Long time no blog…

A week in review.
It was the shortest of weeks and the longest of weeks. Although James and I had Monday off, James had to be at work at 6 AM instead of 7 AM (those silly engineers, they decided to give the rest of the plant the week off so they could go in early and fix things all by themselves). That meant that Isla and James had to get up at 4:15 AM instead of 5:15 AM all four days this week. Since I didn’t have to be anywhere until 9 AM I wussed out on Friday and slept in while James made his own breakfast (half a box of fruity pebbles).
The Battle of Lake Itawamba
Or Redneck Adventures
Or DO NOT TRY THIS AT HOME
We all had a lot of fun over the Fourth of July Holiday weekend. Last Fourth of July, Daddy and James got in trouble for making their own fireworks—acetylene and plastic bottles. This year they just shot bottle rockets at Scotty (Nichols), Zach (Rhyne) and Jamie (Graham) as they rode by on jet skis. To make it fair Daddy later rode over to the Nichols’ end of the lake to let them shoot at him with bottle rockets (Mama told him it was only fair). Scotty, Zach and Jamie didn’t do nearly as good of a job shooting bottle rockets as Daddy and James. Daddy and James had their bottle rockets loaded into pieces of pipe and were using torches to like them (for maximum turn around and reloading time). And yet Daddy wonders why the national security people always pick on him at airports? The next day we all went swimming in front of the house. Mama requested waves and so Daddy got on the jet ski and made some really nice, big waves for us. Then James and Daddy decided to try to pull the canoe behind the jet ski to see what would happen. James decided that his kneeboard is not only more fun, but definitely safer (I am inclined to agree). We had a lot of fun at the coffee house as usual. Galvin is planning on attending Delta State this Fall (he is transferring from ICC) so he will be in Cleveland with me! We also rescued another Blue Jay. As those of you who have known me for a length of time may remember, Carrie and I rescued a Blue Jay from the road in front of our house the summer after I graduated IAHS (Itawamba Agricultural High School). Because I am taking classes and teaching this summer I don’t really have time to feed the baby bird every two hours, so Mama and Daddy are taking care of it. It should be flying soon; it is a lot older and healthier than the one I raised. This one already has all of its feathers except for its tail and crest feathers (they hatch naked). They took him to the Coffee House and from the pictures it looked like he enjoyed it!
The third time’s the charm!
I made my second visit to my school last Friday and made a third visit yesterday. They are pretty sure that I most likely will be teaching 7th grade Language Arts. They showed me my room, which does not have a door, and informed me that they don’t use books to teach 7th grade Language Arts. It turns out that I will only have 70 kids (at the most). However, I will teach all 70 of them every day for 90 minutes! Their school day is divided into 8 periods. At 7:50 every morning every body participates in Reading Renaissance, which lasts until 8:35. Then there are eight-45-minute periods. Language Arts and Math are what they call blocked classes, which means the Math and Language Arts teachers get to teach for two periods straight through. This means I could have my first period class for 135 minutes (45 minute Reading Renaissance plus 90 minute class)! I have one 45-minute individual planning period and one 45-minute team planning period. I am on a team with a math teacher, a science teacher and a social studies teacher. We all teach the same 70 students. The team-planning period occurs when the children are either at PE/Band or Career Discovery and is when we meet with parents or plan interdisciplinary units for our 70 students. If any of this sounds confusing it is because it is!