The Best Day Ever

Caleb has been counting down to today for the last few days. "Only two more days till THE day." Today was the day of his piano recital. He knew that some awards would be given out, and he was anxious to see if he would receive any of them.

Before the recital, we started out the day with a neighborhood carnival. Caleb tried rock climbing for the first time.

He got about two lengths of his body before he was all done. Poor Carter, who is my adventurous one, was so sad that he wasn't tall enough to do it.

Pony ride

Finally at 1pm it was recital time. Memorizing the first piece, Tarantella, came really easy. It took some work to memorize the Harry Potter song, and he didn't want to do it. I was so proud that he finally decided to try, only because Matt said, "I bet you can't do it."

Then it was award time. Each of the 13 students got an award that shared a special trait about them. Caleb's award was a perfectionist award because he comes to each lesson with his songs learned well with attention to details like dynamics.

Following that, his teacher gave an award and money to the best beginning student, intermediate student, and advanced student. Caleb was given the award for the best intermediate student. He was so happy! She also gave an award for the student that practiced the most and the most consistently. Caleb practices 30 minutes a day, 6 times a week. (I let him choose a day to have a break.) Some days it's a little more and some a little less. We were surprised that Caleb won this award and money as well!

Finally she gave an award for the best student over all. She had a rubric of criteria that she graded by (flashcards, sight-reading skills, practice time, repertoire, etc.) Caleb also won this award! Honestly by this point I was a little embarrassed that Caleb won so many of the awards (and money!), but at the same time I was so proud of him. He has worked very hard and been very self-motivated to succeed.

Here he is later today with his awards.

And we ended the day with a soccer game. This is Caleb's sport of choice, and he gives it his all each week. The skill he seems to have over the other players and opponents is that he never gives up. He constantly runs after the ball even if he's tired. He's aggressive, always in the action. He's also very careful to watch his opponents on defense and careful with his aim when he shoots for a goal. This season so far he has scored 3 goals each game he's played, which is the most amount of goals one player can score. They won today 6-1. (The one goal the other team scored was while Caleb was playing goalie, so that's definitely a position to work on. He hates playing goalie because he'd rather be out there running on the field!)

At the end of the day, I asked Caleb if the day had lived up to his hopes and dreams. He told me that it was the best day ever! I love this kid so much!