Being Thankful

I was a substitute mommy over the weekend. A friend of mine and her husband went on a little weekend trip and it was their first time to leave their two darling little kids overnight. Luckily for me I wasn't a single parent. My dear friend Mary (http://www.xanga.com/MARYMISSMARY) co-mommy-ed with me. Mary is the K-3 teacher, so she had little Noe last year. This year he's in my class. We are lucky to be two of his favorite people. His little sister Sara is only two, and i was wondering how much separation anxiety she would go through, but she did great. Unfortunately Sara wasn't feeling very well, and she was quite generous with her bugs. Noe caught it on Saturday. Despite sneezy, runny noses we managed to have some fun - running around on the playground, going to a birthday party, and blowing BIIIIIIIG bubbles in the bathtub (I think I like that as much as the kids!). I started to come down with the bug on Sunday. Luckily, I got Airborne into my system in time to keep me from getting a full blown case of the flu.

This morning I got to my classroom at the usual ungodly hour of 6:58. I had about a 1/2 hour until my room was full of kindergarteners because it is my week to do early-bird and night-owl (early care & after care). I was drugged up to keep me from feeling the little fever that was pestering me this morning. Thank God for DayQuil!!! I couldn't take a sick day because we're in the middle of evaluations before our first round of parent-teacher conferences. The thought did cross my mind that maybe I could be contagious - so I tried to keep from hugging and kissing the little faces that were begging for "bisous". I wasn't really looking forward to the day. Just as I started class, I found out the music teacher was sick which meant an extra half hour of improvising something for the kids to do instead of getting a little break...

But something amazing happened as I was stomping around the classroom singing The Elephant Song that Miss Sheldon taught me in Second Grade. I looked around at the laughing faces of 15 little four year old elephants and realized - I really love this, even when I'm sick! I can't imagine trading this job for anything.

I've been introducing the holiday of Thanksgiving to the kids over the past couple of weeks. I have been trying to explain the concept of Thankfulness to them, but I think it's lost on most of them. It's good for me however. I have so many things for which to be thankful. I have a job that I love, and two assistants that are incredible. I have a Dad who is such a great example to me in every way. I couldn't love my stepmom more if she was born into my family. How many people can say that? My five siblings and three sibling-in-laws are the most incredible support system I could ask for - not to mention awesome friends. My best friend & I have known each other since we were 12 & 13 - I think she can read my mind (kything, maybe?). My grandparents' faith is so rock-solid, and their prayers have surely made a huge difference in my life. I could keep going on and on about how many rich relationships God has blessed me with - both family and friends. And then there are the things...

Sometimes I feel a little guilty.

Then I stop and imagine, if I had kids, wouldn't I be good to them? Wouldn't I love watching them enjoy the good things I gave them? Of course! Their happiness is a reward worth much more than the pennies I spent on the trinkets that entertained them.

That's when I stop and say thank you to God.

You took it off!

So I went to school yesterday looking like this. The first comment from my student, Prince, was:
"Miss Rebecca, you took it off." He said this of course pointing to his head.

I asked him, "I took what off, Prince?"

"You took off the purple."

So apparently after careful inspection last week, he still wasn't convinced it wasn't a wig. I assured him it was my hair, but the color had washed out... in only one week!!!

Four-Year-Old Debate

There was a debate in my class that lasted all of last week. Not too many weeks ago we learned our colors. The kids are great at picking out Red and Yellow and Pink and Green, Purple and Orange and Blue (mainly due to our Rainbow Song). A lot of them have also grasped the concept of black, white, brown and gray. They proudly show off their knowledge whenever they are asked what color something is. On Tuesday (Monday was a holiday here) they were stumped when I walked into class. Some of them laughed, some of them pointed and others just stared wide-eyed at the new Miss Rebecca. I promptly plopped down on the floor so they could get a good look at the new variety of colors sprouting out of my head. Most of them gingerly reached out fingers to touch a few strands and make sure it wasn't a new clown wig for the class. With my question, the debate began:

"What color is it?"
"Red"
"Purple"
"No, Pink!"
"Red and Pink"
"Black"
"No, Red. Just Red"
"Is there any brown?"
"No. Red, Black and Purple."



I have since found the debate is not limited to four-year-olds. I'll let you decide for yourself...

Frenchmen Beware!

I came home this afternoon to find our maid finishing up and getting ready to head for home. She LOVES to talk despite the fact that I am Arabic-impaired and she knows about the same number of words in French. These conversations can take an hour or so. Today I came home to work on our preschool rubrics for the French K4 program, so I was hoping to keep the conversation down to about 15 minutes or so, seeing how we never really seem to understand much that the other is saying. We greeted each other for about 5 minutes and asked three or four times how the other’s family was doing. As usual she mentioned something about France (I think she likes using the word Franzia because it’s one of the words she knows I’ll understand). She said something about a house in Oulfa (a neighborhood) but I didn’t really catch on to what she was talking about. Then she started talking about how much she hoped I would find a husband (you can pretty much guarantee that is going to be the way an older woman here will steer the conversation). I think she then told me that she got married at 15 years old, had a daughter at 16 and a son at 19! Whew! She continued talking about a husband and how he worked in the phosphate industry. At this point I thought she was talking about her husband. It turns out she’s on the lookout for MY husband. When she told me about Oulfa she meant she had started working at a nice villa in Oulfa and the owner was a French man whose work involves phosphate (I’m not even really sure what phosphate is except I faintly remember it showing up on the chart of elements in high school, I think). So anyway, she hasn’t yet met this French man, but I think she told me that when she meets him she is going to really check him out. If he is good, she wants to hook us up so that I can live in a nice villa and he can buy me a nice car. But she said (I think) if he is not beautiful, then he’s no good and she’ll have to keep looking!