Webkinz

So I teach 3rd grade, and I consider myself a pretty empathetic teacher. I feel that I have the ability to, at times, put myself in some size 3 shoes and remember what an 8 year old's life revolves around. But I was not prepared for this incident.

My kids are obsessed with Webkinz...China's attempt at creating consumers at a very early age. Their parents buy them a stuffed animal at the toy store, and this stuffed animal has a secret code that allows the child to log on to the Webkinz site and "play" with their stuffed animal online. They play games which earns them "webkinz money" that they can then use to furnish their pet's room, groom them, buy them clothes, enlist them in classes, and most importantly buy them food which is essential to their virtual survival. My kids all bring their Webkinz to school and play with them at recess, then go home at night and play with their virtual Webkinz at home. Seems innocent enough (even if I have some moral issues with teaching consumerism at such a young age).

Well... one of my students, Anna, who owns about five Webkinz (all with their own personalities and functions--the parrot helps her with her homework, the seahorse plays with her at recess, the koala bear sleeps with her at night, the fish eats lunch with her...etc.) is my most obsessed fan. The other day, we had indoor recess because it was pouring down rain outside. We normally don't allow the kids to use their laptops during recess, but that day we did because they'd been working hard all morning. Anna logs on to her computer and within five minutes is sobbing uncontrollably, attracting a small group of consoling students around her.

I call her to my desk to see what is wrong and she can't speak because she is sobbing so hard that she can barely breathe. Seriously, she is on the verge of hyperventilating, it's the kind of sob where you can barely catch your breath and you are snorting snot everywhere and don't care. I grab her a chair and have to spend about five minutes doing some deep breathing with her to get her to calm down enough to speak. When she is finally able to speak, I learn that she is very upset (still in tears, bouts of hyperventilation again...) because her Webkinz are all going to die tomorrow (more tears, cries get more intense) because they're all hungry and she doesn't have any money to feed them. I ask her how she gets money to feed them and she says that she has to play more games. I ask her why she doesn't just play some games and she tells me that (sobs escalate...) by the time she plays enough games, they'll all be (snot, tears, sobs) dead.

Now, I'm going to take a little side note here. I think most women will understand (which will always baffle men)....when we're upset about something, we like to just be heard and not be given "solutions".

"I'm so out of shape and my clothes don't fit anymore!"
Female response: "Yeah, I hate that, there's just never enough time to exercise, is there?"
Male response: "Then start running."
Which then makes us more upset because although we're being a bit irrational expecting our man to be coddling us, we just want our complaints to be valid, right?

Well, I believe that I finally found the portal to Mars... I had no idea how to respond to Anna's predicament, and I found myself reverting to rationality. I squared Anna's shoulders to me and said,

"Anna. Are your parents alive?" --Yes.
"Are your siblings alive?" --Yes.
"Do you have food at home?" --Yes.
"Do you have shelter, clothes?" --Yes.
"Do you have friends?" --Yes.
"Do you still have your stuffed animals?" --Yes.

"Then I need you to log off the computer and play something in this world. In this world, everything is okay, in fact, it's great--and it's not so great for a lot of people..."

After that she hugged me and within minutes was laughing and playing and forgot all about the death of her virtual friends.

I wonder if they have virtual funerals?

On a lighter note, Micah and I have our own virtual pet, which we have (even before this incident) lovingly named "Webkin." We have an outdoor cat (he had the history of peeing on everything indoor, so we only keep him outdoors) and he spends all day and all night sitting right outside our kitchen window. When we walk into the kitchen, he meows and if we put our hand to the glass, he starts purring and rubbing up against the glass as if we're actually petting him.

Perhaps I'm starting to understand the attraction of virtual pets. We get all the pleasure of having a pet without the fur, without the allergies, and without the peeing on everything. However, we do have to feed this one...

Happy Birthday, 80's Style

Last week it was Micah's birthday and I decided to throw her a surprise birthday party. (Perhaps I feel a little guilty for never being home!) She was completely surprised. She had no idea, it was pretty sweet. Anyway, Micah was born in the year 1980 so I threw her an 80's surprise party. Bart and I took her out for Indian Food (her favorite) to "celebrate her birthday". Meanwhile, everyone gathered in our little tiny house and waited. Bart drove down our driveway unusually fast and reckless to distract Micah from seeing the 15 cars parked behind our shed. She figured it out when we pulled up, but it was pretty darn sweet...

Everyone dressed in their 80's finest, we had Pac-Man Cake and went roller-skating. It was a hit. We all had quite a bit of fun.
I'm pretty pleased with the result. They got a little melty...I had to hide them in my car all day!
Micah's going for "girls just wanna have fun", while I'm going for the sophisticated and sexy real estate agent look.

What is it about those bad boys? Mmmm...

The King would have been pleased.

I'm thinking that MLK would have been pleased that I spent his birthday at one of the most gorgeous places on earth (Mt. Ranier)...with my favorite Pole (B), on a sunny and warm (50 degrees) winter day in Washington. Man, I love this place!

That's Mt. Adams in the background. Mt. Ranier is behind me..



So notice that there is absolutely no snow in the parking lot. It was such a beautiful, sunny day!



Bart is showing you just how much fun we were having.
(He has long arms=lots and lots of fun)

Mount "R" The peak is actually much farther away than it appears.

The white arrow shows our tracks--pretty fun! This was my second real backcountry snowboarding excursion. I love the snowboarding part...the hiking uphill--I'm still working on loving.

So we tried to make it all the way to Camp Muir, but the normal path was steep and icy so we couldn't make it without our ice axes. We actually watch two guys try it and they both almost fell pretty far. One lost his ski pole and had to hike down to get it, and the other fell and started sliding down--luckily he caught himself with his snowshoes before going too far.

Bottom Line. I love Washington. I think I'll stay here for a while!

Farm Girls

So, as most of you probably know, Micah and I recently started renting this cute farmhouse on 20 acres of land. Since we contacted the owner of the house and begged her to rent it to us, we were naturally in charge of cleaning it up and dealing with all the joys that come with owning (or renting) a very old home. This house was built in the early 1900's and has not been occupied for two years. Needless to say, much of the house still operates as it did in the 1950's...very limited and old (ungrounded) electrical sockets, single pane windows in great need of resealing, and many other joys.

So recently, Micah and I had toyed with the idea of getting a third roommate to help pay rent, and to keep each other company since we seem to have opposite schedules. We had talked with a few girls in our ward who loved the idea of living in a charming little farmhouse. When she came to see it, she was enamoured by the quaintness of the house and the way we had decorated it using both vintage and modern design. However, then came the real test.

















It had been a really cold morning, and by the time she came over, it hd started warming up. As soon as the sun came through the front windows, so did a herd of probably 100-200 lady bugs. Literally! They were crawling ALL over the windows and the walls, inside and out. I have no idea where they came from, but they were EVERYWHERE within minutes. I just laughed and kept doing what I was doing, and my friend squeamishly commented, "wow, you and Micah sure are farmgirls, eh?" Since she was getting so grossed out, I vacuumed them up (see the picture to the right) and within 30 minutes, they were back. In all their glory! Needless to say, she immediately started letting me know about some other housing opportunities she was also pursuing.

Today, I went into my bedroom to change before running to the store and found a tiny little salamander peering up at me from my dresser drawer. I guess we are farmgirls. Micah and I just laughed as we let our little friend outside. Who knows what we'll find next!

Big Bad

This year for halloween, Bart and I are dressing up as Little Red Riding Hood and the Big Bad Wolf. I'm pretty excited about the costumes--I'm making them and they're going to be pretty funny. In the meantime, I dressed Tosia as Granny for the Kirkland Wednesday Market dog costume contest. Although it didn't end up being a contest at all, I know that Tosia would have won. She got the most "ooohs and aaaahs" of any of the other dogs. Plus she's the cutest and the sweetest. She was rather upset with me for dressing her up, so I had to reward her with many doggie treats. Bart and I are running a 5K tomorrow in Costume, so I'll post some pictures.

Long Time

So I've avoided posting anything because I'm embarrassed that it's been so long since I've posted anything, and it would take me forever to update you all on what has been going on in my life, so I've decided to start fresh today and start posting as if you're all up to date on my life. I really think that is the easiest way that will create the least amount of catch-up anxiety for me.

Really, I have the most glamourous job...

So a lot has happened this week that convinces me that I have the most glamorous job there is. It has been a rough week because the weather has been a bit crazy. We had some major flooding on Monday, causing the power to go out for the last three hours of school on Monday. Between the weather and the power outages, I had two days in a row where I had no recess--the kids were inside (and crazy!) for recess those two days. So needless to say, on Wednesday, I was worn out and very envious of my recess time. So I'm sitting at my desk during recess and I have three students in my room reading silently, when Jack--my "starving" student pops his head in the door and says, "Miss Sharp, I need you out here..." with urgency in his voice. I'm so sick of dealing with stuff that I lazily ask him what he needs... he then tells me that he needs to go to the office right now! When I ask why, he says (from across the room so that every student sitting in the classroom can hear) "Miguel made me laugh to hard and I had an accident..." he walks into the classroom with his legs spread far apart...
Keep in mind that I teach 6th grade...? And that this kid is a pretty big 6th grader.
So, to add to the glamour. The next day, I dismiss my students first thing to go to Music class after unpacking their backpacks. When they are gone, I walk over by the backpacks and this is what I see sitting on the table next to the backpacks:




Now, does anyone else have a more glamorous job than me? I challenge you...