Spiky hair and hawaiian shirt

So I am officially going to have the coolest teacher identification card on the planet. I was dared to wear a hawaiian shirt with my spiky hair for the picture. Needless to say, my principals were a little speechless. All the kids liked my hair though! And my shirt! Zorro even sat on my shoulder for the picture!

School Pictures day!

So tomorrow is School Pictures Day. For the kids it means dressing in the finest fall fashions and smiling pretty for the pictures that will be sent to Grandma and Grandpa. For the teachers, it means the picture that will be put on our annual ID badge that must be worn all day long, every day for all the world to see. I've decided that I want my ID card to be a picture with spiky hair. I hope that won't be a problem. Miguel and I practiced tonight to prepare. I wonder if there is some rule about teachers having spiky hair at school. Is that really a bad thing?

The Nameless Bear's Allergies

Miguel's team has won their first two soccer games! He is definitely one of the leaders on the team and is part of the driving force that helps his team win. He tries out tricks that he is learning to get around defenders. He can curve the ball too when he shoots!

After the game, we ate pizza and went to Maggie Moo's to eat ice cream. We took Zorro and one of my first and favoritest teddy bears (but I can't remember his name) with us. Zorro wanted to sit in the flowers outside the restaurant. The bear had allergies so he couldn't sit in the flowers. That's why he's burying his snoot in Miguel's sweatshirt. It was chilly that night, but not nearly as cold as Miguel is making it seem.

I MET ESTHER!!!

YIPPEEE!!! FOR THE FIRST TIME I MET ESTHER!!! She is SOOO cute and crazy strong too. She was climbing straight up a fence like a monkey! I can't believe how strong she is, even in her arms. Katie's right...she does like soccer balls a lot! I can't wait to see her again!

Tomorrow I have a meeting all day so I won't be at school. So sad. I'm almost brought to tears. Actually I will miss my kiddos tomorrow because we have lots of great learning to do, but I can't say I don't like the ability to sleep in past 6:30 AM. Okay, it's 1:00 like usual. Time for bed.

Great weekend...wish it was longer

So I'm very tired because I have a cold and I didn't sleep at all last night due to my snout. I can't even remember what exactly the problem was, runny, congested, who knows... but I do remember waking up every 20-30 minutes and wondering why the clock still wasn't anywhere near 9:00.

Miguel played his first fall season soccer game yesterday. They won and he scored 2 goals. He is not incredibly happy with his team, but in typical Miguel style, he's not complaining about it either. The problem is that his ability far exceeds the ability of everyone else on the team. Some of the kids don't even know how to kick, some are afraid of the ball, they don't know where to position themselves on the field for different plays... He really needs to be playing on the Challenge teams or travel teams, but we were out of town for the tryouts, so he's stuck playing the lowest level teams for the fall. It's the same situation for Ivan.

Please pray about this if you get a chance - NOT because playing on a particular soccer team for one season really matters in the grand scheme of life, but because Jesus cares about these two boys more than they realize. He cares for their salvation, certainly. He cares for their future, of course. And He even cares about the little tiny stuff that doesn't really matter to the rest of the world, like what soccer team kids are on.

I remember back in the spring when it was raining and some of the boys in my class had their soccer practice that night and they said they were going to pray on the bus that God would make the rain stop so they could have their practice. I went to pick them up and it stopped raining. The rain held off for the whole hour of practice and the MOMENT we all climbed back in the car after it was over, it started pouring. God even cares about a little boy's soccer team.

For this reason, please pray for Miguel and Ivan's soccer this fall. It's the one thing they look forward to every day and it's the one thing they want to do for the rest of their lives.

SuperZorro

Ever since I got the Pleo dinosaur, Zorro's been feeling a little...jealous. Everyone pays attention to the Pleo now and Zorro thinks he's being left behind. We tried to assure him that he's NOT forgotten, but he still feels a little rejected. So to help him realize how much we still love him, Miguel gave him a cape and transformed him into SUPERZORRO! Zorro's back to his old self now because we informed him that, due to the $350 price tag attached to the Pleo, the robotic dinosaur will not be bearing a cape and flying out a car window any time soon. Here's Zorro the newest superhero:

many updates

sorry i haven't updated in a while everybody! here's a bunch of posts, loaded with photos, so you can see what's been happening in the past 11 days!

The World's Coolest Dinosaur

So today my class got the coolest thing ever! Our principal, Mrs. Jones, gave us a PLEO! A Pleo is a robotic dinosaur life form that takes on its own personality and the ability to learn new tricks, behaviors, movements, etc. It is different than other robots because it is not simply a series of stimulus-response commands. It actually senses its surroundings and changes its own behaviors. Having the ability to learn brand new behaviors sets it apart from other robots that have been created. It begs for food, sleeps, gets bored, gets adventurous, plays, likes some things and doesn't like other things, etc. We hatched him for the very first time today with my class and they LOVED him! He is quite possibly one the coolest things I've ever seen!

Finally he gets to be the ball boy!

Miguel's latest dream came true at the UVA Men's soccer game! He finally got to be the ball boy at the game! He has wanted to be a ball boy for a year now. He's asked me and asked me to be a ball boy. Within minutes of entering the stadium to see DC United a couple weeks ago, he pointed at the ball boys and said, "Miss Tice, how do you get to be one of those? I really want to be one of those!" Then at the UVA soccer game a week later, he pointed immediately at the ball boys and asked the question again. So I realized he was serious about this and through a crazy series of events, including just happening to meet someone who is good friends with the man who organizes all the ball boys at the UVA games, it all worked out! Gotta love God at work! So the end result was that the man called us the next day and said that he had an opening at the men's game. Miguel was so excited, he couldn't go to sleep until almost 2 AM.

At the game, he was so happy to be on the big field, watching the game up close. He even turned to me towards the end of the game, when the opposing team was doing a free kick, and shouted out, "Miss Tice! He's going to kick towards the corner!" And then he did. Then there was another free kick and he, again, announced exactly where the ball was going to go. At the end of the game I asked him how he knew where the ball was going to go all the time and he said, "Because the players do a sign before they kick. They put one arm over top of the other arm and one fist is closed. Whichever fist is closed, that's the direction they're going to kick." I asked him how he knew that and he said he had been watching them the whole game and noticed that just before they kick, they do that motion and then the ball always goes in the direction of where their fist was. He said he had started shouting it out to tell the UVA players where the opposing team was going to kick the ball! Smart kid!


After the game, Miguel met all of the players and got them to sign autographs on his poster! Above is a picture of Miguel with Jeremy Barlow, one of the best UVA players. Collin and Marryn came to the game too and they each got an autographed poster!

Labor Day Party!

My mom and Mike had a Labor Day party back on Labor Day. Here's Miguel jumping off of a floating dock that Mike built! He put it out in the middle of the lake and it totally works! It supports Miguel, Peter, my sister, AND Georgia the dog too! It's great! I can't believe Mike actually built it.
The Adams' came to play too and Collin practiced his breakdancing moves. He's gotten really good!
Here's my little nephew, Leland! He's one year old now and he can walk!



Here's Miguel and Leland. Leland loved hanging out with Miguel, Marryn, and Collin. He laughed and laughed when they played with him and gave him balls to throw!

Here's me and all the kiddos lined up on the fence!