Not bad for a school teacher, eh? I refuse to take on the ordinary elementary school teacher look. You know the one. The vest from the 80's with the costume jewelry. The outfit usually comes fit with at least ten pieces of "flare" (random movie reference ~ thanks Chris) and at least two of those ten must be jeweled lizards.

That's me in my M*A*S*H* shirt. It got plenty of compliments tonight at the carnival. It's my new favorite shirt and if anyone attempts to make any negative comments about it I will hunt you down and put you in time out!

Entertaining school story of the day. We recently had fresh clean sand dumped onto our playground at school. The children love digging in the dirt, so the cleaner the sand the better.

This morning after outside play was done, one of the little girls in my room seemed to be leaving a trail of sand wherever she went. My assistant calls her over and shakes her pants out a bit thinking she just tracked in a small amount of sand. Much to her surprise, when she starts to shake almost a cup full of sand falls from the leg of her jeans. Had she stuffed her pockets full of sand?? Oh no. She's four-years-old and it just wouldn't be that easy.

After further investigation, we discovered that she had in fact filled her underwear completely full of sand using a measuring cup the children use for making mud pies and such. Once we removed most of the sand from her clothes we decided she must have had a good five or six cups down her pants. How she walked from the playground to the classroom with all of that in various uncomfortable places is beyond me.

And I thought sand in the bathing suit was miserable. Talk about chaffing.

The mood was set at 7:15am when I arrived with bags full of streamers, balloons, and party favors. Heart napkins, heart plates, red juice, even little confetti lips lay scattered across the tables.



The children began to arrive, and much to their joy, the entire classroom had been transformed into a Valentine's Day wonderland!



These were the giant coffee tins the children converted into Valentine mailboxes over the last few days. Crepe paper carefully glued to the cans made for a papier-mache look, and then the kids covered their creations in stickers!



As you can see, no two mailboxes were the same. By the end of the day each one was crammed full of candies and cards and pencils and toys. The children couldn't wait to get home just so they could dump everything out and paw over their precious treasures.



If they were lucky, they even walked away with an individualized glass, complete with lollipop and sunglasses. They were all lucky today, in case you were wondering.



Here's a final shot of most of the class sitting down to a sugary lunch, if you could call 3 cupcakes, handful of cookies, and tons of juice a lunch.... $5 says they won't sleep until tomorrow afternoon after all that sugar.



The most important part was that they had a great time. This is a day they will not forget for quite some time I imagine.

I'm in love with the new look here. I will admit it outright. Tomorrow afternoon I will have pictures to post of my class and their Valentine's Day party. The plan is to go in early and decorate the room with all the balloons my brother inflated this evening, and all the streamers the rest of the family made with me. We're talking mountains of streamers, folks.

My standards are high, and I'm aiming for the look a room would have if cartoony Cupid exploded into a million bits of pink, red, and white colors. This isn't going to be highly difficult as I'm teaching in a portable currently.

I'm also making triple berry muffins (all red) for the teaching staff. This means I'll be waking up much earlier than normal to get everything finished before anyone arrives. Thus, I must leave you all now. Besides, I'm very close to discovering exactly where Bhelliom lies. I must aid Sparhawk in his search! Until tomorrow.

Is this not one of the most adorable children you've ever seen in your life? My godson.

HEY WAIT! It's the same old blog, with a brand new look. Hope everyone enjoys the change of scenery. I know I enjoyed changing it... and who says virgos don't like change?!

If anything looks off, leave me a comment.

I really have no idea what the deal is with the disappearing text in the previous post. I'm baffled. Zann is confused. And let's face it, I just don't have the time to figure it out right now.

Today was a day of many exciting (in a bad way) events at work. It was the first day on the new job that I had children spewing bodily fluids in every which direction. It all started at 815am when a parent (who shall remain nameless) knowingly dropped off a child in a most unwell condition.

I cannot explain how much this infuriates me. If you know your child isn't feeling well (even throwing up before you bring them to school) then why on Earth would you haul them into a classroom and leave them to be miserable all day long?!? I will never understand.

This particular parent left the child at the classroom door this morning without saying hello to me. When I looked up I noticed the child laying on the floor not two feet from the door. Now this child rarely has a transition problem so I knew that wasn't likely the cause of his angst. I led him over to our little "kiddy lounge" section of the room (IE the book corner) and let him rest on the cushions there. Not five minutes later he was in the bathroom screaming as he vomited.

I was on the phone to his father faster than you could imagine. I bit my tongue when it came to announcing his stupidity to the world, but I was very assertive while I told him he was to come pick up his child immediately.

The second problem of the day all began with a simple sneeze. Following the sneeze were cries of "Eeeeewwww!!! He's bleeding!!!" Nosebleed. Ugh. Does it never end?? I spent the next ten minutes applying cold compresses to child two's forehead and cleaning up blood sprayed across the table.

Last but by far the worst, came incident number three. After waking the children from naptime and giving them all snack, a child approached me asking "Can I sit down.... ? I just need to sit down??" At the time I was tying shoelaces for another student, and thought "Why is she asking me if she can sit down?? She knows she doesn't have to ask to do that." About that time I look up to see a rather green face staring blankly back.

Now, those of you who know me well, are aware that I pass out whenever I have to get a shot. Everyone's always said I turn all shades of green when this happens, but I've never seen it for myself. I now understand exactly what everyone's been talking about.

As soon as I saw her face, I knew we were about to lose her. I sat her down on the ground, laid her back on the floor and asked if she was going to be sick. Before I could get the question out, she threw up. Luckily I had her on her side so she wouldn't choke on said fluid. At that time I grabbed the phone and started calling her parents while my co-teacher took care of the child.

Panic much? She scared me to death. I'm not afraid to admit it. I was two seconds away from dialing 911.

So we had blood, two episodes of guts.... at least the day ended without any broken bones.

I'll be looking into taking first aid classes. You never know when it's going to be needed when you're dealing with children. Other people's children.

DON'T PANIC.

Sometimes I amaze myself. A staff member is having their birthday party at school tomorrow and I was put in charge of dessert. I hope everyone likes apple pie, because that's what they're getting.

Someone explain why pie crust made from scratch needs to chill for four hours before you can use it. I thought the waiting would never end.

I honestly hope that it tastes as good as it looks, though. I took from several different recipes and then just sort of threw everything in the bowl and crossed my fingers. I suppose we'll find out for sure tomorrow at lunch.

Check out the pretty star decoration on top!

I made it through my third week on the new job unscathed. I've only been called a Big Meanie! two or three times. Little Johnnie and I have a love/hate relationship. He knows that I love him, but that he'll find himself in time out whenever I catch him in the potty mouth phase.

Next week we're going to focus in on the color red, which will include making red jello, drinking red milk, learning how the heart pumps blood, as well as the telling of various stories (IE, Little Red Riding Hood, Clifford the Big Red Dog, The Little Red Hen). Why the color red? Because it leads into Valentine's Day. Why else?

(Perhaps I should do a study through the week to see if all the exposure to red makes the children more agitated or prone to tantrums. Are you seeing red yet?? Hrm..)

I've managed to collect 17 very large coffee cans for the children to use as Valentine's mailboxes. We're going to decorate them with tissue paper and a very sophisticated Elmer's glue wash, papier-mache style. I'll have to post pictures of that. I might need a reminder though.

The week after Valentine's we're going to have our very own Olympic celebration, complete with a "field day". There will be all sorts of games and races for the children to play, including but not limited to the infamous egg/spoon relay game (no worries, I'm going to hard boil them first.. four-year-olds aren't THAT talented), tricycle races, and the hug-a-balloon challenge! Then we'll all go inside and take a nice long nap... and the kids can sleep too if they like.

In other news, I finished my taxes. It took H&R Block long enough to get their e-filing situation worked out for the state portion of the process, but I won't complain.

Most importantly, look what I got today! I've been waiting forever for the store to carry the women's version of this shirt. It was finally on the shelves today. I am so easily excited. I apologize. At any rate, ask me how much it cost. No, go ahead, ask.

$4.98. I rock. You may now all refer to me as "Hot Lips". End transmission.