school.

A few moments from my first weeks back to school:

*One little 2^nd grader comes marching back to my classroom with her mom and 2 little brothers, longing for a very specific pair of shoes. When I say longing, I DO mean longing. According to her mom, she’d been talking and dreaming all summer about the pair of white heels with sparkles that I wouldn’t let her keep last year because they were too big. In a teacherly moment last year, I apparently told her that she could ‘have them next year if they were still here.’ Weeellll, much to her chagrin, her foot has grown and I still have the shoes. She already has several new dresses from the clothes closet that she’s been dreaming of pairing with those shoes, including the floor length black velour dress that she wore the next day with her heels. Don't worry, she modeled it for me. Quite the look for the playground. Did I mention she has 6 brothers?

*Lest she be outdone by the boys, I had a 1^st grade boy come to my room the next morning. Now, this kid is just funny. Thanks to modern medicine, he focuses extremely intensely while he is at school. Last year, every time he came to see his mentor, he had her look through all of my shoes. He wore a size 1. I had a pair of patent leather, shiny black dress shoes, size 5. I can’t even tell you how many times he tried to talk me and his mentor into giving them to him. I went ahead and gave them to a 5^th grader for his dance program last year and hadn’t thought about them since then. Until last week, when my little friend came into my classroom, completely unrelated to shoes and clothing, and immediately asked me about those shiny black shoes ‘cuz my foots grown bigger and they might be working now for me’. Disappointment is sadly a part of life…

*I was sitting in my classroom 30 minutes before school one morning, reading my Bible while my computer booted up. One of my favorite little girls came in my room unexpectedly to hand me some paperwork. I love this little girl! She can’t read very well and struggles a lot in school, but has enough joy and a can-do attitude to carry her through with grace! As she started to leave, she turned back to say, ‘Ms. Stacks, did I catch you reading your Bible? (I nodded with a smile) Did you know I have one too at my house and I like to sit by myself in the closet and try to read it too. See you later!’

*I’ve worn my hair curly at least one day each week. I personally don’t love it that way, but it’s SO much faster! Talking with a mom and her 3 kids: ‘Ms. Stacks, I really like when you do your hair curly – really makes your face look fatter.’ I went home and straightened it.

*Goal setting with a 1^st grader. Typical goals include broad statements like ‘Do my best every day; Be nice to others; Get 0 behavior card marks; Make a new friend; etc.’ This little boy wanted me to write: (please picture blonde hair, pudgy cheeks, big blue eyes, very serious, and an adorable southern drawl) ‘Make a cover out of tape and cover the holes in the walls to keep them roaches out of the bathroom and our school. Draw something scary on the tape. Scare them roaches out of our school. They aren’t as bad as water bugs like the one that crawled on me in my bathtub last week. But we don’t need them roaches.’

Back to school...the fun has begun.