bored and un-loved

I'm pretty sure people read my blog, but I don't see too many comments on it. (Other than Jeannine -- THANK YOU! -- At least someone loves me!!)

The concert went well the other night -- the kids behaved themselves. The biggest problem was getting the teacher who had a main part to remember his lines!! He mumbled through the one song he sang because he hadn't practiced enough! The kids loved it, though -- it was great!

Tomorrow we have our field trip to Antietam Rec. It's going to be a CRAZY day!! Pray for us -- there is a lot of water at this park and even though each chaperone has a maximum of 4 kids to watch, anything can happen!!

Post a comment -- even if it's your favorite type of candy or color or pet or leg!! ANY COMMENT IS WELCOME !! (as long as it's appropriate!)

Spring concert!! AAAAAAAHHHHHHH!!!!!!

I guess there's not much more I can say -- this is the crazy time of the year when all the teachers here are about to pull out all their hair and question, "WHY DID I ALREADY SIGN MY CONTRACT FOR NEXT YEAR?????" We have some fun activities planned for these last couple weeks of school, but that just adds a new dimension of confusion to the whole mix!!

Tonight is the Spring Concert. We had practice today (all morning I might add -- not much academic work accomplished today!!). I finally got to see what happens between all the songs I've heard them practice in music class. It looks like a good program -- lessons from Proverbs and how reading Proverbs will guide you in your Christian walk. The only "problem" is corralling 75-100 2nd to 5th graders for about an hour! I admire our music teacher more and more with each performance!

I'm already thinking about how much I'm going to miss having my students next year. It seems like I'm just figuring out how they think and learn best, and I have to send them to the 4th grade teacher! I keep "threatening" to fail some of them because I don't want to get rid of them! They come up with the craziest stuff sometimes!

Oh, before I forget, there was one last thing. The school where I teach has 2 campuses. The other campus where the lower elementary classes are is a rented building which also has community activities and church services. One their bulletin board is an advertisement the other teachers thought I should sign up for. It goes something like this: "Sign up for our mass-wedding -- all you need to provide is the license!" Sounds . . . interesting.

So, what's the verdict? Should I sign up?? :-)

Father Knows Best

This is the thought from the new book I received from one of my kids. The book is The 100 Most Important Bible Verses.

"Jesus said, 'Your Father knows the things you need before you ask him.' " Matthew 6:8 NCV

"Jesus gave His disciples the Lord's Prayer as an example of how to pray. Right before He spoke these famous words, Jesus shared a few reasons why one should pray. To do this, He provided two examples -- negative ones. Jesus said the Pharisees prayed in public because they wanted to be seen as holy by other people. He also said idol worshipers prayed, repeating themselves over and over, because they believed that the more frequently they asked for something, the better chance they had of having their request granted. After those negative examples, Jesus spoke the reassurance that God already knows what you need.

"At first, His words may seem to provide a reason why not to pray, instead of why to pray. If God knows what you need before you ask, why bother asking in the first place? Jesus's point is, the purpose of prayer isn't to be noticed by other people -- or even by God. God already notices you. He knows everything about you and your life. Prayer is not a way to draw God's attention to your needs. It is a way to draw your attention to how much you need God.

"Your greatest continual need is to better know and love God. Communicating with Him about the details of you life keeps you aware of how involved He already is. It also helps you see how many of your needs He fills every day. The more you recognize your dependence on God, the more thankful you become, and the deeper your love grows.

"The Lord's Prayer teaches you to pray for your daily bread. Jesus's words from Matthew don't contradict that lesson. They're a reminder that God needs to be involved in your life, not merely informed about it."

WOW!!!!!!!

So I was right -- they did give me an AWESOME gift for Teacher Appreciation week. As some of you may remember, my laundry situation is . . . frustrating. I casually mentioned this to one of my "moms" -- not even thinking about anything coming from it. She arranged a "conspiracy" and had parents send in money to give to me on Friday. They gave me $200!!! She said it was for me to buy a washer and dryer. I stood there thinking, "this is great, but I'd need twice this to get both!"

But she wasn't finished yet!! She said that one of my students has a grandfather who sells used washers and dryers and, if I'm interested, he has a set for me for that price!!! I was soooo excited!! BUT WAIT -- THERE'S MORE! (I feel like an info-mertial) A few minutes later, I was opening other cards, and one student's mom had written me ANOTHER check for $100!! Later, my "conspiring mom" told me the first set they had was for $300, so that must be why the mom did that. Either way, I feel VERY blessed to have such giving parents.

Lest you think this is the end of the story, God's blessings just keep getting better!! I was telling my friend, Karen, about this when I was at her house Friday afternoon. Her dad piped up and said, "I have a stacking unit I'd sell you for $150, if you want it." God is so good!! Now my biggest decision is do I want separate units, or a stacking unit -- this is where my Dad's advice comes in. So, by the end of the week, I should either have a washer and dryer, or at least know where they are coming from!!!!! What a blessing!!

I've also received some other gifts I'll try to post about later, and more info on my eventful weekend. But for now I wanted to share this!!

God is good -- all the time!!

Feeling appreciated or showing appreciation or both??!

This is the poster my students made for me!! I'm not sure if you can read it, but they have words which I suppose are to describe me. I'm not sure why some of them put "smart" or "beautiful", but If you see the orange-y looking one near the bottom, it just says "hi hi hi hi hi" I think that one describes me the best!! The week has been great, though I would rather receive excellent behavior from my kids than any of the gifts they have been bringing (not that I'm going to give it back!!) Since Monday, I've received: a set from Bath and Body Works, a bouquet of flowers, a glass fish paperweight, a bag of Ghirardelli chocolate (milk chocolate with caramel filling -- it doesn't get much better than that unless it's dark chocolate!!), and today one of my students brought in a huge bag with a canvas teacher bag, a fleece throw blanket, and a book titled The 100 Most Important Bible Verses. I read through the first one and it is AWESOME!! I think I'll start posting them once a week (or twice a week, or every other week, depending on when I get to it!!)

This week has made me reflect a little. I don't remember teacher appreciation week very much when I was in school. I guess in our house we just called it "Mother's Day" (seeing we were homeschooled and all :-) Having my mom as my teacher from 4th grade through graduating High School, I don't have that much pre-college experience with other teachers. Going through my first year of teaching, though, I have thought a lot about MY 3rd grade teacher: Mrs. Seal. It was her first year of teaching. I remember all the little notes she would write on my work, the fun extra projects she would do with us: boiling salt water in the kitchen to show how salt doesn't evaporate, making coloring page books to go with a missionary story, and who could forget studying the Tabernacle and actually visiting a replica of one in Pennsylvania!! We went to the zoo that year, too!! It makes me think . . . when did she have the time to plan all this? She was married when she taught me -- it's all I can do to get my lesson plans done before I actually teach!! I can't imagine how I would be able to have any time for a family with all that I have to do! I admire her so much and appreciate her so much more for the sacrifices she made to be such an encouragement to me and my other classmates!

Teacher Appreciation Week

Many of you may know this already, but this week is Teacher Appreciation Week. I was welcomed Monday morning with a poster my students had made in art class (thanks to the art teacher!!) I'll try to get a picture of it up later this week. A couple of them brought me some flowers, and one gave me a little gift bag and a picture poster she had made using a tissue box as a picture frame -- it was very creative!

One of my "moms" seems to be conspiring against me -- she was very excited about something and has been receiving mysterious envelopes from my students for the past week. I'm trying not to pry, but I think I have an idea of what's going on. I love surprises, but have a bad habit of figuring out that something is up before it actually happens. Oh, well, I'm sure that whatever happens on Friday (when she said the "unmentioned" thing will happen) I'll have a very exciting post to share. Maybe I'll actually post several times this week -- we'll see how the week goes!

Only 20 more days left!!

A week later

Ok, so it's Thursday again and I still feel like time is just FLYING by!! Tomorrow is our annual "Labors of Love" fundraiser. This is a day for ALL the students at my school to get out into the community and help people by cleaning up, working, or just encouraging them. My "kids" are going to 2 different nursing homes to sing and recite Bible verses. Please keep us in prayer for good weather -- if it rains, we have a regular day of school and I have to figure out what we're doing!! I'm excited about it, though -- we have matching tee-shirts and everything for it!!

On to other events in my life . . .

One week ago tomorrow was the first time I've ever gotten a pedicure!! A friend of mine said she was going, and I've been wanting to get one for a while, so we went!! I took some pictures of my feet (sorry to those who think this is gross). The first one (without the shoes) looked a little bright, so I put on my shoes for the second one. It was a lot of fun. We were going to go to one place in the mall, but there were some "customers" who looked as if they were about to get into a knock-down drag-out with the owners, so we walked to the other place. The best part about the experience was watching my friend have her's done! She is VERY ticklish on her feet and she was laughing almost the whole time!! It was a little expensive, but it was worth it just for the experience -- it may be a while before I have it done again.