and my little brother have gone to school for 185 days of school so far.
And we love things that our parents prepared for us.
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上個星期，弟弟就從學校帶回來一張通知，告訴我們尚豪被老師選上，會得到獎狀，在今天全校ㄉPARTY中，會被宣布並上台。希望我們家長參加PARTY一起為他慶祝。 一個班上選一男一女，原因是這半學期品學兼優。
看到這通知我們當然很高興，代表弟弟很認真學習，也是老師心目中ㄉ好學生。
哥哥沒帶回這樣ㄉ通知，我也不擔心，因為哥哥一直以來，都是全Aㄉ模範生。他以前也領過這種AWARD。
昨天下午去學校接哥哥弟弟，因為爸爸出差回來，說好要去機場接機。快到學校ㄉ路上，接到哥哥班導師打來ㄉ電話，說ㄌ一大堆：" This is Ms. DeVaney, 2nd grade teacher in MST, Jacob is my student... I am calling because I chose Jacob to be the award receipient for our class, because he has been doing SO WELL in our class......." 說哥哥是很棒ㄉ學生，成績也好，人緣也很好， 學習態度很認真。。。。 " ....so whatever you are doing at home is wonderful.. congratulations!!!" 還讚美媽媽在家教ㄉ很好.......
這個時候，媽媽ㄉ眼淚已經掉下來ㄌ
，不是說哥哥得這個獎有什麼重要，只是很感動媽媽ㄉ兩個寶貝兒子，是很認真學習，並且都得到老師ㄉ認同ㄉ好孩子。並且盡自己ㄉ責任作個好學生。最重要ㄉ，是兩兄弟很享受上學。
媽媽覺得，平常在家給他們ㄉ學習，幫助他們發揮更大ㄉ潛力，不被學校教ㄉ有限ㄉ東西滯留。這樣ㄉ堅持，其中ㄉ一個好處就是，他們在學校就很容易ㄉ吸收，不覺ㄉ有困難。
當然，媽媽是覺得驕傲ㄉ。有2個好兒子，讓媽媽平常ㄉ一些些辛苦，都得到ㄌ回報。這樣ㄉ禮物，是什麼也比不上ㄉ。
今天爸爸特地提早下班, 趕到學校看哥哥弟弟領獎. 看到兩兄弟大方ㄉ介紹自己ㄉ名字, 我們心裡都很開心. 這些小男生被校長誇為"英雄" ("HEROS" for boys, "SHE-ros" for girls)
哥哥ㄉ獎狀
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Today is the 1st day of school. Daddy took the boys to school and also tool grandma and Jimmy to the airport for going back to Taiwan.
The boys were excited and woke up early by themselves.. before 7am. I on the other hand, am not ready for them to start school yet.. I couldn't sleep well last night, I guess I miss them already. I like being with all my kids 24 hours a day.. although sometimes it is tiring and challenging. I enjoy watching the boys running to my room when they hear Acacia's 1st sound at wake up... I enjoy watching the boys interacting with their little sister, showering her with lots of hugs and kisses. Now school starts during the day it will be me and Acacia alone. I am sure we will miss our boys a lot. I pray the Lord will keep the boys... happy and safe and heathy, and fully preserved from all the worldly things they get in touch with in school. May this school year be a year of much learning and growing.
Grandma and Jimmy will be gone for 2 months. Mom made me some 包子 and 花捲 before she left. That's how a mom is, always thinking about her child's well-being. Now we can still enjoy grandma's homemade food for a few more days.
Now school starts we will have a very busy schedule...
Monday- Timothy will be enrolled in lifetime fitness swimming lesson
Tuesday- Jacob has his swimming class
Wednesday- Jacob has math class
Thursday - So far is their free day (maybe the day we will have Chinese class)
Friday - Jacob will have his basketball afterhour class at school beginning on 9/13.
Saturday- should be our family day.. when we spend time with each other... still home meeting at night
Lord's day - Always busy.. morning meeting, afternoon I have to teach a piano lesson... then it's time for school again.. cycle after cycle.
Acacia was having some running nose..on and off.... I guess because the pool water was too cool for her (went on Friday). I hope today when she wakes up it's gone away. I will try to feed her more foods... to fatten her up a little bit.
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Last night we took the boys to the swimming class.. the coach was a Korean, Mr. Kim (金教練). We thought it will be just like a normal swimming class, with a friendly teacher and a bunch of little kids... boy we were WRONG!! When we got there, we saw a bunch of kids grouped into different age groups. and when the coach blew the whistle, they all jumped in and started swimming like pros... we were very amazed.
Then the boys' class started, and coach Kim asked the kids to start float on their back and all the way to the other end of the swimming pool !!!!! WHAT???? This is our 1st class!!!! Timothy barely made it to the end... but I was already VERY amazed. I didn't know Timothy could float this far.. then it was Jacob... he usually sinks when he back floats.. but today he did it... all the way to the other end of the pool... he started crying and wanted to get out of the pool... I told Philip that was it, I don't want to enroll the boys in this crazy class, but Philip said let Jacob try it. So Jacob swam back (well, back floated back) ... then the coack asked him to do it over and over and over and over and over and over... I couldn't watch it. I had to go outside. Before I went outside Jacob pleaded "mama I don't want to swim anymore ". I felt like I was torturing my child.
I was very worried Jacob would sink. I asked Philip to GLUE his eyes on Jacob in case something happens.
THIS IS CRAZY CRAZY CRAZY swimming class!!! Coach Kim has a straight face. His English is not good. He doesn't give praises to the kids. He only asks them to swim non-stop.
So about 1 hour into the class, I walked in with Acacia and Timothy, seeing Jacob still had 1 lap to go. But with much surprise, he completed the devil command by coach Kim. We talked to the coach and he said he thinks Jacob is ok to join the class. So we decided to let him try a little longer. Hoping he will be trained in endurance, strength and obedience/dicipline.
So our brave Jacob swam for 1+ hours without any playing or much resting. WAY TO GO!! My big boy!!!!!!
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Starting tomorrow morning, the boys will start going to the Kindergarten nearby for a month+. This morning Ayi and me took Acacia to check out the school. It's very close to us, and next to the market. It's a school sponsored by 聖公會, so the teachers are christians and in the mornings the kids pray before they start the day... which is a very good habit. The classrooms seem very clean, and are all air-conditioned, which is very important under this kind of severe hot weather. Both boys will start school at around 7:30am and come home after lunch at about 12:30pm. We bought the lunch boxes for the boys and they will eat with the kids at school. A-ma paid the tuition for the kids which is $10000 for the 5 weeks, and plus $500 for the lunch boxes. I hope the boys will enjoy their time at Taiwan school... at least they won't be so bored staying at home all day long.
Yesterday we took the boys to the "Dream Style" mall, it is a very big mall, and tons of people because it's Sunday. We ate some stuff there and decided to leave. There have some water fountains and water shows that are pretty cool... the boys LOVED it. We then took them to the 碼頭, saw some fishing boats and for them to run around to get rid of their over-flowing energy, Then we went to eat Korean BBQ... it's pretty yummy, I wish Philip was there to share with us.
A-ma & 公公 took the boys biking in the morning. The boys slept on Ama's bed so they could get up early without waking mommy and Acacia. Jacob got a little scratch.. but already healed a few hours later.
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All 3 kids love to play piano, especially Acacia. Everyday she has to sit in front of the piano and she can play for a good 20 minutes!!! Both boy like to play piano without me teaching them. Timothy has "perfect ear" ... which means he has perfect pitch, he can just hear some music and find the notes on the piano and play it out, which is inherited from me I guess.
Acacia: " Can I join you, 哥哥?"
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Yesterday I took Jacob in to see Dr. Beach(partner of Dr. Cole) to see if there is anything that will help Jacob's wheezing. She spent some time discussing Jacob's asthma history with me, and she said we should treat it very aggressively, and that we should try to get his asthma under control... she said if we have to use albuterol more than twice a week it's too much. I didn't think Jacob's asthma was that bad. So we got prescriptions for 6 different things!!! There are 2 kinds of pills to take, they are for allergy control, since asthma and allergy go hand in hand. The other 3 are for his inhalation, and another one is a nose spray(something to control allergy too and give him a clear nose). All the medicine came up to be $135, and this is only the co-pay part... can't imagine if we don't have insurance, it will probably run up to $500 easily!!!
So Jacob has been really good taking the pills as well as the inhalation treatment. Hopefully like Dr. Beach said, we will have his asthma controlled before we go back to Taiwan!!! And we will have to see her again at the end of next week.
Jacob weighed 60.5 lbs yesterday, what a big boy I have!! He has grown from 8 lb 3 oz to 60.5 lbs in 7 years!!! Wow!!
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It;s hard to believe, but my little boy Jacob is 7 years old today!!! 7!!! How could time go by so fast?
Today is also Martin Luther King day... I am not sure if it's his birthday or just a day to remember him. But he sure was an important figure in American history for the human right freedom. He was the one that spoke strongly for black people's freedom. A well-respected person in this country. So the boys had no school today, so we asked Daddy to take a day off too.. so we could spend Jacob's birthday together as a whole family.
Today is also extremely cold, maybe the coldest day in this year. It's about 32 F degree, which is below 0. And it really feels like 16 F degree when we were outside.
We started the day with the 2 boys snuggled up in our bed. It felt so nice to have all 5 of us in our bed. We talked and the boys giggled with their little sister and we all wished our big boy a happy birthday.
Near lunch time we decided to go out, although it was freezing cold outside. We had to return a toy boat that was not good, then we went to Ikea for lunch and some shopping. Well we didn't expect to buy anything big but we eneded up looking at the desk set that Chocolate and Joanne have in their house. It is actually twin sets of desks that can be combined into a huge work station. We talked about having them for the boys to do homework and later on we would buy computers for them to use. Then we said it would be nice if we could get Chocolate to apply the 15% employee discount for us because the desks are not cheap... $310 a piece. Then when daddy took Timothy to use the restroom for the 2nd time 
me and Jacob ran into Chocolate. Then after a very brief discussion we decided to buy the desks right then! 
That is how daddy is. For the boys he would buy things without any hesitation. We never bought a desk for ourselves for this much money, but when we consider anything good for the boys, daddy will buy anything that we can afford for the boys. 
Then we said this would be the big birthday present for Jacob(although we really have bought a digital camera for him for his 7 year old birthday!!). What a spoiled boy he is. hehe. But we feel it's money well spent. Now I can't imagine how daddy will treat his little princess when she reaches 7!! Hopefully she won't ask for a horse cause she might very well get it from her daddy!!
So at a very cold day, daddy packed the big pieces of the desks on top of our van and inside our van (for about 30 minutes!) then we headed home. We asked Jacob what kind of cake he would like to get, well he doesn't really like sweets that much. He said he would rather have a piece of La Madeleine's Tiramisu. so that's what we got. It might look small but it is really delicious and pricy.
We got home and while I prepared dinner, Jacob did his math homework(what a good boy) and daddy started working on assembling the desks. Later we put candles on the Tiramisu and Jacob blew the candles before we started singing happy birthday !! 
I gave my big boy a HUGE hug and told him how much I love him before I sent the boys to bed. I indeed love them very much, they enrich my life in so many ways. I can't thank the Lord enough for giving me these 3 percious children. They are just perfect in everyway in our family. I pray the Lord will keep them always this pure and simple, with health and happiness everyday, that they will be vessels to contain Himself.
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This morning I went to the parent conference time with Jacob's teacher, Mrs. MacInnis. Jacob has all green passes from the subjects, and the teacher said he is above level on math, reading, and overall everything is excellent, even his behavior. I was very happy to hear that, it's great to know all the hardwork I do pays off. And I am happy to have a confident child at school. The only thing that he needs to work on is his handwriting, I told his teacher. So we will start working on that. Jacob LOVES to learn spelling words every week. Because he has been getting perfect scores on spelling tests each Friday, we promised him he would get a new toy if he has 4 perfect score(4) testes. And he works hard on his spelling and he can't wait for Friday to come to take the test... wow!! Today is only Wednesday and he is already ready for the test. 
As for his math, we sometimes still struggle at his homework time, because mental math is not easy stuff and it's a lot of homework he has to do everyday, on top of his reading. I try to tell myself to cool down and not get angry when he is frustrated. After all we really just wanted to expose him to another way of mastering math, not to force him. After my attitude changed, Jacob seemed to be better, more relaxed. I really need to remember Jacob is only a 6.85 years old little boy. I don't want him to be a genuis, I just want him to be a confident happy kiddo.
I also went in for my bi yearly teeth cleaning today ... OUCH! I dread this time. Bad news. I have 3 spots between teeth that have cavity and another spot under the filling, so total of 4 places that need to be fixed. 
The dentist asked if I have been flossing everyday... of course I do... or at least I try to... but I have to admit since I gave birth some days I have been sloppy... when I got too tired, I would fall asleep while holding Acacia to sleep, and several times I did not brush.. until I woke up at midnight.... 
I am sure that's the cause of these new cavity... but I won't admit that to my dentist..hehe.
Acacia did really well at my teeth cleaning time today, all smiles and cooing. The staff loved playing with her, and she didn't cry at all, my dentist held her for a while. They all thought she was a great baby, and very pretty!! Of course, see her parents they should know... haha.
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