S ~ Stinks
C ~ Completely
H ~ Having
O ~ Officially
O ~ Ordered
L ~ Learning

So we started school today, in case you didn't pick up on that. Is it too early to say that I'm ready for summer vacation? I suppose I should give it a month or so anyway before I start counting down.

On a positive note: I love family. I love MY family. I love other people treating me like family. I love when my friends and their families become MY families. To clarify: I love being asked to your grandma's birthday or your parents anniversary, your niece's school program, your sister's wedding, or what have you. I love that I'm important enough in your life to be accepted as family. I love, love, love the feeling of being connected and of caring and being cared for. I apologize for my over abundant use of the word "love," but I am very moved that I have these amazing friends with amazing families, who share their families with me.

We are mostly moved in. Still wading our way through thank-yous. It was so good to see you all at the wedding. Again......adoptive families...so great. I enjoyed the dance tremendously. We stayed until the end and closed it down in good old camp style with Thomas, Rachael, Andrea, Audra, Emily U., and Heidi.

If anyone reads this who talks to Chip....we found his hat.

We've had some wonderful house guests lately.  Yay for time spent laughing, talking, and eating.

I am thinking about adding "Spider Killer" (cue the psycho music) to my resume. And no...they were not the wonderful house guests. Unless of course their technology is more advanced than I am aware of, and they made use of some fantastic Mission Impossible-esque disguises and voice changing software.

Marco................Polo. Oh good. I AM still here. lol Just checking. I guess I need to keep better track of myself. I always encourage all of you to write updates, and here I am....woefully behind in my correspondence to you all. Rest assured, I am still alive and well.

Well an update on my life. School is over for the summer, and I am excited. I finally caught up on some sleep this week, and it felt AMAZING! It turns out that Ponce de Leon was looking for the wrong thing all along. Instead of the Fountain of Youth, he should have been searching for the Spring of Energy. I feel as though I can accomplish great things in a short amount of time. Woo for energy!

So besides school being over and having a tad bit of seperation anxiety for my eleven students, the biggest thing going on in my life is the impending wedding. For those of you who haven't heard, Ryan and I are getting married in July. We are very excited. I guess you can chalk it up to another camp couple.  If you can survive camp together, you can survive anything right?

Ryan has been helping me with my golf game.  Which is to say that I walk with him while he golfs and then if he has a really impossible shot, he lets me take it instead. hehe Occassionally he lets me pick really ridiculous clubs for certain shots. Now this girl knows next to nothing about golfing, the rules, the vernacular, or the specifics of the equipment, but Ryan still makes it work when I pick weird clubs. (Really, I just think I have a gift.) The only thing he draws the line at is driving with his putter, which I think could be fun....but what do I know.

Head Wounds, Hearts and a Family of Fingers

Good evening Ladies and Gentlemen and welcome to another edition of Life Styles of the Rich and Famous. Tonight, join us as we stalk the first grade teacher in her natural habit to observe how she spends her pseudo-Valentine’s Day at school.

The first grade teacher is amused as one of her students shows her the blisters on her fingers, acquired from yesterday’s pencil sharpening expedition, amused, not because she developed blisters on said phalanges, but because she has named them. The teacher tries to hold it together as the girl says with a straight face, “We lost Little Larry when he popped last night, but we still have Frieda and Annabelle.” The teacher unsuccessfully holds back her laughter as she erupts into gales of glee and compliments the student for having “quite the imagination.” (Plus one to the future speech team.)  

Next, we travel into the dark jungles of the Valentine’s Day Party itself. The teacher cowers in fear as the sugar runs rampant throughout the classroom. Will she survive this feeding frenzy? The teacher frantically dishes up snacks and scoops up raspberry sherbet in an attempt to appease the masses. Alas in her hurry to create these cups of raspberry confection, she gives herself a blister, naming it Ouchy Oscar. The students gather in a circle around the frazzled teacher as she explains how to play “Pin the Heart on That Other Heart.” (Yep, I’m going to patent it.)  Hearts fly and the teacher head for the hills to escape the ensuing mass chaos.

After the teacher supposed her day to be officially done, she is called in to aid a head wound victim from the playground. She quickly pops into her phone booth and emerges as “Super Teacher.” Away! As she applies firm pressure to the site of the injury, she blithely carries on meaningless banter with the student to keep them calm until the parents arrive. Easily 7 stitches she mentally calculates. All in a days work for Super Teacher. Away!

Thank you for joining us for Life Styles of the Rich and Famous. Tune in next time when we scrutinize the local speech coach. Good night!

Well I thought since it is now officially February,  I should probably send an update out here into cyber space just to let you know that I haven't dropped off the face of the Earth. Still alive, just speeching it up. We are in the middle of a five week stretch of speech meets, and the team has been doing really well, which excites their coach in no small way. As much as I abhor the early, cold, dark mornings, the late, cold, dark nights and giving up a huge chunk of my weekends, I also love hanging out with my kids. I love seeing them learn and grow and become more confident individuals. I love the adrenaline rush of a day of speech: Averting crises and putting out fires, so to say,  having conversations with people who share a similar interest and similar experiences, and being there for my kids. It is a part of me.

Along with being proud of my kids, I'm also incredibly protective of them, just as I am protective of my camp family. Lately the boys on my speech team have been followed by a bevy of brunette and blonde (nope, no red heads, I've checked) females, staring, hugging, and giggling around them in a ridiculous fashion. They are just so bold. So willing to be the pursuer. Not only am I annoyed by this, but I feel the Mama Bear in me coming out. I've had the "good girl" talk with my boys more than once. Maybe I'm embarrassed for these girls who don't know better. Maybe I'm worried for my boys who just soak up the attention. Bah! It's like being a parent to 35+ teenagers at one time. I don't recommend it as a recreational activity or for the faint of heart. If I'm gray by the time I'm 30, we'll know why.

On another note, I fulfilled one of my short-term life goals last evening. No, I didn't manage to count every hair on my head (that will have to wait for another day I guess), but I did chaperon my first formal dance. lol I know you are laughing at me because I laugh at myself. I love music, dancing, and pretty dresses. I guess I'm a sucker for that night of high school fantasy. I wasn't ready to give it up when I attended my last formal, so I had to plot ways to return to the scene of the crime. I even got to be Snowball Queen for a short time last night when my speech girl, who was the rightful queen, crowned me. My speech kids dragged me out on the floor for a couple of dances, which made me feel so much more accepted than I ever did in high school. I also got to teach one of my former speech kids a bit of swing dancing. I had a ball. (Get it, ball, Snowball. ha!)

You are missed and loved.