Community Clean-Up Day

I have company coming over in eleven minutes, so I better make this fast!  Here are a few pictures from Community Clean Up Day.  The city gave all of my students t-shirts and garden gloves to keep, so that was kind of cool. 

 Group photo before setting off to work

Me scoping the area

There are a lot of tires in the desert!

Two of my girls taking on a big job

Now some poor hobo is out a fridge

By the end of the day, we had this blue bin completely full!

April lost her gloves

Dragging a couch (and singing, too)

Posing for the camera

The one note-worthy thing that happened is we found a snake out in the desert.  I have no idea what kind it was, although I can say that it was sand-colored, and it was a baby.  I picked it up (I had on thick garden gloves), and it never tried to strike.  It was pretty calm.  One of the teachers ended up taking him home as a pet. 

Overall, it was such a fun day.  The weather was perfect, and the kids were in good spirits and worked really hard.  But that's pretty typical; even the most grueling jobs are made fun by this group of kids.  I've become so close to my Builders Club members (especially the ones who are in the club for the second year now) that every time we get together, it feels like a holiday.  We get so silly, but when it's important, we all work together as a team to get the job done.  It always inspire me to see these kids forfeit their Saturdays to do these kinds of jobs.  They're such an amazing group. 

Next year I'm contemplating letting Builders Club go (that's a story for another time).  But every time I start feeling confident in my decision to not run the club next year, I have a day like this.  And then I'm suddenly sure that I'll never let this club go.  I can't seem to stop ping-ponging back and forth.