Suspensions, Science, and More

So let me start off by saying that I completely regret my misgivings about our new guy - he is better than anything I could have hoped for. This 14 year old kid is amazing. His mother had him when she was a teenager, he's been openly rejected by his father for his whole life, and he's been fending for himself since he was 8 or 9 so his mom could work full-time... Actually, he takes care of himself AND her, as she never really grew up. He is the most polite, tenderhearted kid I have met in a long time.

I had to suspend one of them last week. I was hoping it wouldn't come to that, but I knew it would because she has been increasingly horrible and defiant, and honestly I don't have a lot of options when it comes to consequences (if anyone has any creative ideas about effective consequences for teenage girls that an ultra busy, ultra alone teacher in a one-room schoolhouse can lay down, PLEASE share them). Seriously though, we have been going through Proverbs in our morning devotion time, and we keep coming across those "hell hath no fury" verses that I really think should be changed from directed at women to directed at teenage girls. They are the worst! I expect the usual catfights and squabbling and jealousies that are bound to occur when 6 teenage girls live together in VERY close quarters, but I forgot how downright cruel they can be! It's like they are in a neverending loop - never growing, never getting up over themselves. I keep hoping it will happen, but it hasn't yet. So - I made my first suspension. I doubt very much that it will have an effect on this particular one; but I am hoping it will at least have an effect on the other girls since I had to suspend her publicly, and everyone knows why. Here's hoping at least.

On the lighter side, we had our first Science Fair last night!!! It was a TOTAL hit- everyone LOVED it, and thought that my kids did great. I am so happy that it went well - we had it right after evening church, I had everyone be a judge, we had an ice cream bar, and then gave out awards - my sister Holly won Grand prize! Sunny won in one of the categories too - "Shows the most knowledge in their subject field" which was the field of mold, consequentially. Nice. I had a lot of fun categories to vote on, plus an add-your-own category which was the cutest. They got voted for things like "Most grossest" (love the grammar there) "Tastiest" (that was Holly, who had a smoothie bar set up at her display) "Most Truthful" (Heidi's project failed, and she admitted it- classic.) "Twinniest" (the title went to Amethyst and Amber, of course - Amethyst did her project on fingernails, Amber did hers on fingerprints) and then there were things added in like "they all deserve A+++, they are WAY smarter than me!" So I guess I'm pretty proud of them all. Pastor walked around explaining everything to some tourist couples that dropped by like a proud peacock, and then made a special trip over to the school to tell them all how proud of them he was. Pretty sweet.