Mission possible and even more excitement

This past week was a busy one.  

On Wednesday, we kicked off the school year with the district-wide convocation at the high school.

It was great to see my friends from the elementary school, most of whom I hadn’t seen all summer, as well as sit down front with new friends from the primary school, where I’m teaching this year.

The thing about this school district here, in our tiny town, is that everybody knows everybody.  While there are only about 4000 students, student enrollment in each school is pretty big.   The primary school, itself, is huge with around 1200 students, K-2.   There is only 1 primary school, 1 elementary, 1 middle, and 1 high school.  So essentially, the district is small but the schools are big, and I love it that way.  There is an incredible sense of unity among the teachers, students, families, and community. 

This year’s theme is MISSION POSSIBLE.

We had a great speaker, and an unbelievable video with the MISSION POSSIBLE theme that the tech department put together.  

(The link is posted on the school website for any of you family and friends that are interested.  It’s a really cool video and I was impressed!  I started to put the link here but then thought better of it.)

Basically the video took a look at each school with the understanding that we’re all in this together.  The students start in pre-school, continue their academic careers for the next 13 years until they finally reach graduation.  At the conclusion of the short video, our superintendent said a few words and then, after stating, “Folks, here is the true MISSION POSSIBLE”...

 ....the curtains opened with 13 PSD students standing on the stage in their school uniforms, one student to represent each grade, K thru 12th.

Y’all.

I almost just burst right into tears.

Because you know what?

College really does begin in Kindergarten!

Maybe it’s cheesy but ohmyword I got the biggest lump in my throat and had to blink back tears just as fast as I could.

Right after that, the superintendent gave us a few challenging words and before he even finished, the MISSION POSSIBLE theme started and suddenly, sections of the ceiling opened up and military guys started repelling out of the ceiling on ropes!

Everyone on our row was trying to grab our phones so fast to take a picture but we were all so stunned no one was able to get a pic while the guys were still in the air!  (The guys were throwing stuff into the audience but I couldn’t tell what it was because I was sitting so close up.  That guy in the picture was literally coming out of the ceiling right above my head!)

After that, with Grandma Sandy's heart still racing and her mascara still smudged, we were sent off to our respective schools.

Once we got there, my principal, whose name on this blog will be Lucy, (she and one of her assistant principals are incredibly close and refer to themselves as Lucy and Ethel), had the music cranked up and everyone started line-dancing.

Even the cafeteria workers!!!

After a few minutes of fun, we got busy working on the  Common Core State Standards, the shifts in curriculum/instruction, and how that will all drive instruction and assessment.

This crazy girl is my friend, Lawrie, who transferred from the elementary school with me.  Lawrie has always taught 3rd grade and will teach 2nd gr Language Arts this year.   She’s breathing into a bag in order to not hyperventilate over Common Core.  HA! 

I don’t know who she thinks she’s kidding because I had the pleasure of observing her last year and she is an unbelievable LA teacher!

The next afternoon, my whole school went to the high school gym to be trained in CPR.  

Last spring, one of the high school science classes was awarded a huge grant from State Farm to purchase state of the art CPR equipment.  Their goal is to train as much of the community possible in CPR and they’re starting off with the school district teachers and staff.  It was really cool because all of the high school students are now certified trainers so they were the ones who trained us.

The students were the teachers and the teachers were the students!!

I will only minimally mention the fact that yesterday, I kept wondering why my arms were kinda sore and then it dawned on me.

CPR training.

Y’all, that’s pitiful. 

But 100 chest compressions per minute ain’t no joke!!

In other news, the hens have continued laying eggs.

Here are some of the eggs collected last week.

The first day holds the record for 5 eggs.

Wednesday we got 4, I think, but most days it ranges from 1-3 and twice we got no eggs at all.

The “newness” of egg collecting hasn’t worn off, yet.  The kids love to go check for eggs several times throughout the day.  The hens still haven’t quite gotten the hang of laying in the nest boxes but on several occasions, they actually laid eggs next to the nest boxes.  We’ve also found an egg under the fig tree, as well as in the empty barn stall next to the coop.  Hopefully we can all figure it out soon and get the eggs where they belong.  The thought of eggs being somewhere on our property without my knowing kinda makes me crazy.  After all this time, those eggs are golden to me!

Here are the first eggs we cooked.  The smaller ones came from our hens and the larger ones are farm fresh eggs from the feed store.  We cooked them next to each other to be able to have a comparison of size.  Ours are still small.  And so cute, if I do say so myself.  :)

This past week has been full of fun and excitement, but I saved the very best and MOST exciting news for last. 

No, he’s not mine although I sure wish he was!

Thursday night, Grandma Sandy became an aunt for the 10th time!!!!!

That’s right!  

My youngest brother and his most perfect wife gave birth to their 4th boy.

Fourth boy!!!

Isn’t he the most beautiful thing you’ve ever seen?

If you liked that picture, then take a look at this one........

Be still, my heart.

And because a picture is worth a thousand words, I have nothing left to say.

(although I’d say this picture is worth at least 1000 x 4, don’t you think?!?)