Flat Tire! Shhhhhhhhhhhhh.

I am reporting to you, live, (barely) from deep in the throes of Thanksgiving week/Parent Teacher Conference Week/Catching the Chronically Absent Kids Up On Missing Assessments/Getting ready for Thanksgiving break week at school.  I woke up at 2am and was aghast at the thought of being up so early.  But then I kept thinking about all the things that needed to happen over the next 36 hours and sleep was not going to find me again.  I fell asleep at 8pm, and if my calculations are correct, that is six whole hours of sleep, and that will do.

I should be finishing up my progress reports for the conferences that shall happen on this very day.  Yet, here we are.  And we have a lot of ground to cover, my friends.

The kids in my class have done lost their ever loving minds.

The school psychologist came in to observe a few students and I was wondering how on earth he was going to get any data, seeing as how NO ONE was listening to me.  And then there was Mack.

Mack.

We need to talk about Mack.  Mack has gone to the point of no return.  I will need to watch him all day long today to make sure he doesn’t run smack into a wall and knock himself out, bless his heart.  Mack was NOT one of the students the psych was observing, but the school psych will probably inform me that he is one that he should have been watching.

Mack.

Every day, no matter the weather, Mack walks into my classroom, late,  with his winter coat on and zipped to his chin, his backpack on his back, and his breakfast tray full of delicious food.  Mack was wearing that coat during 80 degree weather because he was so proud of the coat his mom bought him for school.  Trying to get him to focus long enough to take the coat off was no easy feat, and here we are in November, and it is still no easy feat.  Also.  Mack doesn’t know how to open his milk carton by himself.  Ask me how I know.

Me:  Ok, Class.  Remember how I went to that new phonics training?  Well, we need to kind of play “catch up” since I am starting late in the year.

Mack:  Yay!  Ketchup!  Let’s play!  Let’s play!  I wanna play!

Me:  No, Mack.  I am saying we need to catch . . . up on a few things.

Mack:  I want to play the game!

Me:  There is no game.

Mack cries. Mack asks me four more times over the next hour when we will play games.  Also, when is recess?

In my training, I learned a fun little song chant that I taught the kids and they double love it.  And whenever we say/sing it, the kids look like child actors from Barney singing a song in perfect unison.  It is a beautiful moment.

It goes like this:  You can say “the” or you can say “thE” (thee) but you always spell it T-H-E.

We do this over and over and over and over.

I am reading with Mack.  I have to steady him every 1.8 seconds so he doesn’t tip over in his chair.  Mack is looking every which way but down at the book and is wondering “what is Sally doing over there?” and “no fair, how come James is on a computer!” and “when is recess?”

Me:  Mack.  Mack.  Mack.

Mack:  Huh?

Me:  Let’s read.

Unfortunately, the first word is “the.”  Mack, who is a very emergent reader, starts trying to sound out the.  And if you have ever tried to sound out “the,” you will understand that it is simply not doable.

Me:  Mack.  This is a red word.

Mack:  Where’s Jack going?

Me:  Mack.  Look at this word.

Mack:  Awwww, man.  I don’t know how to read.

Me:  You can do it!  Look at this word.

Mack:  I don’t know it.

Me:  You can say the, or you can say thE, but you always spell it-

Mack (shouts) T-H-E!

Me:  Great!  Now look at this word.

Mack sounds it out again.  We do this three times before he understands that the word is “the”.  Spelled T-H-E.

Mack was one of a few lucky kids who were chosen to get free tickets on a local Santa cruise.  I pulled him in the hallway to tell him about it two days ago and it was the greatest mistake of my teaching career.

Because Mack is way so excited and Mack doesn’t understand when anything is or will be happening.  Every five minutes he is asking if he is going on the boat and I am like, No, Friend, that is in 21 days, and he is like “Is that after lunch?” And I am going to need a lot of coffee to get through this week with Mack.  Also, when is recess?

He was so physically out of control yesterday that one of the lunch ladies had to grab his lunch tray, steady him, and sternly say, “I need you to calm down and hold your tray.”

Have you ever read the book, “No, David?”

Mack is David.

My patience is wearing thin.  I am trying, but it is just a lot.  My one little gal, Sally, has upped her usual quota of 2 tattles a minute to 5 and I am going into shut down mode with her.

Me during phonics drills:  Eyes on me, the sound is .  . .

Sally:  Ah!  Mrs. M!  Mrs. M!  Betsy stuck her tongue out at me!

Me:  Well, if your eyes were on me like I had asked, you would not have seen Betsy’s tongue.

Teacher of the Year.

And the whole class is excited and amped up and I have to pull out all my tricks to get them back with me.  One such trick is for me to call out:

Flat Tire!

And then the kids all say “shhhhhhhhh” and quiet down and look at me.

Do you know how often I am having to say Flat Tire this week?  I sound like a lunatic in there.

Hal’s even started shouting out “Flat Tire.” Oh, Hal.

Girls coughs in the vicinity of him.

Hal puts up his hand and says, “I think you need to consider social distancing.”

Let’s move on.

A few of you have inquired about how my new hobby, crocheting,  is going.

I had progressed from “yarn and hooks in the bag” to “yarn and hooks out of the bag and on my nightstand”.  And that is how the situation remained for many days.

And then one day, I got home and saw this:

Me:  David.  What happened to the yarn?

David:  I don’t know.  When I got home it was all over the entire house.

So, I had a little chuckle thinking of the cats joyfully spreading yarn around the entire house while I was in town Flat-Tiring some first graders.

And that is how crocheting is going.

Sunday was a bad day.  I give Sunday two thumbs down.  Awhile back, I told David I didn’t like his keeping the calves in the corral situation.  And it is so refreshing to be old and 40.  I just speak my mind whenever I please.

Me:  David.  Let the calves out of the corral.

David:  No.  I don’t want to sort them again.

The area of the corral is a spot on our property where all the mud in the property gathers.

Me:  The calves are all standing in a foot of mud at all times.  That cannot be good for them!  They are going to die of foot rot or something.

Fun Fact:  I have no idea if “foot rot” is a thing.  But I sure don’t like the calves standing in mud.

So then David just decides on Sunday to create a new pen for the calves!  Because I am truly the brains of this operation over here.

David and the kids started to work on the fence and I washed windows.  Oh, I was doing a superb job, washing both the interior and the exterior and cleaning the tracks and just really doing a top notch job.

And then, I decided to wash the screens.

I really wanted to use the pressure washer to attack the screens, plus all the siding on the house, but I am not capable of setting the pressure washer up without David or the boys, and they were off building a new calf fence, so I had to figure out a different plan.

The bathtub!

So, I start washing one disgusting screen in the tub and I decided to start rinsing off another one in the shower while I was cleaning the one in the tub.  For efficiency and all.

And, Reader.

Something happened in that shower and the screen somehow shattered the ENTIRE shower glass door.

Glass was everywhere, including on me.  There was SO. MUCH. GLASS.

So, I had to walk away and take a breather as it was all so ovewhelming.  I made meatloaf and potatoes for the fence builders for lunch and then I went back to glass and spent the rest of my life trying to get glass out of the carpet because whoever designed our house was foolish enough to put carpet in the master bathroom.

And then David finished the fence and had to come inside and assist me with my issues, and he loves when he has to fix all the things, and then he decided to store a bunch of concrete under a tarp on my front porch instead of in his shop and I am trying not to feel fussy about it, but he knocked over my cute “thankful” sign and is blocking my mums from view.

But at least he incorporated the pumpkins.  And he added some tires.

Flat Tire!

Let’s talk about basketball, shall we?

LD is in 8th grade, but gets to play up on JV.  HD is in 9th grade and also plays JV.  HD is 11 and LD is 21 and look at this sweet bro-bro action.

And doesn’t LD almost look like a MAN now?

Yeah.  That would be my 13 year old.  The child who I lovingly call Cokey Bear.

LD:  My basketball shoes feel too tight.

Me:  What!?  The ones we just bought you?

LD:  Yup.

Me:  Aren’t they size 13?

LD:  Yup.

Me:  Well, I am sorry.  You have to wear them for the whole season.

LD was fouled and had to shoot free throws.  He made one but the refs canceled it because he stepped on the line.  A bit later when he came out of the game, one of the big senior varsity players told him a trick about how to avoid that in the most kind, mentor like way and it made my heart happy.  Wasn’t that nice of that senior to help my 8th grade dude?

HD is also a swing player for the varsity team, and more excited he could not be.

Me:  Look at how big my boys are getting!  They are huge!

And then HD warmed up with Varisty.

Me:  Ahhhh.  He is still my little boy.

Hadley is also playing.  This is her senior year.

LD is going to have a friend over this weekend.  This is going to be quite the event because LD’s friend doesn’t usually stay over at other peoples’ houses, as he gets a bit nervous around people he does not know.

So, this has been an event we have been trying to plan for awhile and all the bits and pieces were coming together.

And, then.

Then I realized that this weekend is also a butchering weekend.

So, that’s just great.  Let’s have the kid who is anxious come over to meet the people he doesn’t really know, and I am sure he will find it completely normal that his friend’s dad wakes up at 4am to shoot one of the gigantic cows on the property and start butchering it in the driveway while three dogs howl in their kennels.

Alright.  Happy Thursday.