15: I took the weekend off...

So much to say...and I will say it tomorrow.  Sometimes we have to be still...

14: Pulled into Lent...

My day started like it normally does…

My daughter couldn't find her glasses..she found them, good you can still ride the bus. I have sixty projects to grade why did I give myself so much work…my son is eating applesauce out of a jar…I want to run because I feel gross but my hip is efffing killing me and I finally figured out why and I'm throwing away any pair of shoes older than my youngest child.

Went to pick up the Christmas cards and was so excited to mail them out....was going to address them tonight.  Then I got a call that my daughter's found glasses had one lense missing.  I had to finish a session with some 8th graders before I could go digging in her room for a lense...there it is, let's get back to the computer...

Message after message after message.

Are you ok?  Are you ok?  Are the children ok? 

We can't remember what town in Connecticut you live in...

Texts...Facebook messages...IMs at work....a phone call from my frantic aunt in Raleigh...

And just like that…  within the span of thirty minutes, I was pulled out of Advent and into Lent.

Here I sit in my own house teaching on a laptop, feeling very grateful for my job.  Just last night I wrote about how I love the time off from it so I can explore my other interests.  Now I don't want to. 

I'm in Lent:

• A family is torn apart and left to have to deal with it- his problems are international news. How would you like the world to know your family's secrets?
• I am a teacher.  I have taught in traditional elementary schools before.  I'm not a fire fighter. I'm not a policeman. Schools should be safe.  I feel like I lost colleagues today. 
• I am a mom of small children...enough said...breathe....

 

My phone rang one last time...it was my best friend- "Um, what are you going to say to your kids? I have no clue what to say to mine..."

I thought about it for a moment and this is what I will say to my kids:

Someone very ill didn’t get the help he needed and had access to things he shouldn’t have had.

So when you have an ear ache, you go to the doctor for amoxicillin, and when you have a speech delay, you get speech therapy.  And when you have a child that needs counseling, you find a counselor. 

 One tragedy doesn’t mean another isn’t coming.  I would love to protect my children from everything but I can't.  I never ask "Why?"  I don't.  I always ask, "What Now...."

Connecticut is a beautiful state.  I know the people in Connecticut.  Connecticut Yankees helped this Southern Belle during the darkest days of her life.   We will climb out of this hell.  We will do all in our power to make sure every child is loved and comforted and feels safe.   This state will use the resources it has to make sure that all are counseled and this will not happen again.

Lent is longer than Advent. It isn't happy, and it is very, very miserable.  But it ends.

And I'm going back to Advent in the morning- my three children need it.

 

13: 'Twas the night before the last day before the holidays....

This is my 15th year as a teacher. I've never taken a break.  Well, I did take three maternity leaves (although my administrator  did a happy dance  when my last child was born in July ten days early).   

Every time I tried to quit,  another job fell in my lap. The universe must really want me to teach Spanish.

 I have literally taught all ages, levels, and settings. I'm not exaggerating. I've taught preschool, high school, virtual, brick and mortar, suburban, inner city.....and I never taught a single way I didn't like.

Doesn't matter how old they are or where they live. Doesn't matter if they have an elf on the shelf at home.  Doesn't matter if they celebrate Hannukah, Kwanza, or nothing because they are Jehovah's Witnesses.  Doesn't matter how much they like you as a person, whether they hate Spanish or not.  (I've had several over the years tell me they hate Spanish, but I'm their favorite teacher.)

 I know one thing to be true.

The last day before the holiday break....all the kids go crazy.

No one wants to conjugate a verb, or learn about Las Posadas in Mexico or the Reyes Magos in Spain.

And honestly..I don't want to teach it either...I want to get two weeks off just to be who I am.

I am not the only one who feels this way....even fictional teachers deal with it....here it comes...

In Harry Potter and the Goblet of the Fire, each teacher had a different way to approach the holidays and the dance coming along with it.

Flitwick gave up and let them play charm games.....

Snape gave a test (on poison antidotes no less, talk about a buzz kill)....

Binns just kept droning away about Goblin Rebellions.... (Sidenote- I always found it fascinating that he was such a boring teacher, yet he loved it enough to keep doing it after his death...or perhaps he didn't know what else to do???)

McGonagall was business as usual.....

Tomorrow is my last day for, as my colleague Heidi said, eighteen days off in a row.  My "Student children" are working on some projects they have enjoyed doing and get to present them on the web cams.  That's a good way to end the semester.

THEN my own "personal" children and I are spending the evening baking cookies, lighting Advent candles, watching Christmas Classic movies, and practicing lines for the Christmas pageant. Wouldn't you know it, Kenneth begged for a speaking part?  By the time he finishes 5th grade he will probably  have played everybody.  I know I did.  It makes for good memoir writing. :0)

We need to come up with a special name for the last day of school before the holidays!  Other than "last day of school" of course....

Witty and clever suggestions are always welcome....

12:How many other women...

While everyone else is enjoying the fun of 12.12.12, I can say I have always enjoyed December 12th.  It's el Dia de Guadalupe!   It has been since she appeared before the Peasant Juan Diego.   In our modern Quack world, it's the day I come up with something  about Mary...

This is just my opinion, but....

She really should be the one and only star of the Christmas story. 

 My girlfriend Austin always tells women "Happy Birth into motherhood day to you!" on the birthdays of their children.  

She is right.  (Did you read that Austin???)

Really, it's Mary's day.  His comes later, trust me, but his birth should belong to HER. 

Think about it....

How many other women can say they found out they were pregnant six months into it? My friends knew I was pregnant when I ordered decaf coffee and passed on Margarita night.

How many other women had to travel on a donkey to another town? I flew round trip to Atlanta in one day for a wedding-that was hard enough.

How many other women were told they had to give birth behind an inn and put the baby in a feeding trough? I scheduled a c-section.  Seriously, I didn't have a single contraction until the third baby decided he wanted to show me what I had been missing at three am....I still can't believe you guys choose that on purpose.

How many other women had random visitors coming to take a look at her and her child? I would have told all those men to get the heck out....

I am the Quack, Mary is not. 


SO....


This is a little shout out to all moms everywhere....be strong like Mary.  Whatever God gives you, tell Him it will be according to his word.

That's all for tonight.

I have two more days of work and then my blog posts will be much longer, deeper, and funnier. 

I promise. 

How many other women can?

11: Cookie Party!

Every year is different and this year I am in more of a visual story telling mood.

We went to  a cookie decorating party with some friends last week.  All the cookies were cut and baked and the icing was placed in special tubes for each child.  All the kids were given two cookies:

Each child had a different approach to the job.....

Kenneth was neat and meticulous- he didn't get any icing anywhere but on his cookies. He found some on his elbow but went to wash it right away. He had a plan and patterns in mind as he decorated.

Lowell was a big fat mess. Talk about two brothers being night and day.  It was in his hair, on his stomach, I even wiped some out of his ear.

And Frances did her cookies and then wanted to move to the next thing:

This is the way they approach just about any project we encounter- homework, board games, a day at the beach....

Amazing what you can tell about a person by the way they decorate a cookie. 

10: I used to make fun....

Is it really necessary to decorate for every single holiday?

I mean really, who has that kind of time?

What fluff...

I save my gingerbread houses for January snow days.... I like to hear them scream they got something in their nose while I am trying to teach.

Christmas Coffee Mugs with chicks and bunnies.....

 

Mom!  I need a napkin! Now!!!!

I might donate my shoes- but save the boxes for Valentine's day- Keep them with the Easter baskets and the Halloween Spider.

We have been known to eat off Easter egg plates in the middle of Advent- I hope that isn't like eating meat during Lent.

 

What is with these crazy moms that do these things?  Get a hobby........

Rule number one about being a mommy during the holidays?  No judging....





9: The 2nd Sunday in Advent Hitchcock Shock

After four years up here nothing should shock me....

BUT.......

When I stopped at a crosswalk this afternoon for an elderly couple to cross the street, the guy behind me flipped me off and drove around me, almost hitting the couple.

Both of the elderly people flipped him off with not one but both of their fingers-so five birds were in the air.

I in turn roll down my window and asked everyone to remember my kids were in the car and we were coming home from church, so please knock off the rude hand gestures......I figured while everybody was doing what they wanted I should express my desires too.


Anway, I was shocked.  But probably not nearly as much as the audience was in 1960 when they went to see Psycho.

I didn't get to see Psycho for the first time in a theater.  I saw it during an Alfred Hitchcock snow day marathon in 1999 back when I taught in the North Carolina school systems.  You just didn't leave your house until all the snow was gone, so by the fifth day I was catching up on classics: Rear Window, North by Northwest, The Birds, Vertigo, and Psycho.

I grew up knowing Norman Bates was the bad guy- the psycho. I wish I could have been twenty in 1960, thinking it was his mother and then being "Shocked" with the twist ending.  Of course, my children's father had to lean over and whisper Bruce Willis is dead in my ear when we went to see The Sixth Sense, so maybe I wouldn't have understood the mental hospital ending anyway.

The cool thing right now seems to be to make a movie about how quirky it was to make a movie.  This started with My Week with Marilyn.  This movie focused on Hitchcock making Psycho and his  relationship with his wife.

It isn't easy being married to a genius-that doesn't shock me.  It isn't easy when the people funding your projects want you to tweak what you are doing- that doesn't shock me either. 

I sure am glad he listened to his wife Alma when she said the shower scene needed music and please Darling, just listen to this score just once.......

The God gave in to the Godess-now that did shock me a little.

OK...so, the second Sunday in Advent is for Peace.  I went to the movies and wanted to find a way to bring it all together, despite the fact that the movie was about the making of Psycho.  The Hitchcocks were able to work together and turn a horror story into a pop culutre canon classic-does that count as peace?

 And while I am at it, there is one thing I am glad my children are learning in the north. Sometimes, when someone is being rude, you let them know they were rude.  Even if I was raised to always be polite....

I hope I didn't shock you.

8: Dan Zanes Holiday Sing-A-Long

Everyone needs  "LET'S DO IT!" Friends.  Run a marathon?  Let's do it! Spend the day wandering around Providence?  Let's do it! 

Go into the city for the Dan Zanes and Friends Holiday sing-a-long ? 

Nah...what a pain...  the kids would whine on the train and have to go to the bathroom and then there is all the waiting around...and we would have to watch them on the streets. Let's just watch Dan videos on Playhouse Disney, that's safer. 

It's Christmas and everything will be over the top crowded and expensive.  Who is going to care in five years anyway?

Just kidding...LET'S DO IT!!!!!!

Dan Zanes is a musician from Brooklyn who really wants parents to enjoy music with their kids. Last year he and his musical friends had their first holiday sing-a-long in New York.  Because it was such a success, they did it again!

I'm always paranoid when my kids are involved that I'm going to make a mistake.  Like I thought I bought tickets for Dan Zanes but it is going to be a different musician or we showed up on the wrong day.  But I was right!  My name was on the list and I had my ID-in we go with five kids and upfront seats......

All the families were given sing-a-long booklets. He really meant it-he wanted to hear us sing with him.  Guess who passed out the books?

Dan himself!!!

My friend said to my daughter, "LOOK Frances! It's Dan Zanes!" She was frozen in her spot.  He smiled and handed me the booklet.  He said later he could spend his time in hair and makeup or interacting with fans and friends. I'm glad he makes the choices he makes.

The songs were awesome- my children were dancing along and singing to Jingle Bells.  He kept the kids engaged with great questions, "Who plays an instrument?  Who wishes they could?"  "Who speaks Spanish? Who wants to learn?"  As silly and interactive as it was, he ended it with Silent Night, to calm the kids down.  My kids were making friends with kids around them-how often does that happen in the big city?  What a wonderful, talented way to spend a Saturday!!!


My daughter struggles with who is real and who isn't.  I'm really glad she had a chance to meet someone real, and that he takes the time for his fans to have special events like this.

A lot of his songs are about enjoying every moment and opening the door to every new day!

I live my life like a Dan Zanes song.  Never say "No, let's stay home."  ALWAYS say, "Let's do it!"

7: This is how I try to watch the Office

OK...Ok..this is it. The last Christmas Episode ever..... NO more Jim, Pam, Angela, Oscar...the gang is leaving me forever. No more Scranton-no more only mockumentary I enjoy that wasn't made by Christopher Guest. I had just had a baby when this show premiered...ah nostalgia.


I will have all three children asleep by nine. And I don't want to hear it from a single uber perfect mommy who has all three out cold by seven after they recite a Bible story.

Tonight is choir night so the girl has to be there and my student council member must be back at school and the little one is coughing.....

All three take a bath and have their homework done.... the time is 8:15 I can do this...

Daughter: You know, I think I want to re-arrange my room.

And she pulls out everything all over the place and reorganizes dresses and dolls and finds one Christmas gift I thought I had hidden well.


Middle Son: They didn't feed us at student council.... what???? My child hasn't had dinner? AHHHHHH so he eats while the other one is rearranging stuffed animals by color instead of Disney movie.

Every body has brushed teeth...little one is asleep no problem....

Why are you in such a hurry to get us to bed?

Hurry? There is no hurry?

You want to watch something on television...

No I don't

I think I'll sleep in your bed tonight....

GO TO SLEEP KENNETH

I have the television ready...and I don't hear a sound...

OMG it's the stupid parental control...it goes on every time a new show starts... Where is the remote? Where is the remote???? What is the code? I can't believe I didn't punch it in right.....

There we go.... Crap I missed the intro...whatever I'll watch it online.

Ahhhh Christmas with Dunder Mifflin. What memories that don't involve my own dysfunctional family stories. The place I learned about the Yankee Swap/Steal game. Where Angela and Phyllis fought over party planning. When Michael wore his Jesus costume...when Michael put himself in the girlfriend's Christmas card...ha ha ha....

Let's see...

How does that idiot not know about Die Hard.... Well, maybe I'm being mean.. I might not have paid attention either if Snape wasn't the bad guy..nice, great...love it when Dwight gets a chance to shine. Krampus...we all know who he is now how clever of these writers as it is December 6th. I'll miss them more than the actual actors.

And I hear a giggle from the other room. Kenneth is laughing at the Office.

GO TO SLEEP!

But this is funny...

The last season of the Office and Kenneth laughed. At an all new episode NOT in syndication. I haven't been so happy since he laughed all the way through Andy Griffith's What is was, was football recording.

Merry Christmas to me!!!!!

Perhaps there will be a spin off in Philadelphia???

6: St. Nicholas Day

St. Nicholas has his feast today, December 6th. Children put out their shoes and he leaves candy or a small toy.

 Every year I plan to put together some cute little thing to put in their shoes for St. Nicholas day. I can never find the right shoes or the right trinket. Then we can never find the pair we need or we discover someone just outgrew a very expensive pair.  Shoes are not a laughing matter.

My girlfriend Kara has it together:

Three beautiful little girls, three adorable pairs of shoes, look at the ribbons on the cookie bags!  I LOVE this! Next year...I swear...I will do it.

This year was not without happy shoe moments at our house.....

In October, I took Frances to the Soundrunner to buy her first pair of real running shoes on her birthday. We ran around the green with some friends.  As we were laying out her clothes for PE day one night, she said, "PE shoes are great, but I think I need a pair of art shoes, and music day shoes, and I really need a completely different pair for library day too mom."  The diva in her is too much for me to take.

I asked the kids what we should do special this holiday season for anyone in need, and Kenneth immediately said, "SHOES!  Could you imagine having nothing on your feet?"  We collected every pair of shoes we had outgrown and the amount was enormous. 

What shocked me was how many pairs of running shoes I went through training for a marathon:

Our shoes are headed  to Soles4Souls.  They prefer new and slightly used donations. Here is another list of places you can send your old shoes.   You should check them out-especially if you are one of my running buddies!

I think St. Nicholas would be very proud of us- and next year I'll make sure they get a treat!

5: Best Christmas Pose Ever!!!!!

This is the best way to get the perfect Christmas picture:

Invisible Kids!  Aren't they clean?  Aren't they all smiling? Nobody is fighting, kicking, or scratching!

I should have done this the first time around:

Frances and Jeremy, 2004

The ornaments are more fun than the picture...

4: You just need a pedicure

Sometimes I suffer from psycho mom syndrome.

One of them has to be at dance and the other has basketball and the third one asked for a playdate at a house on the other side of town and didn't I promise them we could go to the new yogurt place. Then everybody has to have homework done and folders checked and beep there is another email and three more students left voicemails about their midterms and the library books are overdue.

The last straw was when I dropped everybody off at the right place and had an hour to myself. I was going through the ATM machine line when I hear a voice in the car behind me...

PAAAGGEEE can you pull over and talk about this committe for a few minutes?

Are you kidding me?  I can't go anywhere in town...ever....ahhhhhhh

The solution is NOT to cancel all activities and plug them into various technology devices.  The answer is to pull out a gift certificate you have for a ...

PEDICURE

That's what a woman wants in her stocking- a card for a pedicure.

Think about when you can use it:

After a bad parent/teacher conference- either as the parent or the teacher- Pedicure
Forgot to take the garbage out because the kids were screaming and you hear the guy come and go at six am? -Pedicure.

Is your local art cinema so small they aren't releasing the coolest independent movie coming out this year? -Pedicure

Another mother driving you crazy with her high heels and perfect hair at eight am when you know she doesn't work?  -PEDICURE

You just ran 26.2 miles  or ANY mileage that was your long term goal?  PEDICURE

Think about it-you aren't just having your toes painted.

You also:

Sit in a message chair

Soak your feet in foamy water

Have a hot stone leg and foot massage

Read for fun....I once took a professional development book, but that was STUPID.

Get free therapy from a nail technician that knows what she is talking about-mine made me promise never to date from a certain area again.... 

Now, this is the gift giving and the holiday season, but I still have to say it:

STAY AWAY FROM NEGATIVE NANCY!!!!!!!!!!!

You know, the women who are going to crash your plan? I can hear them now:

Well….you could get hepatitis.

I don't have the time for that...I don't have that money....blah blah blah

This may not be in the spirit of the holiday season, but screw them.

If you get bored one day, go to the OPI website.  Click on "Try it on" and play around with the hand and polish colors, but pretend it is your feet.  I don't do manicures.  I might some day when my kids are grown and I don't have to dig in dirt, but until then, I'll settle for pampered feet.

Page's Pamper Pick for 2012?  The Pedicure...

What better Christmas present would that be?

So what if it’s winter time…go anyway and know your feet look nice under the snow boots you are wearing as you slosh to the preschool coatroom from now  until May.

I'll see you at the salon!

3: Tree Lighting, wreaths, and home...

All events in New England revolve around the time of year.  When it’s time for the fair, it’s time for the fair.  When it’s time for the Easter Egg Hunt, it’s time for the egg hunt. Memorial day weekend the beaches open up.  I wonder what would happen if we skipped a ritual?   We wouldn't have much to do until the next thing.

So it is with the tree lighting. Nothing stops our little town from bundling up in the dark to count backwards from ten and light up the tree on the green.

Churches and local businesses have their own activities going on tree lighting night- I didn't take a single marketing class but I have enough sense to know that is good idea.  Our church youth group always sells wreaths and hot chocolate.  I have always helped them on the fringe, but this year, the woman who normally organizes the event was in Germany.

Hmmmmm who would you ask to organize the middle school wreath and hot chocolate sale if the woman who normally does it takes a nice long cruise down the Rhine?

My three children saw the answer: "OH NO MOMMY!  NO SUE?  THE SALE IS CANCELED!"

Thanks babies...from the bottom of my heart.  I'm glad she had more faith in me than my own three children.

She even had a way of giving me such a motivitional, inspirational talk, there was no way I could turn her down. 

Thanks to a lot of checklists and google docs, the set up and wreath making went well.

Thanks to fifteen years of teaching middle schoolers, wreath sales and clean up went well.  I did tell three of my "Salesmen" to go run around the green for fifteen minutes and come back when they were calm.  That was brilliant. :0)

Thanks to my church being incredibly family oriented, a group of us went out on the green to watch the tree, and a group that didn't care for dark crowds in the cold stayed inside.  Guess which one my daughter chose?

This year I broke my own rule.  I actually had cash and let the boys buy plastic blinking Christmas swords.  Call it giving in.  Call it props for when they play Nutcracker/Mouse King.  Call it I've been watching this show called Revolution and now I always play the "What if we lose power and society falls and what will they remember" game.  But they were both running around waving swords.  That is actually how they recognized fellow classmates in the dark.  Good idea afterall.

Just like every year since way before I ever heard of this small town called Guilford, everyone started the count down and my boys started to chant:

Guilford Rocks!  Guilford Rocks!  Guilford Rocks!

Yes, yes it does.

 I had a job at the tree lighting.

 After all was said and done, we skipped home in hats and mittens and blinking swords.  Now I really live here....didn't see that coming. :0)

2: Making the Advent wreath.

It only took nine years, but all three kids can now sit through a Rite II Eucharist service.  This is a big deal considering one of them couldn't go into a crowded room at all ever just four years ago.  Thanks to a couple of social stories and practicing at home, they get the general idea of what is happening and when.

We have also talked about how we don't knock the knealers over on people's feet and we smile and say good morning to everyone.  The BIGGEST accomplishment of all is getting them to understand that during a homily when the preist asks a question, he or she doesn't really want an answer, although we can usually come up with one.

Yay for the team!

Since we can sit through a service, why not try an after church activity on a day there is no Sunday School?

The Sunday after Thanksgiving is the Sunday we make Advent wreaths for home.  I have blogged about the Advent Wreath before.  I was joking about it, but maybe we should make the wreath and light the candles.  Anyone can put up a tree, right?  How many people can say they light the Advent candles?  That is a lot easier for me than making sure all my ornaments are in symetrical formation with coordinating bows and lights.

Each family was to bring their own greenery.  Well, one good thing hurricane Sandy brought us was some fallen down pine branches. Every one wanted a turn with the clippers, but no one lost a finger during the fight. I tried to remind them we were cutting the greenery for our Advent wreath and did we want to start the season off wrestling for pine needles, really?

Like my Moravian Great-Grandmother, we added important symbols from the year amongst the greens, pinecones, and candles:

 

Page: A movie ticket stub from New York City and a sea shell with 26.2 on it.

Kenneth: A snake for reptile studies and legos.

Lowell: A train and a crayon covered in glitter .

Frances: A fashion barbie purse and a tea cup.

The first Sunday in Advent is now over and the candle was lit no problem and there was no fighting over who got to use the lighter. 

We were well represented.

Now on to that tree....

1: Advent: The Ambush that we didn't see coming

For a third year in a row, I'm going to give you twenty-five Advent Quacks.  This year I was hesitant. How is it possible to come up with twenty-five new reflections?  Then I remembered two things.  First, every Pastor, Minister, and Priest all over the world has to come up with some new take on the holiday for a church service-so I can create twenty five stories, right?  Second, I am never in the same place at the same time ever, so I should be able to come up with a new reflection.

I took a moment to think about what Advent meant to me personally, the writer of this blog. The first year, it meant "wait."  Last year, it meant I was about to become someone new. 

This year..This year...this year...I gave up and consulted a thesaurus with the word "Wait". 

 Guess which one sprang out at me?

AMBUSH-.. the act of waiting in a concealed position in order to launch a surprise attack.

In a battle, this means one side would have quite a bit of patience and time and strategy and the other side would be quite surprised.

That is perfect.....
'

This year, like an ambush,  I think the holidays came out of nowhere. 

Part of this is my fault. I had other things going on-mostly a marathon.  On a more ordinary time level, I changed curriculums at work.  Any teacher knows the first year of a new curriculum is a massive undertaking.

Then we had a hurricane that knocked out the power and post-poned Halloween. Just because one holiday is delayed doesn't mean the other two biggies are a week behind too.

The holidays and the weather and the election all were one big ambush.

Over and over again we say,  "Wow...sure didn't see that coming..."

Let's keep going with the didn't see it coming theme:


On the nativity level, they didn't see it coming:

Mary: Um...I'm sixteen and a virgin and I'm pregnant....Didn't see that coming.

Joseph: Um...she's pregnant...it wasn't me... I think I'll pass on marriage...but I'll do it quick and not humiliate her.... OK  I  just had a funky dream and changed my mind... Didn't see that coming...

Both: No room in an inn? So we are going to have a baby in a stable....lovely...Didn't see that coming...

On my level:

I didn't see a lot of things coming this year, or ever...but I sure am glad they came.

A marathon? Didn't see it coming...
Southern Belle in the north?  didn't see it coming
Staying here on my own?  didn't see that coming

 I'm glad Christmas is coming.  If for no other reason, than because I get to write for twenty five days in a row!

I'm going to take it from that angle this year. Things that I didn't see coming are going to weave in and out of the next twenty five days.  Don't worry-there will be all kinds of comedy, reflections, and gift giving tips too.

I hope you saw this coming...