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July 01 Wandering Mercer ArboretumOver the past few years, several people had told me good things about Mercer Arboretum in Humble. I was curious and wanting to take photos today so I looked up their website and decided that I would go and see it for myself. It is an awesome nature center and botanical garden. I arrived in time to follow several groups of day care kids in matching t-shirts around the botanical garden. In the first few minutes I saw a rat snake at least 3 feet long. He was desperately trying to get away from the kids. Following the kids for 15 minutes was enough! I decided to head over to the west side and follow trails. A bonus decision! There were no children on the west side; it was much more quiet, serene and shady. Not as many flowers to film, but a great variety of trees and some decaying wood with bracket fungus. I can't wait to go back and bring Zachary with me. He would have such a great time taking pictures with his camera. If you are curious to see some of the things that caught my eye; check out the following URL for my photo album http://picasaweb.google.com/Fay.Watson/MercerArboretum?feat=directlink June 25 raining, so I said it would be over in a half hour... I love being wrong sometimes! "We could go swimming," I said. "What about the thunderstorm building up over here?" was Em's reply. I didn't think it would be long, I predicted it would blow over in less than an half hour! So! Once again I am wrong. AND this instance makes me very happy. We need the rain desparately. It has been so dry here this year. More like the desert than coastal prairie. No swimming will take place for at least a half hour from now (the thunder keeps rumbling). Thank you to whoever arranged this wonderful rain storm on my birthday and just for me! June 24 Time at the Pool - Swimming or Not Swimming Pool Time! Everyone likes the idea of going to the pool, the thought is really popular on a hot day and lots of people actually visit our neighborhood pool. More children show up to take advantage of the pool than adults. Most people lay out in the sun, they sit and read books and magazines, they float while others cavort with their children. Amazing as it seems to me, I think this is true. What most people do not tend to do at the swimming pool is swim! Very few people actually swim, swim laps, swim deliberately from one end to another. I wonder why? June 22 Happy Father's Day to a Great Father Everyone has a father, my father was a good man. I am lucky enough to be married to a good man. He is a great father. He is supportive, loving and attentive to the needs of his family. There is rarely a time when he isn't thinking about what he can do for his family. My husband is perhaps a one in a million dad. He doesn't take time off for himself. He is always thinking about us. What makes a great dad? Well, in my opinion it is some of these traits I have just discussed in addition to some others. A role model that is hard working, sensitive and caring. A man that volunteers to do jobs that others won't do. A person who is selfless and giving. I could go on and on, but I don't think I need to. I just want to say... Happy Father's Day and I love you to David Watson! June 04 Enrichment School will soon be out for the summer! Our schedule will go lax and the children will lose some focus. I am planning some reading, hiking, and visits to some museums with the boys. I am sure we will find time to hang out at the pool too! Jon will be stretching his mind, studying for academic decathlon. Ross got a job at the local movie theater. Zachary will hopefully keep busy with swimming, reading and studying the French revolution with Jon. I know that the summer months will go quickly, I am just sorry that we don't have more scouting activities lined up. Once we settle on a new troop them perhaps that will change. For now, I want to make sure that we don't slip into an easy existence of no intellectual challenge. We all need that stimulation to keep our brains working at a high level. June 02 Time Management Our 11 year old has been playing a time management game all year long. He saves a bit of homework to do in the half an hour after he gets ready in the morning. This strategy has been working for most of the year. BUT he hasn't learned how to judge timing for bigger projects. So, he had a project to work on this six weeks. He claims that most of his classmates were copying and pasting definitions straight from websites. He was determined to read all of Edith Hamilton's Greek Mythology (he has read several other Greek Mythology anthologies as well in the last year) and write his own definitions. He thought what he had left could be accomplished in 2 hours. Alas! He was wrong. I think this is an important lesson for him to learn, 6 hours of work later he still hasn't finished it. He has almost completed 6th grade, so nothing earth shattering is going to occur if he gets a bad grade on this assignment. The most important thing that he is getting out of this asssignment is not knowledge about mythology. Instead he is learning an important time management lesson, he says that he has learned that he should start earlier and work on something like this when he knows there is extra time, for instance during all his playtime this past weekend. So, the mom and me is very proud of him. I'll keep you posted on his time management skills, because I am sure that next year will be filled with projects and assignments! June 01 Encouragement WorksTim Liston's sermon about encouragement helping to keep the Church rooted works for other groups also. When things aren't going well within a group, some encouragement and acknowledgement that things could be improved on would go a long way to making people feel better about the situation. Having a good attitude and leaving personal feelings and problems out of the group effort would go a long way to improving group efficiency and effectiveness. Adults have a hard time doing this and role modeling good behaviors. Some friends have asked about our disassociation with a certain group. I have been steadfast in not saying anything directly critical of the adults involved in our disagreement about my freedom of speech, or about the group as a whole. So, in the end my boys are affected, they are a casualty of my expressing my criticism of a certain event and its resolution in my private blog. There are several adults involved within this group who have chosen to be unfriendly, discourteous, and unkind. I refuse to stoop to their level. I will not mirror their behavior in public or private. Pastor Tim talked about reconciliation as a way to improve a group. I am a afraid in some cases reconciliation is never possible because not everyone is BIG enough to accept their own culpability and to work to improve their character. I know my weaknesses, I know where I erred, so I know that I can avoid being in this position in the future. I just hope that others aren't hurt by this group in the way that my family has been. May 29 Our Teen Pregnancy Rate is What?!?!?According to the Texas Department of State Health Services website the following are some of the alarming facts of Teen Pregancies... and unfortunately 2006 data ranks Texas 3rd in the nation for teen pregnancies http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/28538524/! It is time to consider changing our attitudes about sex education. What we are doing is not working! How Often Does a Teenager in Texas Get Pregnant?
What are the Outcomes?
We should all care about this because of the health and social consequences... visit http://www.dshs.state.tx.us/famplan/tpp.shtm for more information. May 28 Celebrating the end of the School Year In today's shrinking world our children are falling behind the rest of the world academically. We should be alarmed at how poorly we are preparing the next generation for the "new" world economy. Instead of looking at solutions to this problem we all start planning our summer vacations, forgetting that summer is 3 months that our children lose the most ground. To thwart that reversal in academic growth, think about some enriching activities you can add to your summer. When you fill your beach bag or day pack add some family reading material! Visit a local science, history or art museum, take a hike in a nature center, or visit a state park. Spend time outdoors and enjoy the fresh air, but remember to feed your children's minds too! May 27 Should I Apologize?Now isn't that an enticing title? Hmmm I wonder what it said to you? What were you thinking when you read the title and why did you continue to read this entry? Were you hoping for some deep dark confession, or a further baring of my soul? Since it is rare that anyone actually leaves any comments, I doubt if I will get any answers to any of these questions. If I owe you an apology then please consider it done, whatever offense I commited I am surely very sorry by now. What I was really thinking needed an apology was the awful blog entry I wrote the other day. I just reread it and thought to myself wow that is terrible! It was random words and just plain BAD! So.... to those of you who actually read it, I am so very sorry! May 26 Sunny Day, Keeping the Clouds Away! Words.... tone, mood, temperature, coloring, setting, sitting, reading, writing, drawing Sorry, this entry has nothing to do with sunny days, although writing words often helps keep me in a better mood. May 22 Shout out to Texas City, TexasTexas City allowed us to use their main park for our Learning for Life Outdoor Experience this past week. Their team of workers (from different departments) did a great job setting up tables, garbage cans, chairs, filling our water coolers and bringing out enough port-o-potties to support a group of 400 children coming through the park every day. I think the cleaning crew had a pleasant surprise. The children who participated in this event did a great job cleaning up after themselves. There were water bottles forgotten at every station but the participants put their trash in the proper receptacles. One of the schools had transportation issues, they had no room in their budget to pay for school buses. A local transportation company Connect Transportation (?) came to the rescue. InvestmentAt yesterdays Learning for Life Outdoor Experience a black father was accompanying his son's Community in Schools group from LaMarque. He was the only parent volunteer with his group. It was great seeing him involved with his son's group. I asked him why he was there and he said something that every parent, no matter their race, needs to hear. He said parenting was like everything else in life, if you want it to pay dividends then you have to invest in it. He feels like investing his time in his son is going to help his child be successful. AND he is right, research has shown that parent involvement is the number one predictor of student success. So, I would like to challenge all parents to spend some time with their child and show them that you think that learning and school are important! May 20 Learning for Life Outdoor Experience Having a Great time helping with the Learning for Life Outdoor Experience! It is still going on tomorrow, so I won't say where, but I do want to share this event with you. This program has been brought to these school in conjunction with Community in Schools. This is the children's reward for participating all year. We are providing a fun and educational day for the participants. I pulled together a session on Habitats that includes a game where each child becomes an animal, finds its habitat and then has to figure if that animal could survive in another habitat if something happens to its habitat. So far the game has worked great at all grade levels. Over the last year, I have used it with children kindergarten through 9th grade. You have to help the kindergarteners more, but they really do get the point! We have to take care of the habitats that exist today. If we don't the world will be a "poorer" place for future generations! May 17 Faith in Scouting Despite our recent conflicts with some adults in the Scouting program my faith in the program has been some what restored by scouts. Ordeal candidates come in different packages. Some are more than willing to let others do the labor and profit from it. Some work harder than others. Others don't like to be idle and find more work to do. These are the boys that restore my faith in the scouting program. I still find myself doubting the sincerity of some of the adults. There are always plenty of adults that are willing to supervise, and watch over others. The one's who will roll up their sleeves and do extra work without anyone asking are a rare breed. I wonder if there is link between the boys who step up and the adults who step up? Apparently to some degree it runs in families. May 14 Politics and the Housewife I don't like "playing" politics, apparently I am not good at holding my tongue, or my keyboard. So, I don't want a position of power, I want to stay in the background and be the encourager, the helper. If you want to know my opinion about something you are going to get the good, the bad and the ugly. I can be politically correct. AND there are definitely situations in which this is not only prudent, it is necessary. BUT do you want me to hold back from telling you my perspective on a subject because it makes you uncomfortable? If so stand back because I have vowed to not hide, if you don't ask I might not tell. I can't promise but I will try to curb my tongue, my keyboard. There is one thing that I want to stand up and tell everyone... there is value in being a housewife and putting in a lot of effort into child rearing, and my brain still works! Jackie Kennedy said "if
you bungle raising your children, I don't think whatever else you do matters
very much." So watch out here Fay comes....I am still thinking about my vision of me in the future. I have been happy being the wife of and mother of.... I want to impact and make a difference in the community at large. I have decided to follow Texas politics, local politics and maybe improve my corner of the world. I agreed to be the Area 10 PTA legislative action chair. I really want to make a difference, perhaps to influence others and encourage other PTA members to play a role in the political process. I do not want to convince anyone that my view is the correct view of the world, instead I want to present information (data) and persuade you to think about the issues before you make up your mind. I will always try to open minded and look at the world with unbiased eyes. I hope that others can do this too. May 13 one task done, but feeling no relief One would hope to feel relief after accomplishing a task. Lining out the task at the top of the list, just leaves a myriad of tasks that climb up in ranking! I was hoping that I would feel some sense of accomplishment, but my mind is already thinking about how to accomplish the next thing on my list. I need to polish my training on VISION. That entails me thinking more about my personal vision and the goals I need to set to make that vision a reality. As a middle aged wife and mom that is not easy. Hmmmm maybe I can procrastinate and work on the next task down on the list.... do laundry, arghhhhh that isn't any fun! May 11 A Compliment a Day Helps Keep the Doctor Away Okay, a compliment a day probably won't keep the doctor away. In fact, saying that might be a real stretch, but it is something that can really make a difference to someone's mental well being! A little encouragement can brighten the day and change someone's attitude for the day. Not to mention how it makes you feel to think and say good things about others. All positive, happy thoughts effect your attitude too, so say something nice or even stretch a bit and doing something nice and unexpected for someone right away! May 10 Mother's Day Outing A road trip to hike, and not quite according to our plan... so a car tour of Clear Lake and then we were on the way to Challenger Park. Who knew that Armand Bayou didn't open until noon on Sunday? We didn't! We arrived at the gate around 9:30AM and it was closed. So we toured UHCL, drove down to Saturn and across to NASA Parkway. We zipped over to Challenger Park. After a coating of sunblock and liberally application of DEET we went hiking. We found lots of mosquitoes and ripe blackberries. Zack whined about mosquitoes about 69.75% of the time we were hiking. I didn't know that a Boy Scout couldwhine so much! We chose Dairy Queen for brunch .... The Chocalate Brownie Sundae Waffle Bowl is very good! Don't know what else is store for me today, I think it will involve reading the latest Percy Jackson book because Jon and Zack have finished it. May 08 Lower GroundNot really going to post anything about being low or lower, just thought the title would balance the higher ground piece. Enough griping for me, it is time to move on and be more upbeat. I will probably slip backwards once in a while, but that is okay. I am only human, at least the last time I checked I wasn't immortal, and definitely not without faults. Check back in on my blog in a few days and see what I am thinking about. See Ya around! |
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