Darry

My sweet Darry, a former student from another life (it seems), came back to CRMS for a quick visit. He was the guest speaker in our AVID classes- he reflected on his time at CRMS, moving on to high school, and then wow'd us with his achievements at college. He has a full ride due to his hard work in HS, and now he's graduating college early. He's going to be a teacher eventually we hope :)



In his speeches I learned a bit more about his struggles- losing his Grandma (who took care of him from baby to 12) and his guilt in finding her too late as she died on the kitchen floor, his Dad dying of liver cancer last year, and then Darry's own health issues. I didn't know the extent of what he was going through. Colon cancer and surgery in March to remove half of his colon. UGH! This kid just needs a good life from this point on!

June 19

"He always had a smile on his face."

It was a beautiful smile.

Sad

One of my former students was killed last night. I was called to the high school to help tell his friends and then to help with their grieving. It was a hard, long day. I had to deal with my own grief as I remembered the sweet, shy boy from middle school. I saw him a lot over the last couple months and he was excited to graduate from high school. I don't think everyone expected (hoped, yes) him to finish. He ended up just a few credits shy but would have finished after a quick summer school session.

I don't know what else to say :(

Lucio celebrated his 18th birthday on the Cinco de Mayo. I saw him after this, maybe a few times, but I remember hugging him that day and telling him how proud I am of him. He wasn't all that "hard" with me. I loved this kid. His funeral will be tough.



http://wcco.com/local/fatal.stabbing.fight.2.1743620.html

Feed My Starving Children

My school took a bunch of students to an organization called Feed My Starving Children for a community service project. It was a great day for the students (and me) as we packaged food for needy kids around the world. We ended up packing 30,672 meals which means that 84 kids will be able to eat 3 meals a day for a year. I just can't imagine my James not being able to eat, so it was a pretty significant stat for me to hear.

On a lighter note, I made pineapple sorbet for my family (and school friends) to enjoy. We are very lucky.

Do you ever wonder...?

What they serve for school lunches? When I forget my lunch or just don't have time to pack a lunch I rely on my school lunch account. I have money in my account just for these days. I don't enjoy the school lunches but I do know that some days are better than some. I've really taken an interest in school lunch blogs, articles, and Michelle Obama's Let's Move campaign. I pay attention so that I know what's what when James will be in school.

I do wonder about his daycare lunches, but so far he doesn't have too many bad habits. He just doesn't eat much yet. He's never been a kid who eats just junk but he is picky. We're still relying on a few staples- mac n cheese, chicken, peas, milk, carrots, pb&j, etc.

Well, here's my school lunch from Monday: Mini corn dogs, potato wedges, wheat roll, broccoli & carrots with ranch dip, skim milk, and an orange.



I doubt very much that the kids choose to eat the vegetables. There was a cooked vegetable that I refused- really, really overcooked peas. There were other fruit options- canned fruit cocktail, which is better than nothing but probably very sugary. And then there's the milk. There was also chocolate skim milk but I've looked at the sugar content and it's horrible. I'm sure the kids don't think anything of it.

I never eat lunch when it involves ground beef. Or pasta. They tend to overcook that too.

EXCEL family event

So one Saturday per year I have a work day. I have a program at school of EXCEL students who work on good grades, behavior, and attendance all year. We gather all of the EXCEL students from the district for a big family gathering of awards, lunch, and entertainment. I was in charge of the event this year so I was a little stressed for a few weeks before :) We had 700 people RSVP for the event!

It all ended up well. No big issues.

Some of my students posing before the awards ceremony-

I left my camera with a trusted student for several minutes. They took some self portraits that I discovered later!

Some of my SLA buddies, Cassidy, John, and Nate-

My student Catherine and her "friend" Jeremy. Catherine doesn't even go to our schools any more, she's a college student but she still supports us.

Well, it was the big event for me and it's over. I feel like I'm just breezing through the rest of the school year now :) I think there are only two weeks left!

April 9

Mental note to self: Don't get behind on blogging anymore! I'm sure I'm missing lots of great little stories about James. I'm only able to comment on the pictures from each day, and not necessarily remember the details. Oh well, every day is special and I think every one knows that!

On this day I took a group of students to the U of MN for a campus tour and presentation about why they should go to college. My students took the day pretty seriously- or at least they were well behaved- but students from the other schools really were obnoxious and distracting. I wonder if I can say that my students were respectful of ME and that's why they were good. They certainly are capable of goofing off :) but I'm thankful they didn't choose this day to do it.

The man in the front, in the maroon, is my buddy Tex. He leads the Kids on Campus program and we've toured with him for several years now. I'm hoping to organize another big fieldtrip in the fall (for about 400+ students!)


After a hard day I stopped and got take-out for the family. We had different tastes that day!


I love finding random pictures on my iphone. James plays his little iphone games and sometimes it takes screenshots and then later I find them in my photo album.

A boy!

A boy joined my Step group at school. Brave kid! He amazed the girls by learning all of their steps in less than an hour. He's doing so well.

Yearbook picture

My after school step group is still fairly new but we took our picture for the school's yearbook! They were so excited to be recognized as an official group. They are just too darn cute.

My Students

I just wanted to include the latest picture of my students. We met for a yearbook picture this last week. I have almost 100 members of my Multicultural group- it's a group that meets after school, but thankfully not all of them show up on the same day. We mostly just hang out but they also do talk about some of the issues they experience in school and in the community. I love them all :)


This picture is a submission for our school's Extreme Reading Contest. Students are supposed to photograph themselves reading in some extreme or creative way. One of my students had an idea to hop into the Black History display case that we put together and pretend to be reading those materials. This is the pose that ended up being the best. The bell rang right after this picture and the girls had fun scaring people as they walked by the display case. They looked like zoo animals behind glass! I thought it ended up being a cool way to draw attention to the Black History display- maybe we should have more interactive display cases?

Saturday fun

I was a judge at the Anoka-Hennepin science fair on Saturday morning. It was a nice experience!



Tia ChaCha and Uncle Rich came over on Saturday afternoon to play, cook, and hang out.

ChaCha specifically asked for steak and eggs. James has been cooking up a storm lately. Apple pies, oranges, eggs, cake.


Uncle Rich helped to build a tall tower. Its James' favorite thing to build!


Thank you ChaCha and Richie for so much fun!

Independence

Our boy is much too big lately for naps. He doesn't mess around. On weekends we've been trying to lay him down, but without much success. He gets up almost immediately and stands at the top of the catwalk, with his small little voice he'll say something like, "Mama, I not sleeping." I've tried to put him back in his bed but he'll get up again. We just figure he doesn't want to miss out on the fun!

On Sunday, after a nap refusal, I let James watch his beloved Lazytown show and suddenly the chattering stopped. I looked over and found him slumped over, sleeping!


Still a little boy after all :) I turned down the TV and whispered to Jim to stay quiet. We let him sleep for about 30 minutes and then he just woke up and sat quietly.

So about Lazytown. Its a nonsense show. There is a very sporty character who is always doing flips, push-ups, and activity. He twirls around a room and does his thing. James has started to be like "Sportacus" and runs across a room, does a little attempt at a cartwheel. His daycare teacher even commented, "James just can't cross a room without a little something extra." Yeah :)

While Jim was out of town I needed to update him TWICE that James peed on the potty! I kneel down next to James when he's on the potty to encourage him to pee and the last two nights he actually did! He seemed to look down at his penis and really concentrate and all of a sudden a stream! It wasn't quite making it into the toilet so I did have to use my finger to help umm, point him down. Gladly! Praise! Sticker! Yay!

Today I had a great day with my students. We first went to the Penumbra Theater for "Black Nativity"- it was a play just FULL of gospel, jazz, and dance. It was an all Black cast and I hope my students noticed that. We'll need to talk about it tomorrow. After that we ate our lunches and then headed over to Rice Park for a little outdoor ice skating. I didn't skate but I was happy to watch my students, many of whom had never skated before! I took lots of pictures but here are some of my favorites.


My student Christian (black coat) had never skated before. He was pretty resistant to trying. He sat and watched for a while before he quietly put on his skates and just showed up on the rink. I was so grateful that the other students didn't fuss over this and one boy helped him get the hang of it. Christian declared ice skating "fun" but then took off his skates after only 10-15 minutes. Hey, he tried something new! I was very proud!


Alexis, Rodney, Rachel. Beautiful kids. Truly!


Four more days of school until winter break! I have an especially hard day tomorrow but I just need to get through it.

Random bits of life

I picked up James from daycare and he was playing very happily with another kid and he ran over to show me, "Look! Puppets!" It was a cute moment. I had to admire the puppet and then convince James to leave the puppet at daycare.


I saw this posted on the classroom door. I love that they talk about "current events". We knew this storm was coming and Ms. Sheana was preparing them for snow! We also brought in James' snowpants knowing they'd probably get to play outside today. Sure enough, he came home and talked about wearing his snowpants, his jacket, and his gloves when he played in the snow.


Funky Christmas week is coming!


I made a spice rub for my Crockpot Pulled Pork and when I looked at the bowl it was a heart. I couldn't miss that opportunity to take a pic!


Tonight a teacher and I took a student to JCPenney for some shopping. This is a family that has many children and they have sad circumstances that prevent the Mom from really providing her kids with the basics. Our middle school student needed undergarments, a winter coat, PANTS, etc. Its all stuff that I take for granted, you know? So we went on a shopping spree of sorts after I found the funding from my school district. I talked with the Mom and she gave me a wish list of items and sizes. We were able to buy winter coats for three of the seven kids, pajamas for four of the kids, clothing for them, and even a winter coat for the Mom. I told my teacher friend that I felt like Santa Claus when I arrived with those HUGE and MANY bags of items. The kids were wide-eyed and I know they wanted to rip into the bags. I gave them to the Mom and hoped that everything that I picked would work for the family.

Please be thankful for the shoes, the pants, the bras and chonies that you have!

Inquiring minds

I do have a doctor's appointment tomorrow morning (Friday). I wasn't able to get in today because I had a full schedule at work- including a very cool fieldtrip to the Ordway where we saw a performance by the Bad Boys of Dance! There were a few snickers from the kids when we first saw the dancers (male ballet dancers- sterotypes, anyone?) but the music started and the kids got into it. You can't go wrong with Michael Jackson music these days...

Finally!

Before last weekend's rain, we made it to the park for a bit of golf. I always find it funny that James gets so excited to go to the playground but then golfs like he would at home.



Hi Mama!





On Friday James and I had a day to ourselves because Sandra needed the day off. We headed to the park before we had lunch with Grandma Rosie.



James had no fear when climbing. I was a little scared to let him climb but I didn't want to be a Mom who hovers and gives him no freedom.













Mmmm strawberry rhubarb hand pies. We froze most of them so we didn't pig out.



So it was a rainy weekend and we were sad to keep pointing out the rain when James would ask to go outside and play golf. He understood though and was happy to try new things. Well, not really new, but different from his normal golf! Here he really really got into playing baseball. He is a natural athlete! He would hold the bat correctly and ask for us to throw the ball at him. He would swing wildly but rarely hit the ball. It was fun to watch him!





Lately, he's been very attached to his XL playing cards. Jim thinks he might be a poker fan!





Just a Blankie check. Here is the condition of James' beloved Blankie. Its looking really, really sad. He has chewed the heck out of the corners and its really gross sometimes. He's been much better about not chewing it and so the smell is so much better :)









My herb garden is doing pretty well! Here is some thyme, oregano, chives, and basil. They smell so lovely!



Grandma Laura gave James a great toy. On Sunday we beat the rain and went outside to blow bubbles. I can't describe the pure joy on James' face when he saw the bubbles and would chase them. He loved it!





















James might be a pool shark too. Just recently Jim gave James his tiny pool cue back (it was broken last year but now glued back together) and James loves playing pool. He taps the balls with the cue. Another good rainy day activity!











I taught James how to roll the step stool around the pool table. He's now able to access any of the pockets.



Yay! James bakes! I measured out the ingredients and had James help me make peach muffins.

James added the eggs.



Buttermilk.



Or maybe this was the eggs. I forget.



Stir it up.



Add the diced peaches.



Spoon the mixture into muffin cups.



Add some superfine sugar to the tops.



Bake for 25 minutes.



Eat cookies in the meanwhile because 25 minutes is too long to wait!





Watch and learn golf.



Check email like Mama and Dada.



So I enjoyed my last day of school yesterday. I had a few students who wanted to take "goodbye" pictures with me. I love these kids :)

Lashay and Sirena.



Raymond, Brandon, Harvey, Ekow, Seyi, and Moki.



Me and Moki. I really worry about him going to the high school. He is so sweet and innocent.