If you will please indulge a proud mother...
I took a picture of the CVCA Honor Roll posted in my sons' school. If you click on it, you will see a familiar name in the left column, reserved for those whose grades were between 3.7 and 4.0 in the first quarter. Yes, that's my son, Lance, under the S's. He is in third grade this year, the first year where a student gets past Excellent and Satisfactory, to actual As and Bs.
On the day of our first Parent-Teacher Conference this year, Lance gave Lorenzo and me the best present any parent can have: a 3.75 on his first quarter report. At first, this didn't register with me since I wasn't used to this kind of grading system. I even asked his teacher, Mrs. Mathews, if that was a good grade. (See, when I was growing up in UPIS and UP, we were graded on the eleven point system, where the highest grade was 1.0, followed by 1.25, 1.5 and so on, etc., so for me "3.75" sounded like "1.75", which was still a good grade but not by any means stellar in my book.) But when his teacher explained that his grade was just points shy from a 4.0, it all clicked for me and I was fairly flushed with pride.
My son and I have always bumped heads during homework time. And although his former teacher informed me that he was reading at almost 8th grade reading level, it was just something I took in stride since he has always been a voracious reader. I didn't want to expect too much this early on, especially since I knew there was a huge transition between 2nd and 3rd grades. But when I received the results of his ITBS Testing, it only confirmed that it wasn't a fluke:
"Lorenzo (a.k.a. Lance) earned a Composite grade equivalent of 6.3 on the Level 9 test. This means that his test performance was approximately the same as that of a typical student in the sixth grade at the end of the third month. Lorenzo's Composite national percentile rank of 99 means that he scored higher than 99% of third grade students nationally. His overall achievement appears to be high for third grade."
(This got the stage mother in me wondering if there was such a thing as "99+" in the ITBS. I remember being really impressed when my best friend scored 99 in the NCEE (the National College Entrance Exams in the Philippines), only to discover that I actually got a 99+.)
But anyway, I digress. The point is that my son has done me proud, and I wanted to reward him in a big way.
Since his birthday was coming up, I decided to throw him a surprise party. I invited some family friends and his whole class, which wasn't such a big deal, since he goes to a private Christian school where the entire third grade is comprised of only 13 students.
The week before the party, I started calling all the parents to see who could come. HIs birthday was on Wednesday, November 12, but I decided to hold it a day earlier, which also happened to Veteran's Day, a holiday for schools like Reanna's preschool, but a regular school day at CVCA. Since I was the Scholastic volunteer for the class, I was able to pass out the invitations tucked inside the book order flyers, including authorization notes for parents to sign so we could pick up their kids from the After School Program.
And since I knew that kids would invariably talk, I conveniently scheduled a pizza lunch on his actual birthday with Mrs. Mathews, who was in on the secret and played her part beautifully. That way, if anyone ever mentioned the word "party", we would make Lance think if was about his pizza party at school.
Veteran's Day broke bright and early, which made me quite happy since the weather report said it would be mostly cloudy the whole day. While the boys were at school, Daddy and I worked on the gazebo at Roeding Heights park in Ceres, my chosen venue for the event.
It was the perfect place for a picnic in the park. It was big enough for the 40-50 guests I was expecting, it was right beside the play area and the rest rooms AND it had lights and electricity, in case the party went way into the night.
At the stroke of 3:15, I picked up Lance and Troy while my husband hid in the parking lot, picking up some of Lance's classmates when we left. The rest of the class headed to the park with their parents, waiting for the honored guest to arrive. While they were setting up, I took Lance and Troy to pick up the birthday cake which Lance chose earlier, an Indiana Jones chocolate cake which said "Have a whipping Happy Birthday, Lance!", per the birthday boy's request.
Lance wanted to know why we were picking up his cake early, so I told him I had too many things to do to get ready for his pizza party the next day. Then I said we had to pick up Reanna from a play date in the park.
When we pulled up to Roeding Heights park, there were so many vehicles parked in front of the gazebo that it obstructed the view. So far, so good. As we got out of the car, I made it a point to engage Lance in conversation, so when he finally turned around to see all his friends thronged around the HUGE banner, which read "SURPRISE! HAPPY 9th BIRTHDAY, LANCE!", his jaw just dropped. The look on his face made all the effort worth it!
Of course, I couldn't have pulled it off without the help of my friends: Debye, who makes the most awesome salad and brought a heaping bowl of it to the party, and Donna, who helped her put the finishing touches on the decor while Lorenzo and I got the kids; Elssy, also known as "Mrs. Banner" in CVCA, for the beautiful banner she made for Lance; Melissa, who cooked her famous pancit, and Esther, who helped man the grill where Lorenzo cooked the hot dogs and veggie dogs for our picnic. She was also in charge of the children's games, organizing an Egg Toss, an Egg Relay and a Scavenger Hunt.
It was a wonderful party, with many people staying way past sundown. At the end of the day, Lance thanked Daddy and me for his early birthday surprise. But the celebration wasn't over yet, because his REAL birthday was coming up!
He didn't know that I had another cake planned for him, an Optimus Prime cake I designed with a store-bought cake, some fancy candles and a Happy Meal toy. When his classmates saw it, they said, "Wow, we get to have cake two days in a row?" I guess if you have two parties in a row, you can!
When I sent him to bed on his birthday, Lance still couldn't stop talking about his double celebration. He thanked me again for making his birthday extra-special. I gave him a hug and he gave me a kiss. I looked at my son, not quite believing he was already nine. These last two cakes would be the last with single candles on them. My boy was fast growing up.
In the end, I couldn't resist myself. I just had to hear it. "Do you feel loved?" I ask.
"Yes," he answers simply.
"Good," I say, "Because you are."
