Another year.

Oh boy, another year has come and gone. It was a quiet celebration. But Jarle made a delicious gourmet meal for me. A lovely chianti stained risotto with a pear reduction and gorgonzola with walnuts. Just so very tasty, it's definitely going on the "make again" list. He also made homemade brownies. What a sweetie pie, I can't believe him sometimes. I'm so lucky. The dinner also came with a mix cd he made and a new book to read. I can't wait to read it. It's the new one bye Audrey Niffenegger. She wrote Time traveler's Wife (unfortunately it was made into a movie).

The whole day my students knew it was my birthday because they announced it over the announcements and all the kids kept telling me happy birthday yesterday. I even got a few today. It was nice.

I'm still feeling a bit overwhelmed with the 2 schools. I feel so behind. I find that writing things down on a calendar is a must. Especially for meetings. Do you have meetings like me? I mean it's either and IEP meeting, an art meeting, a parent meeting, or an after school activity, or something. I never leave when school is actually over. It's amazing. And I go home with tons of stuff to do. It's like I'm a new teacher all over again. Hopefully by November I'll have it all worked out.

I need to get ahead with a litttle planning and I think i'll feel much better.

Then there's the wedding. We have an engagement party 2 weekends from now and I'm so excited. Mostly his family and friends will be there, and a few on my side. My parents, my younger sister and my best friend. It will be nice. I'm making it an excuse to buy a nice dress for the evening.

So busy busy. The fall weather is beautiful right now, I can't wait until the leaves really start changing. That'll probably happen in the next week or so.

So 34 isn't looking so bad these days. Bring it on.

This is really funny.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KU3N5c2Kxnw

Enjoy your day!!

Do you ever get the urge?

I'm talking about purchasing music on itunes. It's so easy, and once I get on I can't stop myself. This week I had the urge to purchase folk music. I know what you may be thinking... What is she freaking doing? Well, I happen to really like folk music. I was probably the only kid in any school I went to who knew who The Kingston Trio was. Ahh, parental influence. I listened to my parents' music (Motown, 60's, folk, Helen reddy, beach boys, rolling stones, Marvin Gaye, Tina and Ike, and more...) until i broke free in the mid-eighties. There I dove into new wave, pop music, the cure (oh I heart them so), Brit pop, Debbie Gibson. One of the first songs I remember really loving was -Eye of the Tiger - . It was voted the best song in second grade.

I do love music. I love it all. The good, the bad, the embarrassing, the loud, the teenie bopper... all of it.

So with the passing of Mary (of peter, paul and mary), I felt the need to re-claim the original songs that introduced me to music. Folk is great. it's heartfelt, soft, feeling, emotional,universal, and fun. So yah, I bought "Puff the Magic Dragon", "Big Yellow Taxi", and one of my all time favorites ,"Kodachrome". I plan on enjoying a little peace and love, and making it a low-fi weekend.

Here's to satisfying the urge fo folk music.... may it reign forever.

Here's to the musical parents I have, I'm so happy that music has been and always will be such a part of my life.

"The times, they are a changing."

I thought Labor Day weekend was supposed to be Labor FREE!

Ahh, it so nice to sit down at the end of the day and just relax. After a hard day of hard labor outside, I'm looking forward to relaxing the rest of the day away. We worked so hard on our yard today. We've been trying to figure out what to do with certain eye sores, huge over-hanging branches, grass seed, weeds, crabgrass, and other random stuff.

I love a yard, but honestly it's a whole lot more work getting it to be less maintenance. We're still getting tons of rocks, and random objects (files, tubes, little cars, barrettes, hose) coming out of the ground. I am sure that our backyard will someday be an anthropologist's dream to see how lazy homeowners lived in the early 21st century in Alexandria, VA.

But lazy we are not, and the work is paying off a little bit. It's been almost a year since we bought our house, and we've done quite a lot of work. It's been rewarding, and now it's just about time to take on some big projects again, or at least try to decide what changes we think we want to make. Not sure yet...

So anyway, after a long days work I'm looming forward to a nice drink, cheese and crackers, some pasta and a fresh salad, and homemade peach pie (that I made) with some ice cream on top. What a day. What a weekend. It feels good to be home.

Holey Moley is it September already?

How time just vanishes, and I don't even realize it. School FINALLY starts on Tuesday, and I think I'm ready. I had 2 classrooms to get in order because I'm going to be teaching at 2 different schools. One school is my "home school" and the other I'm only at 2 days a week, however, it still somehow became my responsibility to get 2 rooms together. Argh.

But it's done. And they're both ready for students.

We had 3 days of pep talks. Which is fine, I'm all for supporting teachers, lifting them up, but 3 days? I enjoyed hearing 2 of the Freedom Writer come and speak, and I liked this other guy a lot (forget who he was). But did we need 9 keynote speakers? I don't think so.

So finally, I'm ready for students. Bring them on! They're going to be full of energy and excited, I can feel it. I got to meet a few of my future students this morning, and they seemed really cute. It's been a while since I've taught the little guys, but I'm ready. I think it's going to be a lot of fun.

What else? I have no idea...Lots of things. In the midst of planning the wedding too, of course. Came up with some actual ideas that may work... We'll see. Don't want to give anything away in case i don't do it. But yes, I am still making origami cranes. I have about 600 more to go. I think Jarle is going down to C-ville next week, so he's going to measure the place we're getting married at, and making sure we can fit the tables and chairs etc... it's at some one's house, so... I have no idea how it's working yet.

I'm so excited too-- because next week I'm going to go try on dresses! yay!! My best friends from high school are coming along to see and help me. So it'll be fun. I have no idea what I want, or even what might look good on me, so it will be nice to get their help. They're honest-- I think .....

Anyway, I'm ready for the weekend to begin and hopefully I'll have a little time to relax in between the school planning, yard work, and cleaning (our house has been so neglected the last 2 weeks).

Happy last unofficial weekend of summer! Enjoy it well!!!

Back from the Beach...

Well, I got a week at the beach this year, and I was so glad I got to go. I spent time with my niece, Riley. We had a good time. I don't really get to see her all that often, but we got to spend a lot of quality time together. Our schedule was really nice:

Wake up
Eat breakfast
Ride bike to beach
Walk on the beach, play in the surf
Ride bike back home
Play tennis (or laugh trying)
Swim in the pool
Go home and eat lunch
Ride bike back to beach
Swim, play games, relax, read
Ride back home
Change, shower
Cocktail hour
Dinner
Ride bike to Boardwalk
Eat Ice Cream
Ride bike back home
Relax
Read
Go to bed

Repeat 7 times.

That's a schedule I can deal with. It's always a little hard for me to leave the beach. It's one of my most favorite places. We've been going to Bethany Beach since I was 7th grade, and it's just such a part of our family traditions. The years I haven't been able to go has been heartbreaking. I'm always longing for the beach. I love love love the beach.

One of the cool things I learned to do at the beach this year was make hats. My mom showed me a knitting pattern and I actually made one! It didn't even take that long. Last night I made a second one. They turned out really nicely. I had no idea I could do that.... I thought it would be really hard to figure out. I'll have to post pictures later. I plan on making one for everyone this winter. Merry Christmas!!

We also did a little wedding planning. BUT, I won't totally bore you with that. Except these few things:

I've decided to make 1000 cranes for decorations (to be determined how exactly)
We're planning on have a signature drink
Jarle's list is so much bigger than my invite list...
It will be outside

That's about it so far.

And now school is just around the corner, and I'm busy trying to figure out what to teach to elementary students in 2 schools. Trying to figure out what my schedule is... and a little nervous that I'll have 2 principals to deal with...

Oh well, work has to happen at some point, it's just a matter of not thinking about it as work. And with all the other things going on, it might be that work becomes the least of my worries...

hahahah!

Ok, enough for now. More to come.

I have to share the goodness

The Swell Season. If you saw "once" you know what I'm talking about.

http://www.npr.org/templates/player/mediaPlayer.html?action=1&t=1&islist=false&id=111679769&m=111828142

Well worth checking out, watching and listening to. Love it!

First Slide-- NYC

Trying out slide

New York City-- Hope this works!!

http://widget-bb.slide.com/widgets/slideticker.swf" type="application/x-shockwave-flash" quality="high" scale="noscale" salign="l" wmode="transparent" flashvars="cy=bb&il=1&channel=3530822107884967611&site=widget-bb.slide.com" style="width:400px;height:320px" name="flashticker" align="middle">

long time no post!

I know it's been forever, but it's summer! And I have some HUGE news!

I'm engaged!

Yes, J and I are going to the leap! So excited, and couldn't be happier. It happened on our trip in Italy. We got back this past weekend, and I have tons of pictures to post. I took way too many and I'm still going through them all.

I also got a new job. I am going to be teaching in 2 elementary schools this year. Not the best possible situation, and I'm going to have to dig out a lot of my old lesson planning out. It's been a while, and I'm a little nervous about the little guys. I also feel a little guilty about leaving my current job, but it was time.

I'm looking forward to biking to work (hopefully) and being able to plan things for the long term.

So--- LOTS going on. Busy busy busy... But that's ok, I like it that way.

I will post pictures soon!! Hope everyone is enjoying their summer!

NYC!

So here I am, on an unexpected trip to NYC! I love this place. It's amazing. I've been here about 2 1/2 days now, and I feel that I have very little under my belt. There is so much to see and do, and i wish I could just spend the whole time wandering.

I'm actually here for the Lincoln Institute a National (should be international) Educator Workshop in Aesthetics.... gosh, they have a flair with words. Basically it's educators, arts administrators, college professors, and teaching artists from around the world, and many
disciplines who come and create, and discuss ANYTHING art. It's hands on, very reflective! The workshops are amazing, and the leaders of our workshops are even more so... I love every second of it.

I'm taking tons of pictures and I hope to put them all out when I get home. I can't believe how the time is flying here. It's really good for all my senses, and everything really feels alive for me. There's tons of action, movement and involvement in every aspect of being here. It feels energizing. I don't know how I'm going to be able to remember everything here, but I'm sure trying to document. Probably more than I should. I should take time to observe, relax, and just be in Manhattan,

Tonight I'm off to a concert in central park and hopefully a few lovely beverages in a nearby establishment. WOW! I hope I can carry this feeling in what I'm teaching in a few weeks. It's hard to believe it, but I'll be going back to school in just a couple of weeks. However, I think I have a new skills, and new ideas to pull from.

Now if I could just get over these darn stress dreams.

Off to....

NYC!

I can't believe it. I wasn't planning on a pre-trip before the big trip, but I got accepted to the Lincoln Center Institute. It's a set of art workshops for 5 days. I haven't been to NYC in years, and I've only been once. I'm a little nervous about it, but I think it will be fun. There are 6 of us going from our school district. The only think I gotta say about it, is that we're totally unprepared. After getting all the info about the workshop, I don't think I'll be ready to participate. We were supposed to read a book and some articles before we left, and none of us have those. I even tried to order the book on line, but it's too late! Oh well, we'll wing it. But I have a feeling that this is going to be more than we all anticipated.

We even are going to have to have to write a paper, comment on line, and keep a journal.. WOW.

But I'm still looking forward to it. NYC will be fun and exciting. I'm even looking forward to the train ride.

And then it's a few days home, a few loads of laundry, and some major re-packing and we're off to Italia!!! Yippee!

This summer is really turning out to be busy and exciting.

Hey! It's me!

On Etsy!!!

http://www.etsy.com/view_listing.php?listing_id=27234488

Tell all your friends!

Ahh, school districts

Well, they're up to their old tricks again. First I got hired for the new are position, then it became a 1/2 time position, then maybe not. So now I'm being re-issued a contract for the detention home. After moving through the stages of grief in a period of 24 hours, I have finally come to accept that I WILL be doing another year at the detention home.

Of course it's going to turn out to be one of those things where, they are going to make a final decision in August, and well, it'll be too late for me, because we're in school already at the D-home.

So I'm shifting my mindset again. It'll be ok. I really hope that the detention center becomes a dictatorship... but I'm afraid with all the former military members on staff now, that's exactly what it will become. -le sigh-

In other news, I have a fantastic opportunity to go to NYC this Sunday. It's for the Lincoln Center Art Institute. I get to go with a few other teachers from our district. It'll be fun. 6 days! That's going to be a long time away from home... But I'm so excited. I think this will be good for me, and I get to see and hear from other teachers from all over. I think it's a full day 9-5, but I'm totally excited to be in a huge city and seeing all the sights, and experiencing so much.

Then I come back and 4 days later we leave for Italy! Phew!

So the world is good. Everything is fine. I just need to figure out how I'm going to teach next year. With the restrictions on so many supplies at my school, I'm going to be so limited. I'm thinking about teaching comics. Lots of drawing.....though.

Ahh- Happy summer everyone. Hope you're enjoying.

Oh- and P.S. I'm getting busy on my etsy sight! I'll let you know what will be on it, and when I have it up and running-- hopefully by the end of tomorrow.... So excited to just be out there. Now for the website..... hummmmm....

coming soon..

A new art position. I'm headed back to elementary school this time. It should be a good change. I'm looking forward to the change. I've taught a few years of elementary, and I pretty much know what to expect. I really just hope that it's the right direction for me.

Done

Interview..check
Organize art closet...check
Recycle... check
Organize paint supplies....check
Finish assessments for half my classes...check
Organize leftover photo copies...check (wow, I never do that)
Last Monday with students... check

Now I just hold tight for a day (hopefully) and wait for the answer back from the interview. Then I'll know where I'm at and maybe-sorta relax about it all.

Glass of wine in hand...check.

Home Stretch

2 more days with classes, then grade day, and then.......?????? I have no idea. Our official last day is June 30th, but we have no classes. I guess that means clean up? Who knows. My room will be spotless if I come back and use it, or if someone else is here.

Today is also the day of the transfer interview. Wish me luck! I have everything ready. I know it's just a transfer interview, but I just wanted to be totally prepared. So I updated my resume, made sure my portfolio is in some sort of order..... Now I just have to be able to answer questions in a coherent way.

Ha!

Well, happy summer everyone!!! I have just over a week until I can start enjoying the feeling to the max!

The beginning of the end.

Well, we're coming to a close over here at the D home. And just as the year started.... it has ended. I saw one class today for 20 mins. I just can't wait to be done this year. It could be the last one here. I applied for a transfer, and I have an interview with that principal on Monday. Elementary school will definitely be a change, and I'm not sure it's totally what I want, but I figure it can't hurt to wait out in a more cohesive place.

The D-home is definitely going through some changes. They have a new assistant superintendent, and he's definitely more authoritarian. I hear (rumors) that he has a military background and is going to treat this place more like boot camp. I'm in favor of some consistency and some regimented behaviors, but it would be hard for me to feel comfortable in a place where there are going to be "drill sergeants" yelling and giving orders (I picture some drill sergeant type character saying drop and give me 20 as I'm teaching about perspective or something).

Who knows what will happen? I wish that the position at the high school hadn't been dissolved. There's a slight chance that this will be just some sort of a stepping stone.

Part of me thinks that I would just make a better mentor to a kid who was from the D-home. I could really connect to them by volunteering at the center. I feel like I'd be filling a void.

Summer vacation is on it's way, and that is a thing of joy. I can't wait to be eating gelato while meandering around the Venetian streets. I'm so looking forward to a change of scenery, culture, and food. I can't wait! It's going to be great.

So- with only a few school days left, keep your fingers (and toes) crossed for me on that interview, and that we all make it through the final days of the school year unscathed.

The big push.

Things are getting a little tougher around school these days. I don't have a count down calendar going yet, but I think I might need to make one tomorrow. I can't see the light at the end of the tunnel yet, but maybe after this coming weekend I will.

I haven't heard about the transfer position, but I'm sure within the next week I'll know about an interview. I'm still on the fence about it, but I guess either way I'll make it work. I wouldn't mind being able to walk out the door of the detention center for good after this school year. It would be bittersweet, but also welcoming to know that I wouldn't have a huge weight about my shoulders day in and day out.

I'm not sure there's a perfect job out there for me, but I know this is not it. As an art teacher it's thrilling to have a small setting, but it's so transient you can't really get anywhere. I feel mostly like I'm on a bed of quicksand. Every time I make a move I slowly get pulled under. Not a good feeling.

Oh the joys of being a teacher, so up and down. It's the end of the year, I'm bound to be feeling a little tired. Unfortunately, I think it's a bit more than that this year.

Any who-- things to look forward to:

ITALY!

So excited, I really am trying to spend more time thinking and planning for that. Now that most of the planning is done, I'm really ready to go now. But, we have a little over a month before our plane across the Atlantic. I still don't know much Italian, but maybe if I make some flashcards I'll start memorizing some phrases. We have cd's, but haven't both found the time to sit and listen to them... opps, maybe I can upload them to my ipod and just have it going for the entire plane ride... Ha!

Can I just say?

THE DECEMBERISTS COMPLETELY BLEW ME AWAY!

ANDREW BIRD COMPLETELY BLEW ME AWAY!

BOTH AMAZING! GO SEE THEM IF YOU HAVE THE CHANCE!

YOU WON'T BE DISAPPOINTED!

Yes, I am yelling at you... you must must see them..........