Pray for Madelyn

Please join me in praying for baby Madelyn.

For you local folks, this is the granddaughter of Glenna Bilberry who was the director at the PHBC CDC for a long time. She was born a couple of weeks early, last Thursday 9/24 but has struggled ever since. She's in the NICU at Mother Frances.

Click HERE to read her mommy's blog.

Facing the Giants

I know everyone else in America has already seen this movie, but until tonight, I hadn't. Wow. What a great movie!

I will tell you the truth. I haven't seen it before now because I thought it was a movie about football, and anyone who knows me well knows that I am not a football fan. My favorite part of going to a football game is socializing, smelling the concession stand foods (and eating them!), and just the atmosphere of excitement and fun. In fact, I've sat through a dozen or so games in the past year or so since Savannah's in the band and I can tell you honestly, between all those games, I've actually WATCHED maybe a combined total of 5 minutes of the actual game in all that time.

I tell you that to say this: If you haven't seen the movie because you don't care to watch a football themed movie, rent it anyway. It's not about football at all. Sure, that's what you see on the preview above. And that's what is on the DVD box, but it's not what the movie's about. If it was, I wouldn't have made it to the end of this movie. And I darn sure wouldn't have cried 5 or 6 times.

You see, this movie is about so much more than the football game you see in the previews. The lead coach of the Shiloh Eagles team (a Christian school) is up against some 'giants' in his life. Upon facing another losing season, infertility, a car that repeatedly breaks down, a home in need of repairs and fear that threatens to overtake him, the last straw is finding out that the parents at the school want him fired and he worries about the consequences if that occurs. When he finally allows God control of every area of his life and makes the choice to praise Him no matter what the outcome, things turn around for him. And it's not just the coach who is facing his 'giants'. There are so many other characters in the movie that make the movie what it is -- a glowing reminder of God's infinite love for us, a stark contrast to the attitude & general tone of most movies of Hollywood these days.

The acting is a little strained in parts and comes across a little cheesy at times, but overall, it's an awesome movie.

Please consider watching it if you haven't already. Not because I'm asking you to, but because no matter where you are in your walk with Christ, He has a message for you in this movie.

Samuel's reading for pleasure!

Samuel has always been a little less enthusiastic about academic stuff than his sisters. I am reminded often, however, that boys tend to be that way. It's hard to be the mom of 2 girls & 1 boy in that regard because the girls have both always enjoyed reading, they've excelled at school & require very little (or NO) help at all with their homework. They just sit down & do it...or better yet, they finish it at school and never even bring it home. Samuel, on the other hand, struggles with reading, writing, spelling & handwriting. He has to be reminded 100x to get back to work & quit dawdling. He is not far enough behind to need extra help at school, but he will probably never be an "A" student in those subjects. He has to work really hard to just squeak by. Last year when he had to take the state's standardized test (TAKS) to pass 3rd grade, Larry and I really stressed over it. We were terrified that he'd rush through it so that he could turn his papers over & draw dinosaurs & pirates on the back...and then fail the test. He's just your typical boy. He wants to hurry up & get done so he can move onto better things. Like basketball or TV or skateboarding or just doing anything BUT schoolwork.

And I tell you all that to help you understand my excitement this afternoon. When he got into the car at school, he grinned & said "Mom, I'm now the proud owner of a Diary of a Wimpy Kid book." Savannah read one of these books a couple years ago so I knew it was 'safe'. I just smiled & told him that was great. He drew the book from his teacher's treasure chest today. That alone is pretty huge considering that there were also TOYS in the treasure chest. Seriously...I wonder if he realized there were toys in there also.....because SINCE WHEN does this child choose a BOOK over a toy? I was pleased with his choice, though, and made sure to praise him for selecting a book!

As we drove from his school to Savannah's, then to the grocery store, he was silent. I looked back & realized he was reading his book! He wanted to take it into the grocery store with us, but I made him leave it in the car. The second he got back into his seat to drive home, he was right back in the book. He has to read 20 minutes for school every day & write in his reading log. Today, he read all the way home, then read for 20 minutes like usual. When the timer went off, he looked over at me & asked me to reset the timer for another 40 minutes. I had to giggle & grin & quietly jump up and down. He hadn't done the math himself, but without knowing it, he was VOLUNTARILY reading for a full hour just for fun....that's absolutely a FIRST for him!

Folks, let me tell you....this child has NEVER EVER EVER EVER EVER read a SINGLE book for pleasure. Never. In his entire life. He's read things for homework at school but NEVER "just because". I've been stunned all afternoon & evening!

He had to quit reading long enough to go to Cub Scouts this evening. When we came home, he got ready for bed & climbed into bed with...you guessed it...his book!

This mommy has had happy tears this afternoon. I've emailed his teachers. I've posted the picture (above) to my Facebook page. I am SO proud of him. I am SO happy to see him develop a love of reading ANY book. I am so very thrilled to see him find a book he enjoys. So much so that I've already found the rest of the series on eBay & placed a bid!

Brain Slop...ya know, the random, leftover stuff. Enjoy!

I can't believe that the end of September is already here. Just a few more days & we'll be beginning my favorite time of year! The holiday season is upon us! I realize that Halloween doesn't really fit into the usual "holiday season" that most of us think of, but in my world --that would be the world of children at home & at work-- it does. So yeah, the holidays are a-comin'!

If you know me at all, you know that I don't like Halloween for the yucky, gross, bloody, gorey, icky stuff. I don't do that at all. We don't do skulls & bloody eyeballs & all that sort of stuff at my house. My kids *know* not to ask for blood & yuck sort of costumes. It ain't gonna happen. We have fun dressing up as silly or funny things. Or cartoon characters. We enjoy going to church carnivals & getting loaded up on candy. It's FUN. We don't even tiptoe near the creepy stuff. At my church when I was little, we had an annual "Fall Fest" on Halloween night & for a while, there was even a rule that you had to dress up as your favorite Bible character. That was easy...robes & sheets or scarfs completed the costume for several years there. Looking back, I have to giggle because I don't think my mom ever bought us costumes. We created them out of things we had at home. My great-grandmother died when I was in 2nd grade & we brought home a huge box of costume jewelry from her house. For the next few years, I wore a bunch of her (gaudy) jewelry & heavy make up & was a gypsy. I cut holes in a few white sheets & was a ghost a few years. I painted on cat whiskers with my mom's eyeliner & was a cat several years. We never went "all out". In high school, I had a Tshirt that I wore year after year. The front said "This is my Halloween costume." On the back, it had a whole list of possible things & it said "I am a........." and then you checked a box under it. As a teen, my friends & I would trick or treat down the street that ran adjacent to the church property where our families were attending the church carnival. We'd ring the doorbells & stick out our funny little plastic pumpkin buckets to the odd looks of people wondering why 4 or 5 teens who were not in costumes were at their door begging for candy. Hey, it worked! :)

This year, my youngest has come up with a crazy costume that won't take lots of work. She's going to be a (teen) babysitter. It cracked me up watching her get all giggly while we were in Walmart the other day. We bought some bright pink & green hair color spray stuff. We're going to paint her fingernails black & tape babydolls all over her clothes. I know...silly. She's going to look kinda punk-ish, but hey, it's cheap & it'll work just fine. And anyone who knows my sweet baby girl knows that she is anything but "punk"! That's why it's so funny. Samuel's going to be a ninja & Savannah is going to re-use last year's "slumber party girl" costume--her PJs & robe. Works for me!

At my school, we have pizza & pajama parties for Halloween. No one gets their feelings hurt because they can't wear their costume and everyone gets to do something fun.

Soon after Halloween, my VERY FAVORITE holiday is upon us. Thanksgiving!!! It's my favorite holiday because no one has messed it up. It's not all commercialized & screwed up by anything else that is wrongly attached to the holiday. I like that no one really makes money off of the holiday (other than maybe the turkey people). It's a day about being thankful! I love that!! Family time, yummy foods, sitting around & talking, beautiful Texas Fall weather. Oh, I love it!

And then of course, there's Christmas. Seriously, it'll be here before ya know it. In fact, according to this website, there are only 88 days til Christmas! Larry is dreading it already. He always does. He's got a serious ba-humbug thing about Christmas due to the way it's so commercialized. Every year, he LOVES the things that we do at our house, the way the focus is on JESUS & not the presents & money that must be spent. But he still sees so much of the world getting all caught up in the commercial stuff, so he hates the whole Christmas season. I keep trying to tell him that it doesn't have to be about all of the stuff he hates. He can make it miserable or not...it's up to him to focus on the good stuff he likes. Oh well, I'll keep trying.

Tonight, we arrived a little early for our LIFE group meeting. Since the childcare folks weren't ready for the kids yet, we made a little stop at the church library. I'm so glad we did! I grabbed 3 books. Larry got 2 audiobooks. We got 1 movie for the family to watch, "Flywheel". And Sarah got a book. Later on, before we left, Savannah went back & got a book too! I can't wait to get started on one particular book. It's this little bestseller that all my friends have been raving about for months now. Maybe you've heard about it.


And on a totally unrelated front--2 things for you to add to your prayer list. (See, I told ya this was a really random post!)

Early last week, Larry's aunt called to ask him to do a funeral for her mother in law. He agreed & made the trip to Lafayette, LA to perform the service. He loved the time with his mom's family that we don't see nearly often enough. Please keep that family in your prayers as they begin to heal & move forward without their mom, grandma, mother in law.

Tonight, Larry's mother called him, very upset. Her brother, Jimmy Glenn ("Uncle Jim") has had cancer for a couple of years. I think it's stomach cancer, but I might be wrong on that. I've only met Jim 2-3 times in the 17 years I've known Larry, so we're not really close to him. Anyway, he's gone back & forth for a while now on his health. But tonight, my mother in law's call was pretty sad. Jim's on a ventilator & is not expected to make it. It appears that the cancer is winning. Her sister, the same one whose mother in law died this past week, is coming to pick her up in the morning & drive her to the town where Jim is in the hospital. Nikki (my mother in law) is devastated. This is her older brother. Please keep Nikki & her siblings in your prayers as it appears that they're losing Jim.

Time for me to say goodnight & hit the shower. Sleep well, my friends!

Savannah's Neopets story--part 2

http://www.neopets.com/ntimes/index.phtml?section=469597&issue=410

Feel free to go take a peek. This is part 2. Part 1's link is in my Sept 13th post.

Flu day #3-4

Thursday went much like Wednesday...lots of resting & Gatorade. By Thursday afternoon I felt confident in going back to work today. So I did! I'm about to pass out on the keyboard at this very moment, so I'm going to keep this short. Just wanted to check in & say I'm better!

Flu day #2

6:10am - woke up, Sarah told me she'd coughed some during the night & her throat felt tight. In listening to her talk, I realized that she was having some trouble breathing clearly, so I set up her nebulizer & got her started on a breathing treatment. Not really a full-fledged asthma attack, but definately something we could treat & take care of right away without a trip to the doc. Thus, the life with an asthmatic daughter.

By 6:15, I pointed toward cereal & toast for the kids' breakfasts...after all, I didn't want to actually TOUCH anything they'd be eating. Everyone got settled on what they wanted to eat, then changed their minds. Well, 2 of the 3 did. Sarah ended up waving her arm around telling Savannah something & hit her cereal bowl, tossing milk & cheerios all over the floor. With zero energy to clean it up (she was sobbing & upset that I'd be mad), I told the kids to go get towels & sop up the milk. When the cheerios dried later, I'd sweep them up. Until then, towels on the floor would suffice.

6:25 Samuel swore his toast was burned & he couldn't eat it. After asking to "help" me make a dozen other things (none of which I had the energy to mess with), I told him to get a cereal bar & drink his milk. He got a cereal bar & sat down with it & proceeded to goof off for another 30 minutes. I sat there eating my yogurt & taking my medicine & prayed that they'd get it together and out the door w/ Larry on time.

By 7:15, Larry was rounding them up to finish whatever they were doing & get out the door on time. As they went out the door about 7:35, I heard Samuel saying how he'd never eaten his cereal bar. Grrrrr!

I sat down at the computer for a few minutes to check my email before getting drowsy. By 8:15, I was crawling under the covers. I slept for a little over an hour. I woke up hungry & realized that I'd never finished my yogurt this morning. I went looking for a snack & couldn't find anything that didn't require effort to prepare so I got the hummus & crackers out. I ate about 4 or 5 crackers' worth before I was done. I drank some powerade with it & layed back down. I couldn't really sleep, but I was too tired feeling to get up & do anything either. About 10:45, I put my book down & fell asleep again.

I didn't sleep a long time, only til 11:30 when someone in the neighborhood cranked up their lawn mower or leaf blower or something. Whatever it was woke me up.

The rest of the day was spent between the bed, the recliner & the computer chair. I go in waves of having some energy to having zero energy, from feeling "ok" to feeling like I've worked out every muscle in my body & ache pretty intensely. The coughing comes & goes. I can tell the med for that is working. And I'm not feeling the 'tightness' in my chest like I was yesterday so the antibiotic/steroid/antiviral stuff is helping with all that.

Mom brought us supper (it was good, thank you mama!!!) so that I didn't have to be up, cooking (or touching anything that the rest of the family is eating!) tonight.

I'm reaching the end of my day now. And I can feel it. It's only 7:20 but I'm already ready to get in bed for the night. It won't be long now........

About time for the nightly disinfecting. Clorox wipes & Lysol all around!

dumb doctor!

The last few days, I've gotten up in the morning feeling a little tightness in my chest. Not congestion so much (no productive cough), but just a tight feeling like I do when I have bronchitis or asthma stuff going on. It's rained here off & on all day long for dayssssssss so I really figured that all the rain had stirred up some pollen/molds & it was aggrivating my lungs. It's happened before & it'll happen again. I used my Proventil inhaler a time or two just to open things up a bit and it worked. The tightness of the early morning hours passed & produced no other symptoms, so I put it all off to allergies & asthma.

Today I went to work feeling fine, other than that tightness in my chest. Around lunchtime I started getting a headache, but since I had my hair in a ponytail I figured that was why. By 1:00 when the parents picked up their kids, I was beginning to feel a little 'off'...just worn down & tired. But need I remind you? I teach preschoolers for a living. Of course I'd be tired at the end of the day! It wasn't til about 1:15 when I felt like I'd been hit by a freight train. All the sudden, my legs felt like they weighed 500 lbs. each! My back & shoulders & arms ached. And then there was the cough that had suddenly begun. Ugh.

We've had 2 confirmed cases of Type A flu at the school. It's going around all my kids' schools too, so of course that was my first thought. When I started feeling so bad I realized I needed to go home! When I got here about 1:45, I took my temp. Sure enough. 101.5! I swallowed a handful of Vitamin C & garlic along with my Ibuprofen, then I got on the phone. That's where the title of this post comes in.

I called my doctor's office to see how quickly I could get in. The lady who answered the phone took my name & put me on hold. She came back to tell me that due to the fact that I've been healthy & haven't needed to see my doctor for the past 4 1/2 years, I was no longer on her current patient list. To see my doctor, I'd have to be considered a new patient and she is not taking new patients right now.

I sat there, stunned for a minute & repeated to the lady "I have fever....I think I may have the flu...but I can't see the doctor?"

She confirmed this fact to me & when I asked what I should do she gave a real unconcerned sounding "Well, I don't know. Unless you come in to see the doctor once every 3 years, we remove you from the patient list."

You've got to be kidding me. I'm being punished for staying healthy & having a strong immune system? I don't see my family practice doc unless I'm sick. I see my ob/gyn every year & she does all the "girl stuff" plus blood work, BP check, etc, so I see no point in paying a 2nd doctor to do all those same tests over again. The last time I saw her was in 2005 when I had a UTI.

The lady offered me an appointment with another doctor in the office for tomorrow morning, so I took it. I called our insurance company to have my primary care doc switched to this other doctor only to find out that (grrrrrrrrr!) she wasn't in our network! I called the doctor's office back & cancelled the appointment & then I was back to the drawing board. I got on the insurance company's website & looked up primary care doctors. There was one here in our little town, 5 minutes from my house. This doc has been in this same office for about a hundred years so I knew he was an established doctor who isn't going anywhere. One phone call got me an appointment with him, so I called the insurance co back & had him named as my primary care doc.

And I'm glad I did. I have the flu!

Thankfully we caught this veryyyy early so I am not as miserable as I might be if I'd let it go a bit. I got a steroid shot today & was prescribed an antibiotic, an antiviral med (like Tamiflu--but it's a generic version) and Tussi-Pearls for my cough. Although I do feel bad, I don't feel miserable. Larry made me lay down & take a nap tonight & each time he's seen me standing up since, he's nudged me & said "shouldn't you be in bed?". He's a pretty good nurse when I'm sick. So grateful for him!

Savannah's Neopets story

I know that 99% of you probably have no idea what Neopets are. Don't sweat it. I wouldn't know if I didn't have a daughter who is so into it.

If you go to Neopets.com you will find a website for kids where you create these little creatures (Neopets). They look like a cross between a cartoon alien & a cartoon animal. The site is kind of like Webkinz, if you know what that is, in that you create your little character & then get online to feed it & take care of it. Only Neopets is bigger than that. They have a little newspaper where users can write stories about their neopets. It's called the Neopian Times. Savannah is sooooo beyond thrilled because now that she's 13, she is able to send in stories to be posted on the site in the Neopian Times. She's been waiting for a couple of years to reach this age. She lovessss her Neopets time & since she is a heavy-duty reader & writer, it was only natural for her to write some Neopet stories for the website.

Anyway, I promised that I'd post the link to her story on my blog. It's lengthy, but she'd love for everyone to read it if you have time. She is a very good writer, very creative & well versed. So here ya go: http://www.neopets.com/ntimes/index.phtml?section=469596&issue=409 (Her username is Babygirl229911. It says that instead of her name.) This is just part 1 of the story. It is "continued" each week, so when the next part to the story comes out, I'll post that link.

Photo Catch Up!

I just realized that I have a couple of events in my pictures folder that I've never shared here. Rather than spending a lot of time talking (err...typing!) I'll just share the pictures. I'm sure you'll be able to tell which is which, but just in case, these pics come from the kids' trip to the skating rink to celebrate the end of their summer reading program where everyone met or exceeded their goals AND Savannah's first football game of the season. Here we go..........

Samuel & Savannah, skating on the rink.

Samuel
Sarah
Savannah spent a lot of time like this....falling down & laughing.
Savannah & I before the football game in our matching band Tshirts.
All 230 members of the Junior High band. Savannah's right out in the middle, just to the left of the bank sign. Click on the pic to blow it up.
Again, click the pic to blow it up. Savannah's almost dead-center in this pic with her head turned toward the camera, to the left of the bank sign.

Sat Sept 12

Last night, we watched a pretty powerful documentary about 9/11 on the History Channel. I think I've seen every video & photo slideshow about Sept 11th ever made, but this one was pretty different. It was a collection of videos that amateur photographers took in Manhattan that morning. There was a clock spinning throughout the movie so you could keep up with what order things happened in. Very moving.

Two things that really struck me ---
1. In one scene just a couple of minutes before the towers collapsed, you see a person leaning out a window high in the building (above the level where the fires were burning an inferno out the windows). He/she is waving a white flag frantically trying to get someone's attention for help. I know that there aren't random flags in most office buildings, so you know that they took off their shirt or grabbed a tablecloth off the office kitchen table or maybe it was someone's white jacket. Who knows? I couldn't help but watch that person waving that white flag & wonder what was going on in their mind in those moments. I ached, knowing that I was sitting in my comfy living room literally watching the last minutes of this person's life as they waved that flag, begging for help from ANYONE who could possibly get to them & get them out of the building. Moments afterward, the building collapsed & undoubtedly, that flag waving person died.

2. In many scenes, you see firetrucks & police cars & all the authorities on the ground directing people away from the area. But what hit me like a ton of bricks was watching the firemen going into the building. I'm certain that most of those men didn't come out. Listening to a conversation of one fireman & his captain on the ground was hard too. And the 911 calls where the operators repeatedly told the people to "sit tight....we're coming...there are firefighters in the building....". I know that the 911 operators had to wonder if they'd be able to save them, if they were sharing those people's last moments with them on the phone.

Watching that documentary brought tears to my eyes, and I hope that never changes. I don't think any of us will ever forget the horror of that day, watching people jump from the windows to escape the terror inside the building....planes crashing into buildings before our eyes....knowing the level of sadness & grief going on across the country. :::sigh:::

The truth is, I don't do war movies or even the medieval time movies where there are battle scenes. I just can't 'take it'. I don't like violence, but more than that, I can't stomach seeing the last moments of someone's life in media. The very moment where that person steps from their earthly life into the arms of God is such a personal, sacred moment.

Today I'm praying for the families of all those men & women whose last moments were caught on tape, shown over & over & over for their families to see again & again. God bless those families who have to relive that day over & over, year after year. May we never take our loved ones for granted.

Thurs Sept 10

Update from yesterday's "ON CALL" post.

Remember how someone else volunteered to take Larry's call for him last night? Want to hear how that worked out? She didn't get ONE SINGLE CALL. She slept the whole night. Nada. Nothing. Zip!

Here we are, 10:48pm on Larry's final night & so far, nada, zilch. Praise the Lord!

On call

Larry started his week of being on call Friday evening (9/4). A full WEEK of call is hard, but if you can make it through the week, you're then off call for quite a few weeks. Maybe 7 weeks? I can't remember exactly.

I made a remark Saturday morning about the fact that I was amazed he hadn't received a call yet. Truly, when you're on call in his field it's unusual to go more than 12-18 hours without a call. He looked at me with shock & said "why did you say that?". In other words "you just jinxed me!". And JINX him I did! Let me see if I can sum it up for you.

Saturday 9/5
7:45 pm--call received
1:00 am--returned home

Sunday 9/6
evening sometime (can't remember)--call received, gone for several hours

Monday 9/7
10:30 am-- call received, 3 situations to go take care of
10:30 pm--returned home
11:00 pm-- call received

Tuesday 9/8
4:45 am--returned home
--3 hours of sleep--
9am-5:30pm regular work day at the office
6:30 pm--received call
10:30 pm--returned home
11:15 pm--received call, begged & pleaded for a coworker to take this ONE call for him...thank God he agreed!

Wednesday 9/9
midnight-- fell into bed & passed out pretty quickly
1:00 am-- received call; was able to handle the situation over the phone, but it took a while; he was now wide awake & couldn't get back to sleep & read a book for an hour or so til he fell asleep again.
about 3:00 am -- finally back to sleep
9:00-5:30 -- regular office time

THANK THE LORD, someone volunteered to take tonight's call time for him so that he could come home & see his family and get a full night's sleep for once this week! He'll go back to being on call after work tomorrow evening, but we're crossing our fingers that his final night of call will be much less crazy than all the other nights! Oh Friday morning, he'll surely be happy to hand over the reigns to someone else.

Boy, Oh Boy!

Tomorrow is the first day of my new school year. The kids went back to school a couple of weeks ago, but tomorrow is my first day with my new class. At the school where I work, the kids can attend Monday through Friday, Mon/Wed/Fri or Tues/Thurs. In the past couple of years that I've been there, I have always had a mix of the three, a handful of 5 day kids mixed in with a small group of 2 & 3 day kids. This year I have a first. I have 2 entirely separate groups of kids. I'll have 6 in my Mon/Wed/Fri class and 8 in my Tues/Thurs class. Why is that a big deal? It means I will be able to repeat things during the week without any of the kids having to do something twice. It means my lesson planning just got that much easier this year. Hallelujah! I love it!

Our assistant director moved over the summer & a fellow teacher took over her job. That left her classroom open. And the inevitable shuffle of teachers began by mid-summer when those who would be moving, going to work elsewhere, etc began turning in their notice. We have 13 classrooms at my school. Some of the classrooms have 2 teachers (one teaches the MWF class & another teaches the TTH class), but this year, for the first time since I've been there, we have something like 11 five day teachers. I love that! There are lots of new faces (teachers) but lots of familiar ones, too.

In my MWF class, I have 3 kiddos that I had over the summer, so that'll make the MWF class easier to adjust. The rest of the kids will follow the 'lead' of the three who already know me & know the way I run the classroom. The upside to the TTh class is that all but 1 of the kids is a returning student who's been at our school before, so that ought to cut down on the tears and sad kiddos on the first day.

While my nerves are fired up, I know tomorrow is going to be a good one. So here we go......time to start school!

I love teaching

This weekend I was given a 2nd copy of the book 32 Third Graders and One Class Bunny by Phillip Done. I love this book, so I passed my 2nd copy onto the 3rd grade teacher that 2 of my 3 kids have had. I hope she enjoys it, too. Having had that copy pass through my hands made me want to go dig out & re-read mine. So I did! I'm not quite done with it yet, but I am loving the book all over again. Just a glimpse of what I love---

from the back cover
I take slivers out of fingers & bad sports out of steal the bacon.
I know when a child has gum in his mouth even when he is not chewing.
I know the magic word.
I plan lessons while shaving, showering, driving, eating & sleeping.
I wear four leaf clovers & dandelions in my shirt pocket that have been picked with love at recess.
I correct pencil grips and spelling mistakes and bad manners.
I pray for snow days.
I hope April Fool's Day is on a Saturday this year.
I answer to both "mom" and "dad".
I hate glitter.
I leave "shugar" and "vilets" misspelled on Valentine cards.
I call on children whose hands are not raised.
I know that "colonel" is a really hard word to read and so is "doubt".
I know when a child does not understand.
I know when a child needs help finding a friend.
I am a teacher.

There are SO many sweet parts of this book. I'll share more as I go along, but right now I need to take off & get finished readying myself for work & hit the door.

As you read this today, remember my dad who is having back surgery. He had a spinal fusion surgery a couple of years ago (same surgery Larry had in '06) and today they're going back in to remove some of the hardware that is really bothering him. It should be a pretty simple surgery, but of course there is always a risk of complications. Please pray for a simple, straight forward surgery with no problems. I know he'd appreciate your thoughts & prayers.