What is a School Resource Officer?

My apologies for not explaining what a school resource officer is. Basically a resource officer is a full time police officer in the school. They are responsible for handling MANY issues that come up like: bullying, confiscating weapons, and removing disruptive students from class. They also are available to talk with the kids about their grades, their home life, or anything the kids want to talk about. They are a positive representation of law enforcement. They may meet with a student who is angry or depressed; someone who doesn't know how to handle their emotions; they are there to defuse any potentially dangerous situations. They bring security to the school both to the faculty and the students. The students feel comfortable bringing a concern to them. I spoke with our resource officer the other day and she told me that she has logged 212 incidents (minor to big deal) since September. Minor is removing a disruptive student from class. Big deal is actually having to arrest a student, which has happened twice this year. I don't know why he was arrested. Teachers are not equipped to handle these sorts of things, nor should they have to be. Calling the police when a situation comes up isn't good enough ALL schools (middle schools and high schools) should ALWAYS have a FULL TIME resource officer. And unfortunately some elementary schools should have them too. If your school department doesn't employ full time resource officers at the middle and high school you need to URGE them to change that. Grants are even available to pay for the positions for the first few years. Check out your school - be involved!

My 100th Post!

Such a milestone - 100 posts! It's about time!

I'm currently heading up a battle with our school committee to find money to keep our full time middle school resource officer. The position will be eliminated as of next school year. UNACCEPTABLE - I say! As I was praying the other morning I asked God to lead me to the people who I could support in this effort. The more phone calls I made, the more evident it became that I am the one who needs supporting! Interesting. Talk about being out of your league and over your head. I basically have no understanding of town politics or school committee budgets. I do, however, have a strong opinion as to the importance of the school resource officer position! I have found that ALL of the people I've spoken with (except the school committee chairwoman, who needs to be impartial I suppose) want the resource officer position at our school and they are very upset and concerned that our school committee wants it gone! So far the plan is to have the resource officer address our PTO to explain what she does and why her position is important. From there we are hoping to have a good sized group of parents and hopefully school faculty attend the next school committee meeting and say our piece. From there it would be up to the school committee to set up a special finance committee meeting to see if they can 'find' some money to pay for the position. That's how it was explained to me. We'll see. I hope I am not the group spokesperson at the meeting but if that's what happens, then that's what happens. I'm hoping that our resource officer and school principal will do the talking - if I can convince them to come to the meeting! The meeting is April 11th. YIKES!

American Idol is...I don't even know how to express my disbelief that Sanjaya is still there! GIVE ME A BREAK! I will say that I LOVED his hair the other night. Check it our here. I think it's called a 'faux hawk' instead of a mohawk - get it?!

I have not watched last night's LOST yet. I DVR'd it. Tonight after Survivor. 10 p.m. is just too late for me to be up watching LOST! I force myself to stay awake and then I'm tired the next day - I know, I'm such a baby.

Speaking of babies. My baby girl ( my 12 year old baby girl that is ) wore a pretty outfit to school today. I know you're asking 'what's the big deal?' I'll tell you what the big deal is! For the last long while Katie has only wanted to wear athletic pants and t-shirts or sweatshirts. In the summer it's athletic shorts and t-shirts. Now she's telling me she needs more jeans and she showed up at my bathroom door this morning looking adorable! My Katie is actually giving her appearance some attention. Don't get me wrong, she's always particular about her hair and stuff like that, but not clothes! I'm so happy!

Another huge reason to celebrate...The porta potty that we've had to look at next door for almost a year has FINALLY been taken away!!!! I can not tell you how happy this makes me! Silly, you say? Not so silly if you've had to see a PORTA POTTY out your window EVERYDAY!!!

Cold and windy here today. Spring will back tomorrow with 40's and sunshine. 50's by the weekend. No complaints.

A WOW! Weekend!

What a FUN weekend we had!! Saturday, after cleaning up the snow outside, we went to the mall (again, I know. But it wasn't even my idea!). We came home with some neat things and we had a DELICIOUS meal at UNO's!

Then on Sunday we went to the Rebecca St. James concert! One word...WOW! All of us went and Katie's friend came too. I was wondering what kind of show it would be since it was in the gym of the Boys and Girls Club. You know, would they have all the fancy lights, the cool stage, the really great sound system? They had it all! It was so professional! Rebecca St. James came out after a wonderful young artist named Vicky Beeching. She started off nice and loud! It was cool to be part of the crowd while everyone was jumping up and down and getting into the music! She really knew how to get the crowd involved! We were right up front standing at the barrier between the stage and the crowd! Awesome!

Then after a short break Delirious came out. I don't know their music very well but they put on such a great show that it didn't matter! I wish I could adequately describe what it's like to be in a room filled with a couple thousand people who are all worshiping God! There's nothing like it. Then to hear these Christian artists pray for a revolution in the hearts of believers and even read from their bibles to the crowd. It may sound like some sort of bible study with music but it couldn't be any further from that! It was SO COOL! Katie loved it!! So did her friend! So did Ed, and Becky, and Allison!! We all did! It was just about the coolest event we've gone to as a family and lets face it, there aren't too many rock concerts that you can attend with your whole family! Katie even won an autographed electric guitar!!! It was signed by all the performers!

The promoter of the concert goes to our church and so, many of the help for the show came from our church. We go to a very cool church. I hope there are more concerts on the way. This one was such a success that maybe it will pave the way for more artists to come!

One other great part of the concert was when Rebecca St. James spoke about Compassion International. It's a christian organization where you can sponsor a child. Read about it by clicking the link. Our family decided to sponsor a 7 year old boy from Ghana. I can't wait to write to him and get a letter back! The girls are pretty excited about it. Ed and I figured it would open the eyes of our children to some of the needs in the out stretching parts of the world and would allow us as a family to make a difference in the life of a child who lives in the midst of SO much poverty. I'm excited about this opportunity. Check it out. And maybe you could sponsor a child too!

What a Difference a Day (or two) Makes!

So here's the scene Wednesday afternoon. It was almost 70 degrees and sunny! Perfect. Allison reassembled the snowman in the front yard. Trust me, there was an entire three section snowman here originally...


Katie and Becky played some ball! Notice the short sleeves and the DISGUSTING black snow pile behind Katie.

Now, here's the scene from this morning. Ed is snow blowing about a foot of snow!

Katie and Allison are playing in the big snow pile at the end of the driveway which is now pure white instead of BLACK!

And Becky is shovelling away on the front porch, where on Wednesday she and Allison were blowing bubbles! Ahhh...winter (?) in New England!

On a TV note; When is America going to wake up and stop voting for Sanjaya on American Idol!?!? The boy is so sissyish I find it difficult to watch him! Perhaps I'm jealous of his hair...NOT! Haley needs to go too! I LOVE Lakisha for the girls and Blake for the guys!

LOST...So Clare and Jack are half siblings, hmmm... And Jack is making nicey nice with the others, hmmm... I think John has a dark side which is being revealed oh so slowly. We'll see.

Amazing Race All Stars... Now the Rob and Amber have been eliminated who will I like!!?? Maybe Uchenna and Joyce.

Tomorrow night Rebecca St. James and Delirious are coming to town. Katie and I are going. Should be a good concert. Katie's friend and her mom are going too.

I made a yummy dinner the other night that even Allison scoffed down! I'll post it soon.

Birthday Pictures

Pictures from Allison's birthday...

Here she is...all smiles (perched on the coffee table!)

This is the cake I made for the party we had with Allison's friends. She saw this cake in a picture from Becky's 4th birthday and decided she wanted one just like it!

This is the other cake I made for when my parents came down. I love the smile on her face as she gets ready to blow out the candles. Notice she is wearing rainbow wings! Barbie and the Magic of the Rainbow is becoming her new thing.

Here she is 'cleaning' her new dog from Build a Bear with Memere and Pepere looking on.

I took this one outside of Build a Bear. One of the advantages of being at the mall early on a weekday is that I didn't feel too ridiculous taking a picture in the mall!

And this one I put in here because it's so cute. We got Lucy a crab to play with and she looks so funny when she carries it around like this. She LOVES stuffed toys!

Allison's Birthday!

Allison is four years old. I can hardly believe it. She's fun, imaginative, silly, charming, joyful, and beautiful. For all the fits the child gives me she also brings such happiness to our lives. Happy Birthday Sweet Allison.

We had a fun and busy birthday weekend. Last Friday we started with a party for some of Allison's friends. We had six preschoolers here for cake, ice cream and presents. What a fun time she had until her friend Lauren made her mad and she smacked her. You read right, Allison smacked Lauren! Thankfully she apologized and no one was any worse for the wear!

Then on Saturday my folks came down and we had more cake, ice cream, and presents. Then we all (I mean ALL, my folks included) sat at the table for about an hour and played with Play Doh! That stuff is addicting! I bought a huge 24 pack of play doh and she got some for her birthday so we had TONS of it to play with!

Monday was Allison's actual birthday so of course we had to do something to acknowledge it! So my parents and I took her to Build a Bear at the Holyoke Mall in Springfield, because that's the closest Build a Bear to us. It's about an hour away. She picked out a really cute dog to 'blow up' as she calls it. Then we went to Friendly's for lunch where we had a super sweet waitress who rounded up a crew to sing Happy Birthday to Allison when they brought out her sundae. The WHOLE restaurant sang to her! And then EVERYONE in the place clapped for her too! It was so cool. I think I enjoyed it more than she did!! I think she felt really special, until we went to Penney's and she sat in a tippy, child sized patio chair and fell over. She hit her head on a square pole and ended up with a HUGE goose egg and even a small cut! So for the rest of the day all she talked about was how she got a big boo boo on her birthday!

And if that wasn't enough birthday celebrating, yesterday at her school they had cupcakes and sang to her one more time! I will post pictures later. Blogger is not cooperating - SHOCKER!

Now life is back to normal and I now have a 12 year old, a 7 year old (for another 3 1/2 weeks) and a 4 year old! I'll enjoy the break between birthdays, but I'm already making mental plans for Rebecca's party! Her birthday is the day after Easter this year.

A Question for YOU!

I've been sitting here for a few minutes thinking I should post something and not feeling like I have anything to say. Interesting, I know. Me, with nothing to say... Usually I can come up with something.

How about a question for you to answer!?

You're stranded on an uninhabited island in the south Pacific. Who's one person or what's one thing you'd want to have with you?

For me it would be Bear Grylls from Man vs. Wild! He's like MacGyver. The guy could either get us rescued or keep us alive indefinitely!