Family Display

My family is at the beach - Nha Trang - and I am finishing up my last day of school, then flying to meet them today at 5:00. I hear it was sunny yesterday, but rainy today. I wish you could guarantee the weather when you are a travel agent for your family!

I know it's a cliche, but it truly does feel like the school clock goes backwards on the day before vacation...

The kids came to school with me on Wednesday and all three of them were huge hits. In fact, some seventh grade girls will probably give me the silent treatment for a while because they were not asked to take Megan around school. The energy surrounding the kids wherever they went was pulsating. Perhaps the most pulsating moment, however, was at lunch.

Devon had told me at breakfast that he "didn't feel well." I bought them all lunch in the cafeteria - a pretty safe grilled chicken plate - and at the end of lunch, he came up to me and said, quite diplomatically, "Aunt Marjie, I don't feel very good. Where should I go?" I took this to mean that he was about to throw up and I looked around to problem-solve this when... he did it. He threw up in front of half of the school.

To Devon's credit, he laughed about it the whole way through. He said something like, "I really know how to make a first impresssion, don't I?" And his display didn't even defer an eight grade girl from asking him to the winter dance for tonight (too bad, he can't go). We got him a t-shirt from the PE Department and he sat down in the lobby for most of the rest of the day while Megan and Nolan played dodgeball and took science tests. (Shared with permission from Devon.)

That same day, my mom, dad, Angie and Lewis took a taxi in a downpour (they got to see the flooding right outside the school) to meet us at the end of the day. My students were especially excited to meet my mom, who made them cookies as motivation for a school-wide reading competition (that my 6th graders ended up winning). She also chooses the best table names for groups each month. They were late because of the rain, but my students stayed in my classroom an extra 15 minutes just to meet everyone. I'm so glad my family got to see it all - rain, flooding students, etc. Because it's really hard to explain it all.

When my mom was ready to get on the bus the other night, she said, "I'm looking forward to the beach, but I hate to leave your neighborhood." This is how we feel all the time. My whole family is now quite tight with T and T - Nolan had a specific vision to make some shorts with a neon green stripe down the side, and Thuy rode her motorbike all over Saigon to find that neon green material. I'm sure that after Nolan's fashion hits the streets of Saigon, even more people will be wanting to touch him. But they turned in clothes to be made by my expert tailor at the top of district one, as well as Sweet Seamstress (who is making Nolan's design dreams into reality) nextdoor.

It will be really nice to come back and have my whole family at the castle for a few days before we all take off to Hanoi/Halong Bay on Christmas Day. I haven't really felt myself until just a few days ago - that Dengue was really awful - so I'm looking forward to giving my family a rightful tour of all the food outside my door that I love so much.

Stay tuned for more kid updates when we return next week (and Merry Christmas)!