I feel blessed that I have been able to spend so much time with the missionaries through companionship studies and district meetings recently. I was able to do that again this week on both Tuesday and Thursday and additional district meeting on Friday. It keeps me in touch with the missionaries seeing their personal growth in the gospel and leadership. It also allows me to share insights from my own studies and what I have learned from other missionaries as I meet with them.
Jessie in 4th grade choir after school twice a week on Monday and Wednesday preparing for a performance in April. She tried out and was selected for a solo. The program is based on space, interesting for a choir program, but it is based out the school theme for this year. The Tigers are “Out of this World”. She is loving it and singing songs about asteroids and the rings around Saturn nonstop. Unfortunately, the boys are annoyed by all the singing. ;)
Tuesday night I had Jessie’s teacher reach out to me to see if I could chaperone her class at the Houston Rodeo and Livestock Show at the NRG stadium on Wednesday. Jessie was thrilled to hear I could go on her fieldtrip. Fortunately for me I did not have to ride the bus with them. I actually got to hitch a ride with two other moms. It was great to hear their stories of how they came to live in Houston and I got to share mine as well. Once at the NRG, we met our classes and proceeded to go on our livestock show tour. We first visited displays about the different environments found in Texas. Next we learned about birthing animals. We did this by witnessing animals that had birthed the night before, those about to birth that day and a recorded birth of a baby calf that was playing on a big screen for all to see. Jessie about threw up at that sight. The students each planted sunflowers to take home and watch grow. After eating lunch, we then waited in lines to the indoor petting zoo and then outdoor petting zoo but never got into either because the teachers decided the lines were too long. We then basically “followed the leader” past the rides, a science stage, more rides, food tents, more rides with kids repeatly asking if they could participate in any of it. The answer of course was…..no because that wasn’t the plan and we now needed to line up to get on the buses to go back to the school. This was the first time our school had gone to the Houston Rodeo and Livestock Show. From my perspective it was an ok fieldtrip but could have been a great one if we had separated into smaller groups rather than three groups of 50 plus kids each. Too many kids to do anything. I would have gladly taken 8 to 10 students as a small group to see the other sights and sounds of the Houston Rodeo and Livestock Show on our own and met back at a designated time and place. Hopefully the teachers will learn from this year’s experience and make it a better one in the future.
Zac’s ankle has still been bothering him even though he has been doing rehab exercises with the trainer during Basketball class so I made an appointment to see a doctor in the sport’s medicine clinic that the boys go to. The doctor felt it should be healing faster so ordered an MRI. When Zac mentioned this to the trainer the next day, He recommended seeing the orthopedic doctor assigned to the school. We saw that doctor on Thursday. The sprain definitely was more than expected. Zac is now in a leg cast for the next three weeks to let the ligaments heal. He has to use crutches and so his mobility is very limited. The kids have Spring break next week and he is supposed to be going on Trek with the youth from our stake. I’m assuming that will now be a no go. Bode will likely pull up lame as well so it could be a long week for the Hall boy’s just sitting around while we run around with transfers. Poor timing for a transfer week as we won’t get a break until sometime this summer.
Jessie and I are getting better at the creative book reports, not as time consuming. Her book had to be from the social science section of the library. She choose the book, Her Seven Bothers, a folktale. The report needed a model of a something that is representative of the book and why it is important. Her folktale was about a young Indian girl that had no brothers. One day she finds seven brothers. Six older and one younger and goes to live with them. Their story is seen in the sky. The stars of the big dipper has seven stars with a little one by one of the big ones which represents the young Indian girl and little brother. We found a tent model that Jessie could build and color to represent the folktale. This was by far one of the easier ones she has done. Her idea was to do a tent and draw the big dipper and other symbols on the tent. We found a tent model online. I only hot glued the poles on the base. She did the rest. Happy day!
Allie and her roommates are headed to California for their Spring break on Friday. It makes me all kinds of nervous because they are driving. They arranged a place to stay in St. George and then a hotel in Newport. I am glad they have created such a fun, strong friendship. They are all great girls and really try to support each other. Makes a mom’s heart happy.