Tuesday, September 16. 2025

Tuesday was picture day, so Chase wore a royal blue Polo shirt and khaki shorts, and looked very handsome. After school, Mama wanted Nanaw to send her a picture of him so Nanaw did, and that's the one below. Chase's ICS baseball activities were postponed to Thursday so Nanaw had Chase with her till a little after five, the first time in a long time when he had time to do homework with Nanaw. For tomorrow, he has a science test where he wanted to use a white board to do his answers and study for the test. When he was done with that, he drew a Roblox Robot named JOB for Nanaw on the whiteboard. Nanaw took a picture, and that's the second one below. Next, he read the summary for the 2nd act of Our Town; they have a quiz tomorrow. Then, he finished up with studying for a science vocabulary quiz. Nanaw saw in Homework Central that he has a Young Author's submission due 9/29 so she asked him about that. He said he had a rough draft of his story about another perspective on the Jack and Beanstalk story. Neither Mama nor Nanaw knew anything about that so they were very surprised. Mama said she had just found out that it was required of the 8th graders that they submit a story. It seems that every other year, students are required to submit stories rather than doing it voluntarily. Chase said Mama and Nanaw could read his story when he has a final draft. It was a great afternoon for Nanaw, spending so much time with Chase and watching him do his homework. His grades are good, all A's except for one B in reading because of his problem with the AR reading score of 0.

Monday, September 15, 2025

Chase was quiet on Monday morning, and Mama said it was because he was so tired from all the baseball and hockey he played yesterday. When Nanaw picked him and Hunter up after school, Chase was his old self. He talked constantly with Hunter, and they had a great time. Nanaw had forgotten her phone so she asked Chase to take a selfie of him and Hunter. And of course, Hunter made a funny face in one of the selfies. The ICS team won their game in Maryville this afternoon. Mama had Chase text me the score -- 10 to 7, and Chase went 3 out of 5. Nanaw congratulated the hitting machine. The team they were going to play tomorrow cancelled so Mama thinks the team may have a scrimmage, which means the team will split into two teams and play each other. Mama asked Nanaw to take Chase home after school, have him change into his uniform and then take him to the Legion field. Nanaw said she'd be happy to do that. Mama said the team had planned to have a pizza party after tomorrow's game but they'll probably postpone it till Thursday's game in Millstadt. It's supposed to be cooler on Thursday so Nanaw will go to that game. Nanaw had her first physical therapy appointment this morning, and it went well -- she thinks this will help her back.

Friday, September 12, Saturday, September 13, and Sunday, September 14, 2025

On Friday, the 8th graders received their 8th grade hoodies. It's a tradition at ICS that 8th graders can wear their special ICS hoodies all day, every day. This is totally different from the rule for the rest of the students where you can't wear a hoodie during the day. This is a very special thing for the 8th graders, and they're very happy about it. Mama ordered two hoodies and one T-shirt for Chase, which is the same as most of the parents did for their kids because if they only had one hoodie it would be tattered by the end of the school year.. Chase was wearing his when Nanaw picked him up from school, and he looked very cool. On Saturday, Mama told Nanaw that Chase had fallen asleep in his bean bag chair again on Friday night. Nanaw thinks he likes being close to all the "guys" who are living in the bean bag chair. Mama didn't take a picture so Nanaw used the one from two weeks ago when he did the same thing. Saturday was a slow day for Chase; the only thing he had on his usually crowded schedule was hockey practice in the afternoon. On Sunday, Chase had a Blues baseball tournament. Mama sent a text to Nanaw saying "I have breaking news! Chase's team won the first game of the Bears tournament 17-2. Then they were down 5 to 1 in the championship game, and you guessed it! They won 6-5." Mama sent a photo of the team and one of Chase holding out his tournament championship ring. Yay Chase! On Sunday evening, Chase had a scrimmage hockey game at 7 in Fenton.

Tuesday, September 9, Wednesday, September 10, and Thursday, September 11, 2025

So most of the rest of the week was very different with no devices. Nanaw liked it, of course!! On Tuesday, Chase got out his back-up entertainment materials and set them up in the dining room/new computer lab. The creative little fellow's back-up materials include one of his his hockey nets; lots of ping pong balls and paddles; rubber knives, hatchets and other weapons; small pillows; water guns (without the water); and miscellaneous junk. He'll sit there for an hour or so, batting things around and completely entertaining himself with absolutely no devices. Very funny?! On Wednesday, the ICS baseball team had its special celebration for the 8th grade ball players, and Nanaw was excited to go. Each player had a poster of their photo -- very cool. The moms all got roses given to them by their sons. Lots of pictures were taken -- it was a great celebration, and Nanaw was so hppy to be there. Mama and Nanaw both missed Mr. G. He was a great contribution to ICS, and they hope he's happy in his new job. Thursday was another super celebration day -- Grandparents Day at ICS. First, there was a Mass; Nanaw sat with Chase, Brady, Emma, and both of Brady and Emma's grandmas and one grandpa, just like every year. Then they got to visit Chase's classroom, Nanaw's favorite part of the day. She hung out with Chase and most of the crew members, and she got to meet Mrs. H., Chase's homeroom teacher. Mrs. H is exceedingly nice, and she told Nanaw that she absolutely loves Chase. Mama says she probably says that about every but Nanaw prefers to think Chase is special. In some of the photos below, mama is showing off her new iPhone abilities paired with her new photo cropping / manipulation skills! LOL

Saturday, September 6, Sunday September 7, and Monday, September 8, 2025

At the Saturday, September 6 tournament, Chase's team lost both games. He and Daddy went to 5 o'clock Mass, and then they all went to Songs for Soldiers. All of Chase's crew, except for Joey were there. Mama says the boys hung out at the parking lot and probably didn't pay much attention to the music. On Sunday, Nanaw went for a brief visit to Chase. He wanted to finish his AR book so he could take the test. He had told Nanaw that he had a new way of reading. Rather than reading each word, he was reading down the center of the page, one whole line at a time. Nanaw told him that was called speed reading and that she'd taken a course on it in downtown St. Louis with her boss when she was at A.G. Edwards. She told him that the problem with it is that sometimes you don't retain what you've read. And that's what happened to Chase. He took the test on the book on Monday and only got four questions right. That means he didn't pass the test and didn't get any points, after spending all that time reading a 400 page book. So Daddy took his new phone away from him for a week, plus the computer at Nanaw's house. So everybody talked to Chase and told him no more speed reading; read each work carefully. Plus no more difficult 400 page books -- read the shorter, less adult books. 

Wednesday, September 3, Thursday, September 4, and Friday, September 5, 2025

On Wednesday, Chase was back in school, after his long Labor Day break. Nanaw still hasn't seen any of the papers he's done for school; she especially wants to see his math papers to make sure she ordered the correct math book from Thriftbooks. Nanaw had to take Chase home right after school so he could get ready for the ICS baseball game and be up at the field by 3:15 p.m. The game starts at 4:15 butNanaw didn't get there till 4:30. Chase was catching, and Nanaw was very excited about that. He did a really good job, even though the Waterloo team defeated ICS. On Thursday, Nanaw asked Mama if she could take Chase home right after school because she was going to go to the Emergency Room for her back pain. She was there for about 4 hours because her potassium was high, and they wanted to get it down. Hopefully, the medicine they gave her will help with the back pain. On Friday, still no papers from Chase. He promised to bring some home Monday; we'll see if that happens. Nanaw showed him the math  book she bought, and he said it was the right one. On Friday evening, Chase, Mama and Daddy had a hockey dinner with the other hockey parents and team members. Daddy is going to be the hockey manager, and Mama says he has a lot of work ahead of him. After the hockey dinner, Chase, Mama and Daddy went to the Bears baseball practice. They're all so busy with sports!

Monday, September 1 and Tuesday, September 2, 2025

Monday was the day of the ICS picnic, and the eighth graders were in charge of picking up trash. Chase's work shift was 10:30 a.m. to 1 p.m. Daddy took him up there and kept an eye on him. Mama did also; she and Brady's mom were responsible for making sure the eighth graders showed up and did their work. Mama also worked in the book store from 9 till noon. Nanaw came up when Mama's shift was over, and went with her, Brady's mom and Hunter's mom to play Bingo. Nanaw had fun at Bingo and will do that again next year. After Bingo, Nanaw went back to the bookstore area to wait for Chase to come see her. He did and she showed him the sign she bought for Truman that says :"Love You More." He smiled and said he liked it. Daddy was taking him to get something to eat, and Nanaw went home. One of Chase's classmates had an after-picnic party for both 8th grade classes. She has a pool so Chase had fun swimming. Tuesday was a work day for eighth graders to pick up picnic trash from 8 to 11. Daddy picked him up at 11, then took him home for lunch. Mama and Daddy brought him over to Nanaw's house about noon so they could visit. Mama and Daddy were going to the Verizon store to buy new iPhones for all of them. They picked Chase up at about 2:45 and told him they bought him a new iPhone 16, and he was very excited about that.