Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
You know the rest,
But my Honey is the best!
After lunch, I had my kids reading quietly at their desks and/or on the rug. Suddenly, two middle school students enter the classroom and make a beeline for my desk. On it, they purposefully place a tall glass cylinder. My students and I look at each other. I give them a shrug, and they respond with an anticipatory giggle. At this point, I'm thinking that the middle schoolers want to show me a super-cool science experiment in preparation for the upcoming Science Bowl since they had left a tiny yet bright, orange post-it, which read:
Hold on please. Another seventh grader enters with the familiar blue water bottle that Mr. Woo recently received. He craftily pours the water into the (what I thought was at the time) large beaker. And so it began.
The sheepish students, one at a time, brought foliage and baby's breath. They were then followed by a long and steady trail of teenage students who individually brought in a single red roses - my favorite. Each richly luxurious stem was blooming much excitement in E101. There was squealing. There was yippee-ing. There was jumping. There was running and rushing. My kids were exuberant with ecstasy. It must have been too much for the middle schoolers because the grin they entered with quickly left their face upon their exit. Then there was me. I knew who was up to this kind of something and I loved every bit of it!
After a few roses made their way onto my desk, my third graders caught on to the pattern. A pod of them peered out the door to announce where the wiser fish were swimming out of, "Mrs. Woo, they're all outside under the stairs!" shouting out their predictions of who was behind the scheming, "It's Mr. Woo! I see Mr. Woo!" While I let the Peeping Toms proceed, the other side of the room was shouting their commentary of, "Mrs. Woo, you're so popular!" and "This is the best day
ever!" and the like. It was spectacular fun, and the juxtaposition of my kids' energetic excitement and the older students' demure display of emotions was like peanut butter jelly.
After the dozen roses trickled in, Mr. Woo popped his head in to say Happy Valentine's Day. Using the students to surprise me? Perfect.
Before we married, he mentioned that he had wanted to have students help in proposing (something like holding signs/letters to spell out "Will you marry me?"), but it didn't work out since he proposed after summer school ended and before the new school year. The seventh graders aren't cutesy, giggly kids but it was adorable nonetheless. Husband, you are genius!
You even made me think the two roses you had sent in the morning (MS fundraiser?) via students was my gift. You are getting quite sneaky... (and plastering a big smile on this very happy wife with all these flowers!)
Afterward, even though the older kids were late to Science (no worries, Mr. Woo wrote them all an excused tardy pass), we took time to take a picture with the kiddos. My students were long since reading their books, and were now waving at me with ear-to-ear grins. So I called them all out so we could take a group picture. Cute, huh?
After my version of Lady and the Tramp for pre-Valentine's Day, Mr. Woo said some mumbo-jumbo about not being able to top it. I went my merry way thinking that'd be fine since I'm the creative side of our unit. I was convinced of this when he was watching another "Linsane" moment unfold on his laptop in the kitchen while preparing dinner and announcing that our meal would be later than planned. And if I had any smidgen of a doubt that it'd be anything impressive, the smoke alarm going off drove it away.
Restaurant quality food with superior service, at a fraction of the cost. Selah ended up napping and let us enjoy our meal instead of reaching for our plates and putting the tablecloth in her mouth! I'm all for making this an annual tradition. :)
