Tough Start

Rough start to my morning... 

I brought home a bunch of papers to correct last night and only had a few of them finished. So I corrected the rest over breakfast this morning. Then I fell into the, "Just one more thing!" habit and left a few minutes later than I wanted to. Of course that was the day the key wasn't in the car in the garage. 

Back into the house I went. Maybe it was in G's backpack. It took a couple tries, but I located it and sped back to the garage. 

My drive to school is seven minutes on average. It can be down to five if I hit the lights right. Of course today I hit the lights wrong and it was closer to seven minutes. I got to school right at 7:30 (when teacher devotions begin). And that's when I realized I wore a different jacket to school than normal. So my fob to the school doors were at home. 

The school doesn't unlock until 7:45am on the dot. I went to the office door, thinking the secretary could buzz me in. She wasn't at her desk. No one else was in sight. I texted Mrs. L and asked her to let me in. Before she could respond, one of the pastors saw me and let me in. Whew! 

I sped to my classroom thinking if I walked quickly, I could make it in time for at least part of the devotions... My classroom door was locked. I still don't have a key for it, so I'm at the mercy of others. Giving up, I dumped my stuff at the door, whipped off my coat, and went down to devotions. 

After that my day was much calmer. A different aid let me into my room, and I had a few moments to gather myself before the kids came in. I had brought a new bunch of graphic novels and book requests from my home library to school. We created a mini Mrs. H lending library in the corner of the classroom (a crate on its side on top of the paper holder). The kids LOVE going over to look through the books. Unfortunately, they now think I have any book they might possibly want to read. I told them I brought so many to tide them over until I get back in two weeks. 

They were glad I was coming back. The other class of 5th graders had some fun parting words for me: "Bring me back a souvenir!" one girl commented. Another said, "Don't touch any cacti!" 

My day ended by finishing our class read-aloud book and starting the next one. It's another short book I hope to finish in the month before Mrs. M comes back (she is hopeful about coming back after Easter/Spring Break the beginning of April). 

After the kids left, Mrs. L and I went over classroom stuff to prepare her for taking over for two weeks. Boy, that's a lot for a brain to handle. Making sure my stuff is wrapped up, leaving stuff for her to pick up where I left off, trying to think of everything that might go wrong or that she would need to know NOW just in case I'm not available to answer her questions in the moment... I'm sure it will be fine. My "be prepared" nature is just coming to light.

It was a quick turnaround after school. We worked until shortly before 4pm, I dashed off to a quick chiropractor appointment, hustled back to school for more instructions, then headed home around 5pm so G and I could go to a friend's "new job launch party" in New Ulm. After an hour we drove back to Mankato to catch the second half of an MSU hockey game (a different friend gave G free tickets). Whew! Fun night, just a lot to orchestrate. 

Now to rest up/finish up loose ends before we head to AZ on Monday!

Missing Pieces

My brain got stretched to the max today. 

I'm prepping as much as I can for Mrs. L next week. She is teaching for me for the two weeks I'm gone in AZ. That involves showing her where everything is, teaching her how to access the documents on the computer, and planning ahead for future lessons/tests/study materials. We are still figuring out who will do the parent communication. Crafting the weekly notes Mrs. M does takes some computer finesse and that's not her strong suit. I stayed late after school getting four weekly notes ready ahead of time (the one for this week, the two for the weeks I'm gone, and the one for the week I come back to teaching).

Also on my mind are the students who will be gone in the next few weeks. I thought everyone would be around, but now there are at least three students who will be gone for up to a week! Yikes! That's a lot to keep track of...

Then there's packing for our trip, tidying the house after our remodel wrap up, cleaning the house, doing the dishes, laundry, cooking. G has been picking up where my "homesteading" duties have slacked with my teaching gig. This morning he packed my lunch for me and he cooked supper the past two nights (a layered squash, kale, cabbage, corn, beef ensemble and tonight a potato hash with spinach and taco meat). We make a good team.

It's hard to believe in a few days all those stressors will have been dealt with (or postponed to later because we ran out of time 😅)!

Worshipful Wednesday

I love chapel days at Mt. Olive. They use the same singing liturgy each service (one my church doesn't use, but I know from growing up at my parents' church). It warms my heart every Wednesday. 

The 7-8th graders are gone for the day on a field trip, so we have some adjustments to make in our schedule. First, the 5th graders needed to be buddies with the kindergarteners. We left our classroom shortly after 8am to pick them up, met a traffic jam of other classes in the hallway, and then discovered the other class of 5th graders had beat us to the room, so there were only ten kindergarteners to match up with my class of 18. My kids had been super excited to be be buddies with them, so I was bummed not all of them got partners. 

The other big change was that we ate lunch in our classrooms today instead of the fellowship hall. The 7-8th graders set up and take down the tables and since they weren't around, that was our solution. I was a mean teacher and made them sit in their desks instead of being able to sit by friends. My reasoning: much cleaner if they weren't sharing desks with others plus the friendship drama might get stirred up again if the girls were allowed to comingle. The 5th graders wanted to watch a movie during lunch. Mean teacher strikes again... I said no. I put on a youtube playlist called "lunch music" which was basically jazz. None of them liked the music and wanted it off. 

They ended up going back to their first grade days playing "raise your hand if you...". They turned it into a game and went up and down the rows one at a time asking a question. 

"Raise your hand if you think dogs are the best pets." 

"Raise your hand if you like long hair."

"Wait... on yourself or on other people?"

"Uh..."

"Raise your hand if you like dogs better than cats."

"You did that one already!"

"No, I said if they are the best pets."

"Raise your hand if you like pizza."

And so it went. It was pretty interesting to see what they came up with, both questions and answers. 

I've been bringing a few books from home to school for my nonreaders. Today I brought five more books and four of the five got snatched up. I wrote a "book request" space on the board to help me tailor my offerings. The list for books about: dragons, the Civil War, survival, babysitters club, you choose books, and graphic novels. Now I need to peruse my shelves!

Our church counsel Lenten chili cookoff was a hit. I made labels for each item with G's direction: Bill's mom's chili recipe won first place by a landslide. Pastor's (definitely NOT made by his wife) white chicken chili got second. G's (stolen recipe from his mom) noodle-infused chili (don't knock it until you try it) got third, and Greg's vegetarian (google AI generated) recipe got fourth. Honorable mentions with one vote each were the garlic bread (bought from Walmart) and the chocolate chip chunk cookies (made by me). People loved trying a little bit of each kind so they could vote responsibly. 

My lemon bars turned out strange. I think I didn't put enough flour in the crust. It ended up floating to the top of the lemon mixture, so when I took them out of the pan, they had to be flipped upside down. A few turned out the right way, so their sign read "upside down or right side up lemon bars". Even though they were deconstructed a bit, they were also a hit. 

After church, I sent eggs home with our future goat watcher who will do chores for us in a couple weeks. We got sidetracked talking about tapping maple trees. He got all of his stuff for it off Amazon and encouraged me to try tapping a few of our trees. It's a 10:1 for getting syrup. So you tap 100 gallons of maple sap to make 10 gallons of maple syrup. You can store the sap in food grade garbage cans, then boil it all at once when you've built up a supply. He showed me a cool outdoor boiling station made from cement cinder blocks and stainless steel roasting trays (like they use in catering). You make a little hut with the trays on top, a chimney on the end, and space for a fire underneath. Yep. I definitely want to try that someday. Probably better not start that now when I'm teaching full-time and we're going to Arizona in less than a week...

Draggin'

Holy buckets, I was dragging today. First, I stayed up too late last night with G cooking/baking. The church council is doing the Lenten meal tomorrow night; they're having a chili cookoff. G made two recipes: his mom's usual Christmas Eve chili recipe and his brother's artificial intelligence generated vegan chili recipe (G's brother is not a cook, so he used the Google chatbot to make him a recipe. It actually turned out pretty good.). Pastor's wife is making a white chicken chili, and the other council member is making a traditional tomato-based chili. G had me bake desserts: chocolate chip cookies (a double batch) and two batches of lemon bars. I'm still getting used to this oven, so the bakes didn't turn out as consistently as I would've liked. They'll still taste good though. G has a plan to sort the cookies based on doneness so it's easier for people to pick out the kind they like. His dedication to excellence knows no bounds! 😁

All that being said, we went to bed much later than we wanted to. 

The kids were dragging too, although their mouths weren't. Very chatty all day. 

In PE we started a lawn games unit. Today's activity was bean bags, aka cornhole. The school had two sets and a few parents brought in theirs from home so we had enough to go around. I was satisfied with the lesson. We'll do bean bags for at least one other day, then ladder ball, then spike ball. Maybe bocce ball once the weather gets nicer and we can be outside. 

Another win today was silent reading time. A handful of kids had struggled to find a book to read last week, sitting at their desks hoping I wouldn't notice them not reading... Well, I emailed each of their parents a list of books I thought they might enjoy (encouraging them to visit the public library) and today I brought a few books from my home library hoping they would get hooked. Most of the non-readers either brought books from home or picked one from my stack! The only downside is that I need a new stack of books to bring tomorrow...

Daisy Award

No school on Monday. G and I had planned to hang out at the farm all day helping Dad clean up Shady Acres, but that was not to be. 

I got word last Thursday that a nurse I had nominated for an award had been selected for the award! Months ago, on one of my follow-up visits to the hospital after Bekhor was born, I saw a poster for the Daisy Award, given to nurses/staff who go above and beyond the call of duty as a nurse. The main nurse who had helped me when Bekhor fit that description and I wanted to recognize her for it. So I had filled out the application and kind of forgot about it. 

A nominating committee member had left me a voicemail letting me know Becca had been selected. Tears instantly began pouring. G thought something was seriously wrong when he saw me. 

"No, it's nothing bad!" 

"Then why are you crying?"

"I think these are happy tears?" Definitely a blend of emotions. 

We found out the award is given quarterly to three individuals (one nurse, one supervisor, one educator) across about 3,000 hospitals in the region. Typically there are around 50 nominees. The ones selected are usually ones where the nominator was able to be specific about things the nurse did that went above and beyond. G and I got thanked over and over again for submitting our nomination and being willing to share our story. They wanted me to read the story I had submitted (the one that won her the award). I was sure I would be crying too much to do it, but I was willing to try. 

The awards are a surprise, so we had to keep it a secret until Monday morning. We met at the hospital a little before 9am and then went up to floor 5 to surprise her. Five Mayo Clinic leadership team members who comprise the Daisy award selection committee came with us. We waited down the hall, trying to be unobtrusive and unnoticeable while they gathered as many nurses on the floor as they could. I saw our nurse and immediately turned my head the other way, not sure if she would recognize me or not. I heard her talking to the other nurses, "Uh-oh, someone is in trouble!" (she was joking) "...who do you think it is?" (I think by that point they had all realized someone on their floor was receiving the award).

The leaders came forward to announce that someone was being awarded the Daisy award and it was... Becca! She was so shocked. No idea it would be she who won. I stepped forward as the one who had nominated her and she immediately grabbed me for a hug. "I never thought I'd see you again!" she said through tears. "How are you guys doing? I think about you and Bekhor every day. I pray for you [and Galen] every day." More thank-yous for the nomination. And an, "I wish I could've done more." Again, this lady is so very worthy of the nomination and selection.

Then it was time to read my story. Here's what I had submitted: Becca went above and beyond the call of duty as a nurse when I gave birth to my 16-week-old son in her delivery room. I had come into the ER after my water broke unexpectedly, and my husband and I got sent up to the Labor Delivery floor knowing that our baby would not live long after birth or might be born dead. We had planned to use a midwife for the birth, so this was the first time we had met any of the people on staff here. Becca was so kind. She knew we were in a difficult situation and made sure my husband and I were both as comfortable as possible. She explained things clearly and with detail, so I always knew what was going on and why we were doing them. When my hair came out of its bun, she braided it for me. She made sure not only I had snacks, but my husband and pastor as well. When we prayed, she stopped what she was doing (either to show respect for our beliefs or to pray with us, she didn't say, but we appreciated it). When my son was born, she had the other nurses wait a few extra minutes before clamping the cord, which allowed him to live a full eight minutes... long enough to be baptized and for his grandparents to meet him before he died. All this is on top of her competent nursing care expected and given at Mayo. Thank you, Becca, for everything!

I made it through with fewer tears than I thought! 

In addition to a copy of my story, she received a hand-carved sculpture from Africa, reimbursement for continuing education classes, a bouquet of daisies, sweet rolls for the whole floor, and more things I'm forgetting. It's a pretty awesome award.

We took pictures after that and she whispered to me, "I should've washed my hair today." Proof she had no idea it was coming. I love it. 

There is a video of the surprise and presentation. If you are interested in seeing it, let me know and I'll send it to you. :)

No School, But Kind Of

No school for Mt. Olive today, but I am still teaching. I had a previous obligation to the Christian high school in town, so I showed up bright and early to get myself acclimated to another new classroom.

This one was an English classroom. I was supposed to teach yesterday too, but they found someone else so I could teach at Mt. Olive. Today I taught two classes. I'm already done for the day! They use a block schedule and have about 20 kids in the whole school, so there aren't many classes to teach.

It went pretty well. The teacher left projects for the students to work on, so I was able to get some 'book keeping' tasks accomplished as I supervised. 

Now I'm off to the garden center to hang out for the rest of the day; I'm getting some plant therapy, haha. G said they're in the midst of seeding plants and need extra hands. Tonight we're going to a multi-day virtual trivia challenge at a friend's house in Vernon Center. G works tomorrow and I'll probably go back for more trivia during the day. We're heading to Fulda after he's finished with work to enjoy the rest of the long weekend... no school for Mt. Olive Monday either!

Blue and White Day

Blue and White Day. I've been used to blue and gold, so my typical outfit needed an adjustment. Today I wore jeans, a white tank top, and a blue sweater. Simple but elegant.

We had a normal morning followed by an out-of-the-ordinary afternoon. Well, I thought it would be normal. Only two kids were ready for their memory work hymn quiz. Also, I couldn't find the printed out copies. Next week's quiz is "Jesus Loves Me", so I decided to swap them. We did "Jesus Loves Me" on the fly and saved "Dear Christians One and All Rejoice" for next week.

I was supposed to do PE with Mr. N's class, but there were signs on the gym doors saying the gym was off-limits because it was set up for the afternoon's pep fest. Hmm. Okay. Plan B? Could we use part of the gym for our parachute game? No. Instruments everywhere. I let the class vote on playing games in the classroom or going outside for recess. Outdoor recess won. It snowed a few inches yesterday, so we actually had snow for once! 

In the afternoon, I mixed up the schedule to maximize our time. We did devotions and practiced our hymn for next week, then wrapped up a few questions of Social Studies we hadn't gotten to earlier in the week. Mr. N's class is a little behind then, but they're usually quicker to finish things, so I'm sure I can get them caught up next week. Cheerleaders had to get ready at 1pm, band members at 1:15, pep fest at 1:30. I had one cheerleader and two band members. So for the rest of the class...

I gave them time to finish their optical illusion art project, work on handwriting, or play a game called Whatchamadrawit. The kids who played LOVED it and asked me to leave it at school so they could play next week. It has cards that give drawing prompts (they used their whiteboards) such as a pig riding a bike with an ice cream cone, or a frog riding on an airplane. Silly things that are challenging but fun to draw.

The pep fest was okay. I like Immanuel's better. We had each class do a cheer and then the players played some games on the court. Today's had no games and no class cheers; the cheer squad led the cheers. There were some really neat parts, like the band playing the Star Spangled Banner along with a few pep band cheer songs. The cheerleaders were also great. They had a floor routine with gymnastic tricks and small pyramids. Very impressive. 

They led the school in rousing cheers too. Two particularly rowdy cheers: one side says "We've got spirit, yes we do, we've got spirit, how about you?" and the other side says the same thing. The only problem is, no one knew when to quit, so they kept doing it over and over for about five minutes. The cheer coach tried to step in and get them to stop, but they didn't pay attention. Neither did the crowd. Finally she got the cheerleaders to wave their pompoms and run to the other side of the gym so they could usher the basketball players in. 

The second was the "who can be the loudest?" cheer, also known as the battle cry cheer. Class by class, the cheerleaders ask to hear their battle cry. Mr. Z uses a decibel tracker on his phone to see who the loudest is. One of the kids said it was rigged, the 8th graders always win (confirmed by the principal), but this year (maybe because of that conversation), the 5th graders won. It wasn't announced very well.

I also expected them to announce winners of the door decorating or which class dressed up the most during the week (we had to keep track of numbers). Nope. All he said was 90% of students dressed up the whole week. That's still an impressive number!