Happy Halloween!

I officially have the cutest kids in the world in my class! We had spiderman, superman, a witch, a purple people eater (the best costume ever) and a little mermaid as well as a firefighter and a cheerleader (who was also the witch - long story). The party was total chaos - partially because the kids were wild from the break in routine and the access to the ball pit (this is why it is only made available like three times a year) and partially because I felt like total crap. However, we still had a lot of fun! I think when you are three the combination of costumes, face painting, ball pit, cookie decorating, and cupcakes is pretty darn exciting! I then sent them on their merry little way home hopped up on sugar and way overstimulated from a day of "No Routine!!" and "Anything We Want TO Do!!". Oh yeah, tomorrow is back to schedules, schedules, schedules and rules. Sorry kids, party's over. :) Our November party is much tamer (think feast not party) and in December it is a "snow Ball" not an all out party. Still fun though. And so much easier to plan!! Oh, and I got many compliments on my funky looking Raggedy Ann self and a few laughs which is kind of what i was going for. And the best reactions were driving to and from work today in full costume - wig and all! Now I am hiding from the few trick-or-treaters where I live because I was too cheap to buy candy after putting together treat bags for 10 kids at school ... shame on me!! Good thing I don't have a pumpkin for them to smash! :) Happy Halloween!!

What Have I Done?

I have officially jumped off of the bridge of sanity and am falling head first into the abyss of the insane. Wednesday is Halloween, perhaps one of the most enjoyable not-really-a-holiday-holidays to celebrate with preschoolers. Nothing is cuter than three year olds dressed up in costumes and filled from toes to eye brows with excitement about the fact that, while they may not understand what on earth this is about, they know something fun is going to happen. However, nothing is more stressful than a classroom full of parents expecting you to not only show off your wonderful abilities as a teacher but to entertain them and their children for an hour with creative and enthralling activities. And what did I do for Halloween? I invited the parents of all 10 of my little ones to an hour long party! Oh what have I done! They are expecting crafts, games, activities, entertainment, fun and a demonstration of the wonderful world of preschool. Is it too late to hire a substitute? Anybody instersted? Don't all come running at once! So far I have suckered...um, convinced...um, my very nice friend and the parent of one of my little ones has volunteered (okay, so I asked politely but offerd plenty of opportunities for her to say no) to do face painting for the kids. We also have treats to decorate with frosting and Holloween candies/sprinkles. I plan on setting up our ball pit with its four bags of balls which means a lot of work (cleaning all of the balls before and afterwards - dratted MRSA infection marching through our district) but should be entertaining and I can set my assistant up to play referee to limit the injuries. If I am desperate I can set the swing up - but only BEFORE we eat our endless sweets that parents are providing (I am so not catching any vomit on Halloween - that's what the parents are there for!). I have some games we can play for prizes - toddler basketball, bowling for ghosts (pop cans covered with white tissue paper). That sounds like a party to me. Besides, they are three years old. I think a few balloons and the ball pit would be enough to entertain them. As for the parents - they are always welcome but in large numbers I still get nervous like I have to put on a song and dance or something. Maybe that will go away as I teach more years...or I will learn to sing and dance. :) And performing while in costume - bonus! Yes, I will be the dork dressed as Raggedy Ann! Try finding a costume that is preschool appropriate, not scary, not trampy, readily washable, and that will not become indecent while doing preschool acrobatics (i.e. chasing a child down the hall, helping a child on the playground, circle time). Its even harder when anything with a wig, mask, or face paint is scary as is anything too "not normal" (i.e. the teacher dressed as a cow is going to scare the crap out of my kids - should be fun!). I really enjoy having parents come in the classroom, and I enjoy our parties, but it stresses me out so much beforehand. Especially this year when I have taken on extra students, when my assistant leaves (a lot) to be desired, and I still feel like I am chasing myself in circles. I think it will be lots of fun, but right now I am wondering what on earth have I done????

Running of the Preschoolers

Forty days and forty nights has never seemed like quite such a torturous sentence until now. It has rained non-stop for most of this week which means that at school we have been inside almost all week. Three year olds are not generally happy with the notion of being confined, especially when there is an attractive playground visible from the classroom windows that beckons to them regardless of the sheets of rain pelting the windows relentlessly. So after days of entertaining them with other options - extra play time, bubbles, balls, and I can only imagine what the substitutes used yesterday (that was not covered in my lesson plans)- I finally relented to riding our tricycles in the hallway. This seems harmless as the hallway is a giant circle with only two points of escape (one door to the outside and one entrance point to the main hallway) but there are several classrooms along the hallway that are not selfcontained classrooms for children with special needs. And three year olds riding tricycles do not understand the concept of an indoor voice. Trust me on that one. We can keep our indoor voices up until the point that our feet hit the pedals and then it explodes no matter how hard we try. Also, our ability to steer is not fully developed and so we might occasionally ride into a classroom door or wall at full speed. I am quite sure that the other teachers just love me! It is a redeeming quality that we are rather cute and it is hard to resist a three year old on a tricycle laughing and waving (as they just miss the wall). So today we braved the tricycles and I am forever thankful there was no video camera available. The running of the preschoolers is not a moment of a teacher's life that she wants recorded for the world to see, especially when it involves dodging ankle crashes and rescuing wall smashers while pushing a rider in training on an adapted tricycle at full speed. Oh the glamour would be overwhelming and cause such weeping by jealous supermodels that it simply must remain a secret forever! It is fun, but there is no way to look anything but rediculous while dodging tricycles, rescuing stranded children who are flailing with no success trying to escape the clutches of a wall, and running circles around a hallway pushing a tricycle that looks like it could double as a torture device. But we had a good 20 minutes of fun, we worked on motor goals, and I got a free workout! Bonus points for that! I felt slightly like a NASCAR driver though only making left turns - next time we go right around the hall so I can unwind myself! And I need to invest in steel toed, high ankle boots... or learn to run faster.

Things I have Lost

I am used to being incredibly organized, or at least organized enough to know exactly where everything is in the piles. For some reason over the past few months I have become scatterbrained to a new extreme. It seems like my brain has become a sive and most things enter and then drip out before they can be officially processed. This is not good! Below is a short list of things I have managed to lose recently.

* a pack of gum
* a pair of shoes (they are here somewhere...)
* a stack of papers
* a CD
* my keys several times, but I have found them each time (Thank you God!!)
* picture symbols
* more pens than I could count
* notes to myself about things not to forget
* for a few weeks I lost my planner
* my mind

My Hands Are Overflowing

There are some times when your instincts kick in that you are very thankful - swerving to avoid an object in the road, ducking as a ball comes flying at your head. Then there are times when you act on instinct and then regret your actions. There is a short background necessary to this story to fully appreciate it. Apparently God has a wicked sense of humor. My greatest phobia in all of creation is vomiting. I would literally go to a hotel when my mother got the stomach flu. So God, in his infinite wisdom and with his sense of humor, has blessed me with beautiful children in my class who are proficient at what? Any guesses? Yep, vomiting. Last year it was such a common occurrence we had blue buckets stationed around the classroom to catch it. Nice. In summer school a child vomited on my feet. Thanks. So tonight I am babysitting for my blue eyed boy, who has done his share of vomiting at school. He has to keep up with his peers you know. He was complaining a bit this evening as we watched his choice of movies and so I was letting him sit on my lap. Any guesses what beautiful boy did? It is obvious. What is not obvious (or might be by the title of this post) is how I reacted. In an act of pure instinct, and in direct imitation of something that two days ago I swore I would never do, I stuck my hands under his mouth and caught it. Um, nasty does not even begin to cover it. He seemed satisfied with himself and I had a nice handful of his dinner. I deposited it on his sheet on the floor and positioned him so that any more returns would land on his sheet and not on me. After making sure that he was done with his review of dinner I cleaned him up (easy, I wiped his mouth), folded the sheet, and ran to wash my hands. I think after that I have earned some kind of bravery medal. Who would ever expect such cute creatures to be so disgusting? :) And who knew I could catch so well with my bare hands?

You Want Me To Put My Mouth Where?

There is nothing more fun to do on a Saturday morning than to kneel on a nasty gym mat in a high school at 8 am and perform CPR on an alien-looking dummy to the sounds of mild grunting from your classmated as they too pound the crap out of this half-bodied form. Well, perhaps sleeping would be more enjoyable. Or grocery shopping with a hyperactie toddler. But my certification had expired and I do need to have these skills, so I pulled my sorry self out of bed on a beautiful Saturday morning and sat in a high school classroom that brough back creepy half-memories (my high school was more modern, and just looked a little less dingy somehow). So my dummy had the nerve to lose his arms, legs, and mot of his torso but still want CPR performed on him. I had no problem crushing his chest with enough force to snap ribs, but staring at his alien silver face with odd orb eyes and a gaping hole of a mouth I knew that there was not a chance on earth my mouth was touching that creature. There is not enough alcohol in the world to make him clean enough, especially knowing that multiple high school students have potentially been "kissing" him and depositing their germs onto him. And kids are not generally very good at cleaning things - look at their bedrooms or lockers. And with this high school having had confirmed cases of MRSA, and me having mouth sores and a compromised immune system that sealed the deal. Luckily I had contacted the teacher before hand and notified her that I wanted to take the class, but becaue of immune system issues I was not going to put my mouth on anything. In the past I have taken multiple CPR classes and not had to do the breathing component (or for one class I had been given a mouth barrier). She was fine with that and so instead of doing breaths I just properly positioned the head and leaned down. I'm sorry but I don't put my mouth on things that get around more than an heiress in Hollywood. Lets just hope if I really need to do CPR I remember to do the breaths and not just lean down and pretend!

A Victory Dance

Yesterday I had a home visit with my blue eyed boy and I decided to really put him to the test. He is our mystery child, our little one who presents with so many delays but all of the testing the doctors have conducted have revealed no answers. To anyone who first meets him, he would probably be considered to have severe disabilities limiting all areas incuding language comprehension and cognition. Yet more and more as I work with him I am seeing him make incredible progress and demonstrate that he comprehends almost everything that is said to him, and that he is learning preschool skills that are pretty age appropriate. So I took two of our color sorting boxes to his home visit yesterday. In each colored box are four items that are the same color of the box. With some positioning and assistance from his awesome mom with holiding the items against the lids of the boxes, we asked him the colors of each item using yes/no format. I was so careful to keep my tone of voice neutral so that it would not be a clue to him. The only prompt he received was that when asked "Is the (object) red?" his mother would hold up the red lid behind the object and when asked "Is the (object) yellow?" his mother would hold up the yellow lid behind the object. My blue eyed boy correctly identified 7 of the 8 items!!!!! I was amazed and stunned, and thrilled!!! We cheered, clapped, sang, and little boy blue earned a special treat. In my heart, I did the biggest victory dance! He is learning, he is aware of everything around him, he has greater comprehension than I would have imagined when I first met him a litle over a year ago and was told that he sat in a beanbag and that was about it. Now my challenge is to figure out a way to pull his comprehension out of him, to establish a communication system for a child who is nonverbal, who does not functionally use his hands, and for whom vision is unreliable. Time to get creative!!! Victory is so sweet and he has earned this one! He has earned a gold medal for this victory, for coming so far and defying expectation. I am just glad I got to come along for the ride!

What We Eat

Sitting around the lunch table yesterday with my little ones I could not help but laugh at the interesting lunches being enjoyed. First, I would like to point out that a preschool lunch is a full contact sporting event and that it is not for the brave of heart of queasy of stomach. It is never pretty and quite often what enters the mouth comes back out partially chewed after the child decides it is too hot, too cold, too big of a bite, or too yucky, or just funny to spit it back out. We are so classy! So yesterday the lunches caught my attention, probably because half of my class was absent due to illness (the only things we share willingly are germs) and I could actually sit for a moment with the kids and notice what they were eating. My little ones range from a child who is completely dependent on a g-tube to a child who wll eat anything that is pureed or soft (including spinach!) to children who bring the stereotypical American School-kid lunch (sandwich, juice, fruit, snack). What made me smile yesterday was the lunch of my new little one who seems to have autism. Her lunch consisted of choclate milk, pudding, a few slices of a mandarin orange, potato chips, and cheetos. It was the first lunch she really ate all week, other than the chips she filched from the other kids who did not want then when the school lunch had chips and salsa as a side. Somethings are worth fighting, and some are not fights to battle. Right now, I am more worried about finding functional langugage for her than I am worried about if she eats enough variety of food. I am more worried that she not continue to try to drink our paint like prechool shots or walk off the edge of the playground equipment as if she can levitate than I am that she eat vegetables. Really, I am not even concerned if she keeps her shoes on in the classroom because I have greater plans for her and if she wants to learn barefoot while eating potato chips and oranges I am willing to go along for that ride. But her lunch - it still makes me smile.

Quick Pictures

I am once again running a bit late for work. technically i do not have to be there for another hour, but if I wait that long there is no time to get the classroom ready for my 9 little ones who seem to expect toys and art materials and lessons all planned. So demanding! :) So I am just putting a few recent pictures up here that I took at two different state parks. I am having so much fun exploring both the parks and my photography. It makes me wish I had a decent camera, better photoshop, and real talent! Oh well!

Welcome to Bedlam

I may not be a genius at classroom management, but I am able to have 9 three year olds, including 7 who have special needs, walk in a line down the hallway using a guide rope (ok, so two roll). I can have 8 of them sit at circle time for as long as I want to keep them there - 1 wanders away and 1 will wander but sits each time I request so he counts with the 8. I can have them all follow my directions to open the door to outside and sit on the stairs, within visual distance of the playground, until I have reached the bottom of the ramp and signal them to join me. So why oh why is my class a disaster of total chaos and destruction when I release them to center play? Because for center play I am not in control, that falls under the domain of my "assistant". I may end up getting myself fired before the school year is over. If there is one thing that tap dances on my nerves more than just about anything else on earth (besides the obvious ones of prejudice and discrimination and calling me honey/dear/sweetheart) it is complete incompetence. The assistant that the school in their infinite wisdom hired this year to work with two classes of preschoolers who have developmental delays and disabilities has apparently never before seen a child. She is not only lacking in the skills of an assistant - how to work with groups of children, how to do crowd control, how to engage children in play that is both fun and educational, how to redirect undesired behavior- but in basic survial skills. How many times does one need to be reminded not to leave a child unattended on a changing table? I mistakenly though that was a one shot lesson. And who on earth would put on gloves to change a diaper and then use those same gloved hands to touch a child's lunch? After I gagged I quickly removed that portion of the lunch for a better location - the trash can. Today one of my little ones was screaming for an extended period of time for an unknown reason, possibly because it was the child's third day of school and the room was in chaos and the child has no means of communicating anything to us. I found that after 45 minutes of screaming my assistant is ready to do anything to get rid of the child, includng insisting that a perfectly healthy child is sick and must be sent home. Um, anyone would be sweaty and red in the face after screaming for 45 minutes. Try it sometime and see for yourself. So I am beginning to wonder if children are just a little too complex for her and we need to back up and begin with something a little simpler. Perhaps we should start with a houseplant and work our way up. In all honesty I bite my tongue so many times a day and usually at least once a day something slides right on out that probably should not have because I am so frustrated. I want to be the absolute best teacher possible for my little ones and instead of having an assistant I feel like I have another child. At least I don't have to change her diaper. I guess I should be thankful for that! But otherwise, I am basically teaching 7 children with special needs and 2 (soon to be 3) inclusion peers solo. Welcome to Bedlam where we literally climb the walls!! Hell, soon I may surrender and join them as we climb the walls and paint the floor! Hee Hee, Haa Haa, Ho Ho, Hooo Hooo!

Almost a Two Horned Day

This title is explained n a previous entry - refers to a picture that reminds me that my worst days are probably not anywhere near as bad as other poeple's bad days.

Condensed version because I have to be at school early ths morning:
* Bumped a parked car - not my fault, police officer agreed, suggested I petition department of transportation to correct the dangerous situation of the road
* covered both preschool classes yesterday because pm teacher was sick, without any break, which wul dnot have been bad but I was frazzled before I ever got to school
* new little one in class screamed (not cried, screamed) for the first 90 minutes of school; the parents did not feed the child anything that morning and did not consider this important to tell me - I found out incidentally while answering a call from them about transportation
* new little one screams any time you try to put shoes on their feet. SCREAMS like you are trying to cause serious bodily harm. I am considering a new "shoes are optional" policy
* new little one likes to drink the containers of paint like preschool shots
* the children in the afternoon class can smell weakness and by then I was worn down by the day - they were wild children
* I had a list of things I needed to do yesterday, none of which got done because I was late to work because of the car incident and because my afternoon of prep time was squashed

Redemption however came in two huge gifts:
* the owner of the car I bumped called and asked what happened. He then told me not to worry about it because he was going to have it painted anyway and that it would take a lot to damage his car. I thanked him over and over. Poor guy not only had his car bumped but when he called had to listen to my little one screaming. Anonymous sir, you are my hero!

* diet cream soda!! I have been searching for diet cream soda for over a decade and the only version I found was Faygo diet cream soda in a 20oz bottle that you have to buy individually and that is carried only by select gas stations and party stores in Michigan. That does not help me much here in Virginia, and not even very much in Michigan because they tend to sell out quickly and there is no way of knowing when they will get a new order. Yesterday at the grocery store that I use I found cans of diet cream soda - Jones diet cream soda. I bought all that I could and now know that they will be stocking it! Life is sweet again!! I am so easily swayed! :)

Return to Spender

I often find myself wondering what I could do with all of the time I have wasted in my life. Like the hours I have wasted standing in the wrong line in stores – the line I choose confident it will move faster than the other lines only to have the person ahead of me pull out a check book or the cashier be unable to read the barcode on a pack of gum and be required to call for a price check in Tibet. Or perhaps the days wasted on hold calling doctors offices, companies, and other places that really should answer my telephone call crisply and cheerfully because I am paying them for their time. Then there are the useless months spent in classes through school that I have somehow erased from my entire memory system. Apparently I spent a semester in high school taking a course in communications and all I can remember is watching My So Called Life in class each week. I also spent three years taking German and the great extent of my vocabulary is the ability to sing My Hat Has Three Corners and to ask for a beer and a cheap prostitute. So if I am ever lost in Germany I can tell you how many corners are on your hat and spend the evening in interesting company. I can not ask for the bathroom, for help, for a taxi, or for the American Embassy but I can get beer and a prostitute. But not a high quality prostitute, because apparently that was above our standards, but a dirt cheap prostitute who is likely to leave you with a parting gift you will carry for the remainder of your life. Not that I need to worry, because were I to need a prostitute it would be only in the hopes that one would speak English and be able to translate for me so I could get back to whatever demented tour group had abandoned me. I find myself wishing that this time had been better directed – perhaps on learning things that actually pertain to my life. For example, no matter what we try to tell children I have yet to use the Pythagorean theorem outside of high school yet I could have really used some instructions on how to maintain a car – like opening the hood. Perhaps a peer tutoring system would have worked – you teach me to open the hood of my car, I teach you whatever academic skills you need that my nerd brain has made an abundance of connections for while skipping over things like gas is necessary to drive your vehicle. And those German months would have been better spent in Spanish or Sign Language or Farsi or Urdu or anything other than German. As I struggle to communicate with my families that do not speak English as a first language (or as a language) using translators and creativity, I wish that I had a brain for languages. Instead I have a brain for details and English, for memory and synthesis of information. However, I have a hard enough time retrieving the right English word in mid-conversation that trying to pull another language out of my over-packed mind is like trying to find a diamond lost in a desert at night. I want my time back to reuse – to learn functional topics rather than obscure mathematics and languages that will not help me unless I want a night in Berlin that I would rather forget, to make memories rather than to fidget way in lines and on hold, to live rather than to spend on pause.

Rambling in the first real Autumn Evening

This morning was blessedly, wonderfully, amazingly cold!! I was able to wear my favorite black zip up sweater that should be retired to the donation bag but is much too cuddly and beloved to be surrendered. It is so comforting and warm and easy to wash (hey, that is a way to score huge bonus points with me) that I really don't care if it makes me look slightly like a disheveled bag lady. :) Yes, I am that pathetic. My wardrobe 98% of the time is blue jeans, a basic shirt (polo shirts are common or a "nice" t-shirt in warm weather and I love sweaters and long sleeve t-shirts in cold weather), and whatever shoes I can find in the closet that match. I am teaching children who leak, who like to decorate the teacher as much as the art project, who love to dig in the dirt and crawl on the floor and I don't want to have to worry about my clothing being damaged. I want to be able to be a hands-on, full contact, in the trenches teacher not a pretty-in-a-dress teacher who never plays with the kids because they might get messy. I have taught my kids that everything in my classroom is washable - the tables, the toys, the floor, the kids, and yes - the teacher. Have fun!! Learn, discover, make a mess!! Follow the rules, listen when I ask you to do something but let's have fun!! Shaving cream on the table is great and if you want to get it up to your armpits that is wonderful. Fingerpainting is messy but awesome - if you want to try it on my table or the chairs I am not going to yell but please do not paint your friends. Digging in dirt is fun but we never throw what we find at others. Lets see what we can learn from painting different surfaces - the textures, what colors we make, requesting, exploring, participation. What can we learn from shaving cream - sensory fun, communication, participation, shapes (drawn in the cream), parts of a face (same), so much more. If you are afraid of a mess, you miss so much. Now today when my blue eyed boy somehow overflowed his diaper and soaked both of us as we were swinging in the awesome fall weather that was not a fun mess. Thankfully we are both washable. He found it hilarious and laughed when I complained about being wet. Boys! I laughed when I had to send him home in girls pants because all he had at school were shorts and it was too cold for them. He thought about it and then laughed too. Thankfully, washable me also keeps a change of clothes at school. My little ones also had a great time today wearing monster masks (Roar!), singing 10 little monsters and waiting for me to "scare" them by roaring, and playing a game that I loved as a kid - Don't Break the Ice. I managed to keep the attention of 4 three year olds for 20 minutes and convince them to take turns and share materials with this game!! Awesome!!!!! That is like convincing four countries who are all at war with each other to cease fire, meet together, declare peace, and trade their best resources for a century. I will most definitely remember that this game is valued more than gold in our room and will be used during desperate times and when we are working on our attention spans and our sharing abilities. Right now we are working on our "Hands are not for hitting" abilities. I love that book. I also find it intersting that one of my kids completely gets time out and hates it while my peer model, my typical peer who is supposed to demonstrate proper behavior but ends up hitting the other child back, does not care a bit if I resort to time out. I am sounding like my mother too - "I know he hit you but you can not hit him back. Tell a big person that he hit you. Go play with a different toy. Tell him no. But do NOT hit him." Gee, that sounds familiar. She cursed me when she told me that some day I would understand everything she said - I so understand it and now i am saying it not to a child of mine but to ten children that are "mine". But my brother still has the real payback in my spitfire of a niece. Little Bit is paybacks for anything either one of us ever did as a child and more. She is 30 pounds of solid attitude. I miss my Little Bit. And now that I have written a completely free flowing, good luck trying to connect the dots entry I am going to go enjoy the first real autumn evening with a cup of hot tea, my favorite fuzzy blanket, and an old favorite book. Autumn is my favorite season.

Two Horned Bad

I have a new frame of reference for a bad day. I was looking through a magazine that I picked up at the store recently because I have been too lazy (actually, too busy is a better description) to mail back my books to receive new ones. Inside was a picture of what I would describe as a true bad day. It involves the running of the bulls in Spain which has never made any sense to me, and I almost always cheer for the bulls to take out as many people as possible before they are brutally slaughtered. Anyway, this picture made me feel the pain of the stupid people that decide that running in front of an armed and angry animal might be a fun way to spend a morning. This awesome bull caught the best hit of his life and managed to stick two guys on his horns at the same time and got them both by ramming his horns up their rears. Now THAT is a bad day to be skewered onto a bulls horn by your rear end and then to look over and see that on his other horn, that's your brother. That is a two horned bad day. I may have to deal with the occasional rampaging preschooler or tempremental parent, but the odds are greatly in my favor that I am not going to end up with a horn in my rear. It will take a lot to make it a two horned bad day. For the bull, well it was the worst day of his poor cud chewing heart. I bet there was a great BBQ somewhere shortly afterwards and I wonder if those guys at least got a piece of him in return.....

Amidst the Storm

******* The Lumps, Bumps, Knots, Tumors, Whatever you call them do not appear to be cancerous!!*******

Nothing clearly showed up on the CT scans and the MRI so further testing was done. The bone scan did not show any significant abnormalities and the Chest X-ray done several months ago when my ribs started to really hurt was clear. At this point it is believed that the tumor clearly visible in my arm is an abnormal lipoma, the issue with my ribs is falling into the "we have no idea" category and we wll monitor and rescan as needed in 6 months, the issue on my hip is being ocnsidered an abnormal lipoma and will be followed up with my ribs, and the abnormality on my lungs is to be rescanned in 6 months to make sure it is stable and not growing. The sweet words that there are no signs of malignancy are precious indeed. For once, I don't mind falling into the odd category of not having answers. At some point I may push for a biopsy of my arm to guarantee that it is indeed a funky lipoma - especially if it grows any further. Right now, it is sweet and awesome to be released from that fear. This is a joy in the storm of my life. Last night I was in tears because it seemed like once again I had become a lightning rod for any and all things abnormal and freakish. First I had to spend a half hour sorting out the fact that my payment that I sent three weeks ago had never reached my credit crd company and thus they had added over $100 of late charges to my account. The hassle of canceling payment on the missing check, explaining that I had indeed made an effort to pay the account and that my check was out there somewhere, bouncing from department to department at the bank, finally having the late fees removed, then neogitiating payment of two months fees at once. Then I drove out to my awesome sign language class that I am taking and drove back, making it home just as the rain started. I pulled into my parking spot, put the car in park, turned off the ignition, put the keys in my pocket, exited the vehicle and discovered that MY CAR WAS STILL RUNNING! Um, crap! I got back in and retried the standard maneuvers. No success. My car was running without me. I called for assistance from my father and we discovered a few things: 1) it would not stall, 2) it would not turn off no matter what I tried and 3) I can not open the hood on my own car. I am ashamed of being the absolue female stereotype when it comes to cars. Finally after 30 minutes it sputtered to a stop and after kicking it for good measure I emptied it of anything that I liked in case it might explode during the night. So I had to arrange a ride to work this morning because I am so not geting back into a car that does not turn off before it is fixed. Then this morning I had to negotiate towing for my car and convince them that it is still under warranty for roadside assistance and please tow it even though I will be at work, I will leave the keys in the glove box and pray someone steals it. So all morning at work I was receiving calls about my car while teaching. Nice and professional. I have the best principal who not only understood about the cell phone calls but arranged to have someone give me a ride to my critical doctor's appointment this afternoon so I would not have to try t call a cab or cancel my appointment. My school - it is the best school on earth!! We may not have the newest building or the fanciest equipment but we have the best people. So in the midst of the car chaos and the stress over this doctor's appointment and issues with some of my kids that I can not discuss, I noticed that my kidneys are showing signs that perhaps they are tryng to rebel against the establishment. For example, yesterday I drank a glass of water before work. Then at lunch I had a large iced green tea at Panera Bread and refilled the cup with water which I also drank. Then I had a large (huge) iced coffee from McDonalds on my way to my class. I also drank a glass of apple cider while teaching. I came home and had some water. I went to the bathroom twice all day. From 5 am yesterday morning until 5 am this morning. Me thinks that is not normal. My legs are swelling and pitting - I had a nice pattern from the carpet at cirle time over an hour after circle time was over. Nice. Finally it is possible I may have been having pain in my right lower back that I have been ignoring. Maybe. So today the doctor was nice enough to run the kidney labs and have me donate a urine sample (the nly time I have gone today except for when I first woke up - I am sure you wanted to know all about my peeing). I will get the results tomorrow. So now I have to wonder a bit if the lupus has decided that remission is not qute its style and that my kidneys are tempting. This would suck because otherwise, I feel good. I am able t do more than I have done in years. I have been hiking, I have been playing with my kids on the playground more than ever, I am truly happy with my life even as all these things are thrown at me. I may owe credit card companies and incredible supporters more money than I think I can every repay, I may pay more for prescription medication a month than I pay for my car, I may have $600 in car repairs this month (which my awesome father is taking care of without me asking him - I am blessed), I may be damaged goods and I may take more detours than routes but I love my life. I have the best job on earth with some of the bravest, strongest, sweetest, most incredible children. I work at a school that appreciates my job and my children - my children are treated as individuals with value, not annoyances, not cute little pets, not "freaks". I am discovering more and more that I have people that I can consider friends and that find the good in me. I have things that I am passionate about that bring me great joy - writing, reading, photography, hiking and being outdoors, being with friends, exploring new ways to help my children meet their greatest potential. I have a newly growing understanding of what my beliefs are and where they are rooted. There may be a storm raging around me and life may seem to be really hard, but amidst the storm I am finding great treasures and moments of pure joy. It sounds pathetically sappy but I am convinced I am where I belong. There may be clouds and thunder, rain and lightning, but there are also times of such pristine beauty and incredible joy that I would not trade this detour for any straight and clear road on earth. I am finding that I love to dance amidst the storm.*

* I am so not Pollyanna, but I am also incredibly amazed at the way that in the midst of incredible stresses everything fell into place today. I had the support I needed from people who hardly know me but have decided I am a "good person", something I am only beginning to see in myself. My greatest stress of all was lifted not when I wanted but when it was the perfect time. This was not what I wanted at all, not what I had planned, but it led me to a different and almost better place. No one promised life would be fair but I am learning to laugh, to celebrate, and to dance anyway. I am learning so much from my little ones. It is an honor to be their teacher, even if I do end up sounding like Polyanna instead of the woman who stood outside in the rain yesterday cursing and kicking her car. :)

Clue Jr.

Yesterday one of my typical peers, Goldilocks, decided out of nowhere to hit another child upside the head. I know this because he was screaming and pointing to her. She was sitting there trying very hard to look innocent, but when I asked her if she hit Devon she answered very matter of factly "yeah". I informed her that hitting was a bad choice and that hands are not for hitting. Because she made a bad choice she would have to sit in the thinking chair to think of a better choice (for most of the remainder of my class it is simply the time out chair). When she was sitting in her thinking chair we had the following conversation:

Me:"Goldilocks, why did you hit Devon?"
G: "With a duck."
Me: "But WHY did you hit him?"
G: "On the head"
Me: "But what made you hit Devon with the duck?"
G: "By the doll house."
Me: Goldilocks, we are not playing clue here! I know Goldilocks did it with the duck by the dollhouse. I need to know WHY you did it, what did he do that made you hit him?"
G: "I'm very sorry."
Me: I'm glad you are sorry but you still have two minutes in the chair to think about why it is a bad choice to hit friends. I want you to tell me a better choice."

Two minutes later
Me: "Goldilocks, you can get up now"
G: "Ohhhh. Okay."
Me:" What is a better choice than hitting a friend?"
G: "No duck."

Okay, so round one we played the strangest version of Clue Jr I have ever played. Round two, apparently if you are going to hit someone just remember "No Duck". I then walked over to the toy shelves so she could nt see me laughing. She is my dreamy, quirky, funny, sweet, clever child. And No duck!

1000 Words

These are a few pictures from my last hiking trip. I thought they were interesting. That, and I wanted to add something else here and am running out of time. :)

Consider

Consider the fact that for three and a half hours a day I will have possession of your child. Consider that I will determine what they learn at school, what skills we focus on, what communication strategies we utelize, what materials they access, and what experiences they encounter. Consider that you have to trust me with your child for those three and a half hours with nothing more than my notes home to you and your non-verbal child to tell you how the day has gone. Consider the fact that there are eight children with special needs in my class competing for my attention and that I work extremely hard to make sure everyone's needs are met at all times. Consider that my telephone conversation with you, the child's parent, is taking place before I have even met the child and my brain is automatically forming opinions and conclusions based on our conversation whether I want it to or not because that is how we are hard wired as human beings. Consider the fact that I am going to be appearing in your home every other week for the remainder of the school year, either like a long lost friend or a thorn in your rear depending on how our relationship turns out. Consider all of this carefully before you start to insult me during our very first telephone conversation as I schedule a time to enroll your child in school. Consider that perhaps it might not be appropriate to question if I am "old enough to teach" or if I "will look older when we meet you" because those are not questions that are likely to win you a friend. Consider that informing me that I sound like I am fifteen on the telephone is not going to assist your cause any and might just cause you to sound like a creepy dirty man. Consider that no school district is going to hire "a teenager" to teach a class of beautiful, precious, adorable, and very intense children with special needs. Consider that in order to be a teacher you do indeed have to go to college ad have one of those nifty paper thingys they call a degree and yes, by gosh, I did get me one of them. Consider that it is also inappropriate and rude to ask me about my nationality, especially after I have just been interrogated about my age and education. Consider that perhaps, just perhaps, you could have waited until you saw me before deciding that I was "too young to be a teacher" and questioning me about it. Consider that now, I am leary of you and while I still look forward to teaching your child I dread having to deal with you in the future. Consider that you may have just earned your self the Creepy Parent of the Year award, and it is only October. Just Consider.

This Job, It Can Bite

Preschool kids look sweet and innocent. They are so cute that to anyone passing our mob in the hallway - because really, we are not likely going to achieve a line anytime soon - wants to sneak one into their classroom for a while. I agree that they are adorable, charming, engaging, precious, and the best part of my day but they are also far from the innocent little angels that many people want to make them out to be. We have our days when becoming a lion tamer at the circus seems like a safer and calmer job choice. My blue eyed boy started biting a few weeks ago and in spite of everything I had tried managed to take a front tooth sized piece out of me on Tuesday. He does make a very cute little vampire, but I prefer not to be his afternoon snack. So yesterday I worked with several wonderful experts to come up with a plan to avoid being taste tested and to reduce the biting. I still love him to pieces, as I love all my little ones, and I am sort of happy to see him doing this. He is tryng to express frustration at times by biting, which I hope to redirect to communication, and he is testing limits and being defiant at others which is nice to see in a child that many underestimate. The little vampire- he has attitude, he has spirit, he is a little bit punk and I love it. Just not so much when he shows it by chewing a hole into me. :)

FYI

If you are in any way trying to receive money from me do not call me "honey", do not call me "dear", do not call me "sweetheart" and do not call me "hun". If you call on the telephone, I seriously advise against asking if my mother is home. She is at home - in Michigan. I highly recommend that you avoid whatever evil urge drives you to talk to me like I am still in diapers and high chairs and instead use your "big boy/girl voice". Don't worry, I can take it. But if you call me "dear" one more time? I may just have to kick you in the knees.

24 Hours

It is amazing the differences that can develop in a 24 hour period. On Saturday I spent the day at a nearby state park hiking trails, enjoying the sweet sunshine and beautiful weather. I ended up hiking approximately 5 miles and the last 1.5 miles was done at an all-out push because I spooked myself. On Sunday I spent the entire day curled up on the couch unable to gather myself enough to do anything more than basic necessities, and even those were a challenge. A shower - forget about it, that was way beyond my capabilities. Microwaving food was a stretch, as was pulling words from some distant part of my brain all the way to my mouth and speaking them. The difference? Two little white pills that my insurance company decided would now require prior authorization before I would be given them. Did I receive any warning? Nope. I called the refill in on Saturday and was notified that my insurance would not cover it until they received prior authorization. Um, my doctor is closed until Monday and I am all out of those little white pills. After muttering a few words I would not use around my little ones I tried to call my insurance company, only to be told that they would open at 9am on Monday. Well, without these pills I cannot drive and it would not be wise for me to be responsible for other lives. Crap! I had to take a day off of work because my insurance company sucks!! So today once I could force my body out of bed I made a few phone calls. By 11:00am the prescription was filled. After making those phone calls I promptly fell back asleep on the couch until I used every effort to force myself awake at 2:00pm. Then I had to tackle the shower - I never knew a shower took so much energy. I will not reveal how the medicine got from the pharmacy to my house, only that it is here now and tomorrow morning I will blessedly return from the world of the sleepwalkers to a real live person. The reason I did not purchase the prescription out of pocket - those precious little white pills cost somewhere around $10 per pill and I take two a day. I don't happen to have that kind of money lying around. Right now I am functioning at a minimum because of the three pots of coffee (4 cup pots) that I have consumed since 2:00pm. Oh yeah, great for a heart that is prone to arrhythmias!! But its either that or I hibernate until morning. These pills are the only reason I can live anything like a normal life, and I am so appreicative to be living in a place where I have access to the "village" of medications that it takes to keep this damaged and dysfunctional body working. It is truly better living through science!! And I am sure that tomorrow morning when I am able to take my medication, the difference in the 24 hours between then and now will be just as amazing. what a difference a day makes...