The Pinto Family: February 2018

Scout Sunday

In scouting there are 4 religious emblems that can be earned throughout the lifetime of scouts. It is extremely rare to earn all 4 as they can just each be earned at specific points in scouting, starting in Cub Scouts. Nicholas was awarded his second emblem, Parvuli Dei, this weekend at the annual scout Sunday mass. For this emblem, he worked for several months, learning about being a service to his community and parish. Shawn is the religious emblems coordinator for the Cub Scout pack and certainly is a great example to our boys on this lesson on service. So proud of you both!

At Scout Sunday Mass, all the servers, ushers, lectors, etc are all scouts. All scouts of the parish wear their uniform and process up during the entrance hymn with the flag and sit in front. Nicholas volunteered to be an alter server.

After mass, Monsignor awarded the boys who earned a religious emblem, their patch and pin.

Nicholas' Piano Level 1 Graduation Recital

Nicholas has been working hard taking piano lessons and practicing every day for 2 years. He is learning via the Suzuki Method, which focuses on learning by ear prior to learning to just read music. It is divided into 10 levels and he has now graduated from level 1! The graduation concert was held about an hour away at Spivey Hall, a piano concert hall, and featured children from all levels from all over the Atlanta metro area playing their graduation pieces. Nicholas played Christmas Day Secrets and played very well! We are so very proud of him!

There were about 50 kids graduating so it was split into 2 recitals - here is the group from Nicholas' recital

The bow at the end

Receiving their awards

His teacher, Mrs Russell, and her graduates at this recital

Celebrating afterward at the reception

Cub Scout Overnight at Chattahoochee Aquarium

Shawn and Nicholas went to Chattanooga Aquarium for a Cub Scout event where they sleep there overnight. They had a great time bonding with the animals and each other!

Christmas Break and January Happenings

We had a good start to 2018. Here's a few of the activities we've been up to this month (and the end of December over Christmas break).

Grace's first grade class earned a Sky Zone party over Christmas break and Shawn took the boys along as well since I was working. They all had a great time!

The kids had all earned BeniHana free kids meals from the library summer reading program so over Christmas break, we took the kids out for their first ever hibachi dinner.

While Sam did not really eat the Japanese food (no surprise) he did a pretty good job eating animal crackers with chopsticks!

Fun times!

Lots of fun winter snuggles with Daddy!

Daisy (Girl Scout) meetings - here we learned about self respect and confidence

Grace sold Girl Scout cookies for the first time! She was very excited to do it! She sold a total of 119 boxes!

We enjoyed our second snow of the winter - only about an inch this time but it was mixed with ice so they kids got 2 days off school for it!

Snow Angels!

Snow Day fun - putting on concerts for us!

Henry was Star Student - I came in to have lunch with him and then went to his classroom where he presented his poster to his class, telling all about himself. Then he had a show and tell - where he shared his yard work bag that holds his tools and his favorite Paw Patrol pup and vehicle. Then I read a book to the class. Finally, he took 10 questions from his classmates - he was so cute with this part - very confident and proud in all his answers...he LOVED being star student!

The new Auxiliary bishop of the Archdiocese of Atlanta, Ned Shlesinger, said mass at SPC and Nicholas was lucky enough to serve with him and be assigned the job of holding his mitre (hat).

Bishop Ned also came spoke at the SPC Men's Club Cajun night. He is a graduate of Virginia Tech, where he was a corp cadet, and went on to become an Air Force pilot flying C130's for 9 years until he decided to become a priest. Shawn really enjoyed getting to meet and visit with him - super down to earth and nice - and even chanted the Hokie Hokie High cheer!!

Grace's dance studio held the annual parent watch day where we sit in on her class and see what they are learning. It is always a joy to watch her dance!

Samuel moved up to the preschool (older 3's classroom) and is doing great! His teachers all say he seems to like being around the older kids and is talking and participating more than ever now. Most importantly he is very happy there! Here he is with a "firetruck" he built one day.

Henry learned how to ride his bike with no training wheels! Very exciting!!

Fun playdates with friends over break

Jewelry making on the play date

Good buddies spending time together

New Year's Eve

We rang in the Year 2018 in style - our friends, the Konopka's, invited us over for a New Year's Eve celebration. They are Polish and in their country they celebrate all 12 days of Christmas fully, which includes New Year's Eve of course. So they went all out with tons of food throughout the night as well as an impressive assortment of wines, liqueurs and drinks! We actually had planned to, and did, ring in the new year around 9pm , thinking it would be too late to stay till midnight for the kids. However, we were having so much fun and enjoying their company so much, we actually ended up staying till midnight and ringing the new year again at that time! They were such gracious hosts and we had a lovely time!!