A 6:00 AM Surprise

I have taught with Sarah Williams since 2006 - I teach the 4th/5th grade Gifted class at our school, and she teaches the 2nd/3rd grade Gifted class that feeds into mine. But knowing and working with someone for a long time does not mean that they can't surprise you occasionally.

Sarah and I are attending a conference this week in Indianapolis sponsored by The Indiana Association of the Gifted, a teachers' conference with talks and break-out sessions on how to best teach gifted students.

Sarah and me in the center with other teachers from Tippecanoe School Corporation's gifted faculty at lunch Monday.

Yesterday morning I arrived at her home at 6:00 AM to make the drive south to Indy. She invited me inside, and as I stood in her foyer and waited for her to grab her coat, I looked at her Christmas decorations. Immediately, this caught my eye:

(Photo credit to Identify Your Hagen Renaker.)

A black, glossy Thoroughbred foal! A Hagen Renaker, nestled among her Christmas decorations!

"That was my grandmother's," Sarah said when I asked her about it. "When she died, we all took a piece from her collection of horses to remember her by, and I got that one."

I certainly was not expecting to find a Hagen Renaker at 6:00 AM among Christmas decorations as I prepared to travel to Indianapolis, that's for sure!