Surprise!

Yesterday was a tough day. Kids were ready for the weekend and DID not want to do anything related to learning all day. By lunchtime I was dragging and as I slumped into my chair to scarf down my lunch, my cousin Ariel texted to say she was coming up from Weatherford. I was thrilled! I had no idea she was coming, she had to work on my birthday and decided to come up this weekend instead. We had dinner and went to the mall and had a fantastic time.

Let me tell you a little bit about my cousin. She's not really my cousin. Her dad was in the Air Force and they moved to Altus (where my grandparents live) about 9 years ago. Their family sort of adopted my grandparents and started spending time with them. Our families now spend holidays and birthdays together and we consider them a part of our family. It's pretty cool how it all happened, and Ariel and I have become really close over the years. We both love music, not many people like the kind of music that we do (The Clash is not a place, people!) and we always find the best deals when we shop together. I'm lucky to have her (and the rest of you, Boones) in my family.

So, thanks, Ariel for coming up and surprising me. It made my week for sure! (I know, two sappy posts in a row, maybe I'm softening up)



Rayven, Ariel, and me

It's Friday, I'm in love...

It's great to have friends who love the same things that you do. When Angela and I moved in together (wow, it's been almost 3 years!), I wasn't sure what she and I would have in common. Turns out, she needed a part time job the first summer we lived together and Capitol Hill needed a part time intern. Things worked out perfectly (God's timing couldn't have been better). So, from then on, I not only had a roommate, but a dear friend who had a passion for ministry and a deep love for the children and people of Capitol Hill. I really think that having Capitol Hill in common brought us together more than anything else could have. God truly blessed me with a friend who could understand what was happening and could support me when I needed her. Sorry for the sappy post (I don't do sappy well), but there is a reason for it. A few months ago, in order to keep Angela in the loop about the happenings at CHill, I started a Friday e-mail with sweet pictures of the kids (I called it "It's Friday, I'm in love," after one of my favorite songs). I'm gonna start putting them here now, so I don't forget them either! Now all of you can see how wonderful the children at CHill are, too!

This is D. He is like the sunshine of my world. When he sees me and smiles, I melt. This precious child taught me more about love than I knew possible. This has to be how God feels for his children. His love is even stronger than mine, more than I can even imagine. Peace settles over me thinking that He loves me that much.

D and Mr. Milt

It's Office Thursday!

I LOVE the Office. It makes me laugh, it makes me cry. It makes me feel incredibly uncomfortable, in the best way possible. I even love the British Office, even though I only understand about 43% of what they're saying. So, to commemorate how much I love the Office, I will now begin the tradition of posting something every Thursday to celebrate how entertaining this show is. This SNL skit sums it up pretty well.

Ms. G's Wrath

Today was Wednesday, but all day I thought it was Thursday. What a wonderful realization when I figured out that the weekend was actually further away. Today was the state writing test for 5th graders. All of the kids told me that they followed my advice and got lots of rest and ate breakfast and were ready for the test. I sighed deeply and thought to myself, "This is going to be a great day! They actually listened!" The children were absolutely fabulous (or ab fab, great British comedy) for the duration of the writing test. It took almost 2 full hours and they were perfect little angels. The moment I opened the door, however, it was like opening the floodgates. Almost every child in my room lost their marbles. I'm talkin' screaming matches, a pushing fight, chewing on erasers and spitting them on each other, stealing, and throwing some of the worst temper tantrums I've ever witnessed. I bought cokes and cookies to reward them after their test, but guess what I'm munchin' on tonight. No party for children who behave like circus animals. Here's an example of how I might have reacted to some of the behavior problems...



By the end of the day it was just pure chaos and I think that my voice may have hit Liz Lemon register a couple of times before the children were released back into the wild. Let's face it, sometimes you just can't take it anymore (especially when some doofus steals your sandwich).

Seriously???

Well, today was "another day, another dollar," as my dad says quite often. Same ol', same ol'...until the late afternoon. I was sent on a top secret mission to another classroom to observe what was going on. I won't go into a whole lot of details, but it includes poop and fingerpainting. Yep, you now have the mental picture that won't leave my head. Have fun trying to eat lunch after that.


That's just how it is as an elementary teacher. At a basketball game a couple of weeks ago, a kid puked all down our main hallway. Another teacher and I just started mopping it up, kind of on auto-pilot. Others around were running away and gagging themselves, but none of the teachers were bothered.


And now I'll leave you with one of my favorite TV puke scenes. "Please don't send Dwight!" Enjoy.

Weekend Update

I can't believe the weekend went as fast as it did! I had lots of birthday fun. Saw "Confessions of a Shopaholic." I laughed a little, mostly at how cheesy the movie was, but there were a few funny parts. Went to Zio's with my family and friends. Watched the Oscars. More on my best and worst dressed in minute.


Then it was Monday. Oh, and Monday hit me like a ton of bricks. The kids were on fire this morning. We had two almost fights before we even got to the classroom. I heard later that there were a bunch of gang fights at Tinseltown over the weekend and we were still feeling the tension from those. Yeah, that's right, we have some kids in elementary school in gangs. Unfortunately, it's kind of a growing phenomenon. Younger kids can take the rap for things like running drugs that OG's can't afford to take. And, there's your gang education for the day. Ya'll didn't know that I knew what OG's were, did ya? It continued on like that pretty much all day. Sent a bunch of kids to the office. Pretty much a normal day.


But, then, there was a silver lining. One of my kids who has been struggling a lot lately made me a birthday card. He wrote and spelled himself (!!!), "Happy birthday. I go bananas." Now, that may sound silly to you, but it brought me to tears. We had been talking about idioms all week and he was having some trouble. He told me when he handed me the card, "I wrote you an idiom! It doesn't mean I'm a banana, it means I'm going crazy!" It was something so small, but he got it. And he knew at that moment that he could do something and be successful. And that's why I do what I do.


OK, here it is:
Best dressed


Marisa Tomei in Versace: Perfection.
Runners up: Tina Fey (go girl!) and Meryl Streep (who always looks fabulous)

Now for the worst:

I hate to pick on Beyonce, but girl, that looks like a tablecloth. Runners up: Whoopi Goldberg (leopard print disaster) and Miley Cyrus (tried WAY too hard)

The blogosphere has finally sucked me in!

I hadn't really thought about blogging until earlier this week. I've been reading blogs off and on for a while now and blogging held no interest for me. Then, I realized that life is blowing past me and I'd like to stop and remember it, so here goes. I want to remember the hilarious things that kids say in class and all of the other things that are going on in and out of school.



To kick off my blog, let me tell you about X (I'll use abbreviations for kids names). I told him that my birthday was this weekend and he got excited and asked, "You gonna go to da club for your birthday?" I kept myself from laughing out loud, but then showed him my white girl overbite and helped him figure out the answer.

(Seriously, this is the first picture that comes up on Google for "white girl overbite." Wow.)

In reality though, I'll be spending my birthday with my family tomorrow afternoon and then Angela and I are going to the movies! "Confessions of a Shopaholic," we'll see how that turns out.