Snow Day Blues: An Open Letter to the Students of Olde Sawmill Elementary

Dear Olde Sawmill Elementary students,

Last month, I flew to Ohio for the Dublin Literacy Conference, and I was supposed to spend the Friday before that event at your school. You had a special welcome sign  for me and everything…

But it turns out…I was pretty much the only person at school that day, since you ended up having a snow day! (Or should we call it an ice day? At any rate, there was no school because the roads were all yucky.)  Your librarian was there, and she invited me in to sign books and see all the artwork you’d done after reading my books. That was fun, and I thought you might like to see some pictures of my day, since you weren’t there…

I signed all the books you left for me.

Then I spent some time checking out your art projects. Boy, are you guys ever talented! Your hallways and library were like an art museum!

I was sad that you weren’t there, but I found one of your teachers who’d come in to get work done during the snow day. I convinced him to take a break and visit the library for story time.

When school is empty, you can get away with some things that you might not try with everybody there.  I might have run in the halls once or twice.

I took advantage of your empty gym to get a little exercise.

The lunch room wasn’t much fun without all of you, though.

The GREAT news is that Mrs. Angel and I have figured out a way to have our author visit day now that your ice storm is over, even though I’m back in New York. On March 21st, I’ll be having a private Skype author visit session with every single grade level.  I’ll show you all the cool stuff I was going to show you when I visited your school — and one of the neat things about a Skype visit is that you’ll get to see where I live, too! (I like to pick up my laptop computer and give little tours – show you what’s outside my window, things like that!)

Even though your school is lovely and fun any day of the week, it’s all of you that I’m really excited to meet, so I’m looking forward to connecting with you (finally!) on March 21st.