Leon has been weepy for several days now, sobbing at the drop of a hat. Why? Because he wishes “we were still in Iowa and Minneapolis.”

Dude, I get it.

Last week, we flew to MSP and spent a total of 7 days visiting my parents and exploring Minneapolis. He got tons of attention, toys, and desserts – and it’s hard to come back to reality after all that.

Here’s what his week included:

• A kid-sized Cars suitcase to roll through the airport
• A free bag of donuts
• First time on a ferris wheel
• A treehouse built primarily for his visit
• A treasure hunt with lots of cool toys
• Making kringla
• First time bowling
• First time playing pool
• Making homemade lotion
• Seeing a tractor and cows on a real farm
• First time eating ice cream in a cone
• First time golfing at a golf course
• Steering a golf cart
• A parfait for breakfast almost every morning

Minh: “What’s your favorite subject in school? And you can’t say lunch or recess.”
Leon: “Dismissal.”
Us: ????
Leon: “Why I love dismissal is because then I get to see you guys.”
Us: ????????????

We had Leon’s first quarter parent-teacher conferences today. We also got his report card last week, as well as reports from the reading and math computer programs they have the kids do.

He’s in the 99th percentile for math! His estimated percentile range is literally 99-99+.

For reading, the kids are scored on a different program, so the evaluation report is different. He’s ranking “above grade level” on almost every skill, and his teacher said his total score his the highest she’s ever seen!

At conferences, she said he initially had trouble understanding why he wasn’t called on every time, especially since he knew the answer. He also tends to try to teach the other kids – which is feedback my parents got during my kindergartens conferences too (almost verbatim) 😂 We’ve since been reminding him, “You’re learning, not talking” so hopefully that sinks in eventually.

Either way, we’re super proud of him!

Ill wishes I received this morning from an angry 5-year-old:

“I hope you drink too much coffee and have to go to the bathroom 100 times!” 😡

Leon had no school yesterday, so I was pretty happy on Sunday to only meal-prep 4 days worth of lunches/snacks. BUT… while Minh and I were working yesterday, he ate (what should have been) today’s lunch as a morning snack! So I ended up making 5 meals after all 🙃

A few days ago, Leon came to us with a game he invented. The game was basically “guess the word,” and Leon was surprisingly good at it! (I guess Minh must have passed down the gene for a love of Taboo!) That night, I bought him the game “Banned,” which is basically a combination of Charades and Taboo.

We’ve played a couple times since then, with Leon giving the clues each time. He’s great at acting out the clues, but to challenge him a little more, Minh brought out Taboo and prompted him to try verbally giving clues before resorting to acting it out. We both figured it would expand his vocabulary if he challenges himself to explore different ways to say a common word. 

After drawing a card, he gave a clue that we were able to narrow down immediately to being related to baseball. Since Taboo was more difficult than Banned, we allowed him to read one word from the list of off-limits words. He read “house.” 

So related to baseball and a house… Leon was also pointing down, so we started to narrow the guesses down to something related to the ground. Field? No. Lawn? No. Mound? No.

After a few minutes, we gave up. He had been writing on a piece of paper, and we weren’t getting anywhere.

He showed us the card: Basement. 

In hindsight, I was almost more confused by his clues. I asked him if he even knew what a basement was, and he said no.

He showed us the paper he was drawing on. It was a baseball field with the four bases marked. Basement. Ohhh…

After that, we decided maybe Taboo was a little too much for the time being!

​Leon has finished his first three days in public school! He’s so excited about the new place that he says he wants to go there on the weekends too (lol). Even though his class has been coloring worksheets about letters while he can read at about a 3rd grade level, he hasn’t been bored… yet. So far his only complaint is that they only get one snack per day, and that isn’t enough for him!

Minh is ecstatic about not paying the Goddard School tuition anymore, whereas I’m most excited about him being right across the street. Dropoff and pickup literally take less than 5 minutes each — and we don’t have to drive anywhere. Leon has a checklist of what he needs to do to get ready for school and what he needs to do when he comes home from school, and so far he’s been good about following each (albeit with a few reminders). 

I’m excited for him to be tested for Gifted and Talented in December, and then we can start finding more programs to challenge him!

I haven’t posted in a while, ​which is ​unfortunate because so much has happened! 

​About a month ago, ​Leon graduated from private kindergarten, ​where ​he received the Rockstar Reader award from his teacher. And a couple days ago,​ he read half of a Dog​ Man book​ in just a couple hours​!​ His teacher also had him read a book to his class on Friday.

He has two imaginary friends: Ghost and Snake.​ Ghost is in 5th grade and is in charge of “Ghost’s Magic Forest.” According to Leon, Ghost’s Magic Forest is dark and a little scary (dragons, three fairies, cheetahs, lions, and towels live there). Also, Leon advises not to throw blueberries in the water, because dragons will eat them and throw up.

​A while back, ​Minh created a treasure hunt for him. ​He reads a map (which Minh had printed on a huge canvas), then finds points of interest that also have treasures! So far, he’s found Bluey and Bingo stuffies, a leather-bound journal, a coin purse, and a toy clock for learning time. Thanks to the treasure hunt, he’s learning how to read a map and is getting more familiar with our neighborhood.

He also loves playing board games with Minh — and he’s getting pretty good! He doesn’t really understand risk yet, so he takes quite a few chances that pay off! His favorite games are Sushi Go and Longshot.​

In a couple months, he’ll start public school! I can’t believe he’s already old enough to be in ​”real” ​school!

Leon: “That’s where you’re dead and then they bury you.”

Me: “That’s right.”

Leon: “And it’s really fun like because you’re like treasure!”

Leon: “Chinese checkers is a little racist.”

Me: “You’re right bud, Chinese checkers is a little racist.”

Leon: “No, I said Chinese checkers is alliteration. What?”

Me: “Oh. What?”