My First Day of the Family Marathon

This morning my mom challenged us to a family marathon. Everyone in the family runs miles until we all get to 26 miles. Our goal is to finish before traveling to Utah on June 30. Everyone who finishes gets to have a family Papa Murphy's pizza party while we are in Utah. The first one to finish also gets $25 to spend on whatever they want to buy. If I win first place, I already know what I want to buy: it's an EX Pokemon pack with a big EX Pokemon card. Big cards are rare and so are EX's.

To work on the challenge, I immediately did two miles on the treadmill. Then we walked another mile to Dad's work. I am currently winning with three miles. (Peter has two, Mom has one and Dad doesn't have any yet.)

We ate lunch at the middle school and had fun playing with North and April (and Peter). While we were playing hide and seek I was hiding down a trail. I got bored waiting for them to find me and went back to where the lunch was. No one was there except for a lady who said that someone was looking for a boy in a red jacket (me). She told me what direction the people looking for me went in (about 15 minutes earlier) and I decided that I should go the other way to meet them. I got back to the car and no one was there. Then I just waited at the car and eventually Dad found me. Dad told me that people had been looking for me for a long time. He was more than  half an hour late getting back to work from his lunch break. Mom said she was really scared and almost called the police,

We went home and played for a while. Peter and I played war (card game). Then we went to the library. North and April were there too! (Unplanned.) I played chess with April, checked out some books and two movies. We went home and I started reading. After a while Peter and I were continuing our war game.

Oh, and by the way, the war game started this morning (before the marathon challenge.)

To be continued...

End of 4th Grade

To celebrate the end of 4th grade, I made an ice-cream sundae. (shown above)

I am going to miss having Mrs. Lebeau for a teacher. She was just super nice. I liked the spot parties. They were parties we had throughout the year that were different each time. Sometimes they were read-ins. Sometimes they were movies. My favorite spot party was the last spot party - surprisingly on the last day of the school year. We watched Frozen and had treats.

My favorite subjects in school this year were math, science and reading.

In math we learned how to add decimals. We learned how to add and multiply fractions.

In science I learned about the willow ptarmigan (shown below). It is the state bird. The scientific name for this bird is the Lagopus lagopus. It's higher classification is lagopus. It's lower classification is the red grouse.

The best thing I read this year was Percy Jackson and the Olympians Book 4: Battle of the Labyrinth.

Other highlights of my year include participating in the Geography Bee where I took 4th place in the school. My other highlight was participating in Battle of the Books. I hope to do both of these again next year as a 5th grader.

Another great thing about this year is that my parents bought me Minecraft. My user name is peanutbuterninja.

My New Baby Sister

Laurie was born on New Year's Eve. On June 8th she is 5 months old and wears 12 month clothes!

I love being a big, big brother. But it's only to my baby sister. (I am a big brother to Peter and a big, big brother to Laurie.)

I love having a baby in the house because I love playing with her dinosaur toy. I love to see her have fun. But I don't like it when she interrupts my reading because I am babysitting her.

My favorite thing to do with her is hold her and pretending to "eat" her tummy. (That makes her laugh.)

My Fish

Picture taken by Ammon

These are my fish.

The big ones name is John Henry.

The second big ones name is Speedy.

Peter named the one with white Sariah.

The last one doesn't have a name yet.

If John Henry Were a Fish

*** Note from Jenny:  Yesterday Ammon saw his Grandma Peggy and told her about his new fish.  As we were driving away he asked, "Can I blog about my fish?"  I told him that we can, and I will help him with a post this weekend.  But in the mean time, I wanted to share this story which was written April 28, 2011***

Ammon acquired four new fish today.  When he came home from school I told him that there was a surprise for him.  I sent him in to find the fish tank.

"There's fish!"

"Yes," I agreed.

"Are they mine?" he asked, barely daring to breath.

"Yes, yours and Peter's," I answered.

He is like me - processes the pleasant but unexpected quietly and slowly.  But I watched and saw the thrilled amazement cross through his face.  He looked a little overwhelmed with joy.

"Can I go get my friends to show them?" he asked.

I sent him out the door, but he stopped and turned back.

"Wait!  How many fish are there?"

"Four."

His face was shining with genuine awe now.  This was beyond his wildest dreams.

***

Later he asked me if he could name his fish.  Of the four, one is particularly recognizable because it is larger then the others.

"I will name him John Henry," he said with determination.

"That sounds like a great name, Ammon, where did you get that idea?"

He explained the idea came from a book he read at school.

"Oh?" I asked, "What is it about?"

Trying not to sounds overly impatient with me Ammon carefully explained, "It's about John Henry."

"OK," I tried again, "but what does John Henry do in the book?"

"Well, some people say he was born with a hammer in his hand," he recited.  "It's a tall tale, Mom."

It sounded familiar so after I went to bed, I googled it.  John Henry is a legend based on an american steel driver who grew to be six feet tall and 200 pounds which, they say, was considered a giant in his day.  Which explains why, just as Ammon was going to sleep, he called me back to his room.

"I can't wait to tell Mrs. Capson tomorrow about my new pets.  I will tell her that I named the big one John Henry.  Because I think this is what John Henry would look like - if he were a fish."

My Friends

Korben, Kyler and Me

 I have a lot of good friends.

We like to play the wii.

Other things we do inside is play No Stress Chess.

Sometimes we play outside.

Patrick, Kyler, Me and Jerson

Me and my friends have so much fun outside.
My friends and I have so much fun outside.

We like to play a certain game.

I don't know what the game is called, so I won't tell you.

I have so much fun playing the game.

Shopping List

My mom needed to write a shopping list.  I decided to do it for her.  She told me what she needed and I wrote it all by myself.  I also helped her add some things to the list - like the apples.  She likes Fuji apples best and Peter likes green apples, but my favorite are the dark red ones.  I also reminded her that we needed new jelly because I dropped the jelly on accident when I was making a sandwich for Peter.  The jar broke and we had to throw it away. 

My mom wants to take me to the book store to buy a new book now that I am done reading Harry Potter.  But I don't want a new book.  I want to read the next Harry Potter story (The Chamber of Secrets).  She said that some of the other books get scary and she wants me to wait until I am older to read them all.  We agreed that I can read books one, two and three.  After that I will read something else and wait until I am nine or ten years old to finish the other Harry Potter books.