sick, sick, sick

as bj said this afternoon, i seem to do this every year no matter what i do to try and prevent it! i am lying on the couch feeling simply awful. the only bright side, if there is one, is that i am forced to not do anything but lie here and watch tv and movies. i really would rather be having fun : (

christmas in black and white

my friend holly and i played what is our second annual christmas in black and white. we enjoy doing this for several reasons. the first is we get to play some cool duet pieces on 2 pianos and another reason is we get to work on music that we don't get to play at church b/c it's to long or is more classical. we even had a trio with the 2 grands and the roland, which keith played. it was a very pretty arrangement of the first nowell.

i'll post a picture of holly and i at a later date when i find the camera again!

oh christmas tree

well after 3 days of off and on work i finally finished decorating the tree. i must say it is one of the prettiest we have had, but of course my family will tell you that i say that every year : ) i love putting the ornaments on the tree because there seems to be a memory attached to each one. some of my favorites are the one that was made when nathan was in kindergarten, bj's baby rocking horse from his first christmas and matthew's first baby christmas. there are also michaelangelo, the numerous georgia bulldog ornaments, and the various cat ones, not to mention the ones that are shiny!

i love the ones we have gotten from oma and pepere over the years, they are so beautiful. well, i'm sitting here in front of the fire with the tree lit up and the smell of cookies in the kitchen and feeling very content. i will enjoy this for the moment b/c tomorrow i have practice for the christmas in black and white, a christmas party tomorrow evening, church on sunday with the performance of christmas in b/w sunday afternoon and then wrapping christmas shoeboxes sunday evening!

it is truly the most wonderful time of the year!

snow days are the best!

today i got the phone call that all teachers and students love to get... school is cancelled today due to snow!! i always count these as "gift" days. they are days where you can do anything you want, nothing is planned.

so my day went like this: i got the phone call this morning at 6:15 so i turned over and went back to sleep, that may be the best. i made pancakes for breakfast and then we put the lights on the tree. our tradition has always been that when it snows we make soup beans, so that is exactly what we did for lunch. i then made cookies and hot chocolate for us. i was able to wrap a lot of the christmas gifts and watch a movie. we also enjoyed watching the snow fall, and fall, and fall, and fall! it snowed all day. it was beautiful!

i will go to bed tonight and be thankful to God that he made snow for us to enjoy!

restful day

well, after all the doings yesterday today was a day to relax. i made the mistake of weighing myself this morning so instead of pancakes i had instant grits and toast. daddy and ingrid went to helen today, keith worked on his storage building and i rested today. i think we all forgot about the railroad display. this evening we picked up daddy and ingrid and went to longhorns. matt and tasha, bonnie and jim, and bj met us there. and as bj said, we ate yet again! we had a fun time just being together.

tomorrow we have tuba christmas from 9 until the performance at 12. we have got to get to wallyworld for my contacts and maybe some more christmas shopping then everybody is at our house for matt's b'day party. i have coerced everyone into helping me decorate the tree. the more the merrier!

this season is shaping up to be a doozy. next saturday is our lady's dinner and on sunday is our piano christmas program, christmas in black and white. lots of practice for that one. i'm playing about 4 pieces and my friend and fellow pianist, holly, is playing about 2 pieces also and then holly and i will be doing some duets as well. the following saturday is the big party at our house with about 20 people! there's more this december but as the brits say, that's quite enough to be getting on with at the moment.

well, going to bed now and rest for tomorrow. oh, btw, nathan and kayla are going to get to meet the members of casting crowns, hope i get an autograph : )

thanksgiving day

we had a wonderful time today although the beginning was very busy what with cooking and getting all the food packed to go to tash and matt's. we made mac and cheese, turkey, dressing (that we forgot to take!), cranberry sauce, pink salad, deviled eggs, we brought the cucumber salad (thanks to oma). that was what we brought and then everybody else brought food, too. it was quite a feast. the house was decorated so beautifully. tasha made placemats and name place cards.

after we ate, tasha had a cute multiple choice test about thanksgiving. did you know that there are 3,500 feathers on a turkey??? do you realize that somebody counted feathers on a turkey? of course keith won! he knows more trivia than anyone i know. pepere and i tied for 2nd place. when we got home we got our pj's on, watched some of the "house"marathon, built a fire, read for awhile and relaxed.

tomorrow we are going to have "panacakes" for breakfast, go see a railroad exhibit and then pepere and oma are taking us all out to eat at longhorn's for dinner. we're also going to get the christmas tree and decorate it. btw, my house is all decorated for christmas : ) saturday is tuba christmas, some shopping and matt's b'day party! all in all a great way to begin the holiday season.

hope everyone had a wonderful turkey day and are very thankful to our terrific God for our innumerable blessings.

christmas list

since everyone sends christmas lists i thought i would like to send mine, too : )

clothes:
sweaters (medium) cable knit (nothing fancy) in brown, red, or hunter green

trouser socks- brown, black, blue

music and/or books:
classical music (especially Mozart, or anything from the Baroque or Renaissance era)

gift certificate for Barnes and Nobles or Books a Million

the Left Behind series

Movies:
the Lord of the Rings trilogy
the 2nd Chronicles of Narnia

jewelry ( of course!):
a simple white gold bracelet with a bar clasp (this is the one with the loop and and a bar that goes through it instead of a clasp)

asheville,nc getaway

keith and i finally got away for a few days. we went to asheville, north carolina. we had our fall break oct.27-28. it was absolutely beautiful and it snowed! of course we went to biltmore house. talk about more money than brains! who in their right minds needs 543 rooms????

we got there on monday and it started snowing monday evening. i was looking out the window at around 1:30 in the morning and these big, fat snowflakes were coming down. i woke keith up and probably the whole hotel. i just thought everyone should enjoy this beautiful sight : )

it was so nice not to be in a hurry to get some place, no eating lunch in 15 minutes, no watching the clock and NO getting up at 6:00 in the morning! anyway, it was sweet.

a day off

saturday was such a fun day! i slept in, keith took me to wahoo for breakfast, and then we went to the farmer's market and got some early christmas presents. we also bought some more mums for the garden. when we got home in the early afternoon i just rested and enjoyed the rest of the day. keith built me a fire in our firepit and we roasted hotdogs over it and ate outside. it was chilly but nice around the fire. we played with patty puppy and then watched movies that evening.

yes, my house still needs cleaning and the clothes need washing but it was so nice to just put everything on hold and just enjoy the day off. i'll clean this week : )

lessons learned in a cornmaze

this is the cornmaze i took our youth to this evening. last year at this time we had at most 4 youth and more times than not 2. we started praying and tonight we took 14 kids to this youth outing!! praise God : )

this was titled lessons learned so let me tell you the lessons we learned. when we entered the maze we followed our map and got to the end of the maze where the exit was. we didn't believe it could be that easy so we decided that we knew more than the map, see where this is going?? we went back into the maze and really got turned around. we could see the light that the maze had to kind of guide you in the right direction to get out but we just got farther and farther away from it. we eventually, 1 hour later, sort of found our way out. if you can see where the square above the name pat is, that is where we came out. as you can see, there is not an exit there. we blundered our way through and made a way out. we got out but it certainly wasn't what the makers of the maze had in mind! there was also a platform so folks could stand high above the maze and see the people trying to find their way out.

we got to talking as we were making our way around the maze back to the entrance and said this was what we do as christians. When we see the exit from our sinful lives we figure it can't be as easy as believing, surely we must have to work harder to get out of that life so we go about trying to figure it out for ourselves. as we do this we find ourselves getting farther and farther from the light. god sees us wandering around and he hollars at us to turn right or left or go straight but we ignore this and decide that we will not follow the path, hey, we'll make our own! we stumble, are caught in brambles, sometimes even fall. we may eventually get out but it certainly wasn't the path that god intended for us. it would have so much simpler if we had just gone out by the path that was marked.

good fun, good lesson!

funeral

have you ever wondered what would be said at your funeral? will people say how good you look? (i've always thought that was a terrible thing to say like you look better dead than alive?!) will people say what a wonderful person you were?

as you can tell i went to a funeral today and as always it makes me think of my mortality and what a really short time we have on this earth. i always feel funny about singing or playing for a funeral when i don't even know the person, as happened today. it is interesting to hear what people have to say at funerals. many times it makes me wish i had known this person. sometimes when i overhear what people say when they don't think anyone is listening it makes me glad i didn't know that person!

i would like to be remembered as someone who made a difference in somebody's life. i want people to say they saw christ in me. i would like to be remembered as someone who lived every minute to the fullest and had no regrets. keith said that this lady never said, "i wish i had done thus and so." i don't want to waste my life waiting to live. i think that is something profound that i have learned in the last year or so. so many times we are waiting to "do something" that we forget to live each day, i mean really live it!

i'm going to try very hard to remember that this week!

OMG! where's the gas????

it just boggles the mind that we are such crazy people that we talk ourselves into such a mess. the folks in charge are asking people to drive only if they have to, NOT call 911 to find out which stations have gas and not to top off their tanks! commonsense, which we in this country seem to be in short supply of.

keith had a wonderful idea, he suggested that schools could add an extra hour to our day and go to a 4 day school week and save gas by not running the buses. those things take an enormous amount of gas to run. we only have about 12 buses here but atlanta has 100s. think of the gas that would be saved if we took one day off from the buses.

wonder what would happen if this continues? i have a bike and only work about 3 miles from home. i guess i could ride... i just finished a science fiction book about what life would be like if we had been attacked by nuclear bombs. there was no gas, no electricity, no coffee!, no food other than what was available at the stores in canned food, no resupplies of medicine. it really made me think about how much we depend on technology and modern conveniences. how many people these days know how to can food, cook over an open fire, preserve meat? i think of all the things we take for granted that make our life so easy. with that in mind i am going to learn how to can food, and i am going to make my garden bigger and better next year. it really made me think about things.

oh my poor dawgs!

oh my poor dawgs! it is so hard to be a devoted fan and see your beloved team having their fannies handed to them on a silver platter. but you accept the good with the bad.

i love my dawgs!! woof, woof, woof!

fall in the mountains

in just about 3 weeks this is what our mountains are going to look like. i cannot tell you how sweet it is to live here during the fall season. the highs are in the low 70s to 80 degrees during the day with blue skies that go on forever. the mountains are so clear they seem almost to be within reach of your hand. the evenings are crisp and clean. it's sweater weather and on some evenings, fire in the fireplace weather.

we sleep under blankets that keep us toasty warm and make it very hard to get up on these chilly mornings. the temp this morning was 48! the coffee seems better on cool mornings : )

this savannah girl gets kidded about the weather b/c what i think of as down right cold everyone here thinks is "just cool." i do believe, however, that i might be being persuaded t0 become a "mountain girl."

blue grass weekend

we had a wonderful weekend. there was a blue grass festival in blairsville. we went and enjoyed some wonderful music. it is interesting to me that i don't, and i mean don't, like country music but i love blue grass. when we were listening to some of the music i was reminded again how much the music sounds irish and how much that particular style influenced this area's music.

there were also some arts and crafts folks there. one was from england. he had the most interesting material that he made into a candle holder. it was from a seed pod from western australia. i have never seen anything like it. his story about how he wound up in murphy,nc was interesting, also. he and his wife were on their up north when they stopped in murphy. by the end of the day they had put a bid on a house! they never made it up north. they sold their condo in florida and moved within the month.

we went friday evening to see the play "our town." for a small theater group it was good. i love this play b/c it reminds us that we only have this one life to live so we need to live it to the fullest everyday. btw, i have offered to accompany the theater production of "the fantastics" next summer. i think it will be fun. i played this when we lived in dublin. it should be challenging and fun: )

brenna bunny

we had so much fun with brenna this weekend! she has grown so much and she is such a wonderful little individual.

it was interesting to see that the "mom" gene was still intact. it was strange when she first arrived,
it was like, what do i do with this little child. i'll
admit, i was a little nervous, would i remember what to do with a child of 2 again? interestingly enough, it only took a couple of hours to feel comfortable with her in the house. i even had the "i will kill anyone who wakes her up!" moment.

as you can see, g-daddy had fun, too. we took her to the lake and surprisingly we had the lake to ourselves except for a couple way away from us. she loves the water! we brought bubbles, which uncle matt liked as much as brenna, we had a ball and goggles. she loved the goggles! i think she may be part fish.

we took her to church and she stayed for awhile in big church. she was a very good girl. she sat with uncle matt, aunt tasha and tasha's parents and sister. she had a lot of attention which allowed me not to worry about her and play the piano. everyone thought she was so pretty, of course ; )

she did have to sit in the naughty chair for just a little while sunday evening. she seemed so surprised that nonnie had a naughty chair. her expression was like, "how did that happen?" i had asked her to leave something alone and she wouldn't, typical 2 year old. after she sat i went to her and told her why she had to sit in time-out and asked her if she was sorry. she was so cute, she said, "i sorry, nonnie." i told her i loved her and she said, "i nuv you nonnie." she had me at i'm sorry : )

i am so glad that she has 2 loving parents that love her, that discipline her, that teach her, and are raising her to be a wonderful person. they are doing such a good job!!! thank you for sharing her with us. i love being a grandparent!!!

not a happy momma

i have got to tell you, this momma ain't happy! i do not like the fact that my middle child will only be 100 miles inland from a possible cat 4 hurricane!! thankfully brenna and kayla will be here in georgia when this thing hits texas.

i know, i know, nathan is an adult and is perfectly capable of taking care of himself but that doesn't mean i have to like it!!!

here's matthew

as i said i'm still learning how to upload pictures and edit blogs. anyway, here's my youngest!!

to bj

first of all i apologize that all my pictures are christmas pictures but i haven't loaded any others on my computer.

anyway, to my oldest! you probably don't know this but you almost weren't. your daddy was a youth minister and we had just about decided to not have kids of our own because we had 30 kids at the time but God had other ideas. we are soooo glad he did! (i thought you were the flu : )

there are so many things i love about you it's hard to know where to start. first, i love your humor. you are one of the wittiest and funniest people i know. your mind is so quick! i think you should have a vent all your own with just your comments on it! second, you are so tender hearted. i still remember when we got lady and you wanted to take all the kittens, cats, puppies and dogs home from the shelter! we had to send you out to wait in the car. next would have to be your musical ability. you don't use it much but you do have it. i love that you're a reader. i like sharing books with you and discussing them with you. i like the fact that you take your lumps in life without complaint. if it was your fault then you have always manned up and said so.

i love how much family means to you. you aren't afraid to tell people that you love your family. i am very proud of you. you have always worked hard and i am very proud of the fact that you are going to tackle going back to school. from experience i will tell you that the hardest part is walking into that first class. it will be worth it. the first step is the hardest.

you have always been my child who believes all things are possible. i believe that God gave you that ability. i love the fact that God has His hand on you and you're not shrugging it off. i love that you love Him.

one last thing, i love how you are such a people person! that is such a gift. people just naturally flock around you. you are honest, even when it hurts you. you are trustworthy, caring and a wonderful son.

God bless you, my firstborn.

here's nathan

sorry, i'm still learning some stuff ; )

this one is for nathan

this one goes out to my middle child. you handle that role so well. you have always been the one who sits back and scopes out the situation and then decides whether it is worth your commitment or not. i think that is a valuable asset to have.

i love so many things about you but here are a few : ) i think your commitment to the Lord is awesome. you are a mature Christian beyond your years. i was afraid that when you left to move to texas and had to leave compass that you would just give church a pass and only go when you could go to a comparable church but i was wrong. you seemed to innately know that it was not the how of worship but the what of worship, namely, honoring God on the Sabbath.

i love that we share a love of music, a music tie. both of us would rather play than eat especially if it's new music. i have loved watching you grow as a musician. i am glad that you have this talent and use it.

i think you are a wonderful teacher. you have an ability to reach a very tough age group. you are developing skills that will make you a great teacher. you are willing to listen, watch, and learn and that's what it takes to be a great teacher. great teachers never stop learning.

i love how much you love kayla and brenna. you are good husband and father. i love how you make your girls laugh : )

i love your perseverance. you were knocked down but you were not knocked out! that is important b/c life is full of knock downs. the important lesson you learned was to get back up, rely on God and go forward.

you are a joy to all who know you. i love you, my middle son.

tributes continued

this one is for my youngest (don't worry guys, your time will come: ). my minky! your nana has always said that people should know this about you: they could either lead, follow, or get out of your way. matt, you have always seemed to know what you wanted. sometimes it has been very hard to get there but you persevere and reach those goals.

if someone needs to get something done they just need to see you. you have always had that bulldog tenacity, sometimes to your brothers dismay! you're very sensitive and care very deeply. i love the love you have for God. even when church was hard to endure you never lost your faith.

i know that the fact that your brothers always seemed to be more popular than you was difficult for you at times but you learned that to have several close friends was just as good as having a lot of friends. and the wonderful thing is you married your best friend! i can't tell you how happy i am for you for that fact.

i love the ability you have in music. i love to hear you sing and play. i like the fact that you like to hang out with your family, too.we really have fun together. i like the fact that family is important to you. i think that it is neat that you love history and you are so knowledgeable about it. you have a lot of your pepere in you. you want to get ahead. you're always looking for the best way to do something, willing to go the extra mile. i love the way you love and care about your wife. and i am so happy that you are so happy.

i am so proud of you, my youngest. i love you very much!!

tributes

this tribute is for my dad. my dad is my hero! he is the bravest and strongest person in the world.

let me tell you just a few things about my dad. he served in vietnam twice. that was hard because it was not a popular war but daddy felt that it was the right thing to do. his country called and he answered. i have learned patriotism from my dad.

he always made me feel safe and secure. even now i know my daddy is there for me. as dr. phil says, he provided me with a safe place to land. i learned how to be a good parent from my dad.

he is absolutely one of the funniest people on this earth. if you have never had the privilege of being on the receiving end of one of daddy's stories you have definitely missed a treat. my favorite story is the one about the "ghost" train that was really my dad in a plane! i learned to have a good sense of humor from my dad.

my dad is a leader. whenever something needs doing people look to my dad. he is conscientious, dependable, and gets things done. i learned my work ethic from my dad.

my dad is deeply committed to God. he doesn't talk about his relationship with God very much but i have watched my dad through the years and his actions speak volumes. he will and has risked his life for others, greater love has no man than to lay down his life for another. he is always helping others. his charity runs deep. he is always willing to give someone another chance. i learned many of my values as a Christian from my dad.

these are just few things that i love about my dad. again, i could go on and on but these are the things i thought of today : )

tributes

i haven't figured out yet how to upload pictures but if i had i would put a big heart here. i've been thinking that i want to let my family know how wonderful and special they are and let others know how wonderful they are. my family is my heart.

the first, of course, is my fantastic husband. i love him for so many reasons. first is that he saved me. many of you don't know much about my life when i first went to college. my parents got a divorce and i was pretty much left to my own devices. the summer before i left for college my dad came home from vietnam for the second time. my parents had not had a very good marriage for awhile and it all came to a head when daddy came home. mom and dad got a divorce and my mom went a little "wild." just suffice it to say that home was not home anymore. i lost most of the contact with my dad. i was somewhat adrift when i got to college. i met keith and he helped me work through a lot of things. he loved me and believed in me.

he has always believed that i could do more than i ever thought i could. he has always been there for me. when i went back to college he did so much so that i could study, work and when i wanted to quit he wouldn't let me! he is now encouraging me to continue my education by getting my specialist degree. yet again when i said i didn't see how he said of course i could. it so nice to have someone affirm you.

he is a fantastic father. he is the man that i dreamed of for my children, although he is a soft touch : ) he's never been afraid to tell his sons that he loves them and give them hugs and kisses, even now! he loves them unconditionally and they know they can trust him always.

he is the smartest man i know, alive or dead!!! he's horrible to play trivial pursuit with unless he's on your side. he has helped me with so many papers and research projects that would have taken hours to find information for. he's also my editor which has gotten me more than one A in school. he even went to school for me one time when i was sick to take notes. my professor wanted to know if he could come back!

i think i knew he was truly the man God had for me when we could sit without talking and there was not an awkward feeling about that. even now, if we are driving or sitting and neither of us is talking it just feels comfortable.

these are just a few of the things i love about him. i could go on and on but these are the most important things: he is a man of God, a good father, a wonderful husband, the best person i've ever met and i am fortunate enough to call him my husband.

i love you with all my heart!

your deb

tubing with family and friends

if you read keith's blog then you will know that he is not really a fan of tubing but i love it! i think that if it weren't for me the man would never have any fun (just kidding honey!) i like being in the water and going down the small rapids, getting in the water, laughing and talking, and going at a leisurely pace watching the scenery. i really had fun : )

we had a good day at church and with no church tonight, of which i'm not a fan of anyway, we had a nice restful sunday afternoon. i'm hoping we're going to sam's club tomorrow and see matt and tasha but keith doesn't want to go so we'll see. he has a lot of his mom and dad in him and i have a lot of my dad in me, meaning i like to go and do stuff and visit. he would rather stay home. like i said, we'll see. i'm pretty easy : )

it is one of life's little pleasures that we have a monday off. that to me is so nice to wake up and realize it's monday and you don't have to get up!!!!

hope everyone has a wonderful labor day.

sacs

every 5 years or so the state department of education in its infinite wisdom comes to schools with a committee to see if schools know what the heck they are doing. this group of people are known as the sacs committee. sacs stands for southern association of colleges and schools. before they come the school system that is lucky enough to be accredited that year has kittens and everyone goes "insane in the membrane!"

our school system will be host to this wonderful event the 2nd week of september. you would not believe all the things that we have to be sure we know. we have been told again, and again, and again ad nauseum to know the school motto, vision (i didn't even know we had one!), and on and on. we have these things posted everywhere, and when i say everywhere i mean everywhere, would you believe the bathroom in front of the toilet????? the one in our bathroom seems to have grown legs and it has become quite a game to "find the school vision in the bathroom."

my funny today at school has to do with this visit. apparently these people will be interviewing parents and students as well as school personnel. i chose 2 students from my room. i told them about this separately and their reaction was a stitch! i called one student to tell him about his appointment to the panel. he looked at me and his jaw dropped and in his inimitable way said," this week just keeps getting better and better!" when i told the other student, she took the paper with the "suggested questions and answers" and looked at me then dropped her head on my desk and said,"and who do i owe the thanks for this honor!" needless to say they are not very happy with me right now but they'll get over it (tee-hee).

rainy days and tuesdays

what a rainy day we had here in georgia. we probably had 5-7 inches of rain! everything has greened up again. it doesn't look like august anymore. we sure did need the rain.

as a teacher i love rainy days. the kids are somewhat subdued and seem to be quieter at least until recess. ha-ha, i don't have recess duty! smart woman! everything is going very smoothly. it's almost kind of scary. i guess that it's because i know these kids and they know me. like i said, we didn't have to learn the routine and sort of picked up where we left off.

i gave them an interesting writing assignment yesterday. in social studies we have been talking about scarcity and how that changes what people buy and prioritize in their life. their assignment was to pretend that they were on their own for 2 weeks and they had $100 to use as they wished. of course the goal was to have them see that if that is all the money they had then they had to spend it wisely. when they first heard that they could spend $100 they started talking about buying games, etc. then as they started thinking about it. they became pensive and really thought about the situation. they shared their writing today and surprisingly enough they, almost to every kid, they would spend the money on food, bills, pet food, they would conserve water, electricity. it was wonderful! these are the times that it is so cool to be a teacher b/c you can see their intellectual maturity growing!!!

in another vein, it is interesting to live in this environment we call school. it is like its own world. we have the leader, we have the peacemaker, we have the arbitrator, the comedian, the drama queen, the complainer, the questioner (this person drives me crazy b/c they always have that last question when the meeting is over and we are asked, "does anyone have a question?" and you KNOW this person is going to have ONE MORE QUESTION!!!) anyway, it is an interesting study in people and this microcosm world.

we finished our 2nd and 1/2 weeks of school. i have already graded 252 papers, scheduled 2 conferences, written at least 5 notes and put 5 students in study hall (detention). wow! but you know what? i wouldn't do anything else. i truly love teaching!

i had several "atta girls" this week from my principal! it was really nice b/c she doesn't give compliments all the time. we were asked to come up with goals for our teaching, what we wanted to work towards. i had actually been thinking about this this summer (slow summer ) so i was ready for this. they are ambitious goals to be sure but what's a goal that can be easily reached??? anyway, my principal was so impressed with them she e-mailed them to our curriculum director who wrote her back with "WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

the other thing was about my kids. i am so glad i was able to move up with them. in social studies we have been discussing goal making and why goals are important. this is one reason i wanted to move to 5th. these kids are just beginning to have opinions of their own and understand what these mean and the importance of them. anyway they came up with goals of their own and they also wrote a class mission statement which was pretty awesome. my principal thought this was terrific also!

if you can't tell i am very glad to be working with 5th graders again and so far i have had a good start to the year. i think it will be a good year with lots of hard work on my part and my students' part. i told them i was going to work them hard and they could rest on the weekend!

i would like to share some things i have learned over the years as a teacher. keith is forever telling me i should write a how-to book but for now this will do. so here goes:

1. remember that each and every child you teach is someone's baby
2. you are not the most important person in a child's life but you can definitely be one of the important people in their life
   
3. always give a child a chance to save face, if you back a child into a corner they will come out fighting and you will lose
4. be enthusiastic and honest when you teach
5. never be afraid to say i don't know and then try your best to find out the answer

more later : )

birthday and a funny moment

we went to jim and bonnie's to celebrate jim's b'day this evening. we love getting together with them. it is so good to have good friends. we always have good food, laugh until we can't laugh anymore and just enjoy being together. matt, tasha, keith and i got jim a tent. yeah, i know it's a strange gift but it is practical for what he needs it for. jim rides a motorcycle and at the end of this month he and other riders will be taking a trip for about a week. they will be camping for some of the time and he didn't have a tent thus the tent.

the other thing i wanted to write about was that as i said earlier, i wanted to find something to laugh about everyday. today was a good one. in my language class we are learning about sentence fragments. i was explaining to the kids that you don't start a sentence with the word "and." i asked them to tell me what part of speech "and" is. one of my students very enthusiastically told me it is a conjunction! god love him, he doesn't often get things right so i told him excellent! that it is indeed a conjunction. to make sure he understood what a conjunction is i asked him what a conjunction does. he got that deer in the headlights look and then, you could see the lightbulb go on, he tells me, "it conjuncts!" funny stuff for this english teacher. it made me laugh!! yeah : )

laughing all the way

i now have a copy machine in my classroom! for those of you who teach you know how awesome that is!!! for those of you who don't teach you probably would never understand how great this is and how much better my professional life will be when i'm not looking for a copy machine that works.

how it got to my school is my funny story for the day. keith loaded it in the van last night. when i pulled out of the driveway this morning the darn thing shifted on the back seat where it was sitting. the seat was folded down and it slid back until it was resting on the back door. i got to school and parked in the back parking lot. i thought, "i'll gently open the back door and push it back onto the seat." well, when i opened the back door the thing slid even further out the back! i carefully lowered the door and opened the side door and got behind the it thinking to pull it back onto the seat. oh no! that would have been way too easy! instead when i got my hands on either side of it it proceeded to start sliding out of the car!

now this wouldn't have been to bad but there was absolutely no one in the parking lot at the moment! i was really stuck! i couldn't move the machine and i couldn't let go! our p.e. coach pulled up a few minutes later as i was pondering what would happen if i screamed my head off. to make matters worse he had his radio up to about volume 100. i began to wave my foot out the door hoping he would see me and realize i needed help. he waved at me! i started hollaring like crazy for him to help me. he proceeded to park his car, thankfully he parks next to me everyday. i started screaming at the top of my lungs at this point and he finally knew that i needed help, he even asked me!

well, long story short, he helped me get it back in the van. when i asked him did he see me waving my foot out the door he said that he thought that WAS odd!!

anyway, alls well that ends well, the copier has found a new home in my room : )

trying new things

as many of you may know i am somewhat technically challenged but i have found that if i keep at it i can pretty much figure things out orrrrr really screw things up. anyway, i am trying to learn how to upload pictures. i'll let you know how well that goes!

not a writer

i realized today that i am not a writer! and yet i am teaching writing to my students, yikes! actually there are several of my students who are really good writers. i also realized that my sons are good writers, i guess they got that gene from their dad and mamaw. but they got their sense of humor from me!!

my goal this year at school is to find something to smile, laugh, or sing about everyday. i'm sure that this will be very challenging on some days. the thing that made me smile today was this, one of my students has horrible grammar! he regularly uses ain't, double negatives, can for may, and yeah for yes ma'am, which he knows is a no-no in my class. anyway, i constantly have him repeat what he said with proper grammar or with the respectful yes or no ma'am. after being reminded several times to say yes ma'am he looked at me with his endearing quirky smile and told me " ah thank ah'm gonna have to write that on my hand!!!"

well, as i tell my students, the only way to get better at something is to practice it, so, i will continue to write : )

i love saturdays

what a beautiful day here in the north georgia mountains. puffy clouds, low humidity, and temps in the 70s for the day and 50s for the evening. we haven't had our air on all day.

i love saturdays b/c it is like a free day! you can do whatever you want on a saturday. it's your choice. it's like a mini vacation. yeah, i know there are some saturdays where you do have responsibilities to take care of but on the whole it's still saturday!

good-bye skip

i just read nathan's blog tribute to skip caray.i felt that i also wanted to write something to mark his passing.to me he was mr.braves. i knew next to nothing about baseball when i first started listening to skip call the braves games back in the day. like nathan said, skip made the game understandable, even the infield fly rule! my favorite thing that skip did was to tell the people watching or listening to the game where a fan was from who just caught a foul ball or a homerun ball in the stadium. there were people who really thought skip knew where these people were from!!

he will be missed.....

ps i'm with nathan, larry munson IS immortal, right???????

buh-bye summer

well, in 7 minutes summer comes to a screeching halt as summer is officially over. i will be going to bed at 10:30 for the first time since june 1st. school starts for us teachers tomorrow at 8:00.

i think that we teachers secretly love the beginning of school as much as kids. i bought new school supplies and new school clothes that i can't wait to show off. we get to see our friends that we haven't seen all summer and we are really eager to learn new stuff just like our kids. let's just keep this to ourselves, shall we??? if it wasn't for getting up early i'd really like this job (tee-hee).

well, the coffee is ready to be put on in the morning, my cereal bowl is waiting to be filled, my make-up and hair stuff is all laid out and my new clothes are laid out, too, so i guess i'm ready. good bye summer, it was fun.

thankful

i had my mammogram done today. as i was waiting i saw a lady i work with, she was there for a biopsy. they found a suspicious lump and they were pretty sure it was cancer. this is one of my secret fears. thankfully for me, i was fine and for her they have found it early and it is small so her prognosis should be good.

this made me think, as did the trip to west virginia, i have so much to be thankful for. i need to be reminded of this when i complain about getting up in the morning, i have to cook dinner, clean house, etc. i should be remembering when i couldn't get up in the morning, that i have food to cook and a house to clean. i hope and pray that we are all aware of our many, many, many blessings each and everyday.

3 days to go

well, i spent my $100 from uncle sonny today. i really got some good stuff for my classroom. i find it hard to believe that school starts monday and the weirdness of school has already begun. i have a meeting on monday that is actually a training session but it's for MATH! i happen to teach language arts, go figure. to cap it off i'm supposed to bring math manipulatives. HELLO, i am a language arts teacher!!!!
school sometimes can just make no sense at all.

we took our animals to the vet today which is always an adventure. our three boys are all grown up with lives of their own so we replaced them with 4, yes 4, cats and a dog. when we go to the vet they have to schedule us for about 45 minutes so everything gets taken care of. when we opened the cat carrier all the cats come out onto the table. our vet said she had never had a table full of cats before. we really got tickled because our smallest cat, sweetie by name, growled the entire time. she sounds like a diesel engine! she also is the one who fills the air with cat fur. she's like a feline porcupine.

tomorrow is another busy day. i have a doctor's appointment at 8:30am (what was i thinking!), then i go with keith to blairsville for his library board meeting, then back home for a hair appointment (those roots have got to go) and then maybe, just maybe, a "moomie."

well, i hear my bed calling and my youngest just im-ed me to go to bed, so i think i will. talk to you later....

waning days of summer

if you are a teacher it always comes as a shock that summer is over and school is about to start and you haven't done nearly all the things that you had planned! but on the other hand, and there is always another hand, i will be glad to be back on a routine.

teachers are an unusual breed b/c we don't make resolutions at new years but at the beginning of each school year. so with that in mind, here are my resolutions:
1. i will do my best not to get caught up in the "drama" at school
2. i will avoid, to the best of my ability, gossip
3. i will remember that all parents are not stupid
4. i will be thankful that i have a job that i know is what i'm supposed to be doing, i don't have to ask why i am on this earth

i truly am excited about this year. i get to "promote" with my class from last year. we don't have to go through the beginning of year rituals, what is this teacher like, how much can i get away with, how much homework do we have, etc. we can hit the ground learning!!! and i am back in 5th grade, hooray! oh, btw, i am now certified to teach middle school reading so i will be applying for middle school next year if all goes well. of course i won't know what's available but we'll see...

Mission Trip

we just returned from our mission trip this past saturday. i forgot how much energy it takes to be with teenagers 24/7! we were really blessed by going on this trip. it's hard for me to believe that this time last year we only had 4 youth. we took 10 on the trip. i also forgot how much fun these trips can be.

as i was reflecting on this mission trip i realized how fortunate and truly grateful to God i am for several things. one, i have a good education which allows me to have a good job and thus have some financial security. two, i have made some right choices in my life that have made my life a little easier. as i watched the people at the mission we worked at (we handed out bags of groceries)i realized that had i not chosen to finish high school and go on to college i could have been one of those people who came for help to the mission. their opportunities for employment are so limited in this area. they are either coal miners or laborers and with the economy the way it is there are just not that many unskilled jobs. they were so poor and many of them so destitute. i believe very strongly that education is the way out for many people who are going nowhere fast. because i chose to go to school i chose a different life for myself. i also believe that God has blessed me with people in my life who encouraged me and were my cheering section when it was not easy to go on. i am so thankful to God that He has led my life and directed me. i could so easily have been one of those folks. they just made me realize that i have so much that i take for granted that shouldn't be taken for granted. sorry for the rambling....

west virginia is beautiful but i am very happy to be home. our summer is over and school is about to start. that should prove to be fodder for some interesting blogging later on.

well, it's late so i will close for now.

learning all the time

nathan told me that nobody could read my blog unless they were from mars b/c apparently i wrote in "wingding" which sounds like a language martians might use! i am going to see if this is better. btw, i did not choose wingding (or whatever it is). hopefully this will work.

family

well, my precious texas family is getting ready to return home. i will miss them terribly but it's time that all our lives return to normal, whatever that state is (lol). we have enjoyed having this time together. it's nice to actually be together rather than just talking on the phone. we hope to go visit them in october or december for christmas. we'll have to wait and see what the crazy gas and airline prices do. my beautiful granddaughter was a joy to have around. she may be ours but even so she is very intelligent, has a great sense of humor, and is very much her own person. she loves to ride horses, "playing" the piano, reading her books, being with her G-daddy and seeing patty puppy, and being with nonni to see the cats. we also had brenna's great grandmother here, keith's mom, so that was pretty good, too. it's nice that this house continues to be a place for family to gather. bj was home while nathan, kayla and brenna were here and we also went to matt and tasha's house for a cook-out. i loved seeing all my boys together.
i love my family!