Z is for Zamboni...

....as in the title of this children's book....

Who wouldn't want to drive one?





The town I teach in had a centennial parade a few years back. All the schools and businesses participated. The parade went for about a mile down the main avenue in town. The local ice rink owners drove the Zamboni in the parade right behind my school....and at the half way point there was a loud "Ka-BOOM!!" The Zamboni popped tire! It scared us all, until we realized what it was and then we laughed with relief.

Zzzzzzz.....Happy A-Z April.....now I put this alphabet month to sleep. Ba-Zinga

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*ENJOY A BLOGGING CHALLENGE*

Sunday, 29 APRIL

HAPPY BIRTHDAY TO ME!!

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*EAT CAKE*

Y is for Yellowstone

The first national park in the world!

It lies mainly in Wyoming but a bit into Monatana and Idaho. We were there when my kids were younger and we were lucky enough to stay two nights at the Old Faithful Lodge in the original building. I can only imagine how grand this was years ago when you would arrive by train. The geisers were spectacular and the summer weather was beautiful when we were there.  I would love to go in winter when you can only travel in by snow mobile.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*KINDERGARTNERS

WRITE THE LETTER Y WHEN THEY SOUND OUT A "W" WORD*

X actly 29 Days Left in the School Year!

X is the most commonly known letter to children...I always hope that it is because X marks the spot for buried treasure in books that are read to them...but I am unwilling to accept the fact that it is from playing video games and X is on the controller.

Today I have an X on each of my eyelids as last night was a very successful Open House- but the preparing for 2 weeks stressed me out...and I was more than ready to go out with teachers afterwards to play Trivia. And today I got up early to go to the store to buy mini donuts for a surprise party...the surprise is on the kids....it's for MY school BIRTHDAY!!! My real birthday is this where the X is on the calendar...Sunday!!

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*PARTY UP OPEN HOUSE IS

 OVER FOR THIS YEAR*

W is for....

Worms!

Silk worms to be exact....which are not really worms at all but caterpillars...but were named "silk worms," like 5,000 years ago in China.

Each spring I bring out a cocoon out of the refrigerator from the previous school year. A cocoon that a female moth laid her eggs on...and in a few weeks, those very tiny black caterpillars hatch.

...and they eat and eat and eat all the mulberry leaves I can pick. Then they begin to spin....and hatch....

...and around and around it goes...year after year. I now have white and yellow silk worms....and I even have had some caterpillars that have made it out of their box and across the room to spin...which is unheard of....and even weirder...I have had moths that fly!! The silkworm has long been domesticated and I think all my interbreeding has turned up a few fliers!!

LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH

HARDER*RAISE SOME SILK*

...hopefully chicks hatch next Wednesday...here is one candled egg....you can see the air space...but if you look carefully you can see a chick! I do believe the goose eggs aren't fertile :(

V is for Vanity...as in plates...

When we lived in San Diego I ordered vanity plates for the Captain for his 21st birthday. He drove a'69 VW Bug (that is sitting in our garage to this day,) and I thought plates would be cool. I filled out the paperwork and sent in a check for $25. Weeks later he received a reply- "SORRY 'GNEISS 69 IS INAPPROPRIATE'.

Gneiss is a metamorphic rock- the Captain was a Geology major...apparently the officials thought 69 was crude...it's not like we pulled that number out of the air....it's a 1969 car!

The Captain never bothered to refute. In 1983- when the unemployment rate was as high as it is today- we moved our poor unemployed selves to UT. I was pleased to find out that vanity plates were $15 and a one time charge!! Unlike CA where you pay year after year and only a fraction of the money goes to a cause that supports the plate. The only drawback was the plates only held 6 characters...but MAREY was not taken- I claimed it immediately. It was on the VW when Coppertone paid us to drive the car around like a billboard.

My friend moved to UT shortly after...she was amazed that everyone said, "Oh My Heck" as a swear word.....her vanity plate said, "O MY HEK!"
The Captain and I began collecting license plates...and they all hang in my laundry room-  and we try to get one from each state or country we travel to......one year while in UT I bought this cool fabric and made curtains for my laundry room....

Remember when CA gave these out each January....when everyone in the entire state's license fees for the year were due?

If you remember that you are at least my age....they were mini plates to put on your key ring....in case you lost your keys.....but what they didn't count on were dishonest folks who found your keys and then searched for a car with matching plates....and drove it away!!- I used to use these little plates with my Barbies....(they made cool 8 track tapes!)

What would your plate be? Or if you have one...what is it?

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*

LAUGH HARDER*L84WRK*

U is for...Ursi

Quit with the camera and feed me breakfast!

 

She is actually Ursala...named after the Sea B^#tch in The Little Mermaid. She's a rescue kitty who is about 15 or 16 years old...we've had her for about 14 years. She was abused at her first house...and took quite a while to realize that no one here would toss her out the door or toss her anywhere for that matter. She still freaks out if we carry her to the door to put her out. But she's a good cat who obviously loves her crunchies...and a good, long cat nap on the couch...(like a full day's worth)....that's where she can be found unless I send her outside for a sunny afternoon.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*RESCUE A KITTY*

T is for

TOY STORY!

If you have kids, (or you teach kindergarten...) you know that Toy Story is a hit. Here are some cool facts....especially close to home here because the then mayor of the town I live in worked for Pixar when it won an Oscar.

"Hey, there's a snake in my boot!" My favorite quote...enjoy the rest...

In Toy Story 2 one of the rock-'em sock-'em boxing robots in Al's office has a chunk out of his ear, just like Evander Holyfield!

The crowd voices of the little green aliens are actually John Lasseter and crew after breathing in helium gas!

The original star of Toy Story was going to be Tinny, a mute windup musician and star of Pixar's Academy Award-winning short Tin Toy. Woody was going to be his sidekick.

Buzz's first name was Lunar Larry, but it was changed because it didn't fit the grand space hotshot he became.

The entire first half of Toy Story had to be reworked in a matter of three months after it was agreed that the story just wasn't working right.

Next to Sid's lava lamp, there is a poster that reads "Kill'n Paul Bunyan and his Blue Ox of Doom" while they both hold weapons. Typical of Sid.

The human skin in the movie was produced with ten layers of textural details, including dermal and epidermal skin, fine facial hairs, primary and secondary wrinkles, oil, and blood layers.

The head of Molly, Andy's little sister, is reborn in Babyface, the mutant toy. The X and Y coordinates were squashed , an eye taken out , hair pulled out , and put on an Erector set!

In a single finished frame of Toy Story, there are over 1.4 million individual pixels. They're fine enough so that even on a big movie screen you'll never see the individual dots.

The average time required to render a single final frame is three hours, and some of the more complex frames can take up to 24 hours!

Pixar has 300 computers that render images 24 hours a day.

A boyhood story from Pixar artist Andrew Stanton is our introduction to Sid: one time he made an M-80 into a little backpack for a toy to be set off in a field.

Pizza Planet was first Pizza Putt: a combination pizzeria and miniature golf course.

Sid's room contains: coils of barbed wire, crushed and uncrushed cans and cups, cassette tapes, spring-loaded mousetraps, assorted knives, regular and burnt matches, darts, pencils in the ceiling, bumper stickers, and over a hundred pieces of crumpled paper.

One of the movie's editor's, Julie MacDonald, wanted her name in the movie. So on Sid's backpack it is written, "Julie Macbarfle has kooties."

21 of the license plates mean something special to the crew. One license plate says "MOLYK9" in honor of Pixar's resident sheepdog Molly.

In its most productive week, Pixar completed 3.5 minutes of animation.

Sid has 15,977 hairs on his head; that's 3,593 more than Woody.

Andy's block has about 100 to 120 trees, all of which have about 10,000 leaves.

To get the feel of how plastic army men would actually walk, the animators nailed an old pair of shoes to a piece of wood and took turns hopping around in them.

Sid's desk includes seven blotches, two crayon marks, four kinds of moss, five kinds of rust , three brush marks, 16 splats, four dirt marks, 15 drips, two holes, two scrapes, four spills, eight cup rings, three smudges, two chips, two sprays, three wood-grain chips, one splotch of rug dirt , 15 scratches, and six watermarks! Also, his bed has a urine stain.

Animators spent 15 hours creating hardwood-floor scratches.

When an animator is done with a shot (he/she has watched it an average of 3,000 times!), John Lasseter tells them to go pick out a toy as a reward. The number of toys on an animator's desk demonstrates his prowess.

The books on Andy's shelf are named after Pixar's previous short films: Tin Toy and Knickknack.

The real-estate agent for Andy's house is "Virtual Realty." Notice it on the "for sale" sign in the front yard.

The moving company is named "Eggman Movers" (on the side of the moving truck) for Ralph Eggelston, the art director, whose nickname is Eggman.

Sid's desk has four different layers of textures: a "splatter" layer of paint marks, a "bump map" where Sid hit it with hammers or scraped it with blades, a "specularity" layer to determine where light is reflective around those areas, and a "dirt" layer for general grunge.

*Facts taken from http://wide-eyed-webs.com/instat2/TVMov/ToyStoryFacts.html

Sunday Fun Run

This year I set two goals.
1. I would not miss an assigned duty at work.
2. I would run, ride or swim an event each month.

(Shortly into the New Year I missed traffic duty. To my defense, the schedule changed and I was assigned Tuesday instead of Wednesdays...and I was setting up for Valentine's day and, well...I got a call saying to get my butt outside. And I haven't missed since- even in the downpour.

I began New Year's Day with a local 5 K. I had planned the 10 K but after going to bed at 2 a.m. and then getting a call from BIG Foot at 3:15 that he missed the last train from the BART Station...and could I "please come get me mom," I had very little sleep.

February and March were the Pre Season Burn mini triathlons.

With April coming to a close, Daughter #1 and I needed to find an event. We found a local school fundraiser 5 K for $15. Such a deal! So this morning at 9:30, we ran in the Hottest weather here since last year. But the run was so small, I placed 2nd in my age group and Daughter #1 placed 1st! She got a $50 gift card and a baseball cap for her dad. We couldn't believe it...and we wished we had borrowed Monty the dog to drag us up the two big hills faster.

So far the goals are paying off. Last year my goal of not driving to work earned me the title of Bicycle Commuter of the Year for my county. Go team!

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*RUN A RUN*

S is for my SURVIVOR

At 3:17 a.m. in the Stanford Hospital Emergency Room lobby a doctor walked up to me and said, "We know it is cancer."

I felt a punch to my gut.

"The ultrasound shows a piece of bone missing in her hip."

Suckerpunch to the head.

"And there is a spot on her lung."

Final TKO blow. My daughter is filled with cancer....in her bones and lungs.

"We are admitting her as soon as a room is available."

I reeled against the wall as he walked away.

A nurse walked up to me and asked if Dr. _____ had talked to me. I answered, "I don't know who talked to me but I haven't eaten since lunch yesterday and I am exhausted. She brought me some saltine crackers and orange juice.

My husband had given me his work cell phone -but how do you call a father and tell him his baby has cancer? I chose to tell him in person.

I followed the gurney with my daughter and an IV pole down the dreadfully long hallway that connects Lucile Packard with Stanford. Quasimodo who pushed the gurney said nothing...his one shoulder leaning way down as he breathed deeply straining against the weight of life. We passed parents sleeping on random couches in the halls and the thought that I could be one of those parents didn't help the nauseous feeling in my gut.

We reached 3 North, the oncology wing. The mechanical door button did not open the doors and Quasi was frustrated as I tried to hold both doors open for the gurney to pass. A young nurse met us and led us into a private room. Looking at my daughter, finally in comfort with the morphine flowing into her veins, I was able to leave her for a few hours.

I drove home and told the Captain that our baby had cancer. I slept for one hour and woke up the other kids. It was registration day at middle school. I left checks and directions for Daughter #2 to take BIG Foot to the orientation. To pay for his yearbook, P.E. clothes, hot lunches and whatever the hell needed to be done because we would be at the hospital...indefinitely.

That morning we signed paper after paper. We watched her first bone marrow pull, as the fellow doctor struggled with the marrow, so thick it would barely draw out. We phoned our work with the news that our daughter had some cancer...not sure....we will let you know...call me a substitute teacher...can you pick up my son from school this week? Can you let AYSO know that I cannot possibly coach my team? Tell my indoor team to find another left forward.

The next days were blurs of a diagnosis, surgeries to implant a Hickman Line, bone marrow draws, induction chemotherapy that caused diabetes, pancreatitis and the loss of 20 pounds. The good news was that the socially inept doctor from E.R. was wrong. The "missing bone" in her hip was just marrow so full of leukemic cells it showed up dense...and the spot on the lung was the beginnings of pneumonia. The leukemia was ALL, Acute Lymphoblastic Leukemia, a childhood leukemia with a 70% survival rate at her age group. The cancer had also not made its way into her spinal fluid.

After 2.5 years of daily chemotherapy she was still in remission an she concluded her treatment.

Today, 6 years off treatment, she remains in excellent health.
A SURVIVOR!

and this is why I end every post with....

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH
HARDER*KISS A SURVIVOR

We are very fortunate. Along this journey we have met many cancer families...and we have lost many friends along the way. That damned neuroblastoma. Three little boys and Alex from Alex's Lemonade stand crossed out path....all gone now from that *ucked up cancer. There is no "good" cancer...yet we were lucky to have the one with a better survival rate...but that still means nothing to those 12 friends of ours who lost children to the same *ucked up cancer my daughter had. So when the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society asks for a donation....remember these kids...and give a shit $1 donation to help find a cure.

July 2003- Relay for Life speech:

Kimra called me 2-3 months ago and asked if Ali or I would like to speak tonight. My life was chaos at the time so I told her one of us would. So I put off writing this until yesterday. As I sat to write this I had so much to say I did not know where to begin. Should I tell what we have been through in the last 334 days- what it is like to be told in the emergency room at 4 a.m. that your 15 year old daughter has cancer? Should I tell you how people have helped us? How people have hurt us? How unprotective a parent feels- how brave children can fight? …

16 years, 4 months, 7 days and about 8 ½ hours ago, my husband and I drove our baby girl home from Mills Hospital. For those of you who have made that drive, you know it is one of inexplicable joy. Here is this baby you are to protect and care for. Every lane change, every stoplight is taken with caution. You drive less than the speed limit for the first time since you began driving. You drive as defensive as you can. You do everything in your power to be safe and protective. But no matter how protective you are, there are things like cancer that you cannot protect your child from.

326 days ago I again drove my daughter home from the hospital for the 2nd time. For those of you who have experienced this drive, it is also a time of  joy. The saminexplicablee defensiveness, the same protective instinct. Only things are different…you are very aware of cancer and what you can and cannot protect your child from.

Since last August we have experienced the best of times and the worst of times…the best: first and second remissions; the worst: return stays in the hospital for unexplainable side effects and treatments. We have experienced the good the bad and the ugly- The good: friends, neighbors and co-workers who rallied to help our family in every way. The bad: the pain of treatments that will last 2 and ½ years. The ugly: an F given by a p.e. teacher because Ali could not do what the other girls could do.

What this has taught us is to fight. Fight cancer, fight discrimination, fight, fight, fight. We have become tough and calloused. What we have learned is to love. Love each day that Ali is feeling good, to love bald heads, to love the sunshine and the storm, to love the birds and worms in the garden, love the laughter and our time as a family. We have learned to love a day like this and rejoice that there are other people who are fighting successfully - we are all here in this fight together. Cancer has touched all of us here in some way. It has made us all fight, hate, love, rejoice- it has shown us the best of times and the worst of times- it has shown us the good the bad and the ugly. It has made us vulnerable and unprotective…it has made us stronger…it has given us the strength to be here today and fight. And so we shall until there is a cure.

R is for....

Reading!
Last summer I was lucky enough to go to Columbia Teacher's College in New York for a week long Reading Project. Not only did I love my stay in New York, but I learned to teach my Kindergartners in a whole new way.

It is like magic...when the reading partners read each day they start out with 2 or 3 books and sit back to back and read. Then after 10 or 15 minutes they sit shoulder to shoulder and read to each other, or take turns reading one book. Only a handful of the kinders are "reading." The others are retelling or have memorized the stories. I read while they are reading...but I find I usually only get a littLe reading done before I stop and watch and listen to my amazing little readers.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*READ WITH A BUDDY*

Q GOT MARRIED...

...to letter "U."

Qu

In kindergarten I teach the alphabet, the sounds, the vowels, blends and the likes that one needs to be a writer and a reader. And when Q is involved, a "u" always follows. So we say, "q and u are married....and inseparable."

Quite quaint :)

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH

HARDER*QUITE QUACKY*

P is for...

Persistence.
She trained.
She qualified.
She flew to Boston.
Monday the temperature at the start of Boston was 80 degrees.
She started at 10:20.
She had hoped for a personal record.
3:48:06 was her time.
The temperature was 89 degrees when she finished.
3:19:29 was her time last year.

 Stats:

1,367th out of 11,152 women

1,029 out of 5,606 in her age group

6,015th out of 26,656 runners

Congrats Kira!

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDRER*BE PERSISTENT*

O is for....

Oviparous.

Coming soon to a kindergarten room nearby.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*OVIPAROUS CRITTERS ROCK*

N is for...

N is for National Parks

When my kids were little, we took a trip to one or more National Park each summer. We took along our National Park passport

and stamped it at every ranger station                       

and we took our picture in front of every entrance sign...and we camped or stayed in the grand old lodges...

and then we took it international....to Waterton- Glacier International Peace Park- a National Park that borders two countries...the U.S and Canada...and then to Manuel Antonio in Costa Rica

and we revisited our honeymoon spot for our 25th anniversary

where I put on that totally outdated wedding dress and we celebrated on the rim...

...and took in the beauty...and toasted to

the next 25 years...

My favorite National Park is probably the Grand Tetons....but I would love to backpack through Glacier...and then there's all the others I haven't been to that are on the bucket list....

...and to return to those we barely made it through- Yosemite- we passed through in a day on the way to pick up Daughter #1 from a 2 week backpacking trip south of Yosemite....although I did backpack there in high school.

We are sure lucky to Andrew Jackson, Abe Lincoln and Teddy Roosevelt to set aside these areas that are now National Parks.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*VISIT A NATIONAL PARK*

Monty

Two years ago we had to put our old black lab to sleep...he was a great dog, but just worn out. "Uncle" Woody came to work with me every day and slept under a table during class. The kids would play ball with him at recess and if someone was feeling sad you would soon find them under the table, laying with the dog and stroking his head. It is time for a new dog...one that I will have certified as a therapy dog, so it can go to work with me and make visits to Lucile Packard Children's Hospital at Stanford. But we have to mend the fence and get rid of the downstairs carpeting and a few other things before we can get a puppy.

So while I wait, I borrow Monty...

who belongs to a family that my kids babysit for...and yesterday and today Monty ran with Daughter #1 and I. When I went to pick him up this morning he saw me through the window...and he ran to the front door and tried to open it with his nose. He kept hitting the knob with no results. So he came back to the window and began to paw at it.

"NO!" I said, and he immediately stopped. And then he whimpered....and then his girl opened the door and gave me his leash.

Monty lost his mind!

When we got to the trail he pulled us along way faster than we wanted to go...but after a mile and a half he slowed down...and so did we.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER

*RUN WITH A FURRY FRIEND*

M is for....

Marathon.
I have run one...and that was the San Diego Heart Marathon way back in 1979...before the marathon was even a women's event in the Olympics. It started out over the Coronado Bridge as the sun was rising...and ended at Padres Stadium. I went out too fast in all the excitment...and then the sun came out. I finished. I didn't walk any of it. And I really have no desire to ever run another straight 26.2 miles again. The longest 4 hours and 5 minutes of my life.

Give me a half marathon- for a good cause-

like the S.F. Women's Nike that my daughter and I ran in October...where the proceeds go to the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society...(Did you know Daughter #1 is a childhood leukemia SURVIVOR? 2.5 years of daily chemotherapy. But that's a story for letter S.)

Or give me the local New Year's Day run

that gives out the coolest t-shirts and doesn't start until 9:30 so all the partiers can make it to the start.

Or give me a mini triathlon

Or give me a century ride around Lake Tahoe with Team in Training or a 100K for the Lung Association

but no thank you to another marathon...

BUT I will root for my friends running The Boston Marathon on Monday! Go Kira! She's wearing Bib number 9114 and you can follow her progress by text at www.baa.org

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*RUN A MARATHON...ONCE*

L is for Last Night

L is also for Last night's Lightning storm...

This photo was taken of the thunder storm that rocked S.F. last night.... photographer Phil Mc Grew captured the Bay Bridge getting hit by 9 bolts of lightning from his apartment window. I have never experienced lightning and thunder like this in the Bay Area...it rattled our house, lit the sky and hit an airplane that just took off from SFO headed to England. The flight had to return to SFO for the plane to be checked out. We read Thundercake in class this morning because all the kinders could talk about was the storm.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*TGIF*

L is for Larvae

Larvae: the immature, wingless, and often wormlike feeding form that hatches from the egg of many insects, alters chiefly in size while passing through several molts, and is finally transformed into a pupa or chrysalis from which the adult emerges.  

Little 5 day old Larvae...

BIG about ready to spin into cocoon larvae

Silk worms, butterflies, ladybugs, chick eggs... - the Lifecycle- it's in the kindergarten science standards....and I just kick it up a notch because, what 5 year old doesn't like to hold a caterpillar?

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*LOVE SOME LARVAE*

King of the Beasts

K is for Killer Cat...the King of the beasts around here...

15 years ago we rescued this feral cat from my mom's garage where a stray had taken up residence and had a litter of Kittens. I really wanted an orange kitten but every orange kitten we could capture was a female....and we really wanted a male. After much chasing- my 3 kids and I cornered this guy and drove him 500 miles back home with us. He is getting up in years and has reverted back to his feral ways- coming to the porch for meals and a petting only on his terms. He's never really forgiven us for neutering him.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER

*LOVE A CAT*

Just Ducky

J is for just...as in just Ducky....as in today. I don't have time to be clever, so today's post is Just what it is....I drove out 30 miles out to the coast then inland to pick up the chick and duck eggs for our kindergarten classes to incubate. (I is for I should have used incubate for yesterday's I post.) But when I got to the ranch the woman had no recollection of my 3 messages or my order...and told me to come back next week. Which is impossible- I had two incubators in my room alone that were running for 24 hours - all primed, along with 3 kindergarten classes waiting for DUCK and CHICK eggs tomorrow.

I left the ranch with Just 2 goose eggs and headed to the feed store for a dozen and a half chick eggs. Just that the feed store's hatch rate is a much lower percentage than the ranch. Just saying...I had to go with what was available.

So in 21 days we may or may not have chicks and in 28-30 days I may have a goose...or whatever is just inside those 2 huge eggs! I will candle them in 4 days to see if any are fertile.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*

LAUGH HARDER*JUST INCUBATE

WHAT YOU CAN*

I is for Imperial

...not the Costa Rican beer, but the old time thermos jug for hot or cold liquids...only this baby has never been used...

It sits upon my kitchen cabinet tops with its matching ice chest and with other items that may, or may not make the A-Z April. It is pretty cool since I love antiques, (and 50's things,) and the best part is I was the only bidder on ebay for this and got it for $15...ice chest too....both unused in pristine condition.

Now of course I couldn't do an A-Z post without relating it to my work...so I is also for the Incredibles....here I am at Halloween...Helen Incredible...

...accompanied by the Incredible dog.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*LETTER 9 IS I*

H is for Heartbroken

If you are a longtime reader of mine, you know that I put my heart and soul into teaching. Last school year was very difficult and I moved to a new school. And it has been a very good year. But my heart is at my old school where I taught kindergarten for 14 years. Where I had a giant classroom that I built 18" cubbies in, and with parent's help built a huge garden, where we rode trikes on the playground and dug in the dirt with real shovels. Where kids got to play like they did 50 years ago at recess.

Well today I took the pets up to my new school since spring break is over... and I saw that the silk worms had hatched! Yahoo! Won't my kinders be excited tomorrow! So I drove to my old school to dig up my mulberry bush- my $50 mulberry bush. When I got there I stopped short- and wanted to cry! Right where my playground and beautiful garden were there was a new foundation for a classroom! The construction began this week. Gone was my garden and play area. I am sad that next year's kinders, 75 of them, plus 15 per K's will have one tiny play area- no place to ride trikes or dig. No butterfly garden full of sages and milkweed to set the butterflies free when they emerge from the pupas...and no where to dig for earthworms and treasure. I am so sad...Heartbroken to say the least. I was on the committee for the re-modernization and there was not a planned classroom there. I will go have a good cry now.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*PLANT A NEW GARDEN AND BEGIN AGAIN*

HAPPY EASTER MY FRIENDS!



or Passover, or just plain old Sunday :)

 

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*HUNT FOR EGGS*

G

G is for Greeting Mat.

I painted it at the entrance to my classroom. Each morning I greet my kinders with the greeting of their choice...if they stand on the:

Heart=a hug
Hand up=High 5
Hands sideways=Handshake
Smiley Face=Hello

*

It's a nice way to start the day...and it prevents a traffic jam at the cubbies.

(*Note, I am not at work this week so I pulled this photo from the archives of my old LMNOP blog...this greeting mat is from my old school and a new one is painted on my new threshold...the thermometer was showing that it was 42 degrees at recess...which is darn cold for here...the greeting mat was power washed by the janitor and the concrete paint didn't hold up.)

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*START THE DAY WITH A GREETING*

F is for FiLoLi

F is for Filoli, a local estate- a national trust for historic preservation. Although I have lived nearby for years, I paid my first visit on Wednesday. It was built in 1915 and was completed in 1917. It had two owners and in the end was  donated to the state to run. Tours are given of the downstairs and beautiful gardens. Cool facts about the mansion:

*Heaven Can Wait was filmed there.
*Dynasty had a few scenes filmed there and it is the Carrington Mansion that appears on the credits. Just hundreds of miles from Denver.
*Bob Villa filmed Guide to Historic Homes of America there.
*The name Filoli stands for FIght, LOve, LIve

F is also for flowers- the tulips and daffodils were in full bloom. Good timing on our part.

*LIVESTRONG*LOVESTRONGER*LAUGH HARDER*TOUR A MANSION*