LBJ Elementary Wins District Championship in Governor's Cup Academic Competition!

Saturday, February 27th, started out cold and dreary. However, the snow couldn't chill the spirits of several young minds from around the county. They knew that the 2010 District Governor's Cup was going to be held at LBJ Elementary that day. This was their chance to show off their academic prowess....and show the world just how powerful the mind can be!

Although starting with a delay due to the weather, soon students, parents, and other involved community members converged upon LBJ Elementary for the academic competition. Contest manager, Henrietta Sheffel (FRC director from Breathitt High School) used her expertise in academics to start the match on time. Soon students from LBJ Elementary, Highland-Turner Elementary, Rousseau, and Jackson City School were taking tests in the areas of math, science, social studies, language arts, and arts and humanities. Students had competed in composition and future problem solving earlier in the week.

After a morning of testing, students competed in quick recall, which is a game-show like competition where students try to beat other students by "buzzing in" first and answering questions. It was an exciting day that saw many ups and downs for everyone involved.

At the end of a long day, the LBJ Elementary academic team, coached by Alonzo Fugate, was pleased with the following results:

· Composition - Abi Thomas, 3rd place; Adrianna Coomer, 4th place; Ashlee Gross, 5th place

· Math - John Wyatt Hall, 5th place

· Science - Jacob Collins and John Wyatt Hall, tied for 3rd place

· Social Studies - Logan Back, 1st place; Katie Bowling, 4th place

· Language Arts - Adrianna Coomer, 1st place; Zach Rice, 2nd place; Abi Thomas, 5th place

· Arts and Humanities - Zach Eiserman, 1st place; Kelsie Dalton, 2nd place

· Quick Recall team - 3rd place

· Future Problem Solving Team (Katie Bowling, Rachel Miller, Zach Rice, and Rebecca Watts) - 1st place!

The final scores for the day were broken down as follows:

· LBJ Elementary - 48.5 points

· Highland-Turner Elementary - 36 points

· Jackson City School - 35.5 points

· Rousseau Elementary - 3 points

LBJ Elementary was excited and pleased to win the District Championship. Students, parents, and others were cheering and clapping as each student received their medals and ribbons. A championship trophy was won for the school trophy case and is being displayed with pride in the front office of LBJ Elementary.

Coach Alonzo Fugate stated, "I am so pleased and so proud. These students have worked so hard all year long, and they deserve this win. It takes a lot of hard work to be on the academic team. It was good to see that hard work pay off. It was because of their dedication and the dedication of their parents and teachers that these students can proudly call themselves academic champions."

Coach Fugate continued, "Although I am the coach, there are so many more people involved in making a winning team. First and foremost are the parents. In particular, I had lots of great support from Amy Baker and Janice Hall with practices this year. Next, I want to thank all the teachers for their work in helping to prepare these students in class. I also want to thank LBJ's principal Ron Combs for all of his support this year. He has been wonderful. Finally, I want to thank Superintendent Arch Turner and the Breathitt County School Board for all of their support and encouragement. Without them, we wouldn't have such great schools and great students."

The team will now prepare for the Regional Governor's Cup which will be held at Buckhorn Elementary on Tuesday, March 16th for composition and Future Problem Solving and Saturday, March 20th for all other categories. But as Coach Fugate added, "No matter what, these kids are already champions in my book."

Update on the Adoption

Hello everyone! Sorry that I haven't written in a few weeks, but the snow days get me in a daze! Fortunately, today was nice and sunny. It almost felt like a spring day! I walked around to Mom and Dad's house and saw that the Easter lilies (flags) were already coming up. I can't wait to see those nice yellow flowers in bloom. Hopefully they won't be covered up in snow.

We have missed so many snow days this year in the Breathitt County school system. If I am not mistaken, it is right at 26 days. That is a lot! We work hard in the school system to get the students ready for the world and testing. We will just have to be more vigilant in the coming weeks. Hopefully they will move the testing window back a few weeks as well.

One good thing about the snowy days is that it forced me to stay inside and work on my writing. I finished up my next book. It is called Dark and Bloody and is a collection of horror/suspense stories that are set in Kentucky. Most of them are set right here in Eastern Kentucky! I got the title from the nickname that Kentucky had when settlers arrived....a dark and bloody ground. It should be out in the next month or so. I will debut it at the Harrodsburg Book Festival.

In case you have been wondering, YES, Lisa and I are still adopting. We have been working on this adoption for over 2 years now. At first, we were planning on adopting from Vietnam. Unfortunately, Vietnam shut down all of their adoptions. We were going to stick it out, but after 1 year on the list, it didn't look like we were going anywhere.

Finally, a few months ago, we decided to switch to the Russian program. It was meant to be. I got on the website of our adoption agency, Children's Hope International, and saw that they were desperate for people in the Russian adoption program. We talked it over and decided that we just couldn't wait on Vietnam anymore.

So now, we are officially in the Russian program. We have all of our paperwork together. We just have to get it notarized and then we are all set to send it off to our adoption agency. They will have it transferred to Russian and sent to Russia. After that, we wait to be matched with a child. We requested a little boy as young as possible. We still have his name on the nursery door, Jacob. We still have all the stuff...two cribs, clothes, toys, changing table, high chair, stroller, bibs, rattles, etc! We just need the baby.

From the looks of things, we should be expecting a match sometime around August or September of this year. After that, we will take our first trip to Russia to meet the child and approve the adoption. Then, we come back to the United States for a couple of months. We then return to Russia for two or three weeks to finalize the adoption. I can't wait to get him home! The hardest part will be meeting him and then having to come back home for those two months!

I will keep everyone updated on the process of our adoption. Hopefully we will have him home in time for Halloween. I want to take him trick or treating!

I'm not sure how our little dog Sassy will take the adoption. She is our baby right now and is spoiled rotten. I'm sure that she won't like having to share lap time with a baby. She will have a panic attack! But she is really good with kids once she gets used to them. I am sure that she will come to love Jacob as well. I don't worry about our other dog Sadie. She loves all kids!

I guess that I will close for now. I will post a picture of my current baby....Sassy.

Sassy