I'm Thankful for ... Tired Feet the Caveman!

How am I thankful?  Let me count the ways...

First of all, I am uber excited about my little authors.  Sure, I miss Units of Study something fierce, but when it comes down to it, teaching the craft is teaching the craft.  I have some artful little kiddos.  Enter Exhibit A of my thankful list:

"Once there was a caveman named Tired Feet, and as you guessed, he had tired feet.  He is the caveman who invented the car.  He was an ordinary caveman with ordinary duties, except his best friend Bonzo discovered fire, and his Triceratops was named after his hero Fred Flintstone.  One day, Tired Feet was playing with Fred and he walked into Bonzo.  "Careful, you might burn yourself"said Bonzo.  Tired Feet thought, "Burn? Bad?"  Bonzo told his best friend that he discovered fire. "No touch.  Fire hurt" said Bonzo.  Tired Feet nodded and left.

While walking Tired Feet said, "Me want buy rock."  Back then, hair was money.  Tired Feet was rich so he bought the most expensive one.  It costed 3 clumps and it looked like a flat cylinder. He bought four rocks.  When he was asleep, Fred the triceratops put on on each horn.  When Tired Feet woke up, he thought that Tri had broken them and kicked him out.  He made the last one a hole.  Then he got a lightbulb over his head.  He got his 5 foot 2 inches rock, carved 2 holes in it, got a long cylinder rock, and put the long cylinder in the holes.  Next thing you know, he's selling them, and now you know Henry Ford didn't invent the car."

Ok, beyond the fact that Henry Ford was responsible for the assembly line and not necessarily the inception of automobiles, let's just say that I am a little smitten by this creative little tale.  ONE.  MORE.  DAY.  One more day until a turkey, sleep, and shopping-filled break!   Happy Dance!!!!!

Seriously though, I love unexpected moments like this story... and another unmotivated spontaneously motivated student who recently wrote a seven-pager.  He claims he was bitten by the writing bug and that it's my fault.  I just LOVE sharing my excitement about reading and writing with my thirdsters... and if that means that they catch just a little smidgen of that illness, I'm okay with sharing my "germs" or "bugs" or whatever else they want to call it.  :)  Cooties maybe?

At any rate, I am so thankful for a job that I LOVE.  Sure, sometimes it's a challenge, and sometimes I feel like I'm on a treadmill, but at the end of the day, I can't imagine doing anything else.  Teaching is totally a calling... and you know we don't do it for the money!!!  Ha!

I'm also thankful for God's never-ending grace, my wonderful husband, my rascal pups, my family, my friends & co-workers, my new forever home, my bloggy buddies, my fantastic followers, TpT, chocolate, Ann Taylor Loft, Modern Family, my new guilty pleasure New Girl (because I might be a little lot like Jess), and about a bajillion other things.  In all seriousness, God has blessed me in totally unfathomable ways over the past few years.  I used to feel like the walking billboard for Murphy's Law, but fortunately all of the puzzle pieces have started to fall into place for me.  My life may be far from perfect, but I have no doubt that I am exactly where I am supposed to be right now, and for that, I am thankful.  :)  Happy Turkey Day friends!  Thanks for continually inspiring me to keep improving my instruction, and thanks for always providing me with feedback on my own lessons.  I am so very grateful for our collaborative "family"!   I know I am being a rule-breaker with my format, but I hope you all forgive me.  This is all I can muster.  After all, I'm not on break yet.  You'll have to take it easy on me!!!   I can't narrow my favorite blogs down to three of them anyway!!!!

It's not too late! Join my sweet friends at What the Teacher Wants... and share what you're thankful for! :)