Small Moments

Tornado

By: Alison (5th Grader)

I was rushed inside by mom. She was saying, “Get inside! Hurry! Hurry!” I ran inside confused. Then she added, “Sit in the corner.” She looked pale and I couldn't even hear myself think. The wind was terrible. It was howling. It was like my mom was herding us like sheep inside. I did not know what was happening. I remember my mom and dad getting a tornado warning on their phone, but mom said it wouldn't happen because everything was still before a tornado. It was not still and we are on a lake. We always get tornado warnings, but we never get tornados.

I was scared as a kitten. My stomach twisted and turned. The wind was howling as I sat on the cold floor of my basement. I could hear the wind getting faster and faster. I was with my neighbors when we got rushed inside. Then we heard my mom and dad talking. They said ¨tornado¨ way too many times. I couldn't believe this was happening. Will everything get destroyed? That's what usually happens in tornadoes.

I was so confused. Then Luke whispered, to no one in particular, ¨What's happening?¨ I didn't know for sure what was happening either. Kaitlyn, the second oldest of us, said, ¨It's just a bad storm.¨ but I knew it was worse than bad. I was scared and I could just tell that everyone else was too.

We didn't talk, we just sat on the cold floor and laid our backs against the old shelves. I wanted to look outside, but I was also scared because I didn't know what I would see. But, I was kind of excited because I was interested in what happened.

Things seemed to have settled down, so I decided to sneak over to the window. I looked out. Wow! I couldn't see the grass, because it was covered in leaves and sticks. Some trees had fallen down, and there was a big branch on our pier. The neighbors boat was just floating in the water. Why wasn't it in the lift? I looked closer, my face touching the glass. I saw their lift had collapsed! I looked at our boat lift. It was twisted on top of our boat! How did that happen? I ran back to my spot in the corner of the basement before my mom and dad could see I wasn't there.

My mom came downstairs and told us it was safe to go outside. After we saw all the damage on our frontage, we went and looked across the street. On the hill behind our house, every single tree had fallen down. It made a clear path heading straight towards our house.

My mom, with wet eyes, hugged us all close and said, ¨The tornado jumped right over us. God protected us.¨

Getting My Ears Pierced

by Audrina (Third Grader)

It was time to go to the doctor to get my ears pierced. My doctor was really good at piercing ears. I longed to get there. When we got to the building I sat in the waiting room until my doctor would come to get me. They finally called my name and walked me back to the Doctor’s room. When I got into the room my Doctor was carrying something that looked like a nerf gun with a gap in it in the front of the gun. She put some freeze spray on my ear, so when she puts the earring in it does not hurt as much. The freeze spray does not hurt at all, it is just really cold. Then she put some red dry erase marker dots on my ear in the spot she would be piercing. At last the time had come! She was going to pierce my ears! She started to count 1,2…...and right at 3 she pierced the ear. I felt a really hard pinch on my ear, but otherwise, it did not hurt. She did the same thing to my other ear. I looked in the mirror that she showed me and I thought I looked awesome! Then I walked out of the building smiling ear to ear with my new diamond earrings!

A Sighting of a Hawk

By: Paige (Third Grader)

It was a Friday morning after Thanksgiving, me and my mom were looking for coupons in the Michaels catalog. When all of a sudden I shouted, “There’s a big bird in our backyard!” My mom's head jerked up. While she wondered what kind of bird it was, I was wondering what it was doing in our backyard! We quickly typed “Hawks” in the search bar of my mom’s phone. At that time we thought that the bird was a hawk and we were right! We found out it was either a Cooper's hawk or a red-tailed hawk.

Knowing a bird expert we sent my mom's friend a message asking what kind of hawk it was, (her child was the expert.) She got back to us saying it was a red-tailed hawk. At this point my mom had to go brush her teeth. Then, as if magic, it was walking behind our bush in the corner of the yard! “It moved!” I say right away as I see it.

My mom runs down the stairs and in a flash we see the red-tailed hawk, dragging something behind the bush with it! “What is that thing?” I say. In The rush of finding out what kind of hawk it was, we also found out what kind of food it ate: rodents and small birds. We were still wondering what it was that it dragged but we continued to observe and move on from it. Throughout that day we continued to wonder about all of the little details we did not know about.

Later that day we went to go in our yard and look for it or the thing it was dragging. In the same corner, to our surprise we saw fluttering wings in our neighbors yard. “There it is!” Me and my mom say at the same time.

From that day on we never saw the bird again or any clues from last time!

Blast Off!

By Will (5th Grader)

To begin, it was time for our fast pass to arguably the best ride at Disney World called “Space Mountain.” As it was going to be my first time, I was both excited and nervous. We got to the line, and we were going very quickly thanks to the fast pass. Then, we walk up and see a sign that reads, “You must be 48 inches to ride.”

Next, they held us from going on the ride to measure me. I was very anxious because I really wanted to go on Space Mountain. I could tell my mom was worried too. She said in a nervous voice, “I hope you are 48 inches.” Then I remembered about one month ago, I measured myself and I was 47 inches. I was truly hoping that I had grown an inch throughout the month! I was thinking, “Am I actually 48 inches?” They measured me and exclaimed, The person working the ride said, “You’re 48 inches and good to go!”

I gratefully said, “Thank you! I can’t wait to ride Space Mountain”

Furthermore, they told us to get in the first car. My dad said, “We get to start off the action.”

When I asked him why, he answered, “We are in the first car.”

There were three cars behind us. We got in the car and there were big bars that they called “seatbelts” and you put them over your knees. Once we all had seatbelts on, everyone started counting down together, “Three, two, one.” Then, we started slowly moving. It surprised me that we didn’t just blast off. I wondered, “Is this ride as exciting as everyone says it is?”

Next, I realized that what everyone says is true! We started hitting speeds of sixty miles per hour through rainbow lights. The lights and the high speed made me feel like I was in a Nascar race going through Candy Land. Meanwhile, I started hearing creaking sounds. As we were going up, I thought to myself, “Doesn’t that mean we’re going to drop?”

Before we knew it we took this big drop, and I felt like I was taking a sip of helium. I thought we were done, but we weren't.

Then, we started getting invaded by twists and turns and quick small drops in pitch blackness. I started hearing the creaking sound again, but this time the sound lasted much longer. I knew it would be a huge drop. Then, everyone behind us put their hands in the air, and I heard my mom say “O.M.G.”

It was at least 100 feet down. I felt like I was floating while gravity was giving me a battle. At that point, the drop was over.

The ride was done after the “the big drop” as we called it. My parents and I were thrilled, and there was a big excitement when everyone got off. Everyone was crowding around the screens at the exit of the ride. There had been a camera at the big drop that had taken our picture in mid-air. My hair was super high in the picture, my mom had a serious face, and my Dad had this big smile of excitement.