It's Ten O'Clock on Friday Night and I'm Going to Bed

but to be fair, I've had two martinis (chocolate espresso) so the night isn't a total write off.*

Today was a good day all in all. It was the last day in my class. We had a good day, very busy, with gym and library and lots of projects to finish. My amazing aide helped them create a very nice card with they wrote messages to me on cut-out balls of yarn and then they decorated the card with yarn. One student drew a picture of my desk with all my shoes lined up underneath it. The staff was so generous and very thoughtful and went out a picked out a beautiful file folder container printed with William Morris. I received hugs from kids I never thought would hug me and very nice cards, along with two pounds of dark whole coffee beans and a whole flock of miniature paper cranes.

The flowers were gorgeous too.
So today at lunch I found out where I'm going on Monday. I'm headed to an Annex where I'll be teaching Grade 2/3 till the end of the school year. It's pretty freaky in that those are the two grades I've never taught but I'm really excited. It's made last week's purchases rather great in hindsight.
That is, starting from top left and going clockwise, City Dog, Country Frog by Mo Williams and Jon J Muth, The Magic Paintbrush by Joel Stewart, The Little Hummingbird by Michael Nicoll Yahgulanaas, and Silent Music; A Story of Bahdad by James Rumford.

All four books are just skookum. My favorite bookstore was having a big sale and I had at least twenty books with me with no place to sit since all the benches had been removed for sale bins. The staff was awesome and simply moved a few things out of the way so I could sit down and go through all my books in one of the window display sections.
City dog, country frog is a very lovely story and the illustrations are very powerful. They made me laugh and, though I should state this isn't hard to do, made me cry.

Yup, just got choked up again. Moving along.

Silent Music is an important and unique story and the artwork in this book is breathtaking! The layers of prints and mediums is musical in itself.



I've read it about five times and each time I find something new to marvel at.

The Magic Paintbrush is a great story and the illustrations are wonderful, but I couldn't seem to get a good photo of any of them. They are full of motion and life.
I read The Little Hummingbird to my students today. It's a powerful short story and is so well suited to the illustrations. It's one of those stories that I can't see told without these accompanying drawings.

Very striking and moving.

Now, I go to bed. Here's to good reads and to me not getting taken over and run out of town by 7 and 8 year olds.

*just so you don't worry, some friends took me out for dinner, I'm not having those martinis here at home by myself. Though I wish I was cause those were good.