Happy Birthday Joe!

A very Happy Birthday to you Joe! I hope you know how much you mean to this family, and how much we appreciate you. Thank you for all you do.

Remember this photo?- seems like yesterday.....

In a nutshell.....

What do I have to say that would sum up the week and the girls right now?

-Maddie has joined the choir, still begs daily to be home schooled, sometimes complains about going but still loves swimming once she is there, mostly plays nicely with but still will psychologically torment her sister when the opportunity arrises, seems to be reading even faster now -reads one to two books a day depending on the book and the day.

-Ellie is coming across personality issues in the classroom that she is attempting to mediate (the boy with the bad behavior saying bad words- she is working on him), still loves school and Ms Baza, is very excited about the book fair next week at school, will now attempt to eat cafeteria food if what is listed doesn't look too offensive-but really is just as happy with a peanut butter sandwich, reads daily but not obsessively- she would actually rather have long drawn out conversations which are always entertaining :)

Kevin and I are the same. He is still tolerating work, even liking it at times I would guess- but you would have to ask him.

My work drives me slightly crazy- but I am pretty sure that is normal in the teaching field....I'll have to remember to ask Micki and Laura about that..... not to mention that Guam is a bit backwards about some things so that gives you the "one step forward, two steps back" feeling most days.

Ending on a happy note this week- they are rebuilding the burnt down hut in the courtyard at Southern High! Actually took this picture while I was on the phone with Julie- so nice chatting with you Julie! The new hut is being built because Chamorro day is coming (don't know what that is but I will keep you posted as I find out). A new hut seems like a small thing- but a positive thing...

What's Southern High up to now?

"A random search of Southern High School resulted in one male minor being taken into custody, the confiscation of drugs, and the entire campus being placed on lockdown. Acting Principal James Petitte made good on a promise he made to students by having police, corrections and customs officers come to the school to conduct a sweep for drugs.

Five teams of dogs swept the Santa Rita campus and found a 17-year-old student in possession of marijuana. The student evidently had hidden 8 sticks of marijuana in a potato chip bag stuffed into a pill bottle. Authorities also confiscated several marijuana pipes made out of pens.

Petitte says he is now recommending that the student be expelled, saying, "Southern High's a good school, these are wonderful young people. Unfortunately sometimes kids make bad choices, and when they're caught they're going to get dealt with like I said swiftly and effectively. So this is part of that process."

The male minor was released to his parents and will have to appear before the Juvenile Investigation Section at a later time."

Ya, and what that doesn't mention is that many teachers spent over an hour outside the gate parked in their cars waiting for the lockdown- one of those would be me.

Honestly, glad they had the drug dogs come through- anything to let the kids know that the school is serious about cracking down on the issues- just hope I get the memo next time so that I can be sure to bring more coffee with me :)

Day at home.

Nice day off.

By the time I got out of bed at 7am, the girls had already typed their letters to Santa. Can you believe kids now a-days? Letters to Santa done on the computer with fancy fonts, borders and clip art.....paper and pencil did us just fine growing up!

Here is what Maddie's looked like on my computer before printing it.....

.....and since we are out of various inks for my computer and Guam doesn't sell my ink, this is what Santa is ending up with.....
I am sure Santa won't mind, besides its still nice and its what the letter says that really matters anyway. We will be very thankful when the inks arrive....Grandpa Gillam is on it!

Ellie's Santa letter was very cute and she made snowflakes for Mr. and Mrs. Claus.

The girls had some nice down time at home (as seen by the dress-up photo at the beginning of the blog). We went out to breakfast and did some browsing at the Exchange- actually managed getting some Christmas shopping done. Also bought some sand castle making equipment for Ellie- she embarrassed me into it.....when I read on her blogging day that she was not liking using the kitchen equipment I really felt obligated.

The day ended at Gab Gab Beach with some snorkeling. We invited our friend Mike Thornton along. He was our neighbor in Panama City and is here without his family- they are coming for a month in December and we are excited to be seeing them! Mike loves snorkeling- he is actually the guy that has the eels living in his beach waters. Maddie was enthralled to have a fellow fish enthusiast along.

Because we went so late in the day- it was literally my best beach day yet! Cooler outside and high tide. I suggested to Kevin that we should go at this time all the time- he wasn't so big on that.

Ellie made a lovely sand castle with the new molds- of course I didn't bring a camera- I know right? I took a picture with my phone...so as soon as I figure out how to get that on my computer.......ya, I'll keep you posted.

Hope your day off is as unproductive as mine was- the one thing I wanted to do was put the Halloween stuff away.....I am thinking I will just wait a while longer and swap the Halloween things out for Christmas decorations!

Veteran's and Remembrance Day-Tomorrow

We are looking forward to a day off (we get our day off before you guys!). Madison and Ellie have been working to honor the "veterans" in their life.
Madison wrote a letter and a poem for Grandpa Gillam. Hopefully you can read them in these pictures Gene....sorry its her rough draft...

Ellie (doing her "peace out" pose in this photo) made a card for her Daddy.

Picture of his desk at work included....

We truly are thankful for the veterans in our family- and for all the others who fought for what they believed in. Happy Veteran's Day- and of course for my Candians I would like to wish you a peaceful Remembrance Day...... tomorrow.

Keeping Busy.

Sunday was, as usual, a catch all. Anything in the week not done will definitely have to be done on our Sunday, so it often turns into a mish-mash of chores. The one big job that was done (with many tears might I add) was clearing out some of the girls books and clothes. Books being very personal to Maddie are not easily parted with- but she did a very good job of clearing out some of the old and rearranging her shelves according to author and subject. What you see here is one of 3 set of shelves she has...

-but all to good use as she truly does reread books regularily (Bubby- she just reread yesterday the astrology sign book from her birthday shopping and one of her Shel Silverstein poem books). Ellie also did her shelves-with Mommy doing most of the arranging of books once they were thinned.

Ellie is reading Through the Looking Glass right now and is loving it- she is covering the first title in this picture because this book also has Alice in Wonderland in it- previously read and equally loved.

Clothes clearing out went well also. They were each able to thin out any of the outgrown or over worn clothes- so their drawers are now neat, and more important....they are close-able! Ever since I have had the girls being responsible for their clothes (wearing, putting in the laundry and putting away) their drawers suddenly don't slide shut properly - I wonder how that happens? Here is a finished example of the neat drawers....

Pretty nice eh? I think our clean out would even make Barb proud...

Thanksgiving is right around the corner. The girls have literally only 14 days of school in all of November- so many days off- and Thanksgiving is only two of those! Already shopping for Christmas- by the way Gene and Ann, Ellie was so sure you were coming for Christmas, I had to do my best to convince her you weren't.....broke her little heart :(

Ellie's class is already getting ready for Thanksgiving....

Ellie's turkey disguise?........a punk rocker dude. Very original.

Guest Bloggers- Mady and Ellie!

Mady here, yes, I’m the guest blogger. I decided to mostly write about the fish. If you want a variety you should go to Gab Gab, Haputo did not have as many fish. Anyway the picture below is a Greasy Grouper. The tiny blue one is called a Blue Box Fish. The blue starfish is, well a Blue Sea Star. Here are some pictures of coral… The fish that is very fuzzy that you can hardly see is a Singular Bannerfish. There’s me up above… there is Daddy’s arm down below… Some of the fish we didn’t get were, Harold’s Angelfish, Bullethead Parrotfish, and a Moorish Idol. Next time we will go to Gab Gab and I will try to get pictures of them for you!

Hope you enjoyed this guest blog.

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Hi, I am Ellie. I am writing about my sand castle. But if you have any sand castle equipment then I would be happy, because I don’t have any! I had to use baking equipment- a spoon, cup and a bin from the kitchen. The pond worked out well but the castle was small and I smushed it a lot. At the end Daddy smushed it. It was a very beautiful beach and I liked it because it had a lot of sand and water for me to use in the making of it. We got a really good picture of a very big lizard….we think it may be related to a monitor lizard! The sand castle turned out well….its going to be really fun looking at the pictures down below.

(look hard in this one to see the lizard)

From your guest blogger, Ellie- peace out :)