TGIF

Tomorrow's Friday.After the first week of school, it will be a well-needed break. In 5 days, we spent most of our time figuring how to get all the children safely home again. It is amazing how difficult it is to make sure that every child gets safely home that first week. They don't remember so it's up to us, the school staff to make sure that they get home okay. Sound easy? Not if a child is a car rider on Monday, a bus rider on Tuesday, a walk-up, pick-up on Wednesday and Thursday, and is dismissed early Friday for an appointment. Multiply that by almost 1200 kids and you can see why stress takes its toll by Friday. We did amazingly well though. Everyone got where they were supposed to be with only a few more gray hairs on all of our heads.
My favorite part was talking to the new children. I especially liked trying to communicate with children who did not speak English. They were so cute. In a few months they will be talking away in English but in the meantime, we have to make them feel comfortable and loved, because it has to be pretty scary in a strange land.
For tomorrow, besides it being Friday, it is also (get ready for this!) Oil and Gas Industry Appreciation Day. In the wake of the huge oil spill, that is a tough one. I am still recovering from the pictures of the poor animals who lost their lives to the oil slicks that covered them. And the people who died at the site. And the people whose jobs depended on the clean waters of the ocean. Perhaps an Appreciation Day for all the Volunteers and Workers who worked tirelessly to clean up and try to protect the environment.