Tuesday, September 5. 2023

Chase had the day off from school on Tuesday, and he and Nanaw had a fun day. They went for a walk, and took Lars and Tee Tee along with them. They turned left and walked up the hill; Nanaw was very happy that she could walk up the hill without a rest. So all her exercising and walking is paying off. When Chase is here Saturday, they'll go for another walk, this time to look for the kitty. Chase wanted to take the remote-controlled car but it wasn't charged. They charged it so it's ready for a walk on Saturday. Chase got all of his homework done and played on the computer when it was done. Chase came up with dinner agenda for his sleepover. Thursday evening is Sonic; Friday evening is Taco Bell; and Saturday night is Tiny Tacos. Nanaw checked out two movies from the library for them to watch: Marmaduke and Madagascar. Mama and Daddy are leaving for their adventure on Thursday morning after they drop Sam, Sylvester and Tyler off at Nanaw's house. Mama and Daddy and Mama's best friend Alice and her husband Chris going to stay in a house at Lake Egypt in southern Illinois. They'll be back home late Sunday morning.

Monday, September 4, 2023

Today was the church and school picnic. Chase and Daddy were supposed to work in the pitching booth, and Mama was working in the bookstore with Brady and Hunter's moms. Nanaw didn't know whether she was going because everybody would be busy. But at 1 o'clock, she decided to go, just to say hi to them. She found a parking space up on the school lot and walked through the church down to where the picnic was. She walked around looking for the pitching booth but couldn't find it so she texted Mama. Mama said Chase was inside with her at the bookstore. Nanaw went inside to find them. It turned out that Chase had gotten overheated outside at the pitching booth. Daddy sent him inside, and Chase fell down and skinned his arm. Woody (he's Nanaw's neighbor, one of the volunteer fireman, and one of Chase's former baseball coaches) helped him inside to find Mama. Nanaw found them, and she and Chase got a box of free crackers for him, then chocolate ice cream for Chase and vanilla for Nanaw. Then they went back out to get a Pepsi for Mama. When Daddy was finished at the pitching booth, he got food for himself and Chase, and then they went home, and Nanaw went there too to visit Chase. The second photo is Chase with the toys that his friends Brady, Hunter, Mason and Emma sent home for him because he didn't get to play any of the games and win prizes.

Sunday, September 3, 2023

Today was Mama, Daddy and Chase's annual pre-Labor Day party. Nanaw came to the party around 1 p.m. with her ambrosia salad, in honor of Grandma Pat who always used to make it for the party. Chase and Nanaw played in his room with his Minecraft figures until Chase's cousin Elias got there. Chase had been watching for him because he was eagerly anticipating playing with Elias. They spent all of the party (except for a brief time to eat) downstairs playing on the Xbox. It was a great party, as usual. Nanaw was especially happy to see Kris and Lindsey, Nanaw's wonderful granddaughters and Chase's cousins. Cousin Lindsey brought her "lovely man," Dylan. Nanaw interviewed Dylan and found out where he works, where he went to high school, where he lives now, and how he and Lindsey met. He is definitely a "lovely man," and Nanaw likes him a lot. Uncle Mike was also there with cousin Natalie and her friend Noah. During the party, Lindsey called cousin Mike in California so they could talk to him and find out about his job. It turned out that he was changing jobs and was going to be the manager of the bar in Oceanside, California where he's now a bar-back. He sounded excited about the new job, and they all congratulated him and wished him good luck. He says he's going to get a cat!! Lindsey is moving into her first apartment ever around September 12, and Uncle Mike is going to help her move. Cousin Kris is excited about starting to work at home, especially because she'll be able to spend more time with her beautiful black kitty. 

Saturday, September 2, 2023

On her way home from the little house, Nanaw went to visit Chase and to bring back Pepper. On Friday, when Nanaw took Chase home, he wanted her to take Lars with her for a sleepover. But Nanaw knew Chase would miss Lars too much so she took Pepper instead. As they'd decided on Friday, Chase and Nanaw worked on the math assignment on the Chromebook. It's a series of math problems called IXL (but no one knows what that means). They managed to do four of the six required series, mainly because two of them were really quick and easy. They can do the other two when Chase is off school. After they finished the math assignment, they played Kids Again Maturity with Mama. Chase won, so that made him very happy. Mama had made plans for them to go to a concert and food truck thing and games for kids thing up at Chase's school tonight. Chase, of course, said he didn't want to go but Mama said Hunter might be there. Hunter was there, and Mama said that made Chase happy. Nanaw is going to try to show Chase how much better it is and how much happier he'll be if he looks on the positive side of things and has fun doing things and not say no all the time. 

Friday, September 1, 2023

Mama had the day off from work on Friday so she took Chase to school. Nanaw didn't get to see him in the morning with his purple Field Day shirt. He was going to be able to do some things at Field Day so that was good. When Nanaw picked Chase up, he was not happy about Field Day, even though he looked good in his purple Field Day shirt. He said it was boring and that it sucked. He said that because there wasn't much space when they played kickball, they had to use their non-dominant foot. He said their lunch was a ham and cheese sandwich, with carrots and apples. He and Nanaw looked at Homework Central and saw that he has a lot of homework due next week but none of it is due till Wednesday. He's off school on Tuesday so he and Nanaw can work on the homework. In the evening, Mama, Daddy and Chase went to his baseball team's game. Chase didn't want to go but Mama said his team won the game, and he ended up having a good time, sitting in the dugout with his teammates. Mama and Nanaw are concerned about Chase's negative attitude and his action of saying no to everything. So they're going to see what they can do about that.

Thursday, August 31, 2023

When Nanaw picked Chase up from school on Thursday afternoon, they looked over Homework Central on Nanaw's phone. The only homework was for Chase to study for tomorrow's vocabulary test in AR. Chase asked if his friend Will could come over to play, and Nanaw said yes, and that he would have to study for the vocabulary test at home tonight. Will rode to Nanaw's house with Chase and Will. On the pickup call, Will told Mama all about school that day, all the homework he had, and that his tee shirt for tomorrow's field Day was lime green. Chase said his shirt was purple. Later, Mama and Nanaw told each other that they wished Chase would tell them so many things like Will does. Nanaw texted Will's mom to tell her how delightful he is and how much she and Mama enjoyed listening to all that Will has to say. A little after 4:30, Chase and Nanaw took Will home and then Nanaw took Chase home. In the evening, Mama, Daddy and Chase went to Culver's for dinner and then to Sam's to get things for the Sunday Labor Day party at their house. Mama said Chase saw baguettes at Sam's and wanted one so Mama bought him two. Nanaw asked Mama to take a picture of Chase for Days because in the one Nanaw took, Chase's eyes were closed. So that's the picture below. Nanaw hopes that Bread Boy enjoys his baguettes -- he does love bread. Mama has the day off tomorrow so she's taking Chase to school and Nanaw gets to sleep late.

Wednesday, August 30, 2023

Chase is getting really good at putting his contacts in all by himself. He gave Nanaw a demonstration, showing her how he could get them in on the first try. When Nanaw picked Chase up from school, they went over the things on Homework Central, and he had brought everything he needed with him -- and he had a lot of homework. Some of the things he brought home were assignments he wanted Nanaw to look at -- his answers to science career questions, his vocabulary assignment, and his English assignment about prepositions and adverbs. His most time-consuming assignment was math. He had 25 problems to do on simplifying equations. He and Nanaw each did the problems and then compared their answers. They each missed one problem, but not the same one. They used ChatGPT to check the answers to the problems they missed. Nanaw loves ChatGPT -- it's absolutely wonderful. Chase likes it, too. They also used ChatGPT to prove to Chase that he had the wrong answer to a part of speech question.   The one homework assignment Chase didn't get done was a history paper. He had to compare and contrast two Native American cultural areas. He told Nanaw it was hard and that he would do it tonight, He also had to do his 20 minutes of AR reading tonight. His new, larger backpack is working out well. He had to bring home a big stack of books today, and they all fit well into the backpack.