Our writing prompt for this Roundtable was sharing a small moment made possible by our open-ish adoption. It’s something I’ve written about before, but I’d say this counts.

During School Girl’s 1st grade year, their social studies unit had a “family tree” assignment. When School Girl brought the paper home, the tree turned out to be just that – a 1st grader’s idea of a tree – complete with a gigantic lollipop-shaped top, mercifully minus any branches. The assignment read in part: “Find or draw the people in your family. Place them anywhere on the tree you’d like.” So we did.

As we were frantically hunting for pictures to put on – and we wound up having more pictures of School Girl’s original family than of Evil Dad’s family – School Girl started putting the pictures into groups to put on the tree.

“There’s your side of the family, Mommy, and Daddy’s side of the family, and my side of the family.” There it was. All arranged into neat little groups at the beginning, but by the time they were actually glued onto the tree they were all mixed together. The way they are for her right now. Everybody that she loves all mixed up together. Every side of our family.

As I’ve mentioned several times this week, one of us has her last day of 1st grade today. This has meant…teacher gifts. Last year was pretty easy for reasons that are both obvious and not worth mentioning here. This year was a little tougher. What do you get for the Most Awesomest Teacher Ever? In our case, it was narrowed down to two choices.

Choice A: A large bottle of a Fancy Refreshing Beverage and a package of bendy straws.
Choice B: Something knitted and relatively fancy.

For many, many reasons we went with Choice B.

Here’s what I came up with:

The cloth on the left is the Let’s Have a Martini! washcloth by Claudia of Knitting Without Dog Hair is Not an Option. The one on the right is a somethin’ something that I made up, based on a washcloth idea at the localish yarn store where I bought the cotton and a stitch pattern from Barbara Walker’s first book. School Girl also sent along a note for her teacher, which has helped a little with her sad this past week.

I started both of them Wednesday afternoon, and finished drying them (yes, in the dryer) this morning. Immediately after I took the photo above I suddenly realized, “Idiot, they’re not dry yet. You have to dry them again before you can wrap them.” So I did.

I’ve been working on a couple of other things, including some more on Margaret and my Bat Shawl, but that’ll wait until after this weekend. Now to wrap up the soap…

Bring Me to Life – Evanescence
Sweet Sweet Baby (I’m Falling) – Lone Justice
(Sittin’ on) the Dock of the Bay – Otis Redding
French Suite No. 5 in G, BWV 816: Sarabande – J. S. Bach
It’s Called a Heart – Depeche Mode
Condemnation – Depeche Mode
Crimson and Clover – Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
Dark Wood of Error – Sepultura
Your Country – Gogol Bordello
Tribal Connection – Gogol Bordello
Bonus: I Love Rock ‘n Roll – Joan Jett

Yesterday, her best bud was away (expected, and she won’t be back until at least tomorrow), she had to head to the nurse’s office because of an “earache” (actually, the reason her ear hurt so much is because it popped and she couldn’t get it to pop back), and was invited to a classmate’s birthday party next weekend. Still not sure about the last one – we’ll have to discuss it this weekend.

And today? Today started with an exciting hail-filled thunderstorm. School Girl practically begged me to allow her to stay home. When pressed, she admitted to not being sick exactly – more like not wanting to go in the cold rain and hail. I am the meanest mom on the face of the earth (check the title of this blog if you don’t believe me), so she went. At least I didn’t make her walk today…

The rest of the week is shaping up to be slightly less exciting, except for Friday. Friday is rapidly turning into Tasty Junk Food Day. A popsicle party/chalk art exercise in Art class, an ice cream party at the end of the day in her classroom, and Evil Dad and I picking her up from school and all going out to dinner. Presumably we’re heading for the pizza place (Fridays are Pizza Days here), but she’ll get to choose.

We’re – well, okay, I’m – having the annual dilemma over what to get/make the teacher for a goodbye present. Her teacher this year is Teh Absolutestly Awesomest Teacher Ever, so she deserves something nice. I’m a little bit leery of getting her something that she may very well need after this year, so I think I’ll just stick with a washcloth/fancy spa cloth and some nice soap. School Girl wants to make her something too; either a card or another type of papercraft, she hasn’t decided.

I have to admit, Field Day has always been a bit of a mystery to me. Our school never had anything like that when I was growing up – come to think of it, the concept of physical education for anybody younger than 4th grade has been a bit…puzzling to me as well. But anyway. I do know that at some schools, Field Day is just that – a big track and field contest, complete with sprints, hurdles, field events (yes, it means exactly what you think it means), etc. At our school, Field Day meant a morning full of loosely organized games involving running the kids until the point of exhaustion. The plastic egg carry through an obstacle course, parachute games, tag, ball tag (no, not dodgeball – tagging a person carrying a ball to the other side) – games like that. Oh yes, and the Tug-o-War. Girls rule. Especially when they outnumber the boys by 1/3 of the class.

School Girl did…okay. She’s got the gift of physical coordination, but she doesn’t really enjoy it. Especially in 85F heat – she’s never been good on a hot day, and by the end of 2.5 hours she was really fading. Lunch came about 1/2 hour too late…

And after lunch, they had a Reading Day. Which she enjoyed much more, I hear.