5/24/2016

The Tobin Times #57

Filed under: — Aprille @ 1:56 pm

My little sunshine boy Tobin,

We’re almost done with the school year.  Tomorrow is the last day, and while I think you’re looking forward to summer break, you’re going to miss your friends and teachers at Hoover.  You had a great year.  You made some good friends, learned a lot (you’re doing some reading, partly thanks to Miles’s tutelage), and proved once again that you’re flexible and resilient.  Though I’m sure you would have done great in kindergarten, one more year of preschool will be good for you too.  Kinderfarm will give you a whole new skillset in the outdoorsy realm, and I’m sure you’ll keep up the academics as well.  Lucas Elementary will have to brace itself for you once you start kindergarten the following school year.

You’ve told me that you want to take a semester off from Family Folk Machine, though now I’m not so sure you’ll stick to that plan.  You did such a good job at our concert last weekend.  It was a very long day, starting in the morning with sound check and continuing on until past four o’clock.  Last time you fell asleep right there on the stage during the last song, and I thought you were in danger of doing the same thing this time around.  You did great, though.  I saw you working hard on maintaining your focus.  I couldn’t see you because you were standing in front of me, but our director Jean tells me that you really rocked out on the song “People Have the Power.”  Nana and Papa were there in the audience to cheer you on, and they too were impressed with your great behavior and participation.

Another reason I suspect you’ll want to re-up in the fall is all your good choir friends.  You may or may not have a crush on a couple of them, too.  I’ll support you whichever way you want to go.  Sometimes rehearsals can be a little long and tedious for you, but I also think it’s good to expose you to people who are working together on an artistic endeavor.  For the most part you rise to the occasion and do great.

A couple of weeks ago we attended Wild Kratts Live, the tickets to which you and Miles got as Christmas presents.  Wild Kratts is one of your favorite TV shows, a PBS joint about two brother wildlife experts who go on semi-fantastical adventures in the interest of conservation and education.  For the live show, the actual Kratt brothers were there.  They put on a pretty fun event.  At one point you leaned over Miles to say to me, “I’m really enjoying this!”  You made me promise that if Wild Kratts Live has another tour that stops near us, we have to go.

Whenever we attend a theatrical event, I think to myself that we need to do it more often.  It can be pretty expensive, which is why I sometimes balk at getting tickets for things I’m not sure you’re going to love, but I should really just buck up and do it more often.  Maybe we could skip some of the toys and do more tickets for Christmas and birthdays.  When I was a kid, Mubby used to take me to performances pretty often.  Sometimes I found the actual show pretty boring, but there’s something magical about being part of the whole process.  We attended your cousin Max’s school performance of The Music Man, and I’ll be honest with you, the pit orchestra was not the strongest part of the show.  To be fair, they were middle schoolers, and I admire that their teachers had the ambition to put on such a challenging play.  Max and Foster were both excellent.  The orchestra probably needed a little more rehearsal.  Nonetheless, when the lights went down and the overture started playing, I got chills.  I hope you grow to love those moments too.

I’m excited to have more time with you this summer, Tobin.  You’re a lot of fun to have around.  I’m sure we’ll do all kinds of exciting things.  We haven’t sat down to make our summer activity list yet, but you’re already signed up for tee-ball in the first half of the summer and two mornings a week of Kinderfarm in the second half.  Other than that, I’m sure we’ll be hitting the splash pad, the movies, the library, the downtown fountain, the frozen yogurt shop, and the Natural History Museum.  You’re definitely old enough to enjoy the summer reading program, so we’ll have to see what the prizes are this time around.

I’ll probably go crazy if we sit around the house too much, so I thank you in advance for going on adventures with me.  We don’t have any specific vacation plans, though I’d like to make a Saint Louis trip if we can get it done over a long weekend.

Your current favorites:  pepperoni pizza, waffles, Spider-Man books and videos, taking walks, playing at the playground in the evening with your neighborhood friends, helping with dinner preparation and setting the table, dancing, and doing whatever Miles does.  You’re not a copy-cat, though.  Even though Miles gives you a lot of good ideas, you put your own spin on things.  I know it can be frustrating to be a little guy and just not able to do everything your big brother does, and we’ve certainly dealt with some tears and grumpiness.  You get mad that you can’t write in cursive, that you can’t play Clue without significant help, that you can’t learn computer programming on the Khan Academy website.

Photo by Gary Clarke

Still, you find your own way to get things done.  I can always count on you for a smile, a hug, and a dance party.  Keep on gettin’ down, my Tobin, even if you’re the only one facing that direction.

Love,

Mommy

 

 

 

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