Now On a Lighter Note...

So as I told you in the last post, we've had a complete range of emotions this week. There was no time to wallow in the sadness of Mari's experience...life was waiting for us to live it to the fullest...warts and all!

I can now officially announce that I am no longer a room mother! I am retired with no plans to ever apply for that position again. The final duties of the room mother involved organizing the teacher's gift and planning and hosting the year end picnic. 

We had been in a minor heat wave in the 90's in the days leading up to the picnic and we all were dreading being outdoors...the adults I mean! A call was put out last minute for more donations of popsicles to keep the kids cool and hydrated. Then the night before a storm moved through and the actual day dawned cool and comfortable in the 70's!!!!

We had hot dogs and pizza ready and waiting in the park adjoining the school as the lunch bell rang. All three 3rd grade classrooms poured out of the doors and burst onto the fields with excited exuberance. Parents were allowed to bring blankets and lunch baskets and join the fun as well!

Julia was as excited as the rest of the class but also made a point of coming up to me for several hugs saying how glad she was that I was a room mother....sweet kid!

She ate and played with her friends....

and then we broke out a craft area that I had packed for 'just in case'. Thinking it could help pass the time should the weather get a little on the wet side or for those children not into the sporting activities that ruled the day.

They were supposed to be Chinese fans! I took the idea from an on-line craft site...guess I should contact them about the length of paper actually needed to get the fan to open fully?!?!?

But the kids went with the flow as we suddenly were making Chinese hats (: Auntie Peggy had stopped by on her way past [as she was running errands] to snap pictures for us and was pressed into craft duty as my two hands could not keep up with the  onslaught as word filtered across the field that there was a craft option!! Another couple of Moms were pressed into duty as well!
[P.S. Guess who's pictures are the nicely focused and the right color??? Somehow my camera had gotten onto an underwater setting?!?!?]

Then the picnic closed with the presentation of the scrapbook and gift. Guess you can see Julia was a tad excited when the teacher got to her page in the scrapbook?After this the children followed the teachers back inside to end the school day and we cleaned up the mess....emphasis on the 'mothers' part of the title! And with that my obligations ended and I RETIRED!!!! Happily, my daughter thinks I was the 'cool' room mother....I do not know how that happened?!??!