Happy Veterans Day!

Happy Veterans Day to all! Today is a very special day to honor those who have served in this country's military and to honor those that are still serving. Being in a small school district, we rotate a Veterans day program between the three schools. This was our year to host the event. We started off with a breakfast for the Veterans in our community, then we had a special Veterans day program. Veterans day is a special and dear day for me because I've had so many men in my family to have served in the military and I always take it to heart. So many of us have no idea, could not even imagine what some of these men and women have seen. And so many won't even talk about it. But I feel that at Kelly Edwards today, we honored our veterans and did our best to say "thank you" for their service and sacrifice.

I had this idea to create a bulletin board to say thank you to our veterans. So I sent a letter home with each student in the school and some turkey feathers. The students filled out a turkey feather with the name of a veteran in their family and returned it to school. Here's some pictures of our bulletin board. I thought it turned out awesome!

During the program, one of the 5th grade students did an amazing job at singing the national anthem. A 4th grade student read this poem; she didn't write it, but I don't remember the author's name.

It is the veteran, not the preacher, who has given you freedom of religion.

It is the veteran, not the reporter, who has given you freedom of the press.

It is the veteran, not the poet, who has given you freedom of speech.

It is the veteran, not the protester, who has given you freedom to assemble.

It is the veteran, not the lawyer, who has given you the right to a fair trial.

It is the veteran, not the politician, who has given you the right to vote.

It is the veteran, who salutes the Flag, who serves under the Flag, whose coffin is draped by the Flag.

And if all of this plus more speeches didn't get your emotions stirring, all 450 something of our students sang a song called "Thank You Soldiers", this song will. We had been practicing for the last week and a half every chance we could K-5th to learn this song and the motions that go with it. I don't have a video of our students signing, but here's the song from YouTube. And trust me, with 450 something children voices singing this song out, it was very touching this morning.