~and their names were Mr. and Mrs. Renfro~

     When Mike and I got married back at Lincoln Elementary on the last day of school in 2013, there were a couple of hundred children that attended our wedding.  They all remained back after the last bell rang at 3:30 and by the time Mike and I said our wedding vows underneath the most romantic basketball goal we could find, they were all sitting "criss-cross, applesauce" around us.  They were so good that we didn't even realize they were there.  It wasn't until we saw photos from the wedding that we noticed just how close to us they really were.

I told Mike when he married a teacher that not only did he get me, he also got about 200 children who came along with the deal.  He soon understood what I meant.

     We moved to Colorado after the wedding and thankfully I found a position teaching at a wonderful school just up the road aways from our home in Montrose.  For the homesick and lonely newlywed that I was, it was like the best gift and the greatest blessing that I could have asked for.  My first year of teaching was with a classroom of 4th graders and they soon learned about Mr. Renfro.  He was the "giver of the snacks" and if you ever ask any of those 9 and 10-year old students, they'd tell you exactly what I meant  by that.  No belly ever felt hungry for long during the course of a nearly 8-hour school day because Mike saw to it that I had plenty of crackers and cookies for them to nibble on.  

One of those sweet 4th graders even invited us to his house for Easter dinner that year because they knew that we had no family in the area.  We may not have been related by blood but we sure feel like a part of the Fletcher family anyways!

                               Mr. Renfro and "the 18"~2013-14 school year

     The next year I had a class of first graders.  They were 22 of the sweetest 6 and 7-year olds that one could ask for.  They knew their "Mr. Renfro" too.  Not only did he make sure that they had snacks to fill up their growling tummies, he also made sure that they didn't want for school supplies either.  Countless glue sticks, pencils, stickers, and markers were purchased by him in weekly runs to the local Walmart.  I promised them, just as I had the 4th graders the year before, that whatever they needed to have a successful day in school, we would provide for them.  No matter what and no questions asked. 

     

One of "the 22", our dear little Scarlett, spent a Saturday with us before we moved away to Texas.  We were busy shopping in Grand Junction and they just needed to sit down and rest their feet a bit.

     This has been the year of "the 120+" and most of the kids at my new school had only heard about Mr. Renfro and seen his photo on my desk at school.  They hear a lot about him, much the same as children heard back in the mountains of Colorado.  It is Mr. Renfro who makes sure that whatever they need to be successful students is provided for them.  In particular, this has been the year of "the pencil".  We tend to go through a whole lot of them but after all, I do teach writing.  Mike came to our Christmas program this past Thursday and had the chance to meet many of the kids who were there.  One of them in particular had the strangest of looks on his face when he said,

"So THAT'S Mr. Renfro!  I've been wondering."

My years as a teacher will soon have to wind down.  I'm still trying to attain my goal of 40 years in the classroom and with only two more years after this one to go, I pray to make it.  At the age I am now, it's a given that I probably won't be around to see these young people grow up and begin families of their own.  But whether I am or not, I hope that they will always remember one thing.  I hope they will remember that once there was this couple who loved them all very much.

And their names were Mr. and Mrs. Renfro.

May 21, 2013~Lincoln Elementary-Hutchinson, Kansas after we were married.

November 27, 2013~Montrose, Colorado in our front yard.

July 1, 2015~at home in Burkburnett, Texas.