What a weekend! "Wicked" rocked! I am truly like a little kid when I see it. I have a smile from ear to ear, and I also shed a tear or two (or a jillion) throughout the show. I just get a little overwhelmed by the acting, the music, the beautiful theater, being downtown---it's all amazing!! Then there was Sunday. When I was teaching the kids about urban/suburban/rural communities recently, I told them about where my best friend lives down in central Illinois. She grew up in a small farm town of 2,000 people--no McDonalds or Target for as far as the eye can see---not even a stoplight in the entire town! She now lives right outside of the town in the middle of a cornfield, so anytime I hear of storms down there, I tend to get a bit uneasy. I happened to be driving home from a post-church shopping trip when the insane wind and sideways rain hit here. I was terrified, to put it mildly and had a long, out loud conversation with my maker asking Him to guide me home safely, which He did! Once I'd stopped shaking from that experience, I sat down for the game, which of course was preempted by the weather reports. At 12:01, I texted my BFF when I heard the name of the town she grew up in, the town she lives in now and two others on the news. I then did not move a single muscle until 12:46 when I finally heard back from her. Meantime, the news about Washington came out--a name which I recognized because she'd taken me there for some shopping (see how it always gets me into trouble??) so I knew all of that destruction wasn't too too far from her. Yikes! What a day! By God's grace, her home and all her family's homes are safe. They have no water or electricity, but all are safe. Her brother-in-law's sister's home however, which is in the town she grew up in, was leveled, as was a home down the road from her. Scary, scary, scary how closely it touched! I'm sorry to prattle on to you-----frequently I find writing to be quite therapeutic (if you haven't noticed-haha!), so I think I had to get all of this out of me. I'm so grateful that they are all safe and sound, but from what I can tell, the emotional piece of all that they've been through is starting to take a toll. What I wouldn't give to be down there to help out. I wish I could think of something we could do from here......hopefully something will come to mind.
In the meantime, I was out at a meeting all day yesterday. I was very happy to come back today to good news from both the sub's note and from Ms. Edwards' report. Not too surprisingly, the kids brought up the tornadoes at some point during the day today. I was thankful that we'd recently talked about our tornado drills, and I'd assured the kids that most frequently what we have around here are strong winds, but rarely an actual tornado. To be honest, I'd forgotten that conversation until one of my darling little girls told me that I'd been right, we didn't get tornadoes, just strong winds. Phew!! Thank goodness one little mind could be at ease!! I never ever ever want the kids to have to think about their safety or have any worries when they are at school.
Okay--enough therapy for one night. Today the kids did some writing about what they are thankful for and I'm dying to read it!! They did an UH-MAY-ZING project (and by amazing I mean cute and funny) project yesterday, so when I have my act together, I'll get their writing attached to the project and send it home for your Thanksgiving decorations. You can thank my later... LOL!!!! Trust me, it's a good one!
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