When the Art Teacher is Absent... lessons for the sub!

There comes a time in a teacher's career when she has to be absent for some reason, or gets sick and finally gives in, goes home, sees a doctor and finds out the best medicine is rest. We laugh when we hear that recommendation, especially the teachers who have little ones to take care of at home. What we dislike the most about getting sick is not taking the day(s) off, but having to leave plans for the sub. God bless our subs, though, for without them we would be up a creek without a paddle, and without a prayer!

I am mostly speaking from the art teacher's point of view, but I'm certain all teachers have to decide if it's worth the extra stress to go home sick, or to stay home sick, put in for a sub, and often not even getting someone you know in there. There is much work involved in creating sub plans. On the one hand, particularly in relation to the art teacher, you have specific art projects to finish, and you may even have projected completion dates in mind. Several days' absences in one semester could easily set you back, timewise. Add into the time dilemma testing pull-outs, test administration duties, and even professional development days that take an art teacher away from her classroom, and it's quite possible a project won't get finished on time.



Back to the purpose of this entry... sub plans & sick teacher. That's me this week. Fortunately, I had a set of plans for all my classes from preK right through 5th grade, including a couple of EC classes. The plans were not of my own creation, but something I found online, or maybe at my Art Teachers Group (we meet once a month, I thank God for bringing them into my life five years ago!). I used the plans for three different days, same plans, but each day different classes came through. And had three different subs... not my doing, but how it worked out with our online sub system. I had to do some minor modifying to adjust for grade/ability levels, and the EC class, but that took much less time than trying to find something different for each grade level.

I discovered the first time I got a sub, several years ago, to NEVER leave your current art project plans with a sub unless you and she are close friends and she knows exactly what you are thinking and what you want done. There's no way any sub can be you, and do what you would do in any given situation. Oh! the pain the next day I arrived back in class... supplies not put back properly, materials mixed up; class work not filed away properly; and the students of one class had convinced the sub they could use the circle templates (plastic lids) to press into the modelling clay. Ruined for drawing, the lids were. Had to throw them all away. But I learned from that experience, a great deal, about what kind of plans to leave the art teacher sub. 

I found that it is best to leave something the students can do that is interesting for them, and keeps them busy to prevent any behavior problems. I don't want to scare off my subs as they are often hard to come by. But having a good activity reinforces the point of our students coming to school, after all: they come to learn!!
 
I want them to learn something valuable in the time they are with me, so why would I expect anything less while they are with my sub? And from the sub's point of view, they want to do what they've been trained to do, and that is to teach. 

Generally, I call the sub that is assigned to me before s/he walks into my classroom so I can get to know at least their name, which grade levels they feel most comfortable working with, and if they have children at home. Having a casual chat helps break the ice, eases my mind about the person in my room (if I didn't know her/him to begin with), and probably eases their mind before they enter my classroom for the first time. Some subs will tell me they love art, and can't wait to do my class, while others tell me they don't know how to draw a straight line.  just tell them they won't have to!



So I want to help other art teachers by posting some things I found on the internet, some I have used, and some not, that can be used for a day or two of classes. Most can be done in one session, or taken home and completed. They are for the most part simple, requiring only paper, crayons or color pencils, or markers.



First I will leave some links of the blog entries that addresses this issue, in case you need something right now. Then I'll come back and leave some of my own ideas (with photos) in a follow up entry.
Substitute Art Lessons at The School Arts Room

Animal Art Grids at Teaching Ideas

Feelings Flowers at Teaching Ideas

Kindergarten - The Five Senses at Teacher Vision

Substitute Teacher's Survival Kit at Teacher Vision

A Day in Space (5th-6th grades) at Teacher Vision

Sub Teacher Art Ideas at brighthub.com

Sub lessons for the Art Room by Janet at Mrs. Malone's Art Room



So, if you are sick, please stay home and take care of yourself! A good rest really is often the best medicine for your body to heal and recover. Make your sub plans interesting for the kids, convenient for the sub, and educational for everyone.  Oh, one more thing... leave them some chocolate... for a job well done, they certainly deserve it!



I hope you find something at these links that you can use as they are, or with some minor modifications.

                                                           Be well!!

Student Self-Portraits: Voila!!

Another project our fifth graders just completed last semester was the self-portraits they painted. I found this idea on a teaching video by Peggy Flores, as shown in this YouTube video. It is the very same one I have on DVD (except I bought the DVD 2 years ago) which goes on to explain several different ways to approach the self-portrait. For the 5th grade students, I gave them a choice to either do the Fractured Watercolor portrait, or the Puzzle Self-Portrait (both are demonstrated on the video).

First, I showed my students a powerpoint I had made featuring famous self-portraits through the ages during our first introductory session. The following week, we watched the Peggy Flores DVD segment so they would have some idea of the various techniques that they could use once they drew the original pencil portrait. This was followed by several drawing sessions during which students learned and practiced drawing themselves while looking into large self-standing mirrors. Most took about two to three practice drawings on newsprint before they felt ready to transfer their drawing to watercolor paper.

The transfer involved them placing the watercolor paper on top of the finished portrait outline over a window on a sunny day... sort of a vertical light box effect. Students easily trace their outline and features from the newsprint onto the watercolor paper with a Sharpie fine point marker.

Fractured Watercolor Portrait:
The next session saw them watercolor painting the portrait. Instructions included: use one color for the background, one for the hair, one for the face, and one for the clothing. Eyes and mouth were left open to the student. They had to paint wet on wet (which they learned in previous years).

The watercolor session took one to two sessions, depending upon a student's speed and comfort zone with this media. For most, they got the entire painting done in one session. I found that the best looking paintings were the one in which the students didn't overwork the watercolors, and were able to live with the way the colors would bleed together. Some kids really thought they were messing up when this happened, but I was prepared to address that.


I told them to consider themselves on a discovery mission: they knew they wanted to complete the project, and they knew the materials they were working with, but they didn't know what the results would look like. There was a real fear (for some) that they would mess up. I explained that was a risk, indeed. Artists often take risks when they make a piece of art because there is always the chance that what they see in their minds will not match what they actually make. But what I've found (from my own experience) is that what I make is usually better than what I had imagined in the first place... mistakes and all!  I wanted them to look at the 'mistakes' as part of the process. I reminded them that many discoveries were made from misjudgments, errors, misunderstandings, and taking the wrong path. I had hoped these words of encouragement would allow them to let go of the fear of making a mistake, or at least to accept the minor anxiety they were feeling, and just go forward anyway. Just do it, I said, to quote a famous advertising slogan!!

The next week, they picked up the ultra-fine point Sharpie marker to fracture the watercolor. To fracture, they first had to notice the places where colors met and blended, where values suddenly changed from light to dark. When they could see these 'lines', they could trace over them with the marker, and outline these 'islands' of color/value. A few kids had a hard time with this at first, but once I pointed the possible fractures out, they easily began finding new ones to trace on their own.



I think the girls had the most difficult time when fracturing their faces... it didn't make them pretty.  (I overheard their comments as they worked.) It felt like they were putting scars, lines, wrinkles, etc on the face. In the end, though, most of the girls were happy with the effect of the fracturing. The boys got a big kick out of the fracturing technique. One even emphasized his outlining technique with stitch-like marks. It wasn't bad actually... unfortunately, his is not finished. I may come back and edit this later and add it. It's interesting.
The biggest complaint I heard was "Man this takes a long time!"... "But look how good they look!" I replied frequently. "Isn't it worth the extra time?"

\

 

 Puzzle Watercolor Portrait: One class elected to do the Puzzle portrait instead. Their instructions were slightly different... and they used washable markers (we used RoseArt, Crazy Art, and Crayola brands). They transferred their outlines to the watercolor paper the same as the others had, and they outlined with Sharpie markers...  but they used the washable markers to color, and brushes with water to paint over the marker colors, to achieve the watercolor effect. However, the background was completed with wet on wet brushed on watercolor (using Prang semi-moist pan colors).

I would have to say that of the two portrait sessions, the fracturing took the longest, and was the more challenging for the students if only of their patience and endurance to continue working on the same project over a period of time. The Puzzle portraits didn't take quite as long, but coloring the puzzle pieces with markers took longer than painting them with watercolor directly. I suppose we could have just used watercolor paints, but I was trying to get two different looks. And if you compare them closely, you'll see that the Puzzle portraits are brighter and bolder than the fractured portraits, while the fractured portraits have a greater looseness, almost a sketchy look to them.


If you are an art teacher, I hope you find this information helpful. I think it helps when art teachers share their class work... their students' work, and the process. It helps take the mystery out of teaching art, or even making art.

Please feel free to contact me, but mostly, just leave a comment. Thanks!

Odd discovery today as I tried to read the comments on the previous post... I kept getting a blank screen each time I clicked on the comments at the end of the post. I finally was able to read them when I went into another feature of the blog, and clicked on comments. That's where I could read every comment written, without any of the text from the post. Just comments. I was wondering if anyone else has experienced that, or if it is something unique to my computer. I've not been using this blog for so long, possibly there's something I haven't done, that I need to do, to make sure it's updated??? Would appreciate any help ... thanks!

It's been too long since I last posted... not a day has gone by that I didn't think about coming back to post here on my blog. Things happen, you know? Life, and living it, sometimes... often.... most often, takes me away from doing what I love to do more than anything, and that is to write about my observations and experiences.

Facebook was another thing that happened to me, and if you are on Facebook, then you know what I mean!

In the past I've had many followers who encouraged and supported me and my efforts to do this, and without going into all the details about where I've been and what I've been doing, I'd like to just start with where I am now. My apologies to those who have come here to see what I've been doing only to find I haven't been posting.                

I continue (most gratefully) to teach art in an elementary school in North Carolina. What amazes me about teaching art is that I prefer to do new art projects from year to year, just to satisfy my own need for new experiences and new images, yet often I come upon an art project that is so satisfying and beautiful that it can be done again and again, year after year without producing any semblance of boring repetition in the classroom.

I've linked the text from where I got the following project for art teachers who may be interested in getting their own copy: Dynamic Art Projects for Children by Denise Logan. If the link does not work, here is the URL for you to paste into your address bar: http://www.amazon.com/Dynamic-Projects-Children-Step-step/dp/1562903500

Okay, onto the pictures and narrative... my favorite part. The project book mentioned above is filled with project ideas, not lesson plans, but they can easily be rewritten into lesson plans that suit your schedule and grade level. I found the large color photographs of finished projects helpful for my own use, so I could create my own finished pieces to use as examples to show the students. I've never been disappointed when using this book for project ideas.

One project I've repeated over the past few years is the Abstract Animal Relief. The book includes several black and white masters of Reptiles for teachers to copy, which was very thoughtful of the author to provide. However, I was working with fourth graders, and they already have a good skill: copying and tracing. I gave them access to hundreds of pictures from various nature magazines (Ranger Rick, Your Big Backyard, Nature, Wildlife in North Carolina, National Geographic for Kids, etc).

But even before any drawing took place, I had to introduce the project, so I created a powerpoint of animals that lived in North Carolina... they are studying North Carolina history in their regular classroom, and animal behaviors and adaptations in their science curriculum. (As the art integration teacher, I integrate grade level curriculum with art.). 

After viewing the powerpoint and selecting a North Carolina animal (that was one session alone), they had to find a picture to copy. It took a couple of sessions just for them to find the animal picture they wanted, or felt comfortable trying to copy it. If the picture was a large two-page spread, they could easily trace the outline of the animal using tracing paper (9x12"). But if it was a smaller picture, they had to trace it, then enlarge  the outline using their own copying skills. If a student had trouble copying/enlarging (as some are inclined not to copy well), I let them ask another student who had finished their drawing to help them. This prevented anyone from asking ME to copy it for them. Besides, every class has 3 or 4 students who are highly respected by their peers for their drawing skills... I like to give them the opportunity to help each other as much as possible.

After the drawing was made (the final drawing had to be done on white bond paper, at least on a 9"x12" and up to a 12"x18" paper because I wanted the animals to be large), the next step was to transfer the outline from the white paper to the black construction paper. I don't have pictures of that step. The student places the white paper outline on top of the black paper and traces over their pencil outline with a ballpoint pen. Pressing a bit hard, but not too hard as to tear the paper, they trace the entire outline, which leaves an easily visible track/outline of the animal on the black paper. Then, I gave them each a white watercolor pencil to draw over that track just so they could see it better for the painting step. It took them only a few brief minutes to complete the white pencil tracing.

In the photo below, students are working on the next step: painting the outline with white tempera using a flat brush (I forget the number of the brush, but it made about 1/4" wide line).

Each student has their own cup of white tempera paint and a flat brush. They have already drawn the animal on white paper, transferred it to the black paper in white watercolor pencil.

This student is painting the outline of a wolf. From what I saw, they enjoyed this part the most, especially if they had a good tracing. They were impressed with the realistic shape of the animal, although in the next step, they would be abstracting it with inside lines, shapes, and color.

Outlining continues here in white tempera. Tip: don't dilute the tempera with water... you want a solid, thick white line against the black paper. Most had to repaint the lines at least twice to get that bright white outline.

Students are working on the background piece... it's non-objective, oil pastel. They had to create an abstract by painting white tempera lines directly on the blank black construction paper. They painted this step directly, with no guidelines... using what they knew about line types, they included straight, curvy, zig-zag, diagonal, horizontal, vertical, etc... but I told them to make the lines a single thickness, which is why they used a flat 1/4" brush.

Prior to teaching this step, I briefly taught them about abstract (expressing a quality or idea of the subject, in this case, the animal) and non-objective art (easily identified by not having any recognizable objects: no person, place, or thing) by showing examples. The emphasis is on line, shape, and color in this project. The background is the non-objective piece, the animal is the abstract piece.

After they drew the animal, and colored in with oil pastels, they cut out the animal shape, leaving a black construction paper outline around it. Then they glued cardboard squares onto the back... this gives the relief effect as the animal piece lays just above the background.

Students are at various stages as we work... some are working on the backgrounds, others are working on the animals, and still others are putting it all together. Early finishers are working on another activity (weather picture for newspaper publication).

Here are two more finished examples. I hope you enjoy looking at them as much as I do!

                                                                                         

What I am Doing in my Classroom, II

Thank you to Astaryth for sending me a copy of my entry that I lost. I was able to piece it back together. It only took me an hour to reclaim it all...THANKS, Astaryth! You rock!

Recently, in Kindergarten, I read to the students a book, A Stranger in the Woods. The beautiful photography, from wildlife photographers Carl Sams, II and Jean Stoick, tells the story of animals living in the winter woods. One day, a stranger shows up. As the animals gain the courage to walk closer to see who the stranger is, students are also curious about this stranger. Students never even suspected it to be the Snowman until they saw a clue in one of the photographs. After all, the snowman is no stranger to them. It is interesting for them to think from the point of view of the woods animals, how the animals respond to the new stranger, and why it is there. Following the reading of the book, I lead the kids through a series of steps to begin a painting that tells the story from their point of view.

I taught them how to blend blue and white for a background sky of tempera paint. They learned about painting trees... it doesn't matter how many times I showed them how to make the same tree, they made theirs different from all the others.

I admit, their trees are generally more interesting than mine, but they're nice to me when the work is done.

One kindergarten student offered these words one day: "You could be an artist when you grow up!" It brought a smile to my face.

We painted the falling snow with the ends of toothpicks and tinker toy sticks to create varying sizes of snowflakes.

We painted the snowman,... well, I painted one snowman, but more often they painted multiples of this image, for they do love their snowmen.

After we recalled some of the woods animals from the story, the children added theirs with oil pastels. Deer and chickadees seemed to be the favorite animals drawn in, a few rabbits, and one student even added a huge owl flying amongst his trees.

First graders are presently working on a kite-flying landscape with watercolors. I'm often in conflict when teaching the students how to work with watercolors because it is, at once, a simple and complex medium. So much about watercolor painting is in knowing the medium, and how it responds to certain papers, about the colors and color mixing, how much water to use, the brushes.

But that's too much to teach at any one time, and I really just want them to enjoy the experience of applying water and paint to paper while creating this image of sky and land. Soon they will add trees, a fence, some children flying their kites, and flowers blooming in the trees and on the ground. I see the big picture, and I show them a finished example so they'll know where we are going... but as with the snowman painting, every painting will be different as students add their own personal touch.

My second graders are delighted about their Jazzy Jungle Cat designs.


Watercolors is also the medium for this project, but they'll be adding a third dimension later on.
The whole effect will be very jungle like, with the colorful cats prowling through the bright leaves of a rain forest.

  

Fourth Graders are puzzling over the idea of abstract art as they make an Abstract Animal Relief. Their work is mostly soft pastels, a medium I am about to swear off of for teaching in a classroom. It is messy, dusty, and the finished piece needs to be sprayed with a fixative of some type.

Did I say it was dusty? I took precautions, of course, and had students stand at the doorway to tap off the dust from their pictures when they changed colors. The final piece will remind me "but it's worth it." But next year, no soft pastels will be my mantra.

Third graders came with me to explore the world of air dry clay. I told them right at the beginning that it was as much a learning experience for me as it was for them, and now that the project is finished, I am satisfied to say that clay is another medium that should be reserved for art classes with longer sessions.

Preparation and clean up time is important, but practice time is the entire point of having an art class. I did everything I could to reduce the time spent cleaning up so they could get those few extra minutes of practice time.

At the start of every class, I filled four dish tubs with water, set out hand towels and nail brushes to make sure the kids could get cleaned up before returning to their next class.


Once they learned the routine, clean up was a breeze.



Most of the items they made were bowls and cups. I think they learned to appreciate clay more, as the only experience most of them had had prior to this class was with modeling clay. One thing we learned about air dry was not to make something that had little arms or limbs sticking out... things like that broke off easily. We learned that making and using slip helped hold parts together, and we learned that shaping pots, bowls, or cups more than a 1/4 inch thick resulted in stronger products.

I loved the Space Fantasy Art pictures we made in Fifth Grade.

Here you see students applying an acrylic varnish to their finished pictures. The varnish was my idea, serving two purposes: 1) to give it a glossy finish; 2) to make it water resistant to any future spills or splatters; 3) to protect it from fingerprints of curious students that walk by in the hallway and want to touch it. I had taken some pictures of the Space Fantasy Gallery, but they are not on this computer... must be on my computer at school. I'll have to find them and come back later to post them.

My latest art project borrows from the style of Gustav Klimt, who liked to surround his subject with flat planes of color and pattern. If you check out the link to this interactive website, be sure your volume is turned up.

Most of his subjects were women, but there is this one painting, called Baby Cradle, which shows a child covered in a myriad of blankets and quilts. However, the planes of color do not appear to be flat as those in the women portraits he painted.

The Baby Cradle painting reminds me of the times when my young son would wait with anticipation for the clothes to come out of the dryer.

When he saw me taking them out, he'd say "Momma, throw them on me!" The dryer was just a few steps from the living room, so I'd grab up an armful of the warm towels and sheets and toss them on the boy who lay on the couch waiting. He snuggled there for several minutes before the heat wore off.

Then he'd help fold them, like a good son.

One of the characters I painted into my version of this blanket collage is an image of my son (as a child) in the white t-shirt, with his arm peeking out of the blanket. It's just the memory I tried to capture, and the feeling of peace, warmth, of being embraced, loved, safe.


Fifth grade students are producing their own versions of a Krazy Quilt. Some are including their pets, friends... currently we are at the stage of initial drawing, creating shapes of blanket planes, thinking about colors and repetitive lines. We'll be using watercolor and tempera for the most part. They'll be learning how to make tints of the color brown, to create any skin color they wish.


Last week, students helped me stage a live version of the Crazy Quit: I brought in several blankets, and borrowed a couple of quilts from one fifth grade teacher. I positioned students in and around a hammock chair, covering each one with a different blanket. Then they pretended to be asleep. The rest of the students could easily see how sleeping postures vary, how faces angle and tilt, how hair falls around the face, how eyes and eyebrows look in sleep. Doing this little staging prior to starting the drawing helped give them ideas on what they wanted their drawing to look like. I took a picture to show the ones who were involved in the staging so they could see themselves.

I plan to post the results of their paintings here within a few weeks... it will take that long to finish them.

Since this is actually the second time I've posted this entry, I found another Crazy Quilt I painted that would fit well here. Teachers need to have a model or two for the students before beginning a new lesson. In teaching art, we walk a fine line between showing them an example and giving them something to copy. I do not want them to copy my example, but use my model as a jumping off place. I encourage them to copy elements of design and arrange them into their own creation.

It helps stir the imagination of those who seem unable to imagine the picture they want to paint. When I show them several examples, of classic pieces, prints, my work, other teachers' work, or even other student examples if it's a project I have done before... if I can show a variety of examples I know they will have a more confident beginning.

Those of you who knew me before, when I was with aoljournals, you might recognize the miniature schnauzer sketch I worked into this. Whether I used the memory of Max or of Misty, I can't be sure.

And I apologize for those people who had left comments in the previous entry... those were lost as well. Please come back and comment. I enjoy reading your comments!

Blog entry disappeared today.

I don't know what happened, but I'm puzzled and dismayed. I made an entry yesterday, after being away for several months. I visited the blog today, and decided to change the template. I selected a new template. Saved it. Then went to view it and that entry was gone! "What I Am Doing in My Classroom" has disappeared. I had spent several hours working on it, getting the photos, editing and re-editing. I wasn't happy with the way the copy was all chopped up around the photos, and was going to change that today when I lost the entry.

Have any of you experienced this with your own blog? What did you do? Is there a way to get the entry back? Who would I contact about this?

Thanks for your help!

bea

Family Thoughts and Wedding

As the summer winds down for me (school begins for teachers in less than three weeks), I am feeling rested, revived, and ready to begin my tenth year as an elementary school teacher. After the coming week I’m sure I’ll even feel rejuvenated (Vacation Bible School begins tomorrow)!

In mid-July my significant other and I headed for the northern states. For me the trip was more than going to my nephew’s wedding.

                                     





Tim and Ester


My mother and son would be there, my sister, her children and grandchildren, many of us traveling from various parts of the country. Then there were my aunts and uncles, my cousins… I’d be seeing family members I hadn’t seen in at least ten years.



My sister, mother of the groom. I know she is so very proud of her children, all five of them, their spouses, and her grandchildren. This was her night as well.





Cousins… the next generation in our family. All wonderful ‘kids’… this wedding was a grand opportunity for bringing them all together, to celebrate the marriage but also to celebrate Life!
These are just a few: Vi, TJ, Steven, Tim, Tom, TC, Joey, Tom. I love these guys (and girls)!
My Aunt Vickie and Uncle Joe warmly welcomed us into their home for seven days. When we finally had to leave to come home, I told myself I wasn’t going to let so much time pass between visits this time. They reminded us many times that we are family and they’d love for us to visit more often. I realized how much like my aunt I am. That’s another blog entry! For now, a great big thank you and I love you to these two loving and generous people!

While in Connecticut, it seemed practical to drive another three hours north to visit one of my childhood homes in New Hampshire.  Before we made the journey, I Google searched the area, hoping to find a map that could take me back to my home. Yet, I was unable to recall any street names. Even my mother couldn’t remember the street we lived on 48 years ago. In my mind, I knew that if I could find the school or the church I attended, I could ‘walk’ myself back to my home. I have a very good memory!

In the end, my husband and I just drove there, with a state map in hand. He’d never been to New Hampshire in his life. This trip was all about me and finding my ‘roots’. He was my traveling companion. We’d been on a similar trip to his childhood home in Virginia a few years ago, and now it was my turn.

After checking into a motel room in Manchester, I talked to the receptionist there about the purpose of my visit. I told her of my memories living in “the projects”. I couldn’t remember more than that. She frowned… said that the projects were Ghetto now.

However, standing a few feet away, a woman who also worked at the motel overheard our conversation. When she heard the words ‘the projects’ she joined in the conversation. “You mean the Kimball Street Projects?” she asked. When she spoke the street name, it all came back to me.
She smiled and said she knew the place. The expressions on her face as she spoke about the projects confirmed my own fond memories. She told us how to find the place. I was grateful for her helpful insight.

Soon after, we were driving through the city streets. With only the memories to guide me and the directions the woman gave us, we neared my childhood neighborhood. I began to recognize the general layout of the streets, the houses, the ‘feel’ of the area. I knew we were near my home place. Even before the first building came into view, I said to Steve, “That house there… there used to be a store there. A little store where we walked to, to buy milk or eggs, or candy. But the store is gone!”
We drove on, and it was like reliving the dreams and memories all over again. Just as I remembered. Appearing only a little older, with some minor differences, the neighborhood looked nearly the same. Brick buildings, each with twelve apartments. Expansive back yards, playgrounds nearby. Family oriented. Walking distance from the school and the churches we attended.

We drove around the neighborhood. The lawns mowed, children riding their bikes or running to their friends’ apartment. I asked my husband to stop the car so I could take a picture of my ‘home’. I was eight or nine years old when we first lived there. All my memories of living in the Kimball Street projects are good ones.

In 1961, I didn’t understand low income housing. I didn’t recognize that we had less opportunities than other children… probably because all the kids I knew there lived in the same area, we went to school together, and church together. But we learned within our friendships, we played outside every day... kickball, hide and seek, jump rope, marbles, and tag. We cut through the woods to get to the swimming pool each summer, even though our parents told us to walk along the street sidewalk. We picked blueberries in the summer, built snow forts and ice rinks in the winter. We suffered the long hot summers when the evening air was thick and still, with no fan nor air conditioning to relieve the heat. I didn’t even know what air conditioning was back then. Did anyone? We walked to school every day, even when bussing first began. The idea of riding a bus to school seemed so alien to us… school was only a mile away. It was a great childhood.

It didn’t seem like the ghetto when I lived there those two or three years, and it didn’t look like a ghetto in July 2009 when we visited there. Perhaps it is because I’m getting older that thoughts to past days and places come to mind. I’ve been wanting to travel ‘back home’ for the past few years. I just wanted to check it out, to see if what I remembered was what actually was. For the most part, it was.

It was good to ‘go home.’
And it is great to be home.

New Bridge closure

It's time to put a closure to the story of our new bridge (not closure of this blog!).

For nine months it has been a regular feature of neighborhood conversations. A typical chat would go like this: "Hi, Neighbor! How are y'all doing this week?" (answers varied: Mary is sick, Stan lost his job, I'm looking for a new job, we're doing great, etc) followed by more in depth conversation....




"So how's your son in the Coast Guard?"

"He's on ship off the coast of Florida this week, loving it."

Keeping up with our children's lives is an important topic no matter how old they grow. I think those of us whose kids have grown up and moved away have adjusted well to their absence because we have friends and neighbors who remember to ask about them, and who truly appreciate the little stories we pass on to them, knowing that they will pass on the story to another neighbor. It's a living 'grapevine' I have respect and gratitude for.

"Have you heard about Mrs. Neighbor?" We often share what we know about our most senior neighbors as well, the ones we've come to know and love over the years, the ones we will be missing soon enough. Whether they still live in their homes nearby, or further away in a home care facility, we need to know how they are doing. There is a warm feeling of true neighborliness as we find out who needs a visit, a phone call, a hug... who is celebrating a life transition, or who is mourning one. When tragedy strikes one of our neighbors, you can be sure the rest of us will be there for support and comfort. But our greatest strength is that we are there. I find comfort just knowing that my neighbors are there, a holler or phone call away.


Finally, the conversation, whether it was personally in depth or cautiously distant, always got around to "The Bridge."

"So, have you seen the new bridge lately?"
"Yeah, I walked down there last week... they're making good progress...."
or
"Yeah, what the heck is taking them so long to finish it? Think they'll be done before the May date?"

But the most shocking, if not surprising, news was when we learned:

"Have you heard how much our new bridge is costing us (via taxes and other funding)?... a million dollars."

"Aiyeee! They could have built two bridges for that kind of money!"



But we love our new bridge, and that's all I'm going to say about that!

I wanted to have these pictures embedded throughout the text, but could not move them. I'm thinking there's something about this blogger program that I'm not using... if one of my blogging friends could enlighten me as to how to do this, I'd be ever grateful.



BTW, the sleep study was successful, as I got enough sleep. I'll get results from my doctor, but the sleep technician did say my oxygen levels dropped as I slept, so there will be changes in my sleeping habits in the future for me.

For the first time I am posting from my son's apartment! I knew I'd love having a laptop.

Mid-Life Transitions, Snoring, and the Sleep Study

Uh, Hi All!

I am a little bit disoriented coming back like this.

I feel like I owe an explanation for my absence this past year. Demands of the school year and the unpredictable, time-consuming ways of an old computer combined to interfere with my blogging routine. Despite being disgruntled about not having time to blog, nor the desire once my computer started misbehaving, I was able to turn my attentions to other things, other thoughts. Long reaching thoughts.

Mid-Life Transitions... the new bridge that was built down the road from my neighborhood (less than a mile away) this year has become a metaphor of life for me and my neighbors, in more ways than we can count. I started blogging about the same time workers began tearing down the old bridge (in August 2008). We were all looking forward to the completion of the new bridge because it was going to take nine months for them to complete it, and that's a lot of extra driving to and from work each day. With gas prices rising dramatically during this time, we were not very happy. The bridge was finished on schedule in May. We've rejoiced at having our trips to town shortened, as well as having a shiny new (albeit costly) bridge to drive over. I still haven't gotten a picture to post. I don't know why I haven't walked down there to take the photo. I'll set the goal for tomorrow.

I can't ignore it any longer, I am definitely experiencing mid-life changes. On the outside it looks like I'm cleaning house. I started cleaning out my attic three months ago. If I'd been bloggin every day I would never have tackled that job. It was my goal to clear out the attic of anything we have no use for, anything we haven't used in the past three years, and anything we didn't think our son would care to inherit. We've been married 34 years. Accumulate has been our middle names. Well, more mine than his.

Motivation for tackling this major work came from the thought that one day my husband and I would either be dead or incapable of climbing the ladder that leads into the attic. I just couldn't bear thinking of who would have to climb up there and take all of our (mostly) junk down to either sell it or burn it or give it away. Rather than burden our friends and family with that chore, I decided to do it myself. I'm healthy now. I can walk, run, climb ladders. I'm the one who put the stuff up there, I should be the one to take it down again. Clothes, shoes, books (the ones I really don't need), dishes, tapes, old record player, etc went into boxes. Over a period of several weeks, I was able to donate mucho, mucho things in great condition to the Good Samaritan Thrift Shop, things that someone else might need more than I. I didn't want to bother with a yard sale... that would have been more work on a weekend than I'd care to do.

I hadn't realized how liberating cleaning out the attic would be! The cleaning and clearing-out frenzy continued for several months, while that new bridge was being built, and soon I was cleaning out the basement level of our home. Then the garage. By the time the school year was over, I was ready to do some 'clearing and cleaning' in the attic of my body: the mind/brain. I told my doctor I was having trouble sleeping at night, feeling tired all day, yawning excessively (embarrassing) at meetings. But the one symptom that perked her ears was when I said "I snore."

There, I'm out. I'm a snorer. Haven't always been. It's a new development over the past ten years. My husband (of 34 years) didn't tell me about if for the longest time. He let me complain and joke about his snoring all these years, but never made a big deal that I snored. He said it didn't bother him. But lately it has gotten louder. And now it's interfering with his sleep. Ironically, he doesn't snore anymore... after he lost 30 pounds several years ago, he stopped snoring. Now I'm the snorer in the family. It's embarassing. But more importantly, it's interfering with both of our sleeping needs. That's when I decided to tell my doctor.

She said I may have sleep apnea. I thought that was only for people who held their breath in their sleep. She said (here's how I understand what she said) that I wake up because I hear myself snore, and when I wake up with a start, with a "snort" of sorts, that's when I'm taking a breath. She said I'm possibly not getting enough oxygen at night, that my brain is waking me up to breathe. The only way she can know for sure is if I come in for a sleep study.

That's where I'll be tonight. Just like Regis did on TV. All those wires taped to my head and face, my chest wrapped in wires, my legs... how does anyone sleep with all those taped on wires? I guess I'll find out tonight.

But I am curious to see how much REM I get at night, and I'll ask them if they can show me what my dreams look like on paper. So though I'm a bit anxious about my comfort tonight, I am excited that I'll get some information about my sleeping patterns, at least for one night.

If you have been part of a sleep study, and you have a CPAP machine, I would like to know what you think of it. Either leave a comment, or send me an email. I want to know if it's worth it, do you use it every night? Is it loud? Did you stop snoring? Please let me know!!