Three years, seven months and two days have resulted in this girl being a certified teacher!! My lack of posting is indicative of what an all-consuming, demanding profession teaching is.  I honestly had no idea.  The simple act of using the bathroom or making a phone call requires planning and speed and the cooperation of another staff member.  Teaching the same lesson three times in a row with four minutes inbetween is impossible without  a level of precision and energy that I never knew I had in me. Attempting to meet the physical,emotional and social needs of 112 students while hoping to teach them a thing or two about writing and reading is no small feat.  And while many times I wanted to throw in the towel, after spending an entire day saying goodbye to those 11 and 12-year-olds who stole my heart, I have no doubt God has chosen the most rewarding profession in which to be spending my second career.

I had all kinds of activities planned for my last day but I had no idea that Wendy had the students each make me a personal card.  If I had already been emotional, these sweet sentiments took it to a whole new level. What I loved was seeing the difference in how expressive the girls were versus the boys.  The girls decorated their cards with glitter pens, drew hearts and smiley faces and every other girly touch.  The boys got down to business, said what they wanted to say and wrote their names.  End of story.  These were my favorites from the guys: "Good luck with that teacher thingy."  "You spent a lot of time on our class, at least it seemed like you did."  "I spelled most every word right and that's prob because of you."  "I hope you get a job, as good of a job as a teacher can get."  "I'm still going to see you on the soccer field so there's no point in writing this letter." Every single one of the girls' notes made me smile but I took pictures of my favorites.