You are the center of attention

Hehe. That was in my fortune cookie yesterday. How did they know? It's been a busy/exciting weekend after a busy/boring week. Lots to tell you.

Friday - 1:30 I get a knock on my classroom door and this soldier is coming home in about an hour from Iraq who lives in Reese and the family goes to our church and they want us to get out by the road and wave when he comes by. Fine, we scurry around and get some banners together, scrounge up all the flags in the building and finally get the call that they'll be there in 10 minutes. More about 10 seconds as we get outside and are walking to the road and the one teacher is like "they're coming, they're coming!" So it was a sprint to the road and my classes beautiful "Welcome Home Sal" ended up being "Home Sal Welcome" LOL!!! We totally botched that I guess. It was neat to do though quick.

That night was the homecoming parade. The boys road on the St. Elizabeth float and I walked. My cousin Amanda was crowned queen by my other cousin Kelsey! It was awesome, even more awesome because Amanda was one of my students at St. E. So that was great!

Yesterday, Tommy had his first hockey game and his team looked great! Tommy played really good defense, almost scored and he had one assist! So fun. I'm glad we're back into that.

The biggest news of all though is that Austin is moving up to 4 year old preschool tomorrow. Mrs. T thinks he'll do great with the 4's as he knows his alphabet pretty much, and many songs and all. He's also a copier, definitely not a leader. He will march to the beat of everyone else's drum. So instead of copying all that young 3 year old behavior, he'll just behave like an angel with the 4 year olds. I'm not sure what to think but he is excited to move up. So then it would probably be Young 5's for next year as I certainly don't think he'll be ready for kindergarten.

Today is Sod Farm Ball! Hopefully we can pull off a win.

Happenings...

Last week I had the pleasure of being Austin's preschool helper. It was a lot of fun but I was so tired afterwards. I had to then teach my class the rest of the afternoon and we pretty much did nothing. Yes I'm a loser. I have new respect for the early childhood workers. Those kids are busy, busy, busy!!!

On Saturday Joe was up to school helping a bunch of other parents work on the playground and such. Austie's teacher was there and she told Joe that no matter what Dawn says he's doing fine. So I will just leave it at that. He's doing fine! Glad to hear it!

So I usually leave my students out of the blog but I have a proud moment that I simply must share. All of the teachers had to go to mass yesterday and I'm usually at the Saturday night mass. Well imagine my shock when one of my students was playing the piano. He played with the regular organist and I was so impressed. Usually he'll tink around at lunch and play the YMCA or other fun tunes. He did so well!!! I guess he's been doing this for a while now. Needless to say I think I will be heading to Sunday masses more often. Way to Go Big "J". Stewardship in action!

Our ball team stinks. We've been killed and are 1 - 3 now. We just can't score. We've scored 2 runs in our last 3 games. Bah humbug. Oh well, it's still fun.

Tommy is well and enjoying school. They're turning his room into three different habitats so he's all about that. I did walk by his room today and I heard Mrs. B giving him a little business about something. Not listening apparently. Oy vey! I guess that's normal 1st grader hopefully.

Hope all is well in your realm.

Well...

I thought I was going to post but my brain just isn't bringing anything exciting! Hump Day is tomorrow. Yay!

Busy Bees

We've quickly settled into our new school year routines. Austin isn't liking preschool as much lately but I'm sure he'll end up ok. He has a few criers in his class and once they get going, he gets going and he's harder to calm down. He just lets loose. Hopefully that will end soon. I get to be the helper on Thursday so we'll see how that goes. Tommy is doing great and aced his first spelling test last week. He has another this week with much harder words. The challenge is good for him though. Austin has about 5 more lower case letters to learn and he will have mastered the alphabet too. Maybe he will be an early reader like his big brother. One can hope! Although sometimes I just don't know about him as he comes over laughing with a candy corn stuffed up his nose. Who is this kid? Such a little turkey butt.

After a few fall feeling days last week we have a forecast in the 80's all week. I suppose this will be our last taste of summer. I usually look forward to fall and winter but I'm actually sad about saying goodbye to the warm weather. Maybe I'm just getting old. I don't know it's just been a fun summer.

Our ball team is 1-1. The team we played yesterday killed us 9-1. They had 3 guys who could just blast home runs. Ridiculous! Oh de well. It was fun anyways, especially the after party at the Bojo's. Party on a school night, we're getting bold over here.

Play Ball!!

Sunday the Sod Farm began the fall season. We started off with a 3-0 victory. It was fun, everyone played well. Then a couple on our team has a son that has his own team and he was short two girls. So the Mom and I played on their team and won that game as well. Fun Fun!!

Last night we took the boys to the Detroit Tiger game with Dad and Uncle Scott. It was the best game, or at least the best ending ever. Austin picked a great 1st game to go to. We were losing starting in the first inning and by the 9th were down to 2 outs, no one one and losing 4-1. The Tiger's got 5 straight singles and a walk to win it in walk-off fashion. It was Magg-nificent! Magglio Ordonez hit the game winner, Tommy had his shirt on so yup we're fans. I have pics from the game I'll try to post them tomorrow.

Austin had his teeth cavities filled today, that was rough. I'm so glad that is over with. Now we have to focus on keeping him cavity free.

In other ball news the Detroit Lions are 1 - 0!! Unbelievable! We'll see how long it takes for them to win again. ;) And what is up U of M? Not cool, at least the Spartans are 2-0 and our Reese Rockets are 3-0. Don't you just love fall?

Picture Perfect

Have any of you ever had a camera with a roll of film in it that has taken years to develop? It's almost as if it were an unintentional time capsule.

Yesterday was our biweekly pizza visit to Grandpa's. He had some new pictures to show us. The one roll had pics of them in their old home that they moved out of over 5 years ago. There was also a pic of Grandma, & Uncle Everett and Aunt Sylvie all together. All of them have left their earthly home. How neat though to have some new pictures to look at of someone so special to me!

The 1st week of school went very well and even Austin has done great in his first two days of preschool. Pray that he keeps it up. Tommy is having a good time in first grade too. He likes having specials this year like gym, art, & music. Today is his first day of hockey practice on his new team. Yay for hockey season.

Hope all is well for all of you.

The 1st Day of School!

How many do people normally have in their lifetime? Preschool to 12th grade gives you 14 1st days, I don't know if you would count college. It's such a different scene. Us lucky teachers have the 1st day of school for most of our lives. And you know what? There's nothing more nervewracking yet exciting than the 1st day of school. How quickly though do things becomes business as usual. Probably by mid-morning actually. ;)

The boys both did GREAT! Austin got good reviews from his preschool teacher and the daycare teacher as well. Thank the Lord, I was so worried about him. I walked by at one time and heard a screamer and was thankful to see Austin just looking probably towards the upset kid. Last year Austin was the screamer in daycare. He cried I know for at least 5 hours before finally falling asleep. He did that for about a week and then quickly settled in. Bless him heart. Tommy likes his teacher and 1st grade though he said he had to do a lot of writing. Oh if he only knew.

My class was good too. A very fun and lively group I have this year yet they also settled down to work very well. We'll see how it goes but I was very pleased today.

Monday Musings

What a day. I don't react to stress usually but at about 6:00 tonight I about cracked. Tomorrow is the 1st day of school and as any teacher will tell you, you're never totally ready. I actually had just left school and my room is all set for the new year. What about set me over the edge was the fact that at 6:00 I finally remembered that we were supposed to do a family poster for Austin's classroom. DOH!!! I already had a 6:45 tennis match scheduled with my Dad and I frantically called to cancel but he didn't answer so he showed up on time and we just played one game. He killed me as usual. A certain student of mine was running by and after an exceptionally lousy play by me he yells out, I see you are improving Mrs. Papesh! Every stinking time I play tennis in Reese I swear he is there! I will have to have a match against him someday and show him! ;) He'd probably mop the court with me, super athlete extraordinaire! So anyhoo, I'm delaying the poster making for tomorrow.

Earlier today was the annual Bean Festival Parade. My IL's live in Bean Town and we always head there for the parade and lunch. It was fun and the boys liked the parade. We had to skedaddle out of there pretty early because I hadn't gotten any clothes or shoes for the boys. Thankfully uniforms make it super easy to buy. I also picked up a couple things for myself so I will look new tomorrow too.

On the way out of Fairgrove we drove by my Grandpa's and he was out on his lawnmower so we wheeled in. Further putting us behind in our errands but a good visit as always. He loves the boys and had Tommy steering the lawnmower. He sent me inside to get some sweet corn and I had one of those "stolen moments" I suppose every woman needs once in a while. It's not everyday where I'm in that house by myself, so while Joe and the boys visited outside I sneaked into my Grammy's bedroom. It was just like it always was. Every other Friday for years Dad, and our family would truck over there with pizza. I always had to go into her room and the plant room for extra chairs when the whole family made it over. I'd always have to take a pile of clothes off the chair and sometimes this bright flannel would be hanging on it if it wasn't already on her. We don't need two extra chairs now that she is gone and I of course get the chair from the plant room. So in her room of course I noticed the chair with the clothes on it, I sniffed the flannel shirt and muzzled into her pillow on her bed for just a short moment. I then meandered at the pictures on her vanity, noticed her tennis shoes and slippers on the floor, the "now I lay me down to sleep" cross stitch on the wall and then headed back out. I was probably in there less than a minute but that moment delighted my senses.

Oh how I miss her. I think of her so often. She was just one of those special ladies, I could talk all day about her. She could talk about her Grandma too though. I remember her telling me how she cried for 2 weeks straight when she died, my Grammy was 18 when this happened. I knew it would be traumatic for me when it would finally happen and she'd always say oh don't worry Dawn, I'm going to live to be 106. LOL. Yeah, she was cool. I cried so hard, pretty much non-stop when she died and then after the funeral I stopped just as suddenly as you can imagine. I haven't cried since and it's been since April. I don't understand that. I've had my moments of sadness and I've maybe welled up a bit especially when my Grandpa gets shook up but I haven't had a good cry over her at all since the funeral. I get sad, but somehow the tears elude me. I wish I understood why. Sometimes I wonder if it's because I was always so threatened with the thought of losing her. I found a letter this summer while cleaning a closet I wrote to Joe in 1994 talking about how worried I was about losing her someday. I know I was always so thankful for every visit I had with her and I had the most irrational fear of losing her. Maybe it was because she was the most stable person in my life growing up. I don't know.

Well I have to go, Joe gave me "the look" and a few "words." Can't blame him, he's had a long weekend too and dinner is on the table. Yup, we're a tad behind on the day. Probably a bad time to get into a long ramble but sometimes you're overcome you know?

Wish me luck for tomorrow.

Happy Holiday Weekend!

So Labor Day weekend is here. Last night we had a great party. The last of the crew left by 1:30 and thankfully both boys slept in today. Tommy was all torqued up and told everyone we were partying like rock stars and had to stay up until 3:00. We did that at Disney World one night and I guess it stuck with him. He's definitely a party animal. He had his own kid party inside while us adults sat out on the deck with a fire. Lots of fun and fellowship.

Only a couple more days until school starts. Austin will be a big preschooler. I know when we were told he had brain damage I never dreamed that he would go to St. Elizabeth's. I figured at best he would be in a special ed classroom at the public school. I'm so happy that he's going. We've worked a lot this summer. He knows his whole upper case alphabet and now we need to work on the lower case. He's not a sponge like Tommy but he's definitely smart. A smart Aleck especially. I hope he doesn't get in a ton of trouble in school. I'm seriously worried about him. He has a tendency to be stubborn. Tommy is such a good boy, especially with other adults we never had any troubles with him. Austin though will challenge anyone. So pray for us that we make a smooth transition into preschool and that a week from now he's still welcome there. :)