Count Your Many Blessings

Math class has not been as horrible as I thought it might have been since we have it for 7 hours a day for four days straight.  Our teacher Helen has been a fountain of knowledge with great ideas of integrating math concepts with exciting projects and cross curriculum concepts and lessons.  The first fun project that we did as a class was make tapa clothes.  We took this brown paper and created an image using measurement involving a grid for the base of our picture.  Then we created Pacifica or Maori symbols and designs.  After we sketched out our design we traced the parts we wanted black with a sharpie.   Next we “screwed up” or crumpled the paper to give it creases and a softer hide look.  We then took our paper and ironed out some of the major folds.  After Helen put out a red dye that we spread across our entire artwork.  Once the dye dried we bleached out any part of our art that we wanted black.  With everyone’s unique designs we discussed symmetry, patterns, translations, reflection, cultural patterns, measurement, and a few other math concepts that could be discussed with our own future classes.  This was one of my favorite art projects that I have ever completed.  

We also did a yummy graphing activity with some m&m like candies called Pebbles.  They're not quite as good but it's chocolate!  Diana and I did a pretty great job with this project!

On our final day of math class we discussed some great ideas of small thinking groups and different leveled tasks and activities. 

But in the middle of class we took a ½ hr break for a newspaper fashion show!  We were broken up into a few groups and we were given a little string, newspaper, 4 sheets of colored paper and tape to create a New Zealand outfit.  I got to model our group’s lovely Maori dress we created!  We made a grass skirt on bottom with a couple ankle bracelets.  On top we added some orange and yellow designs.   Completing the outfit was a head band with a feather and two poi  balls that I spun around as I walked the run way! 

This evening was a warm, windy, BEAUTIFUL night!  I made Christine walk with me to the park so we could take it all in.  It was a full moon and I felt like the moon was so close we could touch it.  The lights from the city glowed as the thick clouds were beginning to cover the sky.  I can't describe in words the night and give it justice and my camera struggled capturing the moment, but here's my attempts.

Tonight I also had the special opportunity to go with Phyllis to visit her “adopted” son and his family.  Over the past eleven or so years Phyllis has been very close with a young man, Abrahim, who is now 30 years old and married to a beautiful Indonesian women.  Abrahim and his wife both call Phyllis, mum, because she is the closest thing to family that they have in their lives right now.  They have one small boy named Hood, just over a year old, with big beautiful brown eyes, and a baby girl due by the end of the month.

 I didn’t get all the details but what I learned a little bit about the life that Abrahim has experienced that has not been an easy one.  His father died before he was born.  His mother tried to best provide for her small son while she was servant to a family living in Yemen.  His mother died while when Abrahim was only 6 months old.  The family his mother was a servant to kept him in their household.  To any visitors that came by the family he was proclaimed to be their adopted son, but in reality he was worked as a slave.  He eventually escaped and in 1991 he made his way to New Zealand.   He is now a Taxi Driver doing his best to try and provide for his family.  It made me realize that there are so many people in this world that are still in slavery and struggling on their own to make ends meet and survive in this world.  I know that I have been blessed with more than my fair share of life blessings and comforts.

Anyways I got the chance to go visit this family with Phyllis while they were moving into their new home.  They were in a tiny apartment and they just bought their first house.  It is the kind of house that is split in half, and they share the other half of the house with someone else.  I forget what that kind of house is call.  But the house is a very humble one.  The neighborhood is a bit run down and old.  There is a lot of fix up needed.  But I could tell that they were happy and excited to have their own place.  As I helped move their final possessions from his trailer into the home, put together the crib, and hang up curtains they were continuously thanking me.  What grateful people they were.  The whole experience was such humbling opportunities to get a glimpse into the lives of people that I would not normaly have the blessing of getting to know.  But I know that I am a better person for getting to meet and spend time with them.   Even though they are not members of the church they had such a sweet spirit in their home.  I know how much heavenly father cares about this family and that they can be happy despite the humble circumstances that they live in.  And it made me realized that I need to make sure that I would be able to do the same.  I need make sure that I could be happy without my material possessions, that I depend on and feel are so important.  I also need to make sure that I never complain about not having enough.  I am so blessed.