Oh dear...oh deer

http://northwesternkiddies.blogspot.ca/2012/12/merry-christmas.html

It all began several months ago when my husband and I were walking into Target and I spotted them...every teacher's dream:  giant googly eyes. I immediately launched myself across the store and landed on them as though I were shielding a group of orphans from the blast of a grenade. As this wasn't completely unusual behavior for me, Brad only looked moderately embarrassed as he peeled me off of the ONLY remaining package of googly eyes in the entire store.

"What are you going to do with a giant pair of googly eyes," he asked tiredly, not thrilled to be spending three of his valuable dollars on what he doesn't necessarily view as "educational" material. I stared at him, dumbfounded. Who was this man? Didn't he KNOW me AT ALL?!? What WOULDN'T I do with a giant pair of googly eyes? Needless to say, I was NOT going to leave that store without them and was prepared to throw a great big ol' hissy fit, if necessary. Turns out, it wasn't necessary. Remember...this is the same man who constructed an R2D2 costume for his nearly 6 foot tall wife for Halloween. It may take some wheedling on my part, but he usually comes around to the creative genius that IS Amy Mosiman.

What WAS I going to do with a giant pair of googly eyes, I wondered, alone in my classroom, rubbing my hands together gleefully. Ah-ha! I dug out my December "Dear Future Amy" letter from last year.

                                                     

Dear Future Amy, (it read)

You are such a good-looking gal! Remember NOT to make cheese-string

 snowmen again next year because it gave you a big fat headache trying to 

hot glue on all their little hats. You also burned your fingers and cried a little. 

Also, if you ever run into a giant pair of googly eyes, grab them so you can 

make the deer decoration that you found for your classroom door.

So with giant eyeballs in hand, I wrestled a reindeer on my door. Perfect, I sighed.  Wrong. The first person walked by to admire my efforts. "Why is it upside down," she asked, twisting her head while I clenched my teeth, wanting to twist her neck. I explained the premise of my dim-witted deer to her.  The next person approached. "That's cute," she said while I beamed. "What IS it?" Was I going to need to add a captioned translation to my door? Three times a charm, I thought to myself as the next person came towards me. I braced for the worst. "Funny," my colleague nodded and my spirits soared. "But shouldn't it be saying Oh deer?" "No," I screeched. "If the door were captioned, it would say Oh deer because it would be remarking about the exploits of the silly deer who accidentally fell while hanging holiday lights. BUT, since the deer is the one speaking, he would say Oh dear because it's an exclamatory sentence!!!" My fellow educator regarded me silently, nodded once, shrugged her shoulders and walked off. I stomped into my room and slammed my door. Good grief! Why don't I listen to my husband?