To My Seniors

I have been very blessed this year with wonderful classes.  While I have great students who are not seniors, I want to take a post to focus on the seniors, even though they probably will never see it.  And mainly to say the things I would love to tell them as they leave my class tomorrow for the last time but won't be able to without crying. 

You are wonderful and caring individuals.  You are capable of great things.  The potential is there.  It's all in how you use what you have been given.  It has been a pleasure having you in class this year.  I have loved getting to know you and making memories with you.  I hope that in our time together you have learned something valuable to take with you as you leave, even if it has nothing to do with the subject matter.  Know that you will be missed, and please stay in touch!

Foodservice Meal

I know, I'm going post crazy here, but I've got so much to catch up on!  And I have to take a minute to brag on my class. 

We had our big final project today in Foodservice Occupations class.  The kids prepared a meal for the teachers and staff.  The menu consisted of lasagna, salad, homemade rolls, cupcakes, and drinks.  The kids also served the meal.  Counting the kids, we served about 36 people.  Everything tasted great and looked great too!  They did an awesome job of cooking, serving, and cleaning up.  I could not have asked for better help.  From ironing tablecloths to keeping the servers supplied with lasagna and cupcakes without being told, and doing an excellent, speedy job with clean up, I could not have been more proud.  I had more compliments today on my students than I can count.  I have been on cloud nine today!  I wish that I could take credit for all of it because of my stellar teaching skills (ha!), but I have to give the kids credit.  They've been great this year.  It makes teaching so much fun to have kids that are willing workers.  I have loved every minute of this class and will miss them tremendously next year! Thank you for being such a great class!

FCCLA End of the Year

If I hadn't been gone from school enough, the Thursday after we returned from California I took four of my FCCLA seniors to State Conference in Springfield.  One of them competed.  A first for her and for me.  Considering our inexperience I think she did pretty well.  The kids were great.  We had tons of fun.  Friday night after the keynote session we went back to the rooms.  This trip I shared a room with one of the girls.  Everyone ended up in my room watching movies on tv.  We decided to order pizza about 11:15.  It finally arrived at midnight.  The movie ended about 1 and the pizza was pretty well gone.  It was another late night, adding to my sleep deprivation I hadn't caught up on before.  Luckily in our down time earlier that afternoon the kids were nice enough to let me take a nap while they watched a movie.  Yes, I have kids that are nice enough to let me sleep and not do awful things to me.  Except for that one rude awakening when one kid jumped on the edge of the bed.  He shall remain nameless.  :)  Saturday morning we skipped the awards session and headed back to school because the girls had to get ready for prom.  I drove home, spent my 5 hours unpacking and resting, and drove back to school with Scott in tow to chaperone prom.  Prom was great fun with lots of good memories for the kids.  I let Scott drive home as I was pretty well out of it by midnight. 

Then on Tuesday we had our FCCLA Officer Installation Reception.  Seniors and outgoing officers were recognized.  I also had some four year members that received FCCLA blankets.  I am going to miss my seniors next year!  They have been a great help.  It's been a good year.  We donated food to the local food pantry.  The kids made about 40 baby hats that we donated to the local hospital.  And we donated books at state conference to be given to children that cannot afford books.  We pulled off our first annual bread sale fundraiser, too.  It took the entire club to do these things, but my seniors stepped up big time.  They were the main contributors to the baby hat project.  And one my boys was a huge help during bread week.  He was the only one to volunteer to stay after school and help me wash the 40 to 50 pans that we used every day to make our loaves of specialty breads.   These kids have participated in every activity we've done and taken interest in attending our meetings.  I could not have asked for a better club this year.

San Diego Parts 2-5

My goal when I titled the last post "San Diego Part 1" was that I would blog a little every day of our trip so I would get all of my memories down.  Well obviously that failed as we have been back from our trip for over 2 weeks now!  So here's how the rest of the trip went.  Beware!  It's quite lengthy!

Wed - Groceries & San Diego Zoo.  We piled in the vans Wednesday morning and took the kids to the grocery store down the road.  It is quite the experience to take 21 high school kids grocery shopping.  We went to the zoo in the afternoon.  It was amazing!  Of course I love zoos anyway, so this was right up my alley.   I spent the afternoon wandering around with 5 of my girls.  We had a pretty fun time.  We got back to the hotel with enough time to get ready for dinner at the hotel restaurant.  Dinner was very good and was quite comical.  Afterwards we watched some tv in the girls room on my floor.  Everyone on my floor was exhausted, so we went to bed early.  I slept much better the 2nd night and even got to sleep in a little the next morning until one of the boys knocks on my door before the alarm goes off asking for sugar which I did not have.  I had just gotten back to the bed and turned off the alarm when there's another knock at the door - a different boy asking for creamer, which I also did not have.  Not 5 minutes later as I'm getting ready to close the bathroom door to take a shower there's another knock at the door.  The first boy is back asking for the coffee that came with the room.  I had just gotten out of the shower and dressed when there's yet another knock at the door.  The second boy is back asking for salt and pepper, which I also did not have! 

Thurs - Beach Day.  I finally managed to get ready and we left for Coronado Island to go to the beach there.  The scenery on the island was beautiful.  They had some really cool little shops down town, and we saw the Hotel Del Coronado. 

Hotel Del Coronado

The beach on Coronado Island. 

The Pacific Ocean is freezing, and it didn't help that the entire time we were in San Diego the temperatures didn't get out of the 60s.  So while it was too cold for my liking to go swimming I did walk in the waves a bit. 
Thursday afternoon the kids were on their own.  I walked down to the boardwalk with a couple of the girls and we did some shopping.  We then went to get manicures and pedicures.  So relaxing!!  Thursday night we separated for dinner.  The other 2 chaperones took some of the kids to a seafood restaurant while I took the non-seafood eaters to Luigi's at the Beach.  The food was ok, but check out the size of this pizza slice! 

The Giant Slice at Luigi's.  That's a normal size Chinet paper plate!

Thursday night found the kids on my floor in my room playing truth or dare.  We stayed up way too late, but it was lots of fun. 

Fri - San Diego Zoo Safari Park.  The park was nice.  It rained most of the time we were there that morning.  There were lots of complaints, but the group I was with had fun and enjoyed wandering around and seeing the animals.  Friday afternoon we got to experience a thunderstorm.  I spend the time curled up on my couch under a blanket reading.  At least until the kids started visiting again.  Two of them put on a song and dance show for us.  Friday night we drove to Old Town and ate at Cafe Coyote - a Mexican restaurant that was highly recommended.  The food was excellent!  And we had a very attractive waiter!  Two of my boys ordered fried ice cream and surprised me with it for my birthday.  And the entire group sang to me.  Friday night found the kids on my floor back in my room.  This time we played charades until the wee hours of the morning. 

Sat - Sea World.  Our last day in San Diego was very nice.  The weather finally cooperated with us all day.  The park was amazing!  I loved Sea World!  We spent most of the day at the park.  We were on our own for dinner that night and I took a small group to Dave & Buster's.  Unfortunately the wait was too long for us to eat there, but the kids got to play some games anyway.  We then found a gas station that took me and one of my boys to figure out how to pump the gas.  Once back at the hotel, some of us at pizza rolls in my room.  We then went out to the beach for a bonfire and smores.  A few of the kids came back to my room.  We had to leave for the airport at 4:00 am Sunday morning, so the plan was to just stay up all night.  I started out with about 7 kids and ended up with 3.  One by one they couldn't make it so they went back to their rooms.  Of the 3 that stayed with me only 1 didn't fall asleep at some point during the night.  I managed to make it the entire night.   That was my first all-nighter too.  Somehow I managed to make it through college without going an entire night without sleep.  There is a very good reason why that happened!  I do not do well without sleep!

Sunday - Departure & My Birthday!  I got birthday wishes at midnight Illinois time and San Diego time.  At the bonfire the night before a couple of the kids went to the hotel and got me a strawberry drink.  Sunday was rough to say the least.  Over the last 3 days I had approximately 11 hours of sleep.  Our flight to Dallas left without issue.  We had a little turbulence as we got close to Dallas as there were storms in the area.  I got some really cool cloud pictures though!  Our 40 minute layover in Dallas ended up being about 3 hours with other delays due to the storms!  The flight to St. Louis was terrible!  And the landing was even worse!  Everyone made it home safe and sound though. 

The clouds on our flight to Dallas from San Diego Sunday morning. 

We had a great time on the trip!  I won't say it was without a few issues, but overall the kids were great!  I would definitely go again!  Oh and I had an unwelcome souvenir that stowed away in my suitcase.  I brought a mouse home from San Diego!  Luckily he was caught pretty quickly!