When I was a little girl I was obsessed with school- particularly my teachers.
I didn't necessarily love the school part, mostly I just loved watching
my teachers interact with me and the other students in the classroom.
I loved how they decorated our classroom for holidays,
I loved the way freshly copied worksheets smelled, and I loved getting read to.
When I was about ten years old I transformed
my basement into a full-blown school.
I called it "Little School" and invited little cousins and neighbors to come.
I moved my brothers weight sets, sport stuff, and my
dad's hunting gear into closets and corners,
and hung up calendars and 'welcome to school posters'.
I even talked my 5th grade teacher into letting me have five
very old desks that were being unused in the schools basement.
I'll never forget the day I called my mom to tell her the school
gave my teacher permission to let me have these desks dated
back to the 1950's, probably when my dad was a student there.
One day after school, my mom pulled up and together
we piled five heavy desks in our 1989 Suburban.
I was on cloud nine!
I spent any money I had, (or could scrounge up) at the print
shop on BYU campus coping and laminating
worksheets and holiday decorations.
I had every single marker and colored pencil known to man.
I took the kids on field trips, decorated cookies, had a school program,
and even we had school photos.
(I've GOT to find those!).
Lottie has the same teacher bug.
Each day she comes home from school and sets up her own "Little School".
She asks her siblings to come- and they usually don't,
so she talks to herself, or to her stuffed animals, or even she
sometimes suckers the neighborhood kids to come.
And she's really bossy.
Last week, the Little Nies had two days of school cancelled
because of Hurricane Michael.
Lottie took full advantage of her freedom
and set up school in every room downstairs.
Because I am a good mom, I made the older Little Nies
sit down and participate with Lottie, aka: Miss Ozzy.
(even Mr. Nielson was the PE teacher).
I told the kids if they made fun of her, laughed and/or
didn't take her seriously, or so much snickered at her,
I would add on 15 extra minutes of school.
They ended up playing for nearly an hour.
And Lottie was on cloud nine!
