Where did the summer go?????

I swear I was just saying good-bye to my class of really sweet Grade 6/7 kids in June! I cannot believe the summer is all over! The writing project was rather long and arduous, but I learned an awful lot. I have written curriculum items over the years, and I have, of course, developed a lot of my own classroom stuff. But this was more structured, and drew from using the Curriculum Planner (a Ministry of Education product). It was really quite interesting. And I have never written a storyboard for a professionally done video ever before. The people I worked with were really spectacular-top drawer all the way. All in all, although it ate up a lot of my summer, I would recommend it to any teacher who needs to revitalize- get charged up-make a difference. The new technologies that are accessible to classrooms are amazing. I would LOVE to have a white board set up in my room (anyone out there willing to foot the bill????) I know that there are many people "out there" who believe that teachers have a hard job and do their best. But I also know that there are people who believe teachers have a free ride, and are being paid to do very little. Elementary teachers work hard-think about it. I don't get to school for 9:00 am and boot out the door at 3:30, nor do any of my co-workers. I bring work home just about every day, and, if I am sick, I have to write down everything I was planning to do in minute detail for someone else to do. But I am not complaining- because this is the job I chose for myself when I was about 11 years old (Annie's age!) and have been doing for 28 years. I love the job. It is exciting, invigorating, frustrating, rewarding, thankless, fun, sad, wearying, tiresome, exhausting, satisfying, challenging...what can I say-it is all things at some time of the year.

The challenge this year will be dealing with the so called "second wave" of the swine flu. It is difficult for me NOT to touch-to pat a shoulder, or shake a hand, or "high five" a kid. But apparently, touch is dangerous-both to me and to the kids. Some schools have decided to "touch elbows" as a way of showing acceptance and reward. Is your kids' school doing anything about this? I think it will be an interesting year!


This is a picture from last year, but I think it says it all. It was a quiet summer. Hello, Fall!

Knitting and Kidlets

What does one do with a stash of bits and pieces of sock yarn?


ONE MAKES A SOCK YARN AFGHAN!!!! That's what! (actually, there's more that this done on it now-it is rather addictive, you know!)

Speaking of addictive- this is the shawl I made Mom, in progress. It is now done, (has been for quite some time) but I haven't taken a picture of Mother and shawl together. It was for her 80th birthday, and has 80 diamonds (my mother is a real gem).

And what does one do on a lovely August afternoon before school starts? Why, you invite your neighbour over for a Creamsicle in the pool......

And you turn into MUSCLE MAN when you puff up your Skins shirt (it is a way of keeping her protected from UVA and UVB).

Man, it must be nice to be a kidlet.

Annie's Sheep

Annie loves to draw-or sing- or dance-or play piano. She is just one of those arty kids, ya know? So when she thought she would like to make me a picture for my blog, I suggested something with sheep in it. Here it is......



Hmmm- is that me knitting the sweater off of some poor sheep?

Hair of the Dog, and the Writing has been a real DOG!

Oh Good Lord! I haven't finished that writing project yet- I have worked almost everyday ALL day-but I am getting close. And now, next week, I have to go into my classroom to get ready for school! Where did the summer go?

I haven't even really been doing much knitting. The few things I have worked on aren't really worth talking about, or taking pictures. However, I HAVE been knitting on a plain sweater, knit out of beautiful yarn. The yarn is the heavy worsted from Impulse of Delight (you can go here and see what she has http://www.impulse-of-delight.com/store/index.php). That Ruth is quite amazing- she takes photos of things she loves, and then manipulates them on the computer to get the pure colour out of them. I saw she had taken some pics of her beloved Irish Wolfhound (whom they lost, sadly, quite recently). She called the yarn colour "Guinevere", after the dog, of course. I just fell in love with the colour- a rich variety of greys, bordering on a taupe a "greige" as they call it-right down to a near charcoal. The sweater is a simple cardigan-seed stitch borders, and one button (I actually have a lovely antique mother-of-pearl carved button that will be quite nice). Sorry about the blurry picture- but it was the only one that came close to capturing the colours in the yarn!

What I wanted to do was line each front edge with a piece of brocade ribbon or braid- but do you think I could find any locally????? If anyone has a Canadian source for wide brocade braid or ribbon- leave me a message!

Anyhow-I am so close to the end of the writing I can almost TASTE it-so off I go while it is quiet in here-