A few of my favorite things........

Here's the first of the Mother's Day posts, that will continue through the weekend!

Yesterday could have been stressful. Well, I'll be honest, it wasn't completely void of stress, but it definitely could have been a lot worse!

Testing has been a freaking nightmare this year, and I don't know why. Well, I think I do, I usually have it done in April. But, April was impossible for some reason! Because I was so wrapped up in finishing testing, I completely forgot about Mother's Day for my preschool kids. So, yesterday I frantically came up with something we could hurry and throw together and was really worried about not being there in the afternoon, since Em had a dr's appointment at Primary (or so I thought). The morning class went very smooth! They all got their popsicle sticks painted for their frames. And I got some very adorable pictures of them each sitting on a log outside to put in their frames. I was worried that neither of my aides would be able to use my camera for the afternoon when I wouldn't be there, but I didn't have much choice. So, I gave very detailed instructions, with the emphasis being they needed to be vertical and zoomed in as much as possible, so that it was pretty much just the child in the picture (there is a lot of ugly construction outside!) Then, I left as soon as I put kids on the bus to get Emarie, and we headed up to Salt Lake. I felt pretty good when I got there 15 minutes early, only to find out that we should have been there 5 hours earlier. I have no idea what happened, I have never written a time wrong or forgotten about an appointment for Emarie in all of her existence! So, I'm still not sure.

But, anyway, I was pretty unhappy when I got in the car to drive all the way back. And, not 2 minutes after I pulled out of the parking lot, Em started to laugh.....hysterically, which in turn made me laugh pretty hard too, and this lasted the whole drive home! I proceeded to drive all the way back to my school, so that I might rectify leaving, for really no reason at all, and finish up with the Mother's Day gifts. As, I started to unbuckle Em, that was when I noticed that she was completely drenched in her formula, tube in hand, as she had been the one to open it, and I'm almost positive that was why she was laughing. I took it as: this was how she was trying to cheer me up, so I decided to appreciate it for what it was, which was pretty dang funny! We then hurried into the building where I began to download pictures and upload them to a 1 hour photo center. The only thing I noticed about the afternoon's pictures was that they were horizontal as apposed to vertical like I wanted. But easy enough to fix the frames to work. It wasn't until I picked them up that I realized there were more problems. 3 of the kids had their eyes closed, 2 of them were completely cast in shadow, and all of them were much too far away. I realized there wasn't much I could do about all of them, because I did not have enough time to retake them all, save for the ones that were really bad. I was also racking my brain trying to figure out how I could pick them up and put them all together in the few 2 and a half hours we have. It was a miracle that I saw photo paper in the workroom (I mean, we've NEVER had it before)! It took me all of about 10 mins to retake the necessary ones and print them off right there at school! Thank goodness!!

Another good thing happened yesterday to cheer me up. Since, I no longer have a bathroom right next to my classroom anymore (it got torn down), I now have to use the next closest one, which is the elementary girls bathroom. Which is not a problem, little girls are relatively clean, and hold good conversation when washing hands. On this particular day, there was a very sweet, and smart (I might add) little girl who was the daughter of one of the second grade teachers in there with me. She smiled at me and asked, "Do you work here?" To which I replied, "Why yes, I do!" She looked a little puzzled, but then said, "That makes sense, I used to think you were in high school when I would see you, because you look so young, and you dress so cool. But, I thought you were away from school too much!" I actually hugged her, and told her she made my whole week, but let's be honest, probably my whole year! Bless you child!

So, here's the real reason I am SO HAPPY! This child is without a doubt the funniest little girl I have ever met! Playing jokes now, and I swear this kid has at least 20 different distinct laughs!

Here's a picture of her latest trick of opening up her tube. This one was caught at home later that night. Little stinker!!

And a video of her infectious laugh. Although, I must warn you, you may pee your pants! Yes, it's that funny!

And yes, that is her talking (even if you can't understand, I repeat it for you ;))

So yes, this girl can brighten any day, especially mine! She can turn any frown upside down, and when she smiles/laughs, the whole world smiles/laughs with her! I am so blessed to have her in my life, and I couldn't ask for a better Mother's Day gift!

Happy Mother's Day to all you women out there! You're amazing, and I'm so glad you are all part of my life!