1st Row: Nicholas Ragusin, Gracie O’Shields, Landon Jones, Connor Ferrell, Kyndra Carriles, Brayson Thumann 2nd Row: Jaydin Rhoads, Lyric Lopez, Alex Lopez, Emily Ferrell, Byron Ferrell, Shelby Wheat, Cole Spicak, Rylie Ragusin 3rd Row: Kyle Doggett, Hagen Rhoads, Alexandra Mallory, McKenna Guevara, Annabelle Thurman, Dane Spencer Back Row: Gage Spencer, Matthew Stapp

1st Row: Maddix Delgado, Stephen Bowman, Aubrey Ragusin, Leland Carriles 2nd Row: Landin Rhoads, Anthony Flores, Luke Doggett, Blake Bowman, Jackie Gutierrez 3rd Row: Aislin Guzman, Aiden McClelland, Antonio Gloria, Justice Epley, Christopher Richter 4th Row: Damian Guzman, Ashton Fowler-Albrecht, Sergio Sanchez, Dylan Ramirez

Perfect Attendance at Port O’Connor School
for the 2nd 9 weeks of the school year

1st Row: Kyndra Carriles, Landy Resendiz, Pryncess Few, Bradley Eure, Lena Luers, Jakob Donaldson 2nd Row: Cole Spicak, Jaydin Rhoads, Aubrey Ragusin, Shaneesa Mallory, Landon Jones, Connor Ferrell, Leland Carriles 3rd Row: Rylie Ragusin, Lyric Lopez, Alex Lopez, Emily Ferrell, Byron Ferrell, Luke Doggett, Blake Bowman, Dane Spencer 4th Row: Keegan Short, Hagen Rhoads, Landin Rhoads, Aiden McClelland, Jackie Gutierrez, Antonio Gloria, McKenna Guevara 5th Row: Hunter Williams, Gage Spencer, Ashton Fowler Albrecht, Matthew Stapp, Dylan Ramirez, Aislin Guzman

Seadrift School “A” Honor Roll

First Grade: Marisol Banda, Clay Brumfield, Kendell Cady, Briley Clark, Colten Evans, Matilyn Gibson, Keegan Goode, Alexis Green, Brice Petrisky,
Ashton Sternadel, Callum Taylor, Lorena Torres, Dusty Waghorne

Second Grade: Jada Dean, Kylee Gray, Zoey Henning, Jaxson Key, Layla Myers, Christina Ragusin, Kyle Staggs

Third Grade: Maci Bryan, Briley Christensen, Braylyn Galloway, Trevon Ragusin, Natalie Hunt

Fourth Grade: Andrea Hataway, Trinity Morgan, Jonathan Nguyen, Morgan Russell

Fifth Grade: Tres Canales, Eda Gilliland, Ayden Maddux, Hector Perez

Sixth Grade: Noah Estrada, Maritza Jaramillo

Seventh Grade: None

Eighth Grade: Keegan Brumfield, Ethan Mikolas, Morgan Sanders, Casey Wooldridge

Seadrift School “A/B” Honor Roll

First Grade: Aspen Crittenden, Kayden Garza, Jason Joines, Hunter McGill, Alaina Morgan

Second Grade: Sarah Armbruster, Layne Brown, Kingston Cady, Yuliana Hernandez, Dayz Hinds, Keith Hicks,
Emma Lancaster, James Ledesma, Logyn Middaugh, Matthew Morgan, Isaac Perez, KevinTurner

Third Grade: Jasmin Banda, Taylor Blevins, McKenna Boedeker, Brilee Crittenden, Layton Davenport,
Francis Hoang, John Jacobs, Dillon Morales, Mackenzie Moncrief, Sabrina Nguyen, Nevaeh Rangel, Ethan Saenz, Destiny Starkweather

Fourth Grade: Eric Anzaluda, Rhiannon James, BreAnn Kelley, Kaitlyn Lashley, Nevaeda Munoz, Braeden Ragusin, Mia Salazar, Tyler Salinas, Natalia Zarate

Fifth Grade: Isabella Arriaga, McKenzie Bierschwale, Keaton Cady, Adrian Cano, Zayda Estrada, Creasie Gohlke, Vivian Ledesma, Jacob Nguyen, Tim Pham,
Nate Saenz

Sixth Grade: Tyler Cobb, Eliana Cowan, Avery Flood, Autumn Key, Nataly Rodriguez, Tyger Whatley-Ballard

Seventh Grade: Katherine Frazier, Caleb Gregory, Caleb Lehtinen, Fernie Mendez, Franklin Murcia Rivera, Jason Nguyen, Jacob Ruiz, Christopher Salinas,
Joseph White

Eighth Grade: Dylan Beaver, Bryant Bordovsky, Emily Cain, Destiny Chandler, Lydia Cowan, Canion Epley,

Brenda Ledesma, Hunter Mitchell, Aubrey Moore, Danny Munoz, Amber Rodriguez, Liliana Torres, Gatlin Wimbish, Jasmine Wooldridge

Nothing enhances one’s health and well-being more than the presence of a caring family and nothing makes us richer! Nothing threatens a person’s well-being more than the absence of a caring family and nothing makes us poorer!

Our sense of “family” grows out of investing time and energy in building caring relationships with others, whether we are “blood-kin” or not. This will pay richer and more satisfying dividends than we can earn in any other pursuit.

In attempting to give our children more material possessions, we often deprive them of the greatest treasure of all – getting to know their family. It is difficult to love those we do not know. Strong, healthy families are the product of much hard work over an extended period of time.

Allow me to share some practical steps to developing healthy families.

Plan regular times together.

Parents, the best thing we can give our children is the example of a healthy you – healthy in every way: spiritually, physically, and psychologically. God has given us a biblical family priority: God first, spouse second, children third, and then our jobs and other community or extended family obligations. Our families will be no stronger than our relationships with God and each other. Consider how we spend our 168 hours each week and determine to spend more of them with those we claim to love.

Put an end to credit buying and begin paying our way out of debt.

We should make a list of our creditors and beside each, list the amount we owe them. In the next column, put the monthly payment amounts. In the final column, write the pay-off dates.

Find the one which will pay off first and work to get it paid as quickly as possible. Credit will remain important for our home and cars, but the other obligations need to get quickly to the point that we can pay cash for them.

Celebrate the retiring of each debt by spending the savings on something fun for the family. We will be reducing the tension level in our homes as debts go down.

Build memories.

In our stressed economical times, most parents have to work, but if possible, have a trustworthy family member care for all children from birth to age three (3). No one will care for our children like someone who is connected to more areas of the child’s life than just day care.

Provide loving discipline.

I find that most parents do not realize that there must be positive discipline before the negative discipline will be effective. Provide plenty of physical affection through smiles and hugs. If we must be employed outside the home, we must work to verbalize our love to them daily. When a child truly knows they are specially loved, they will attempt to please, which will result in less negative discipline. Consider it our responsibility – and their right – to be sure than on one ever goes to sleep in your home without knowing they are personally and individually loved. Frequent manifestations of love equip the child with the security and experience necessary to benefit from healthy discipline.

Parents must know the difference between punishment and discipline. Punishment teaches the child what not to do; it seeks to eliminate undesirable behaviors. It should be applied in measured amounts consistent with the situation and administered by a parent who is in complete control of himself as well as the atmosphere. Punishment is visited upon the child from the outside in.

Discipline is teaching the child what to do – the kinds of behaviors and attitudes you consider appropriate. Discipline creates controls which eventually operate from within the child to limit undesirable behaviors and reinforce desirable ones.

Allow the Lord to help you build your riches.

For children, parents are the Christ they see most plainly. We must ensure that our actions are in line with the values we are hoping they are receiving. Valentine’s Day, Easter, Mothers’ and Fathers’ Days, Independence Day, the first and last day of the school year, Thanksgiving and Christmas are times to build traditions into their memories. Teach them by example to give thanks at meal-time and let them see us sing, pray, and attend church together.

Attempt to picture our relationship with each child as a triangle with the Lord. As each of us grow toward Him, we will automatically draw closer to each other.

Who needs a family? We all do! Our families are our fortunes that must be developed. Whether it is a natural family, a social family, a church family, or a community, we all need each other in order to have the wealth that God has meant for us to possess!

Happy leap month! The normal thing is to call it leap year but February is the month that the leap takes place, so it is the leap month.  Fortunately it is also the month that we and most of the world celebrate Valentine’s Day.  I hope you had a wonderful leap of romance in your Valentine celebration this year.

Unfortunately this is also quite often the year we leap into actual presidential elections rather than presidential polls.  The polls of who should be President are yearly. It must be a good thing to try to figure out who the people will elect in the next Presidential election. They sure try it often enough.

The best thing about the primary elections that take place in the first part of the year is that they slowly replace the polls. Or at least the way it is going lately at election time in the primary phase we get to eliminate some of the “pretenders to the throne”  Apologies for that throne phrase it hails from the medieval times when relatives were vying for the kingships that come about when the old king dies.  We haven’t completely eliminated the relative part of the contentions.  However, nowadays it seems anybody can run. All they need is money.

Another good thing has happened is that we don’t have wars over who should be king.  We did have a Civil war when some folks didn’t like Lincoln.  Now that was not only those that came to be known as the Confederates, there were others. For instance the Copperheads in the North sure wanted someone to settle the war and have two countries instead of one.

I don’t expect that there will ever be some kind of universally acceptable form of government.  Unless, of course, it is one that completely agrees with me.  That is the question isn’t it?   As Frank Sinatra used to sing “Do it my way”.

Another interesting thing about this leap month is that we do all the leaping in just one day.  Oh, it is true that the scientists and the atomic clocks of current design slip in a leap second every so often.  They are not proud of it because they do it late at night. I guess no one is supposed to notice that one second out of 86,400 in the day.  Is it a big deal? Somewhere in the next 3 to 4 thousand years your clock would be about an hour late.  Heavens, my Cu-Koo clock loses at six minute a day rate.

The good thing about the leap day (Feb 29) is that those people who are born on that day only have a birthday every four years so they get to stay young. For instance, they have only twenty birthdays when someone like me is 80. In one first few years that might not be fun but nowadays I would enjoy it.
And that is to say once again, I wish you a very happy leap month.

New Picnic Tables at Pavilion

At the January Chamber of Commerce meeting there was discussions of 2016 events. The 4th Annual Crawfish Festival & Cook Off will be held on April 30th.There has been a meeting for volunteers. If you missed it and would like to help, contact us. And thanks to the ones who have given of their time to help with all of the events. Without the volunteers, these events would not be possible.

Also, if you would like to enter the cook off or if you would like to be a vendor, go to home page of our web site for information.

It’s been quite an ordeal, but the new pavilion project is coming closer to being completed. Mike Clifton has been a real life saver, by donating his time and experience to make the 6 new picnic tables with benches for the community to enjoy at all the functions. The Chamber asks that people please respect the tables and if you should see someone damaging them, report it. The electrical work for the pavilion is the next project, hopefully to be completed by Spring Break.

If you are a member of the Chamber and have a special going on or news of your business that you would like emailed out, please contact us. 361poc@gmail.com
361-983-2898

portoconnorchamber.com