The Blessing and Responsibility of Living in a Free Nation

I'm in love!

HA! Did I catch you with the title? Don't go getting your hopes up. However, I really am in love - with first grade! This semester has been interesting because all of my classes were scrunched into the first 1/2 of the semester, with the second 1/2 being spent all day in an elementary school classroom. I was assigned to a first grade classroom, and I was pretty nervous. I have never worked with kids younger than 3rd grade, and I always thought I preferred the older grades. This week was my first week with my first graders. I knew it would be a good experience, but I did not know what to expect. I most definitely did not expect to love it as much as I do! The only bad thing I can say about them is that they wear me out completely. By three o'clock I am ready to collapse. Here are a few reasons why I am loving 1st grade so much:

-They get so excited over the smallest and most simple things! Like a pencil on their birthday, or a dum-dum for Halloween.

-They are completely honest.

-They are hillarious! Example: (a conversation I had with my student yesterday)

Student: (Pointing to a pimple on my face) What's That?

Me: A sore.

Student: Is it gonna get bigger?

I was giggling so hard I barely managed to say "I sure hope not!"

- I get love notes daily

- Have I mentioned how utterly adorable they are?

- They love to give hugs and do so frequently.

- They try so hard! Yesterday I was helping a student with his math. He is struggling with addition. He is still using his fingers to do very simple problems. I was helping him with 7 + 2. He counted each finger on a hand to get to five, then looked up at me with big, worried eyes and asked "How do I get to seven?" So, so cute!

- They are full of energy, smiles, and giggles!

I still love the older grades, but I am finding myself very happy in the 1st grade as well!

ouch!

I love squash. It is at the top of my favorite vegetable list. I could eat it everyday! And there are so many yummy ways to prepare it. However, I should be banned from cooking squash. Every time I try to peel a squash, I cut myself. It doesn't matter what kind of squash I am making, or what knife I am using, I always manage to come away with an injury. Today it was butternut squash, and I gave myself a pretty ugly cut in a very visible place. As much as I love squash, I just don't know if it is worth it. I should find someone who is willing to cater to all of my squash peeling needs (any takers?) Or find a store that sells pre-peeled squash.

Even More . . .

PUMPKINS! Yesterday our family did our annual pumpkin carving get together. I always forget how much work it really is to get these things carved (even though I always do the most simple of designs!) but it was fun! Here is a group shot of all our pumpkins:

And a close up of my masterpiece:

But the cutest pumpkin award goes to Liz. She didn't even do much. She just cut off the top of the biggest pumpkin she could find, cleaned out the seeds, and threw Maddie in there. Maddie LOVED it. She thought it was hilarious!

More Pumpkins!

For as long as I can remember, each year around Halloween we have gone to the pumpkin walk. The pumpkin walk is a fun event where people or groups create scenes based off of a theme - and everything (at least the majority of the stuff) in the scene is made out of pumpkins! It is always lots of fun, extremely entertaining, and FREE! Today we went with my grandparents so they could enjoy. It is fun to see at night, too, when it is all lit up. I really do love pumpkins!

This was one of my favorite scenes. It was a hospital. I thought the woman that was puking her "guts" (aka pumpkin seeds) out was hilarious. And can you see all of the babies made of little pumpkins on the right hand side? It was really cute! (you can click on the pictures to get a better view)

This was another favorite, "Noah's Ark". I thought it was so clever how they used pumpkins as elephant bums. And the tumbleweeds for the sheep. How do people come up with these things?

Until Steve arrived towards the end, it was just Grandpa and all his girls going through the Pumpkin Walk. When we mentioned that he had alot of girls with him he said "Good! I like girls!" It was so much fun!

How Eye See

No, this is not going to be a creepy Halloween post, though the picture is kind of odd. It is actually a picture of my eyes. They were photographed today. Cool, huh? I had never had this done before, which is strange considering the amount of time that I have spent in the Optometrist’s chair throughout my life. Shortly after my 1st birthday my Mom noticed that I had a tendency to go cross eyed. It was discovered that my eyes are very, very far-sighted, as well as having astigmatism. I was fitted for my first of many pairs of glasses. I was a very small child with very large glasses. It was the eighties. See evidence below (this was actually a couple years later, but you get the idea). I thought the fact that I was sitting next to a pumpkin was quite appropriate.

I was thrilled when I was turned 16 and began wearing contacts. They have become the everyday norm for me since.

I had my eyes checked shortly before I went to Brazil. I have been using that prescription ever since (about 2 ½ years) Over the past few months I had noticed that I was not seeing very well, and knew that it was time for another appointment. I was worried that my eyesight may be worsening.

Today I had my appointment, and I learned a few things:

1)- I don’t like eye appointments. Even though the Optometrist was super nice, they make me take off my glasses (at which point I can’t see well at all) and go through all sorts of tests that wear me out! By the time I am done I just want to close my eyes and go to sleep!

2)- My eyesight is actually IMPROVING. Not a ton, but to the point that my prescription was too strong and throwing everything off balance.

3)- I have VERY little depth perception. They had me put on some 3-D glasses and asked me to pick the eight things on a page that jump out. I was able to pick out one. Just one. When they asked if I could see the picture on the next page, I had to admit that I couldn’t see it at all. The doctor explained to me that during the time when your mind is learning depth perception my eyes were probably too occupied with the other problems they were having, so the part of my brain that controls depth perception doesn’t really work. It doesn’t really harm much, but it explains why I was never able to see those magic eye pictures as a child (or now!), why I find 3-D movies boring, and why driving at night is hard for me. It may also explain why I tend to be a klutz :)

Beyond that my eyes are healthy! It is always a relief to hear that! And he gave me new contacts that feel FANTASTIC! I am so grateful to live in a day and age that allow my vision problems to be fixed easily, making it possible to live a normal life!

PUMPKINS!

I love pumpkins! I love to carve them, I love to paint them. I love the smell of them. But most of all, I love to eat them! Yum, Yum, Yum! Pumpkin Chocolate Chip Cookies, Pumpkin Bread, Pumpkin roll, Pumpkin Pie, Pumpkin Ice Cream (from Cold Stone - Sooooooo Good!) you name it, I love it! This week I found special edition Pumpkin Spice Quaker oatmeal at the store. Of course, I had to buy some. It was good (though not super pumpkin-ey). One thing that I had never done and always wanted to was make a dinner in a pumpkin. This year we finally tried it, and this was the end result:

You clean out a pumpkin and fill it with a stuffing made with LOTS of things. Then you bake it. When you serve it you take a scoop of the stuffing, and you scrape the cooked pumpkin off the sides to eat along with it. It was my first time eating pumpkin as a squash side dish, and I have to say that I thoroughly enjoyed it! Definitely a worthy effort. Plus, I think it turned out so pretty! It fed 12 people quite easily. I think this is going to become a yearly tradition in our home!

This is what our supper looked like after Liz and Steve got to it. They pulled off pieces of the pumpkin skin and created a "Jack-o-lantern". I think it looks like ET.

Madison found her Uncle Eric's hat. She loved it. Doesn't she look adorable?