Elementary schools are getting fancy!

Stop number two of the tour: Williamston Elementary in Williamston, MI. This school was amazing!! The kids were awesome!! - Great audience, excellent participation, lots of good feedback, and really really good questions.

At the last school we were at, the mascot was a puppy and the kids had a BARK song (Be safe, appropriate behavior, responsibility, and kindness)! We thought that was super cute and had it stuck in our heads...UNTIL...we went to Williamston and were introduced to the appreciation clap which we are now obsessed with (two knee slaps, two claps, two snaps and two finger guns with a nice "YEEEAAAAHHHH") - I'm tellin' ya, you learn something new everyday :)

SOUL is rapidly improving everyday in every aspect - group dynamics, presentation skills, creativity, and musically as well. My part of the presentation has also gone swimmingly thus far - no complaints or horribly embarrassing life moments as of yet.

This time around my host families home is in East Lansing right across the street from the MSU campus...familiar surroundings! Connie and Richard are my host parents and Zuleika is with me this time!! We have a super cute guest bedroom that reminds me of being in a vacation cottage ( I will add pictures in a later post) - and our host parents are awesome once again :) So welcoming, and Connie is an excellent chef if I do say so myself. I think the kitchen here could appear on the food network and fit in just fine.

Our newest inside joke that is not an inside joke because we tell everyone, comes from Steve's song called Mitata. "Mitata" is something on Rapa Island that is a snail, but it's not a snail, but it looks like a snail...and as Connie says, it is "snail-ish". We cannot figure out the english translation for this peculiar little sea creature and so it has become a very light hearted and funny part of our presentations.  And now the cool thing to do is say, "It sounds like english, but it's not english, but it's spoken just like english", or "It looks like pepsi, but it's not pepsi, but it tastes like pepsi"...and you get the idea!

My driving, that's not my driving, that seems like my driving, scared the singers a little bit today during rush hour traffic. I have Steve in the back seat shouting "my mom loves me!" and I shout back "my mom loves me too!". But of course this craziness is caused by other drivers on the road who are highly UNDER-qualified to have a valid license. :)

The singers are rehearsing at my host home right now...it's like live entertainment and/or listening to the best CD you've ever heard, all the time! I love it. They are officially like my children. I am always worrying about them, and I beam with happiness every time I watch them perform :-D

Also our host family has a son who is the master brewer at a local Michigan beer brewery, and they have one of a kind beer for us to try with dinner tonight, so that should be exciting!

This entry is very all-over-the-place I realize, but I am just trying to highlight all of the most exciting parts of the past couple days.

Today at Williamston, we all felt like celebrities. The kids and their parents all wanted to take pictures of us and with us and they wanted our autographs! It was so cute - and people think famous people get sick of that....I don't know about that! I think I could get used to it, hehe

I am missing my friends of course - my roomates - and driving past MSU's campus this morning seeing people on their way to class kind of made me miss college! And of course, I miss you mom and dad and CHARLIEEEEEEE (and Kiki and Bob I guess)!

I got teary eyed today like a mother would - as the singers were performing at an all-school assembly this morning a 5th grade boy came up to the stage to borrow the microphone - and announced in front of the whole school, and to Makly in particular that he and his classmates raised over $1,000 for Haiti disaster relief. It was so sweet - Thank you Williamston Elementary!! As SOUL has become like a little family now - we all appreciate the thoughtfulness very much.

I have a head-ache now - I think from hunger/tired...these loooooooong days will take some more getting used to, but I will gladly get used to them, because I LOVE THIS JOB!

Tata for now.

Cheers! Jackie