Saturday, May 31, 2008

Vacation Bible School

Well, I think every church in Oxford is having their Bible schools this week. For those of you who don't know...this is a week or several days when kids come to church and sing songs, play games, make crafts, etc., and learn how much Jesus loves them.

I can remember growing up and going to Bible school and singing Father Abraham and the arky song. Can't remember quite how that one went. Those were great times. I look back on those days and realize that that is where the foundation of my faith came from. I learned about how to become a christian and about God's grace. I am excited that is such a fun thing for so many kids. My kids are always pumped about the theme each year and the new songs. (We use the Lifeway curriculum/ songs by Jeff Slaughter.) Here is the link: Outrigger Island
Claire especially loves the motions to the songs. We are starting off tomorrow night with a luau with a real roasted pig. Matt is going to rock out on some ukulele. Can't wait.

I am teaching the 1st and 2nd grade class. That is a wild and crazy group. Lots of fun. Never a dull moment. Carpe diem. Oh yeah.

I am excited because I get to wear a grass skirt (thank you, Amber) and sit in a tiki hut built by my good guy friends at church who love a good project. They had the massive nail gun in the room and I thought I needed a bullet proof vest on by the way it sounded. It is covered in bamboo and everything. Thank you, Kevin and Russell. Claire added her decorating touch to it by putting pinwheels through the roof of the hut. I was impressed by how she spaced them out just right. Two were too close together and she took one out and adjusted it. Aww.

Today I ran all over town looking for more beach/luau paraphernalia. About all I could find was a flower bra. Don't see myself in that one.
My friend from school gave me her mini grill that she bought to take her class to the park, so while I was out I bought hot dogs and s'more fixins. Even though it was incredibly late we cranked up the charcoal and watched them flame. We threw away our other grill after getting tired of moving it in our early years of moving all the time. Anyway, this one did great for now. I have a fire pit for the backyard in my mind for the summer. May happen this summer, maybe not. I did make one improvement by buying stepping stones to go from the patio to the pool. Anyway...enough of me and my backyard.

Matthew is playing the electric guitar with Matt in the morning for worship. I have been listening to them practice upstairs and they sound great. It is cool to hear them together.

Hope your summers are getting off to a great start. It is fun to have so much planned and not planned. We can't wait to see our friends from Park Place in July. We're going to Grandma's and Grandpa's next weekend and then to Mom's. Maybe to Atlanta after that. Relaxing the whole time. These are some of the times that teaching really looks good.

Take care.

Wednesday, May 28, 2008

Matt the builder






One of his plans


When I told my husband about my desire to build risers in my choir room I didn't know how dedicated he would be to the project. He downloaded an architecture program and got to work. He stayed up really late last night drawing out the plans so I could have them approved by my principal. The plans were gorgeous. I felt like I was living with Mike Brady the architect. How could my principal say no? Well.....she couldn't.
Now we need to go to Home Depot and ask them if they will donate the lumber and carpet to build them. I was told that they did.
I have to pick out the paint color I want the room to be so the school can go buy it. Then, I can paint later this summer. I am excited. First, I am going to take a little time to have a summer break.
In between riser planning he has been leveling the backyard to set up the pool for the kids. One side of the yard where the pool will be is about a foot higher than the other. He is just all over things. The only problem has been that while he has been busy, the mice have played. Jacob proceeded to eat an entire bag of cookies and who knows what else. I hope the pool will be a lap pool so we can work off all of those calories. Whew.

I am off to read with Claire. Tomorrow is the 2 hour Lost. Yea! We have been looking forward to this one. It is getting crazy. Even for Lost.

Take care.

Monday, May 26, 2008

Two posts in one day

For some reason I am just now seeing this picture that I took while we were at Mamaw's over Mother's Day. Claire and the boys made fortresses outside in her back yard. Coltrane enjoyed visiting each one.

Pictures from our day at Pearson


Here are the pictures I talked about a few weeks ago. I just discovered Picasa's web album. Hi to Kris, Calvin, the kiddos, Don, Susan and all our other friends there. We had a great time being with you!! Come to Oxford.

Saturday, May 24, 2008

"There's a lot of problems" with the English Language?

:WARNING:
:Random Uptight Rantings to Follow:











OK, I know that I am a language freak, but it really concerns me when I hear really "educated" people using the wrong verb in a sentence. I almost don't hear the verb "are" used in the plural with "there" anymore. I started noticing this a few years ago, and now it is all I hear, except from the other language freaks.

I thought that I might be wrong and that the rule might have changed, so I googled it.

Here is part of an article I found:
In sentences beginning with there is or there are, the subject follows the verb. Since there is not the subject, the verb agrees with what follows.
There are many questions.
There is a question.

I hear "there's a lot of cookies" or "there's a lot of people" etc., etc.

I don't know why I even thought about this tonight. It is totally random.
I know that I don't have perfect grammar. My husband keeps me straight so I won't get too high and mighty. I mess up just like anyone, but when I hear it over and over it reminds me of when we went to Greece years ago. Our choir from Ole Miss was singing there and all over we were seeing them taking signs down and then we heard that they were taking down all of the English. They were passing a Greek only law. It seems that English had infiltrated their country so much that they wanted to take steps to preserve their heritage.

I know this is a silly post, because it probably doesn't matter much to most people. I personally don't think anyone should be ashamed of using good grammar. It is OK to have standards.

Not sure how much people care now. I have seen letters from teachers that made me want to cry. The grammar was so incorrect. I thought what could this teacher be teaching my child if she writes like this.

I may should delete this post before anyone reads it. I just think we shouldn't lower our standards as a country. We hear so much about school being dumbed down. As a teacher this really makes me want to do something about this issue.

OK.......I have said my peace and now I can move on. :)

I want to thank Jay for asking us to sing for the youth steak supper fundraiser. Matt and I love to sing together whenever we can. It has been a long time. He was so happy that he got to sing his favorite song by Lyle Lovett, "She's No Lady, She's My Wife". It's a classic.
We came home tonight with 4 ziploc bags full of baked potatoes, several bags of chopped lettuce, a huge bag of steaks and grilled chicken and even some peach cobbler. There was so much food left over that everyone left with bags of food. That takes me back to Pearson BC when we took home food from every church dinner because they had pity on us and our 4 children. Then, I was a stay-at-home mom, so that food really helped.

I am going to have to fight Matt for the piano this summer. He practices every chance he gets. Funny thing is, I am the one who really needs the practice. I am going to bring my keyboard home from school so we will have two here. We have found some great new websites that have public domain piano music. Bach, Mozart, etc. Alright.

OK, enough babbling. My eyelids are getting closer and closer together.

Hope your worship is great tomorrow. Praise God.

Now to something that really matters:
We need to pray for the Steven Curtis Chapman family. Their beautiful 5 year old was killed when one of their teenage sons was coming home and didn't see her in the driveway. What an awful accident. Here is the link to the page they dedicated to her. http://chapmanchannel.typepad.com/inmemoryofmaria/
I am always so moved by how I see God working in this family. They are such an inspiration to me. Please lift them up in prayer.

Sorry, my thought train jumped around a lot tonight.

Sunday, May 18, 2008

Benjamin's dream came true

This week has been unbelievable. Last Saturday was my birthday which I spent most of with my high school choir. This week we had state testing and then our spring concert/banquet was on Thursday night. There are always so many elements to putting on something like this. I had great help. The kids worked hard and pulled it off. I had some wonderful parents and fellow staff members come to my rescue with cooking and ticket taking.
I think everyone left with very good feelings. Not all students were able to come to the concert, so I have 3 final exams to give. I think a parent is bringing karaoke for class on Tuesday. Alright!
My mom came for the concert Thurs. night and was so much help. We went to see Prince Caspian Friday afternoon after going to Claire's school program. We had a good time Saturday getting ready for summer. Mom and I went to Home Depot and looked at outdoor tables, etc. Matt's and my anniversary is Tuesday, so I wanted to think of a great gift. It seems like for a few years we have been so busy that our anniversary got pushed together with our birthdays and Mother's Day and the end of school and ......
I hope he doesn't read my blog (I don't think he does.) because I am getting a baby-sitter and surprising him. If you have any good ideas for gifts, let me know.
Now to the title of my post. Later Saturday I took Benjamin to the Oxford Skate Park. He has been dying to go and I finally decided to take him. Another time when Matthew went, there were a lot of scary teenagers there and we weren't sure about our little guys going. I decided to check it out and it was fine that day. I think it depends on the day.
He had the time of his life. We need to get helmets before we go back, though.
Jacob wants me to take both of them tomorrow afternoon.
We are counting down to summer. I have kindergarten awards day and then all the other awards days the next few days. My exam is Friday morning and the kids are gone. Graduation is Saturday. The choir was going to sing, but I decided to take a break this year. All the faculty is going, though.
After Memorial Day I have a couple of days without students. Maybe I can get the risers in my room built then.
And then it is "summer time and the living is easy".

Friday, May 9, 2008

Finally....Amber are you happy? :)

Poor Olan Mills man. We had to reschedule our picture appointment a couple of weeks ago because Matthew was gone and then Benjamin was sick. Our make-up time was Tuesday at 9:00 PM. That's right.

Claire fell asleep in the van on the way and barely woke enough to have her picture made. She was playing the game of making funny faces because she was tired. It was one of those moments as a parent that make you proud. :) The man taking the picture kept saying " Oh....sissy looks asleep in that one, too." He managed to get a few pictures with everyone looking the same direction. Here is one:
My friend from church who is putting the church directory together has been very diligent about reminding us to get our picture made. I guess she had to because we were too sorry to remember to reschedule our appointment.

It is over now. My friend also is a photographer. I was really wanting her to take some informal pictures. That will be a little more fun, I bet.

Happy Friday!!

Tuesday, May 6, 2008

Too much to blog about

Since my last post we have had tornadoes in Oxford, band banquets, 100 year church anniversaries, friends losing loved ones, celebrating birthdays, girlfriends going with sons to band banquets, lots of bow and arrow shooting, choir banquets with kids getting to dress up and go with Daddy, contracts signed at Potts Camp, backyard springs, curtains made, etc.

I think you know that you are getting a little tired when you aim your van remote at your classroom door to unlock it. Tonight I did a survey with the Immunization dept. I don't think Matt could have laughed any harder listening to me trying to remember where and when Matthew was immunized. I have never felt so inept at anything in my life. A total failure. Hee, hee. I told the guy I didn't want to send him on a wild goose chase for information. He named all of these shots that Matthew has never received. As I said "no" over and over Matt merely said that we are stinky parents. About the question about Matthew's last wellness check-up......I had to say that he hadn't been for one of those in a really long time. I guess when your kids are so well that you just avoid the doctor's office. I am so thankful that we haven't had a real need to go.

Saturday is my birthday and I will be spending the morning with my high school choir getting ready for our concert on Thursday. A small group from choir will be singing the Irish Blessing at graduation on May 17th. I don't think they realize that this is the morning after prom. I probably need to make sure they are up on this to see if we really are going to have a group there. If they don't want to, my principal friend and I might sing the song we sang last year at the choir's spring concert. We always are secretly looking for an occasion to sing together. Too much fun. Here is the song we sang last year: For Good My mom can't tell us apart. I know it is not perfect, but hey, there you go. When I went blank on the words was when I saw rustling behind the stage curtain and heard talking behind stage. I am not that good to block out teenagers.

I was very honored by Emila Yusof's award of World's Greatest Mom
She is such a neat person. Wonderful artist.
I hope all you moms are getting ready for Mother's Day. I saw an article in myhomeideas.com about having a brunch for special moms. I wish I could have a brunch for all of you.

I have lots of great pictures of our weekend coming soon. Being at Pearson and hanging out with our friends was great. Oh, thank you, Kris, Calvin, Brian and Elizabeth for dog-sitting Coltrane while we went to our friends visitation. Sorry he whined so much.

This weekend I also got some good pictures of the kids in Mamaw's backyard. Making forts with Coltrane. Coltrane eating acorns. Good times.

Have a great week.
God bless you.

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