Janet's Blog

Years ago, when I first started teaching kindergarten at Trinity Lutheran School in Traverse City, Michigan, I taught my students this song:       Blue, blue sky, oh, I can see the sky.      God gave me eyes so I can see the sky. Blue, blue sky, in the fall, near the North Platte River. It was a great song, with a verse for each of the five senses. But this verse, at least, was dead wrong, because the sky in not always blue. In fact, in many locations, including northern Michigan, the sky is rarely blue. I wonder how many early childhood educators expect their students to color the sky blue, with a yellow sunshine in the corner, and maybe a few puffy, white clouds. And if you ask a class full of normal five-year-olds, will any be observant enough, and brave enough, to say that the sky is sometimes gray or black or orange, or any color except the expected blue? I don't remember when my thinking shifted, but by the time I was teaching preschoo...

It has been quite a summer throughout Nebraska, weather-wise, and the Panhandle is no different. Just in the last week, we have had three hailstorms, with golf ball- and even baseball-sized hail. The last storm was a doozy, pouring a torrent of rain, two inches in little more than an hour, and boasting winds of 90 miles per hour. Our yard and cars fared pretty well. My petunias and hollyhocks were flattened, but the petunias, at least, are looking much better already. The solar pool cover has quite a few holes in it, but that is easy, and relatively cheap, to replace. Victoria's Mini Cooper has only a couple of new dents, but our daughter, Meagan, wasn't so fortunate: her mini-van sustained thousands of dollars in hail damage while awaiting repairs at a local car dealership. Other people in Scotts Bluff County didn't come out well at all. Shattered windshields and dozens of dents are not covered by the liability insurance that is all so many younger people can afford. O...