Monday, October 28, 2013

My children

So many times it is easy for me to focus on all of the bad things that I did during a day, or how my teaching wasn't up to the standards that I think it should be. Today was not that day.

I had a wonderful weekend, another post, and walked into school ready for the week. I had quite a bit to do, and felt like a chicken with my head cut off, as I ran around trying to organize everything in my room.

BUT, as soon as I saw my children, I knew that I had missed them. I missed their smiles. I missed their personalities. I missed the way they all talk with one another. I missed being their teacher. I missed being with them.

These were feelings that I had never had before. I have never experienced such joy at seeing children who I so often see through a more negative light. It was a wonderful feeling. The best feeling to start the day out with.

I was able to have such a fabulous day, although missing 5 of my little ducks was sad, it did make for a quieter, and calmer classroom. We all had fun together. Every student was able to have more attention. Attention they so often desperately need.

Later in the day, we had writing, and had just read a story about germs and how they make us sick. Our sentence revolved around such things being: "I see germs." Now I know we can't really see germs, and that was explained to them again, so we decided on drawing an illustration to go with the sentence that included a sink and our hands. Mind you, when we do writing, I do the writing of the sentence on my own paper in front of students, and then I draw a picture to correspond to the sentence. So I'm sitting in my chair, after having written my sentence already, I'm in the middle of drawing my picture including the hands, and then the sink. I lost it right before I took the picture. The kids laughed just as hard when they noticed it too....


Yes, that is my "happy face" sink. I, in no way, meant for this to happen. I was just trying to draw the bowl part of the sink, rather than just the perimeter. 

Some of the quotes from today:

"Miss Grant, you are a beautiful colorer." 
"Miss Grant, you make beautiful drawings."
"I love your beautiful jacket."
"Miss Grant, your hair is so beautiful today."

Anybody think they were sucking up? With all the hugs they gave me today, I don't think these kids are anything other than the sweetest little ducks! 

M

Monday, October 21, 2013

Introverted Weekend

Lately, my weekends have consisted of traveling to Roslindale, MA. Which for those of you who don't know, it's a city of Boston. That means I have to drive on 93 (an interstate that goes straight through Boston), at about 4:00 on a Friday afternoon. For those of you who don't know Mass traffic, that's a bad time. Mind you the first time I made the drive, it took me 1 hour and 30 minutes to drive a whole 10 miles. Yep, could have driven it faster on a tractor. That thought helped me get through the drive.

The drives haven't been terrible, and when it ends with seeing this face:


Who wouldn't want to make that drive??? 

This weekend we decided to finally take some time for ourselves. The previous 3 weekends were dedicated to doing things with other people, and we needed time to just be by ourselves and enjoy each other's company, and we did just that!!! 

Much of the weekend was planned on a whim, including a diner breakfast, a barbershop, a small town farmer's market, and a hike. Such a comfy, cozy, fall weekend. Just perfect!

We decided to take a hike in the Blue Hills Region, which confused me, because Blue Hill is a town in Maine, the town in which I was born. That town doesn't belong in Massachusetts. 

But, nevertheless, the hike was beautiful. The leaves were changing color, and falling all around. I'm not one to take a lot of photos, but I snapped these two of interesting things we saw along the way. 

Random rock that looked pretty ominous.

One of the many trails we followed.
 The "path less traveled" illustration anyone? 

The hike turned out to be a bit longer than we had originally planned, due to a lack of attention paid to what direction we were walking down the mountain.....The picture at the top is the "are we seriously lost?" face. 

After an hour in the wrong direction, and walking half way around the mountain, my hip popping out of joint, the soldier made me sit, while he got the car. Isn't that cute?? I was much happier not having to walk another mile....

While on the hike UP the mountain we snapped a pretty darn good picture of ourselves, if I do say so myself, we take some good selfies.


It turned out to be a wonderful weekend of snuggles and recuperating. I think we can go back to hanging around people again. :) 

M



Tuesday, October 15, 2013

Old-Fashioned Thoughts

Whilst talking with a friend about old-fashioned values and the traditions that have been lost as of recently, due to the internet or cell phones, we thought of multiple skills we don't want lost:

Sewing
Knitting/Crocheting
Cooking with a Pressure Cooker
Gardening

I'm sure there are multitudes more, but these are the ones that we so often find ourselves saying "if only we had the time to learn."

I read this article earlier in the day, and it makes me rethink my usage of social media and technology that much more...

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/katie-d-anderson/teen-texting-the-ruin-of-romance_b_3763576.html?utm_hp_ref=fb&src=sp&comm_ref=false

It is wonderful on so many levels, not just the "teen romance" level.

Worth a thought,
M

Thursday, October 10, 2013

Topsfield Fair

Talk about stressful!!!

I have chaperoned field trips in the past, but they were all short ones. I have led trips for my after school program, but those all stayed on campus. I have taken kids multiple places, but never in such a large group, to such a large PUBLIC venue.

I started my day with one of my parents not showing up, so I scurried around to change all of my plans. All of the things I packed for each of my children had to be changed so that another parent could step in at the last minute.

Somehow, we made it on the bus and were on our way. I brought extra crackers, and bottles of water for each child, and boy did they come in handy!!!

We started off our morning by looking at giant pumpkins, and lots and lots of vegetables. We even answered a list of questions, earning all of the children lollipops. Needless to say, that was a highlight for the children. :) While we were eating the lollipops we saw an elephant walking into an arena. The children screamed with joy and begged to go see. We watched the "Beulah's Birthday Bash" in the arena, and all of the students wanted a chance to play with Beulah. It was so cute. Rather than playing with the elephant we went and fed all of the animals at the petting zoo.

If anyone needs to know how to make a quarter worth of the animal feed last between 15 and 20 students....just ask. (It's about 3 or 4 pellets per child.)  Considering most of the feed fell to the floor because the students screamed any time an animal came toward them to eat, it was good they weren't wasting it all. We headed back towards lunch and checked out a few more buildings like the "poultry" building.

I said to my children "We are going to go look at some chickens!" Super enthusiastically of course to keep them entertained, I might have included a little jig to jump start them along. One of my girls looks to me and starts whining "But I don't want to see these chickens, I want to see real chicken, like the kind you eat." I didn't want to completely ruin her day by telling her that live chickens and chicken nuggets are the same thing, only one is dead. She will find out eventually.....ruining her morning didn't seem like that time. :)

We headed over for lunch and enjoyed some time of just relaxing. Well, I might have enjoyed more of that time than the children, but it was definitely needed. After lunch it was only 45 minutes until we needed to be back on the bus, lunch was definitely a good point of the day! :)

With more walking around, looking at sheep, and cows, and pigs, and bunny rabbits, and horses and more sheep, the children were happy!

We headed over to the bathrooms for one last stop before the bus, and that's when the terrible hit. You never know how far your stomach can drop through you and the ground, then the moment you realize that you have truly lost a child. Your thoughts become all jumbled trying to remember the last time you saw the child. I retraced my steps. I remembered what she was wearing. I called her name in the bathroom. I talked to all of my parents who saw nothing as they had been attending to the children in the bathroom while I waited outside.

10 excruciating minutes passed between the time most of my students exited the bathroom, and the time that I called my principal to see if he knew anything. It was at that moment that I found out she had been turned in to "lost children" and another teacher had her going back to the bus. Little did I know a comment made my a random person mere moments before I knew my student was lost, about a girl in a "blue jumper", was actually a comment referring to my child, who had taken off her purple jacket, the only piece of closing I had seen her in all day. Knowing my child was finally safe, although not with me, was still terrifying. No one ever wants to think that they have lost a child.

When she was finally returned to me the only feelings I could have were that I was hurt and I missed her. I wasn't angry that she had wandered off as she explained. I was just scared, and that was a feeling we could both share.

We all crawled onto the bus and headed home. I had 21 students to take to the fair, and I, by the grace of God, had 21 to take home.

That was my field trip. I can say "1 and done" now right??? I lost a kid one time, and now I'm done forever right??? Let's hope!

M