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No longer on the river and, again, an empty nester. Back to living on Fleming Island and making some more friends!

Wednesday, April 14, 2010

Typing with one hand behind my back

Not really, but I am typing with one eye shut, because the sun is so brightly shining in the window, reflecting off the water. I cannot keep my right eye open, involuntarily it closes! No worries, I only need one for this 'job'. It took me forever to fall asleep last night for some unknown reason and truly, I was not overly tired at bedtime. It might be because I took my usual morning pills in the late afternoon, which includes a B12 vitamin, which might possibly be stimulating. I should take them by the handful, if that is the case! I doubt iron or calcium tablets would interfere with sleeping, I am merely speculating here. But I woke up at my usual time so it seems I am back on schedule again.
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One thing about the sun shining and my laptop balanced the way it is on my pillows in front of me----the screen rather serves as a mirror and that is not a good thing, especially when I am lying back. It makes me look fat! Ugh! I am glad the sun is out because yesterday early afternoon we had rain for a bit and the skies stayed sort of grey the rest of the day. In fact, when the kids were on the playground, we had to go running inside when the heavens opened.
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On the way to church/school yesterday, I stopped at Target to see what I could find for the kids to play with. I did find some squishy balls with tentacle things all around it, I do not know how else to describe it, except, when holding it in my hand, it felt icky and almost wet. The kids will love them and they were in the dollar aisle! In the toy dept. I found the Nerf football thing, looks more like a bowling pin than a football though, with "Packer" colors and insignia on it. The kids were a bit, shall we say, "restless", yesterday, only the 5 boys in class, so they needed to run and play to burn it off.
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Little did I realize how only one toy between 5 boys would be such a problem. Every time there was a tussle for the football, they would turn to look at me from the middle of the pile, thinking I would settle it. No way! Battle it out, guys, figure it out yourselves. It seemed to work better, the football whistles if it spends time in the air, when I threw it to them, but it would take a long while for them to come up with it from the bottom of their pile. And it makes a wonderful club, where I actually did step in and stop that game. No clubbing!
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Oh, and they were sooooo dirty when we got back in after rolling around in the dirt. All needed their hands and faces washed, their clothes brushed off, and Akin's head brushed off. Next week I am giving them the squishy balls instead of the football to see how that works out. When we were in the classroom, I said something to them about not looking at me to settle the battle, that the players have to come up with the ball themselves, to not stand and look at me to figure out who had it first. Little Mario said, "You are like the coach", thinking that would influence me, but I told him the coach knows better than to get into the pile with the players. Guess I would be more the ref than anything else. Am I getting old, or do kids no longer know how to play?
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While at Target, I also found their discounted DVD rack, $5.00! I got an oldie but a goodie, "Love Story" which is good for cleaning out ones eyes and washing of the cheeks. "Love means never having to say you're sorry". That is not true but it is such a sweet sentiment and a good movie, can't wait!
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Laurie is such a wonderful teacher, what can I say? Everything in her classroom is a learning tool, including the egg cartons with plastic filled eggs. After coming in from the rain, the kids went to the 'centers' and three of them played with the eggs, which told the Easter story. One egg had coins in it, signifying the money paid Judas' to betray Jesus; one had dice in it, for casting of lots for Jesus' clothing; another had a stone in it to indicate the stone in front of Jesus' grave. The boys were telling me the story as they opened each egg, and they put the eggs in the correct chronological order in the carton to retell the story. They were also studying weather and rainbows, which again tells the story of the first rainbow of promise, and so on. Love it!
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Before going into the classroom, I stopped to talk to the preschool teacher and some of the kids on the playground. A man had been there to take their class pictures complete with costumes and props. It is not about posing in your good clothes, not for the little ones anyway. I asked Ms. Deb about getting together with them at their monthly meeting next week, the date about which there is some question since the calendar and reality are different things. We finally settled on Monday night despite what the calendar showed so we can discuss the upcoming celebration of Precious Lamb's 10th anniversary. After finally get a set date from the Council/Elders, it is time to set the wheels in motion as time can often get away from us. Deb was telling me I was off by a year, though, that the school is actually 11 years old. This made me furrow my brow because I knew Timmy had been there in the first few weeks it was open, having to finish his month at ChildTime before transferring over and he stayed at Precious Lambs until starting pre-k at St. Johns, in 2000. Huh.....how did I mess this up?
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Later, Deb came up to me with a scrap of paper with dates and numbers on it, to tell me we were both right. Whew! The approval for the preschool came in 1999 and the first class and first director/teacher came in 2000. Whew!!! I knew it! I am not crazy after all....Deb did not come to our church/school until about 5 months after Timmy had died so I knew that was in 2001. Deb said, "I could have sworn I was here for ten years already....." Not quite, off by a year. The missing year! Next year, then, we should recognize her 10 years of service with a special event....shhhh!
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I took the paper from her, then folded it before tucking it away in the same place where I keep my phone and some cash. Deb chuckled, saying her daughter, also Kim, emulates me, tucks her phone in 'there', too. We laughed about that and then Deb said, "She really emulates you, wants to be like you...." Okay, THAT I did not see coming and was blown away. You just never know sometimes, you just never know.
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Back to church I went last night for our single session Bible study titled "Christian Unity", after sending out a reminder notice to the members yesterday afternoon. At first there were only two us who showed up but just as we were about to begin, Carol came in, which added much to our discussion. A couple weeks ago this same class was held in a member's home in Mandarin by invitation and a half dozen folks came for that one. I asked Pastor before we began if personal invitations might be the way to go for this type of church-held event. Of course, we can invite folks all the time, but I feel badly when people miss these opportunities. Especially when talking about unity, and how we can serve each other and Him.
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I had invited Kathy B. and she had considered coming to the study, but the previous night she had begun a new exercise regimen which left her feeling aching and sore. I shared with her the story of my sisters and my first time going to Jazzercises, how Kerry and I could barely move the next day. Of course, Lori and Lynn were hurting, too, but did not live with me. Even going potty was difficult because of the sitting and standing muscles that complained. We just wwaayy overdid it the first time, dancing can't hurt us, right? Wow! Kerry did live with us, in our split-level home, and my then-spouse amused himself by putting M & M's on the steps in order to get us up the stairs. Ha ha! It worked.