Celebration Saturday

Thanks to Ruth Ayres, we all have the pleasure of celebrating our past week together. Come read everyone's posts linked up to DiscoverPlayBuild.

        Whew-what a week, a pleasure and busy. For a little while, I am subbing for our new teacher, who is also a new father as of Wednesday. It's always something to celebrate when a new baby enters our lives. I'm celebrating new life, and being in the classroom with wonderful middle school students again. 
         I had three lunch meetings also this week, starting conversations with the Primary, Intermediate and Advanced School teacher groups. We made some goals, and will finally begin talking about best practices in different areas. Exciting.

Learning Important Things-not just about writing

           Time for the Tuesday Slice of Life Sharing at the Two Writing Teachers blog. Come over to read and enjoy everyone's post!

       I've already written two other times about my poetry retreat last week (last Friday & Saturday), & as you can see from the badge on the right, I've also been writing in an online poetry class in September. I'm trying to focus on several things I can share as takeaways for teaching writing (teaching writers) in the classroom. I've written about happiness in finding one's passion, gratitude for people who really listen, and in this final post, want to emphasize the importance of being surrounded by beauty. Here are some photos, and thoughts about connections to a classroom.

A special space in a classroom can mean much
to a student who needs to be alone to write.

                  Looking out a window for one beautiful thing
among the rest is something writers do.

Celebrating Special People

         Thanks, Ruth, for Celebration Saturdays. Check HERE for the links. 

Don't forget to tweet at #CelebrateLu

      On Oct. 1st, the nominations for Cybils awards opened. You have until Oct. 15th to nominate a favorite book in several categories from YA to easy readers, poetry to apps! Go here if you want to know more.

          It was a spectacular week at my writing retreat that I was anticipating last Saturday. I've wondered how to share, what to share, and while I will celebrate poems that I wrote and poems I hope to write, I think I want to celebrate people today. This applies to those we live and/or work and play with, those we meet who are new, old acquaintances, too. 

         I want to celebrate how kind people can be, how honest and open, sharing pieces of themselves, if--a big IF--we are also kind and willing to listen. This workshop, while in the best of circumstances like beautiful surroundings, cozy places everywhere, and delicious food, we also nourished each other by listening, and by sharing. I met and worked with eight wonderful people this past week. We all do that, at work, in church, in other organizations, exercising, having coffee at Starbucks. And I'm hoping in all those interactions that we are kind, and willing to listen.

Retreat Today

          Go over to Cathy Mere's Merely Day by Day to find all the Poetry Friday people who love, enjoy, write, then share their special ideas about poetry on Fridays.  It's such a great time!

          One definition of the word ‘serendipity’ is “the occurrence and development of events by chance in a happy or beneficial way.”   This time at my school’s fall retreat, I love how our time is going to fall around us, delighting us with the usual people, like having Thursday evening to hang out with everyone, having some wine or beer, just talking, snacking, playing silly games, and laughing.  It’s been a huge rush of busy-ness since school began, and this is a time of renewal before the second rush to conferences, then the holidays.         

Reflection Retreat

  It's an exciting time for our Poetry Friday host, Irene Latham, at Live Your Poem.  Her new book, Don't Feed The Boy came out this past Tuesday!  Congratulations Irene!

    A week ago, my staff drove to the mountains to spent Thursday night and Friday together for our retreat.  This time we had a facilitator that came to lead us in examining our lives particularly in using time more wisely.  Most often, my colleagues have so much to do, and like many teachers and those in other lines of work, like writers, we make our lists too long and our expectations too high.  The first questions asked this day were: How do we order our lives against stress and fatigue? and What are we confessing by how we order our lives?  and How can we negotiate our lives so we can be fully mindful with those we care about? 

View from our family cabin!  There was a small forest fire in the area.  You can see the smoke in the photo.