I participated in the March Slice of Life Challenge: A slice a day for all of March.  You should do it next March! Check it out here. Thank you,  Two Writing Teachers! 

Slicing has become a household (and classroom) word around here. My students ask me what I sliced, and joke about classroom happenings by saying, “Is this going to be your slice today?” “Am I your slice?” My husband has taken to saying things like “If I sliced, this would be my slice,” after a particularly ironic, funny or upsetting moment or story.

One of my favorite slices of any day is listening to my children talk. The other day, E (4) must have been tired of the winter when he said, “I wish we were in Rwanda. It never snows there. Do you even know where Rwanda is, mommy? It’s in Africa.”

On the way home from school one day last week, I asked my kids where they would want to go with the snap of their fingers, for 24 hours.

“Hawaii” said H, immediately.

“The Sistine Chapel” was L’s surprising answer.

E couldn’t pick just one. “Space. Santa’s Workshop. New York City, where you went, Mama. Savannah. … where lions live.”

Every conversation with my kids is a slice, so tonight I asked them about their slices of the day.

H (7) said his slice was the walk we took tonight, home from getting dinner. “It was fun, and interesting how long it was to get to our house. ”

“What did you see?” I asked him.

“We didn’t see anything.” He whispered to me. “We saw trees, and lots of people walking dogs…and that’s it!”

“What was the temperature?” I asked, trying to elicit details.

“32.” He made up. I reminded him we hadn’t even needed jackets.

“Well, it was really cold.”

“How did you feel?” I asked. Expecting an emotion.

“I felt, really… well, I was all worn out…. Yea! Okay that’s it. Yea.”

L (10) said her slice was P.E. A game of kickball. Her story was complete, with no need for prompts and questions from me: “We did this thing that was kickball… but instead of being tagged you just run around the bases. It was really fun, but it was really really hot out. I felt all the sweat dripping down my face. We had a cup of water but I had a really dry sore throat and I kept breathing ahhhhhh hhhhuuuu ahhhhh huuuuuuuu. When we went inside from it, we were so hot and sweaty we used our ice packs from our lunch box to cool us down.”

E (4) came in and I asked him about his slice. I reminded him that I write every day, and I wanted to know a story from his day. This was a question that was too mature for him tonight. He had many answers:

“My favorite part of my day was a long time ago when we made that little pig book!”

“No, no, no,” I reminded him, “Favorite part of this day! This day that we just had!”

“My favorite day was when we made that pig book!”

“Not your favorite day! Your favorite part of this day!”

After several more jokes, and questions from me, he finally settled in and said, “My favorite part of the day is right now because we are snuggling.”

Me too, E! Me too!

Happy last day of the March Slice of Life Challenge!

See you tomorrow for Tuesday’s slice!