Monthly Archives: February 2022

ski day

I went skiing yesterday for the first time in more than ten years.  I have never been a good skier.  I skied once in Wintergreen in Virginia at 16.  Then I skied again in grad school at about age 23.  I’ve skied every now and then since then – once or twice a year on average but not at all plenty of years.  I’m not coordinated, and I’m not brave.  But it is still so much fun!  I get an awful lot of joy out of cruising down a green run.

The problem is that it seems a highly disproportionate number of skiers hit the greens, and many of them are out of control half the time (learning to ski), so skiing the greens is definitely a mixed bag.

The oldest my youngest child has been since 2012 when I gave birth was 4 years old when I got pregnant with S.  And of course, I couldn’t ski in 2011 / 2012 because I was pregnant.  So it was early 2011 last time I skied.  It’s just been way too much trouble to figure out what to do with the kids to go with Jonathan.  I have friends who ski, but universally, they ski extremely well.  A lot of people who grew up around here are very good skiers.  And I just don’t like feeling pressured to ski above my ability level, or holding people back.  So I just never went.  But finally, yesterday, I just went up on my own to Snoqualmie Pass which is a mere 50 minutes away.  Of course, skiing is always a huge PITA between parking and snow and equipment.

And it was great!  I picked the second easiest green, sort of accidentally, as the true easiest green was obviously swamped with people learning to ski and the lift was constantly stopping as people fell getting on or off.  And I just skied it over and over – 7 times I think.  At first I seriously thought I was going to break my neck, but by the end I was starting to get the hang of things again.

My body feels old and creaky to me.  I am very fit right now, but I don’t feel coordinated or confident in doing a lot of things I did before children.  It’s just a bit harder doing new, or basically new, physical things in your 40s.  But it went super well and I had a great time.  I’m excited to do it again.

There are zero lessons available for kids at Snoqualmie, sadly, as they all booked up a long, long time ago (like last summer).  However, we’ve been able to get them lessons at Crystal (1 hr 40 away) and they had an all-day lesson.  Unfortunately, they don’t sell lift tickets there.  You have to buy a season pass.  We got season passes for the kids (cheapish) but haven’t for ourselves (very expensive).  So we have to drive 1 hr 40 minutes to drop them for lessons and can’t actually ski and there’s basically nothing to do there since it’s the middle of nowhere.  First world problems.  Nevertheless, we’re going to try and do another all day lesson for them this weekend.

Valieva

Kamila Valieva is to skating as Simone Biles is to gymnastics – a once in a lifetime star, a generational extraordinaire.

 

And Alexandra Trusova is nearly as good.

Both are extraordinary and head and shoulders above every other skater in the world.

Their third best skater is also amazing and light years better than the rest of the world.

Only a major mistake will keep them from sweeping the medals. Personally, it’s what I’m most interested in seeing this Olympics. Watching is the rest of the world’s female skaters is like a flashback to 15 years ago. The Russians have progressed and the rest of the world has stood still. Honestly, I’m kind of obsessed with Valieva and Trusova.

report cards

The kids got their report cards today.  Now, when I got a report card back in the dark ages, starting in second grade, we got four report cards a year.  The report card was short and sweet – grades A, B, C, D or F in six or so subjects: English, Spelling, Social Studies, Science, Math and maybe one or two more.  There was a honor roll for people who got all As and Bs or all As, and awards were given out, so you knew where you stood.

The kids’ school is totally different.  I don’t know if this is modernity, Seattle liberalism (and avoidance of honest assessment) or a French thing.  But the older the kids get, the more it annoys me.  First of all, they give marks in a crazy number of areas.  I just don’t believe the teachers honestly can take the time to do a proper assessment on dozens of different items.  Second, they give 1, 2, or 3.  Is that the same as A, B, or C?  Or what?  Last, short of asking friends’ moms what their kids grades are, which seems a little rude, I have no idea how my kids stand in comparison to everyone else.

I am showing the first couple pages – but this is less than half the report card!

 

Obviously, the fact that she got 3s is encouraging, but an actual grade in each subject would be a heck of a lot more meaningful – to me at least.  Can you imagine being a teacher and having to fill all this stuff out for 20 kids multiple times a year?

So, another survey: what is done at your kids’ school?  Grades in each subject?  Something like the above?  Or something else?

Isla is extremely self-motivated to do well in school.  But she also has a lot going on with activities outside of class.  It’s hard to assess if she’s working hard enough, and what level of natural ability she has.

school topics

Isla is in fourth grade and currently reading Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in school.  In third grade, she read Charlotte’s Web.  In second grade, one of the Magic Treehouse books.  What are your 2nd through 5th grades reading in school?  Or do you remember, if they’re already older?  These books seem extremely easy to me for the grade level.  There are a number of non-native English speakers in the class, so they do have to balance things.  Still, I wonder about the level of academic rigor.

In math, they are learning fractions, which seems about right.  Bri, in second grade, is learning her times tables which also seems about right.

In general, L finds her English classes very easy, as does B, but they are challenged in their French classes.  L has in fact read Charlie and the Chocolate Factory in French, though not for school, and it is a good, challenging book for her in that language.  Her hardest topic is French verb conjugations.  Needless to say, I’m not much help.