4:15.  It was early, but I agreed.  I even got permission to leave work a little early to make it on time.  

I’ve talked about it before but if you, my lone reader, know anything about me, it’s that I’m far too lazy to link to a previous post.

I learned it over a decade ago from Stacy (Everyday Gifts – over there on the right – see? Too lazy to link.) It was at a Bible study class we attended together. I was lamenting that everytime money came in our door, it went right back out. I wanted to build up our savings account. I wanted the security that money in the bank brought. But each time a check arrived, from consulting my husband did, or from a tax refund, from wherever, there was a repair, an unexpected bill, something to eat up the money before it was even cold in the bank.

But when Stacy prayed for my concern that day, she taught me one of the greatest lessons I have learned. She didn’t pray that God would take away those unexpected bills. She didn’t pray that He would allow me to get money in the savings account. She prayed instead a prayer of gratitude and thanksgiving. She thanked God for providing the resources each and every time before I even knew I would need them! I remember sitting in that little circle of women looking over at Stacy in awe. She had just changed my life by changing my view of it.

It’s the little joys in our everyday that make life so wonderful, isn’t it? It’s easy to be bogged down by the stresses, by the bad, but God gives us joy!! Everyday! He doesn’t want us to struggle. He doesn’t want us to worry. He wants us to be happy.

A decade ago, Stacy turned my view on life around by showing me all the blessings God has for me and I’ve never forgotten it (or her!) In every moment, of every day, in every situation, we can choose to find the joy. And it really is that easy.

Today, I stopped at the store, four days before payday with $6 in my wallet. I bought milk and flour and cheap margarine to get us through. I had all the ingredients (I thought) for homemade pizza at home now that I had the flour, but when I arrived home I realized I didn’t have any tomato paste for the sauce. I was frustrated. I was just AT the store. It’s a $.60 purchase! But then I remembered in the back of the fridge were two small packets of marinara sauce that came in something we had many many months ago. I pulled them out, defrosted them and you would never have known the difference! Saved!

This morning I carpooled with a co-worker. We don’t have a fixed schedule yet, but even one day of not driving my car is allowing me to stretch my gas money just that much further. Plus, gas has dropped nearly a dollar!! At $3.38 this morning I’m nearly giddy with the idea of filling my tank!

This weekend, LM and I visited a church to hear a pastor that friends of ours know. He didn’t end up speaking and we didn’t love the church, but it was a great reminder of how much we do love the church we found this summer through TB. God brings us little gifts in so many different ways!

I still have Pam’s two cats. It’s not a great situation. I’m sure they would like out of the bedroom, but the one is too aggressive with Jonah to be let out to roam. For all the hassle, however, I haven’t had to buy them any food as they came with more than a month’s supply. I didn’t have to purchase litter boxes, treats or toys as they came with more of that than I would ever need. All these cats have needed from me is love. And for that, for Pam, it comes easily.

The little joys surround us. God gives them to us daily, hourly! He wants us to be happy and full of the joy of being a Christian, of knowing our eternity is in His hands! If we have nothing else in our day to be grateful for, cheerful about, smiling over, we should at least be joyful for our eternal salvation!

I wish all of you a JOY filled day!

He plays like he lives. Like a 12 1/2 year old boy. Which makes me smile.

LM has always been mature for his age. His vocabulary has always exceeded that of his peers and he can often come across as pretentious. As an only child, and one of divorce, he’s had more responsibilities, more expectations, more maturity required of him. And for that, I blame myself.

I saw it in his dad years ago, a man who lost a childhood and I never wanted that to happen to my own. I wouldn’t say LM didn’t have the opportunities to be a child, just that his environment and his abilities have pushed him into a corner where he’s often more comfortable with adults than with peers.

But then we play Yahtzee.

And he leaves his common sense at the door. He rolls three sixes but will pick up the lone deuce and go for two’s. He will try for an inside large straight with one roll left and genuinely act surprised when he doesn’t roll the three. He never has a back up plan and more often than not will cross something off his list rather than take a one on his ones or even fill in his Chance. For all his giftedness, I tease, he can’t play Yahtzee worth a darn.

He knows all of this. If I choke on my milk while I watch him throw away a small straight, he’ll just laugh and say, “oops!” It doesn’t bother him in the least that we don’t play at all alike; my strategy formed from my dad, LM’s formed from…well…nothing I can figure out. He has no plan, no back up plan, no in case none of this works out plan. He just rolls the dice and lives with the consequences.

He plays the game like a child.

And THAT is what I love most.

Besides, one of the Kindergarten teachers told me that the kids are as excited about Technology Class as they are about gym.  Ranking right up there with gym?  Now that’s something to be proud of!

…he’s cooking dinner.  It’s KICK’N and he’s so proud to be grilling burgers and making homemade fries and even heating up some baked beans.   He’s currently getting the lettuce, onion and tomato ready, too.

I need help.

I don’t celebrate Halloween.

But I work in an elementary school this year and Halloween is a mandatory celebration complete with costume parade.

My fall-back costume from when I was young just won’t do.

These kids don’t know who Pippi Longstocking is.

I thought maybe I could be Ms. Frizzle from the Magic School Bus, but even that might be above the heads of Kindergarteners through second graders.

HELP!!!

I can stand in a room full of 26 computers and 24 Kindergarteners and not be afraid.

I can have the power blink 7 minutes before my computer class and still be up and ready before the kids come in.

I can have lessons to teach that require minor assistance from the classroom teacher and still pull it off when I have a day full of substitute teachers that know nothing about how to help.

I can have a lab full of a dozen students, ready to participate in a reading program that I have not been trained on nor instructed in nor debriefed about and still teach them something about the program (and myself) in the half hour we have together.

I can change my schedule for every new need of my principal, including a change to cover for a recess monitor; to eat my lunch at 10:30 on Tuesdays to accommodate the lab schedule; to become a hall monitor before and after school instead of a bus monitor; to move classes around to accommodate the needs of one particular student in one particular class….

I can reproduce an entire set of log-in cards when they go missing even though I am certain I didn’t lose them but unable to find them and the teacher insists she didn’t take them only to have the teacher confess days later that she did in fact find them in her room.

I can grade papers, staple art projects, file math papers, and any other assorted tasks for other teachers when I have nothing at all to do in my lab.

I can help a brand new sub on her very first day, even making sure to be in the classroom at the end of the day when it’s time to get kids ready for the bus (she apparently didn’t make this a priority for herself, I was there alone with the kids).

But today, I did the hardest thing yet. I stuck a needle into a precious little six year old Kindergarten girl. She’s diabetic and every day we have to test her blood and give her insulin and it’s been changed to my list of duties as there needed to be a shift with the woman who was helping. And I did it, and we both survived. She made it easy. She’s braver than I am.

I had a call from the Assistant Principal yesterday. It turns out there was an altercation with LM in Computer Applications class yesterday. We talked about the incident – minor, really – and I happened to mention that it’s hard for LM because the material they are covering in C.A. is so easy for him. She suggested we move him to another computer class. I replied that I was unaware there was another computer class. “There’s the 8th grade C.A. class,” she responded.

“What will he take in 8th grade then?” I asked.

She didn’t have an answer. She finally said he’d probably have to repeat the class. I politely suggested that wasn’t much of a solution to the problem then.

So today LM goes to school and is approached by his counselor after 5th hour. “After lunch, go to your new computer class.”

LM replied, “I didn’t know I had a new computer class.”

“Yes, you’re in the 8th grade class now.”

LM, aware of my conversation with the Assistant Principal, and the fact that I didn’t think moving him was a good option to begin with, shrugged and headed to lunch.

After lunch, for 6th hour, he headed to his new computer class. It was already in session. The teacher told him to just “take a seat in the back and do the typing progam” which he did. And 20 minutes later, the bell rang. Because it was time for 8th grade lunch. And the teacher announced to LM that this wouldn’t work at all because this was also her lunch hour. LM shrugged. And went back to his counselor and explained the problem.

And the counselor said, “oh, yeah, that won’t work, will it?”

I think the best solution is to just let LM run the school at this point. He’s clearly got the smarts for it.

It happened last weekend, too, but I had forgotten.  I could hear it outside my window but it took me a moment or two to realize what the sound was.  Breaking glass.  Just a little.  There it was.  Now there again.  Right outside the window.  I laid in bed and listened more carefully.  It’s when I hear the slider that I realized the whole picture.  I looked out my window, into the reflection of the patio doors across the way and verified the scene.  He was throwing glass off his balcony into the street outside my patio.