Highlights of the Weekend

Being the first weekend back from vacation, it was a busy one. I'd love to share about all of it in detail, but I'm sure you're not that interested, so I'll just share the highlights.

• Sabbath, all the staff and other close friends got together for a potluck at the Maycock's after church and, as an added bonus, we celebrated Antonee's birthday. (Antonee is the newest man in our lives. He's here for 2 months to help teach winter ESL school along with 2 other teachers. Since Sean is the only male on our staff, it's nice to have another guy around for a while.)
  
  
• After potluck we took the new teachers on the famous "island tour." We took them to all the "must-see" spots. It's always fun to show off our island.
  
  We even saw a turtle from the Bonzai Cliff look-out. Thanks to my beautiful, new camera, I was able to get a pretty decent picture of it. If you click on the picture to make it bigger you'll see him better.
  
  I also had a lot of fun trying to capture Kimo's beauty.
  
  And....every time I see this little ranch from the Suicide Cliff look-out, I fall in love with it all over again. I wish I could live there (or somewhere similar), grow my own garden, and only have to go to town once a month to re-stock supplies.......what a peaceful life it would be!
  
  We ended the tour at the Grotto viewpoint, where we just chatted and watched the sun slip behind the mountain. It was beautiful!
  
  
• Sunday dawned way too early - it was our school's annual Walk-A-Thon. We had to get to the park extra early to set up.
  
  This year, the tent wasn't quite as rebellious as we struggled to put it up.......but some of the polls were protruding at peculiar angles when we were finished. I don't think there is a "right" way to put that thing together!
  
  
  See how crooked that poll is??? It should be standing straight up and down.
  
  
  We got some staff photos before the kids arrived.....
  
  Students, parents and teachers all had a lot of fun...
  
  There were no accidents or injuries......until after the Walk-A-Thon had finished. One of my little 3rd graders was launched off a skateboard when his shoe lace got stuck in the wheel. No one saw it happen, but when I found him he was just laying quietly on the sidewalk moaning a little. I could see immediately that his arm was broken - that terrified me! But thankfully his mother - a nurse - was nearby, and she helped me get ice on his arm and get him to the car and off to the hospital. It turns out that it was badly fractured and he needed surgery because they had to put screws in. Poor little guy........ :(
  
  
  He was such a good sport - really brave - but he didn't feel like smiling for the camera. (You can't see the broken arm, it's being covered by the bag of ice in the lower right-hand corner of the picture.)
  
  
• For most of the Walk-A-Thon, I was stuck behind a table counting and recording students' laps. That was tough - not the counting part, but rather the "being stuck behind the table" part. It was such a beautiful day but I felt trapped. The sun, that danced between the mysterious trees and landed playfully on the ground, called out to me, but I couldn't answer. I wanted to run through the trees with reckless abandon. I wanted to throw off my sandals, let down my hair, and dance with the sun. I wanted to twirl in circles until I flopped on the ground, dizzy and breathless. But I didn't. I was trapped by duty and circumstance. That's the way life is sometimes. And that's why I can't wait to get to heaven so we can all live life the way we were created to live it!
  
  The scenery that spoke to me.....