Christmas and the Kindergarten Teacher Gift.....

I can't believe the holidays are upon us! Tomorrow is the last day of school before the Christmas holiday break, and I only now purchased a gift for little Margo's teacher. I was reminded today of the impending tradition, when I saw one of Margo's classmates present the box of chocolates to Mrs. B. It was not wrapped, and Arnold began to point out a variety of letters on the box to Mrs. B. She accepted the gift with grace and acknowledged his current accomplishments with the alphabet on her newly acquired box of chocolates. Margo is currently oblivious to the gift giving towards her teacher thus far. I have mentioned it a few times, but no bites on her part. I will say she was quite excited about the books that Mrs. B. gave to each child in her class today. The individually wrapped gifts, contained the hand written name of each child on the tag, followed by, "from Mrs. B". Margo's friend came over to our house with her gift from Mrs. B. too, today after class. Both girls decided to wait until Christmas to open up their treasured present from their teacher.

Back to my quandary, what do I get for Mrs. B? I didn't want to do the chocolate or the wine, although both can be quite delicious. I wanted something a little more meaningful, and so I decided to write Mrs. B. an essay about rose bushes. I found a pair of beautiful rose bushes at Costco today, and thus began my inspiration for Mrs. B. and her lively rose bushes in her garden.

Once upon a time, there was a rose gardener, named Mrs. B. When I first met her, the garden was just starting to be developed. In fact I was not sure Mrs. B. could really be a gardener, because she was just starting out. I knew she was accomplished from her years of training at the university, and then she had even worked with the 1st grade roses for a year, but this year, Mrs. B. had to plant her own roses from almost scratch. These were the Kinder roses. They can be tough to manage sometimes I have been told. I wanted to discover how Mrs. B. would go about bringing the dormant roses to life.

The difficulty of planting a new rose garden, was understanding where the seeds were germinated and nurtured during their early days of life. I believe each of the 20 or so little plants were started with the best intentions at their home nurseries. Some of these nurseries have had a few of their older rose bushes grow beyond Kindergarden, before their most recent batch; other nurseries were experiencing the Kindergarden for the first time. This very wide variety of nurseries was providing a very wide variety of roses for Mrs. B's garden. Some of the dormant roses really did not sit well in one spot, nor did they keep their little thorns to themselves at times. However, Mrs. B. actually had them sitting on their own square plot after a couple of days. The colors of the plots were purple, green, blue, and yellow. She began to nourish them with the Alpha Bet fertilizer. It was working quite well. She combined this technique with the number quota. Soon each of the rose bushes was providing a variety of services about the garden.

One would describe the weather for the day, and let everyone know if it was cloudy, rainy or sunny. Another was in charge of the gate, ensuring it was closed and opened at the appropriate times. These little dormant rose bushes were amazing. Some could turn the light off and on upon request. Others would bring the attendance list to the main barn for filing. In fact each of these 20 dormant rose bushes was given jobs to do on a daily basis. Some were even table captains for the week. And suddenly, one could observe, that this new freshly tilled garden was becoming quite organized.

In reality it has only been about three and a half months since the garden began. In fact the nursery owners were still very interested in this kindergarden plot. I am one of those owners, and we gather everyday, outside the plot and wonder, what is happening inside. We actually share stories of things we've heard from the rose bushes themselves about the development of their garden. The over all consensus was our little rose bushes seem to all like Mrs. B. Sometimes Mrs. B. was away for a day and a substitute gardener came in to run the Kindergarden. Some of those days were marked by a little disarray about the garden. Soon Mrs. B. would return and start the repair work once again. Fertilize with Alpha Bet, and water with cheers.
Bit by bit, I watched, I saw the little leaves began to sprout. I head the stories read to me by my little rose bush. I watched the stubby little branches start to write words and then sentences that looked like run on words, and required some deciphering with a hoe. Eventually I was able to read this work. But you Mrs. B. already had the knack of sorting one word from the next. You weeded all about and throughout this garden. Sometimes it was a simple reminder of what needed to be done. Other times, the sacred "superstar" was turned over for the hour, and that seemed to cause the rose bush to grow in the most appropriate manner. I have heard it rumored that a "superstar" was torn asunder...and eventually the little rose bush returned to better growth patterns in the garden.

Do you remember all your precious rose bushes for this year Mrs. B.? Each one is a gift for you to grow, to nurture, and to create opportunity for growth in independence. In fact you garden more independence from each bush than we do, even though we were the original nursery. I know, once in a while, you were 'stuck' by the unruly thorns in these little dormant rose bushes. But I also know, in the next six months, each one of these little rose bushes will bloom. We will all be amazed by their colors, and fragrance, and in the end, we shall reflect along with you about the wonder of the dormant rose, now grown in the Kinder-garden by Mrs. B.

I really just wanted to give you the Elvis cheer, Margo has taught me so well. "Thank you, thank you very much!"