We made it across the finish line to summer!
Bode: Has been stuck between a rock and a hard place along with all the other fifth graders. Due to the fact the Heber Valley is exploding with growth, the schools are busting at the seams. We live a few blocks away from the elementary school but they bumped it down to K-4 so he had to go to a weird intermediate school dedicated to 5th and 6th graders. They’re opening a new elementary and middle school in the area so that means everyone is getting shuffled. He’ll be bumped up to the same middle school as Hadley (yuck) and will miss being the king of the school in sixth grade.
But as usual, Bode is highly adaptable. He ended up with almost straight As this year and was ticked on his last report card when he had an A- in media but when he looked at the actual percentage, it was 93%, an A. I chuckled how much he agonized over that and I told him he could get it corrected but in the end, a fifth grade A- in media won’t keep him out of Harvard.
Fifth grade certainly wasn’t his best year ever but he made some new friends and had some fun adventures. Here’s a snapshot of the last few months of his life:
We joined thousands of other fifth graders at the Salt Lake Bees baseball game. I volunteered but we got grouped with some kids who were not his friends so the first chance he got, he apologetically ditched me to sit with them. I didn’t blame him; I would have ditched our group as well.
Also of note: for his track and field day at school last week, he encouraged me to come but told me “not to speak to any of my friends unless first spoken to.” Apparently my years as the Queen Bee being invited to play four square at school are over.
He won the pinewood derby and later earned his Webelos rank. He will be entering 11-year-old Scouts this summer.
He wrapped up another great season of soccer with Jamie as the coach and Bode was the top scorer on the team. We lightly discouraged him from doing competitive next season because 1) of the cost and 2) they practice several times as week and travel extensively on the weekends. If he was a true soccer prodigy, we would have supported him but he ultimately decided to keep it casual and do rec soccer again in the fall. Better to be a superstar than to sit on the bench!
He was so sweet and made me breakfast in bed for Mother’s Day all by himself. Even if he has to save face with his buddies, he’s still a mama’s boy at heart. 
The whole family had a blast doing the Adventure Zipline Utah in Provo Canyon (more details forthcoming on that).
He joined in the fun at his new middle school’s Color Festival. Bonus: It involved a lot of color wars without having to run.
Our local library offers free coding classes so his three besties–Eli, Charlie and Jonas–joined him at the library every Thursday to learn how to code.
One day after class, I asked him what they learned and he proudly boasted, “We learned how to hack a website.”
While he gave his disgusting backpack a final scrub-down, I tried to give him a last-day-of-school pep talk. “Now Bode, if someone is sitting by themselves while everyone is getting their yearbooks signed…” “I will offer to sign their yearbook and ask them to sign mine.” “Yes, and as for your teacher…” “I will give her the gift and thank her.” “Yes!” “And don’t worry, Mom. I will only give my phone number to ‘trusted friends.’”
It’s sure nice when kids know how to parent themselves.
I'm a Canadian-born mom of two, former Denver Post columnist, family travel writer, editor of MileHighMamas.com and 9News contributor. Expert on all things Utah, Denver, family and travel. Lover of laughter and life. Happily married to a man obsessed with growing The Great Pumpkin. 