Butterfly Kisses

Dear Jonah,

So this year you have had a really, really amazing 2nd Grade teacher, Ms. Grosskreutz. I know, you call her Ms. G. She's been wonderful and this is yet another example of that. For your current science unit, each student had their own caterpillar to raise in a jar on their desk. They formed chrysallis (sp?), then hatched into monarch butterflies. This week, she hosted a butterfly picnic and all of the moms were invited.

Ms. G brought big chunks of watermelon, and each butterfly attached to one for awhile before finally flying away into freedom. You even had a few bites of your watermelon before your butterfly spread its beautiful wings and took off.

Kariah was bored to death and very angry about not being allowed to play on the playground with the entire elementary school (it was lunch time). She didn't like the butterflies, even though she was dressed appropriately, and could care less about the watermelon. She's not motivated by food, that girl.

Every time she tried to run away, Jonah you instantly ran after her which I really, really appreciated because I get bigger and slower with each passing day.

This isn't your whole class, there was a HUGE crowd of moms and dads (yes many dads) trying to take pictures at the same time and I could only get this tiny picture.

Jonah, as you know, you and Marcus don't go to our neighborhood school. 90% of your friends at church all get on the bus and head over to our school we are zoned for. You guys on the other hand are chauffered by your Mommy, to and from Neely Traditional Academy about 15 minutes away.

Mom takes a lot of flack for that from the neighborhood moms and I worry about the day that you will too. It's not that it's uncommon, Gilbert has a ton of charter schools. But we go to a public school that is purposefully ran a different way than the rest of the public schools. And that rubs a lot of people the wrong way.

But when you get to do things like THIS, or when you started reading the scriptures on your own in kindergarten, or when you're already doing your times table in 2nd grade, it really really makes me feel like it's worth it.