teach.run.pray.

The week before testing can be daunting. Reviewing for state standardized testing can be BORING...FRUSTRATING...EXHAUSTING. However, my co-worker and I decided to change that. Last Monday, students walked into a crime scene and became active detectives in Granger's Detective Group (DDG). The room was transformed  and a "possible suspects" board brought it all together. As students walked in, they were handed a detective bag. The detective bag was a Ziploc bag containing a small magnifying glass, a pack of sticky notes, and a pair of silly glasses. I even had detective/mission impossible style music playing in the background. The kids were totally stoked! I began class by welcoming the new detectives (of course I had my silly detective glasses on) and explained someone had snuck into our classroom over the weekend and completely trashed it, and they had to figure out who it was. I also explained that focused and hardworking detectives would earn a clue each day at the

About two weeks ago, I ran the Diva Half Marathon in Myrtle Beach with a close friend. Well, we didn't run it together, but we both completed it. It was not my best race-one of my slowest to be honest-but my less than average performance had everything to do with my life decisions that weekend.  We arrived in Myrtle Beach late that Friday. The week had been crazy busy and stressful. I was nervous about the race because I had been dealing with hip and glute issues again (and they were bad). I got out of the car Friday night in pretty severe pain and hobbled down the beach with my friend and her aunt. On Saturday, the pain subsided a little, but I was afraid I'd wake up race day, Sunday, and not be able to walk, so instead of taking care of myself, I made some less than savory decisions on Saturday.  After picking up our race packets and spending a little too much money at the expo and shopping, Allie and I decided to spend a few hours on the beach...with a cooler full of col