Katie Strickland Update

Well, hello everyone! I was so shocked and excited to get Jake's e-mail inviting everyone to come back together again! Corinth was and still is a great place to make friendships that stand the tests of time. Here goes my attempt to update my info...

Once we graduated, I went to Northeast Community College and then Mississippi State majoring in elementary education. John Bell once gave me an award in speech class for being the Best professional babysitter. Guess I just never got over that and now I have been a professional baby sitter at West Corinth for 14 years as a Kindergarten Teacher ;0). For those of you who started the Corinth system in First Grade, Miss Timmons was still the principal when I began my career. Stacey (Carson) Sitton and I began teaching the same year under her watchful eye. When she would pat me on the back in 1993, I would be taken back to first grade when she would greet us hello and smack the breath out of us with her "love pats". Remember the electric paddle? It was still there in 1993 and still terrified the kids. Miss Timmons retired around 1997 (can't remember exactly, the years run together now!) and Kate Butler has been our principal ever since. The classrooms still have the same smell as when we were there! In place of our playground a gym now stands. Our playground now is across the street (remember playing on the road when it rained?) I started as an assistant, became a kindergarten teacher for a teacher needing to leaving in the middle of the year, taught first grade one year, then finally returned to my true love of kindergarten in 1995. In 1999-2000 school year, I was selected as Teacher of the Year for West Corinth and in November of 2005 I became one of 3 National Board Certified Teachers at our school. I love what I do and the students of Corinth are still some of the best around! I have seen so many of our classmates kids come through - and even taught a few of them! I can say they have all been little geniuses and sometimes spitting images of their parents! Our classes have their kindergarten play at the old high school auditorium where we put on our Follies. The stage is a lot smaller through the eyes of a teacher! I get a little remenisant each year as I sneak off to explore the back rooms where we got ready for those hot nights of singing. It's a good thing to have happy and warm memories of places that now hold old desks, tables, and cobwebs in cold darkness.

While at Mississippi State, I met Mike Draper. He was finishing up his masters in electrial engineering and very interested in this little girl he had seen at church with his friend Tommy Gilmore (especially after I yelled at MIke that Tommy and I were not dating..."JUST FRIENDS!" although I don't really remember it that way at all!). We started dating, fell in love, and were married in June of 1994 at the Fillmore Street chapel here in Corinth. We have lived in Corinth since then. Mike works in New Albany, Mississippi as a design engineer for HMC Technologies. Basically, he makes the big old machines in the big industries do what they do through computer programming. He has traveled all over the United States and Mexico to install, operate, and train workers on these big robot things. He is way too smart for my kindergarten brain to understand!

In November of 2003, (after we had been told it would not happen for us!), we had our first child! Robert Samuel Draper has been the delight of our lives! I fell deeper in love with being a Mom than just about anything else I'd ever done. He is now 3 years old and amazes us everyday with his observations of the world! In August of 2006, his little brother John Thomas completed our family. He is one of the happiest kids I have ever seen and smiles almost constantly. Both boys are the sunshine in life and I am blessed to spend yet another day with them!

My parents are still in town. My mom keeps the boys for me while I teach. My dad is still self-employed and does lots of plumbing and electrical work. My sister, Cindy, is living in Jackson, Mississippi with her husband Russ and continues to dominate anything she undertakes! NO children for them yet...but maybe soon.

I have enjoyed reading all the updates so far. I hope there will be more soon. I remember at the 10 year reunion feeling like our class had really done such great things with their lives! A few of us continue to call Corinth home and a few of us will keep Corinth as home in our hearts no matter where we are! Thanks for including me! I look forward to hearing from you!