Shane/Bub

Shane Markley (my maiden name) Benedict. 8 weeks before Shane was born Jeremy and I came to the conclusion that the name we had picked out for our son, Kane, had to go. We both liked it and felt confident the the stigma behind the name Cain did and would not affect us, but what about the little boy? Would he grow up resenting the fact that we didn't consider his feelings about the matter? Hindsight is 20/20 they say, but I'm still not sure how he would have felt about it. He's sort of like a crusty little crab, hard on the outside but soft on the inside.

Last night when Shane went to put his dirty clothes in the hamper he discovered that he actually had to reach the put his things on the top of the pile/mountain of dirty clothes. He then collapsed in a fit of giggles declaring loudly that "Mom REALLY needs to do the laundry!" The good part about it was he was more than willing to add Jo's dirty clothes to the very tip top when I was getting her pj's on her. He wanted to see just how tall he could make that mountain of laundry that Mom so needed to wash. I'm happy to report that although I probably won't be finishing it today the laundry is sorted and the washer and dryer are humming cozily. I'm so glad for a warm house and modern commodities like washers and dryers on days like today!

This year Shane is in the First grade. His teacher is Ms. Green and she is an excellent teacher. Shane's math skills are amazing, but he is still struggling to understand the concept of reading. He seems to be able to memorize really well and does good with his sight words, but struggles a lot when it comes time to sound words out. My challenge is to get him interested in the books he is trying to read. Since he is a science and biology geek it's not that difficult. He loves all kind of informational books the hard part is fining them with words simple enough for him to read. The funny part is when we get to some scientific word that I don't even know and we both sit there trying to sound it out. I'm still not sure we figured out the true name of that one kind of frog the other day. Oh well it was fun to say it all the different ways it might be and good for him to try.

Shane has two hobbies this year. I had originally told the children they could pick out one each, but both of Shane's hobbies were inexpensive. He joined the Cub Scouts about a year ago and really loves all the outdoorsy stuff. This past November he also signed up for wrestling and he's been doing really well. This coming Sunday is the tournament and then after that we'll go to the Nutter Center for his final meet if he does good enough this Sunday. So far this year he's gotten 6 pins.

Just this past Christmas, when we were in Kansas, Shane spent a day with his Uncle Kent reading water meters. That evening at the supper table he wondered if he was related to Kent. Upon confirming that he was indeed related he replied "Sweet!" Immediately a red flag went up and I had to inquire as to just what those two had been up to that day. Besides Kent trying to teach Shane how to gleek, if you don't know what that means consider yourself lucky, I'm not sure what all they did. Shane did get paid a very large sum of moolah for his wonderful companionship that day though. He is squirreling it away and intends to amass a much bigger stock pile. I'm rather pleased to find out that he has a desire to save his money as in the past he can't wait to spend it.

He may be the only boy in our family (actually can you every really say a man is not a boy any more? which would mean there are actually two boys in our family), but he definitely holds his own in a house full of females. ...Note I'm not commenting on the maturity of the parental female of our household...