Happy Birthday Zoey!

May 2019

This post is a little late, but Happy 14th Birthday Zoey!  You've been part of our family since 2005 and we can't imagine life without you!  Here's to many, many more snuggles, pets and happy years with you.
   

End of School Fun

Thursday, May 16, 2019

Lots of fun things happen toward the end of the school year. First, we had field day and NASA day.  Then tonight was the Accelerated Reading Swim Party. This year the kids got to swim at the YMCA instead of South Charleston Rec. To be eligible for the party, the 5th graders had to read at least 50 points.  Emily read 75 so she got to go.  This is also the last year for AR and swim parties. A lot of Emily's close friends didn't get to go this year, but luckily Katie (right) and Addy (left) were there!
   
5th grade was responsible for the safety patrol at the school this year. So before school got out, Ms. Ramey took a picture of the whole class in their safety patrol gear.  Love these kids.
The last field trip of the year was to a WV Power baseball game out at Appalachian Power Park. I didn't get to go on this one, but a couple of other folks did take a few pictures.
   

ACSI Awards Day

Monday, May 13, 2019

Today was ACSI Awards day. Emily participated in Math Olympics (reasoning - word problems), science, art and drama and she did a great job in all of them!

She came in 4th out of all 5th graders from all schools statewide in Math!  She is most proud of this award.  None of the other 5 fifth graders from BCS placed and she works really hard at math.
The biggest disappointment, was science.  All of her teachers, principle and assistant principle all raved about her project and she had the highest score in her class.  Unfortunately, the judges on the panel for ACSI didn't seem to get it.  Some of the comments made that readily apparent. Oh well, she still got a "good" ribbon.  Sometimes creativity can be ahead of its time...

All the disappointment was quickly replaced with joy when she earned blue ribbons (superior ratings) in art (for her red macaw picture from Animal Kingdom) and drama - with a perfect score from both judges. 


Goodbye Grandpa Heintz

Monday, May 13, 2019
Well, sadly not all posts on this family blog are happy.  This is one such post.  Grandpa Heintz was admitted to Hospice a week ago Friday.  He was really struggling to breathe due to his pulmonary fibrosis. Luckily, after he left the hospital and moved into Hospice he had several really good days. And even as recently as this past Friday night he was able to talk a little, hug all his loved ones (including Emily) and spend time with family.  He passed peacefully this morning and now joins his parents and first wife,Sandy, in heaven.  I am certain Jesus greeted him with open arms.  His faith was strong and up until the last couple of days, he read his Bible and "The Upper Room" every single day.
   
Of all the titles he held in his life,  I have every confidence that "Grandpa" was  his favorite.  He loved his grandkids like nothing else on this Earth.  He was immensely proud of them and took great delight in watching them grow and play. 
  

We were really lucky to get one last family vacation in this past August to the Atlantis in the Bahamas.
   
While we are saddened by his passing, we rest easier knowing he is in a better place looking down and watching over all of us - no doubt serving as a angel for our whole family and his many, many friends.   Rest in Peace, Bob.  We miss you already.

Field Day!

Friday, May 10, 2019
Last week we got an email looking for volunteers for field day.  Field day is something I have elected to miss for the last several years in favor of attending other things.  But this year I noticed that the sign up sheet had a couple of slots for photographers.  Plus, this was Emily's last field day.  Middle school doesn't participate in field day. Anyway, I couldn't resist.  I signed up to be a photographer.  And I got to participate in Emily's last field day too.  A total win!

Field day included lots of fun activities this year including a sack race.

Tug of War
Spoon races!
   

And lots of other fun games too!
   

And, of course, fun time and happy memories with all of her favorite girl friends.  What a great day we all had!
   

USFS Test

Sunday, May 5, 2019

Today was YSFS test day!  This was the first time in several years that Emily was testing both Moves in the Field AND Freeskate.  She was excited.  Since she has progressed into some of the higher levels we didn't have to get up at the crack of dawn which was really nice.

First up was her moves test.  She passed Juvenile back in October, so she has been working on Intermediate for about 6 months now.  It looked to me like she skated a very good test, but when she came off the ice she was sure she hadn't passed.  She was pretty down.  But, now time for pouting because she had to go right back out to test her preliminary freeskate test.  Her freeskate test looked very good too and she felt pretty good about it.

Finally, after what seemed like an eternity, the results were in....and got a double pass!  She passed both tests!  The super exciting part is that this means there are only 3 tests (novice, junior and senior) standing between her and a USFS Gold Medalist jacket!

CONGRATULATIONS EMILY!

ACSI Competition

Friday, April 26, 2019

Today was the 2019 ACSI competition and once again Bible Center hosted - only this year the competition was at the school instead of the church.  Emily competed in Math Olympics, drama, art (photography) and science fair.  Only drama and science actually went to the event.  Art and math were completed in advance.  For art, she submitted her picture of the macaw from Animal Kingdom.  For drama, she performed "The Hat", by Martha Bolton, her piece from New York. 
For science, she did her "What Makes a Video Game Fun?" project with the video games she coded.  They spent at least 15 minutes with her, but her slot was only supposed to be 5-10 minutes.  She thought both drama and science went very well.  Now we wait for results. 

NASA Day at the Clay Center

Tuesday,  April 23, 2019

Wow.  You know, as I sit here catching up on all these posts I am reminded just how busy this spring (and particularly April) has been.  I am glad we made it!
Today was the 5th grade field trip to the Clay Center for NASA day!  They had speakers from NASA,  a movie about space, lots of activities and the kids got to make and launch rockets too. We started the morning with a talk from Justin Smith, one of the  NASA folks charged with teaching astronauts to fly the space shuttle.  How cool!  He talked about his path from Parkersburg, WV to WVU, to NASA's jet propulsion lab in California and ultimately back to WV to the Fairmont facility.
Then it was time for rocket launching and rocket making!
Emily's rocket launched the farthest in her group.  She was really proud.  They also had a chance to build a rocket seat for a little stuffed money - the first living thing launched into space.
After the activities, the kids ate lunch and then headed back to the planetarium for a movie about the Saturn V and other satellites researching other outer planets.  It was pretty neat.  Then it was time for more activity stations.  They even had a station with VEX robots.  Emily was thrilled!
This entire day was funded by a NASA/WV Space Grant Consortium grant and was totally free.  So hard to believe.  It seemed like all the kids had a blast.  I was so glad I got to chaperone.  This was a day even I will remember for a long time.