Mrs. Bjerkaas.

I have different names, depending on where I am in the school building.

I'm "Miss C." with the grade schoolers--their strange substitute teacher.

I'm "Miss Andi" with my special ed preschoolers. When I took the job in January, I knew a name change wasn't far off, and I didn't want to interject that variable for them, as continuity is important with those kids.

So important (sarcasm) that I was bumped out of their room and into a regular ed classroom in April, where I'm officially "Mrs. Bjerkaas."

Which, I'm surprised to report, the kids have very little trouble saying. That probably has something to do with the fact that they don't yet read. That's when the ol' surname gets tricky--when you see it written out. (Eric says his students did fine with it until they saw it spelled out... haha.)

Some call me "Bear-kiss." Some get closer to "Bjerkaas." And some--I'm not going to lie--call me (or try to get away with calling me), "Hey you" or some variant thereof.

We've got this one little guy who gets excited when he's able to do something. One day he needed some help at the art table and called me over--"Mrs. Bjeeeeeerkaas!" Then he interrupted himself to celebrate, "Mrs. Bjerkaas, I did it! I did it, Mrs. Bjerkaas! I called you Mrs. Bjerkaas!"

Really, really cute.