The Anderson Family

Wednesday, May 23, 2012

Annie Oakley

For the last 5 weeks now, Mikayla has had an assignment to do on Annie Oakley. She had to read a autobiography on Annie Oakley and fill out a weekly worksheet on what she read. Today she had to go to school dressed like Annie Oakley, answer interview questions about her life as Annie Oakley, and bring a prop. School rules made it hard to bring a prop for Annie Oakley. Annie Oakley was known for her sharpshooting skills. Unfortunately, she couldn't bring her bb gun unloaded, or even make anything out of paper that resembled a gun. So we decided to make a poster board with pictures of Annie Oakley and take in a target that Mikayla had shot with her bb gun. We were in such a hurry to get out the door this morning, that I didn't get any pictures of the poster board she made and the teacher asked her to leave it at school on display for others to see so it hasn't made it home yet for me to take a picture of it. Here are some pictures of our cute Annie Oakley.

Ashlee's end of the year 5th grade class party

Mr. Sundy before with hair on his head.

Ashlee's 5th grade class celebrated the end of their 5th grade year today with a party. The teacher keeps group points for behavior, etc. The group with the most points gets to shave the teachers head at the end of the school year. Ashlee's group consisted of 5 girls. They had the highest points, so they got to shave their teacher Mr. Sundy's head.

The five girls that got to take a turn shaving his head.

Alyssa

Sarah

Ashlee

Before the party began there was a baseball game. The staff members played against the graduating 8th graders. The whole school watches the game.

The teachers team.

After the baseball game. The 5th graders walked to a near by park for a party. They had a hot dog BBQ lunch and got to play activities at the park for the rest of day. Families were allowed to come and celebrate with their children.

Ashlee

Sarah and Camryn

The school year has flown by. Every school year seems to go by quickly anymore, but this year seemed to pass faster than any other year. Next year Ashlee moves across the campus to middle school. I can't believe that she will be in 6th grade. Ashlee is a little apprehensive about the move over to middle school, I am hoping that the transition goes smoothly.

Saturday, May 19, 2012

Swim Trials

After a long but fun trip to Alcatraz yesterday. We had to get up bright and early this morning for Ashlee's first swim event of the season. Today Ashlee had swim trials. She swam in 5 events (IM, 50 yd backstroke, 50 yd breaststroke, 50 yd butterfly, and 50 yd freestyle). She got first place in her heats for the backstroke and breastroke. Ashlee is off to a good start. I think we made the right decision by putting her on a different swim team this year. She seems to be getting coached better and learning how to do the strokes better.

Alcatraz

Ashlee and I, along with 3 of her friends their moms all went to Alcatraz together yesterday. The 5th grade classes have been planning this field trip all year long, yesterday they finally got to go. There are 50 5th graders in their school. All but 6 kids, had at least one or more parent or grandparent go with them. The group was huge. The weather was perfect. Not too hot, not too cold. A little windy on the boat ride over to the island, but other than that it was great.

I have never been to Alcatraz, so it was a neat experience for both of us. The day we visited there was a guy there who's father was a worden at Alcatraz, and he grew up on the island. He has wrote some books about his experiences on Alcatraz and he was there signing books.

Ashlee in front of a model of Alcatraz, before we boarded the boat to the island.

Alyssa and Ashlee on the Boat. Headed to the island.

Ashlee, Alyssa, Sarah and Lauren

The inside of a cell.

Ashlee in cell. The tour is a self guided audio tour. That's why we have headphones on.

Ashlee and I in a solitary confinment cell. These were small and dark.

Alyssa and Meliesa

Looking out a prison window at the San Francisco Bay.

Sarah, Ashlee and Lauren

Lauren, Alyssa, Sarah and Ashlee in the gift shop at Alcatraz

This may look gross. But there were 3 prisoners that made these heads out of soap and placed them in their beds to make it look like they were in their cells. They escaped the prison through a utility room corridor using spoons. They planned their escape for over a year. They were never found and it is believed that they made it to South America (I think they became shark food). But I guess one will never know.

After our tour on the island we had a late lunch on Pier 39 and headed home. Needless to say, the bay area traffic was awful. It took us 45min to get through one stop light, over 3 hours to get home. While we were sitting in traffic, a crazy city driver came up along side us (my friend Meliesa was driving) and hit the mirror on the side of her car. Cut us off, got into the lane next to us, and acted as if nothing happened. Since we were just sitting in traffic we decided to confront this crazy driver. He knew what he did, but all he had to say was "I was in a turn line and needed to go straight. So I needed to get over." I guess to him that means you wipe out anything in your way to get in the lane you need to be in. Thankfully there wasn't any damage and no one got hurt. Traffic was slow all the way home. Our trip to Alcatraz ended up taking 12 hours from start to finish. We all had fun, but we were all a little tired. It was a long day!

Sunday, May 06, 2012

John's 35th Birthday

We had a really lo-key birthday celebration for John. His birthday fell on a Monday, but Monday's are hectic and crazy around here between work, school, swimming,and the rabbits and chickens so the girls and I decided we would make his favorite cake and give him his gift on Sunday evening instead.