school is in session

School has begun...I am exhausted, but the kids seem to be adjusting back to school schedule. I have 29 5th graders this year. Just a ton of work keeping on top of things, but SO much better than last year when I wasn't sure what I was doing or if I could even teach!! Jacob is now in 4th grade, Sofia in 3rd and Isabel in 1st. No tears from Isabel this year, I can't even begin to describe the relief of her being a happy little school girl, again a huge change from last year where she basically cried for 2 months straight. Anyway, here are the yearly first day of school photos. I kind of forgot to take pictures the first day and the second day and the next, but finally managed to get it done this week.

future teacher?

My kids were 'lucky' enough to spend time with me in my classroom while I was getting ready for the new school year. They have a lot of fun playing 'teacher' with the whiteboard and all my teaching stuff. They are very creative and luckily it kept them busy while I was doing all my work. I found this picture on my camera after the fact. Sofia loves to take pictures and I'm always finding odd pictures or self-portraits. This one was fun. Isabel is instructing the pretend students. Too cute!

the nerve of some people!

So I left my house this certain Saturdayat the end of July at 12 noon and returned by 3 pm. I noticed a few things out of place when I went down the hall. This is what I found when I entered my room. It was a strange moment. I have never had this feeling before, someone was actually in my home, in my bedroom and completely tore it up. It wasn't fun. I forgot to lock the back door when I left. I always lock the doors, but forgot this one time. This would be the one day that someone would climb over my back fence and try my house. Of course! They pulled everything off the closet shelves, emptied my cedar chest completely, emptied the drawers, emptied my file cabinet (that was fun to put back together), tossed my sewing box, and seemed to dump my jewelry box onto my bed. UGH! They took all of my kids piggy banks, my full piggy bank, one of my checkbooks, and my videocamera. All 5 of the tapes that I had recorded my kids on since 2004 were in the videocamera bag. I can't even think about it, it makes me too sad. I wanted to scream out the front door, take anything you want from this house, keep the money (only about $30 they got away with) but return my video tapes!!!! Oh well, not much to be done. The police came, after about 6 hours took a report and left. It makes me so mad that some evil people have nothing better to do than take from others what doesn't belong to them.

A few weeks later, on a Friday night when the kids were at their dads, there was a knock on my door around 9:00 pm. I peeked out the window to see who it was (because I'm at least smart enough not to open my door that late at night, right?). No one was there, but there was something on the porch right outside the door. I opened the door and found a bag of money, dollar bills and change. Attached was a note that read: To the Fernandez kids, Here is a little something to replace what was lost. From, Your Friends. Inside the bag was 3 two dollar bills, 3 one dollar bills, 3 gold president dollar coins, 6 half dollar coins, and I can't remember how many quarters, dimes and nickels, but when the kids came home the next day, we split it up and counted it. They each received the same amount, $7.20. Can you believe it? I was stunned. My R.S. president lives across the street, so she knew about the burglary, and a few neighbors knew, but I will never know who took the time and love to give back to my kids some of what they had lost. We are surrounded by angels here in our little part of Mesa! I have seen soooo much goodness given to me and my little family in the past year and a half. It's incredible to me. You can be sure that I double check all my doors before I leave the house always...too bad I had to learn that lesson the hard way.