The Rest of the Story

New Year's

2012-01-27T20:07:00.000-08:00

After Christmas, I decided to get away to the home country. We spent a delightful amount of time cooking.

The weather was fabulous. It wasn't too cold, but there was beautiful snow all around. I would like to take this picture with me to show to people when I tell them I am from Arizona. Yes, Arizona does have snow.

New Years in the big city with my parents.

They started a new tradition that just might out do New York and Times Square. Yes, the dropping of the playing card that was so instrumental in the naming of our fair city. Check it out!!!

3!!!!!!!!!

2!!!!!!!!!!

1!!!!!Crash!!!!! Ha, ha, that would have defineitely made a more memorable night, however, this huge, roaring fire was really just sparkly, fun fireworks.

New Year's pictures by the Deuce of Clubs!!!!

I'm pretty sure that in New York they don't have kind people walking around asking you to flip over a card which they have conventiently made sure is the Deuce of Clubs so you win a $2 bill. Yep, I'm pretty sure that doesn't happen.

Nothing says Home Sweet Home like a picture with our dear old card playing namesakes. :)

Christmas

2012-01-27T19:56:00.001-08:00

This Christmas season started with my school's annual Christmas party competition for the Golden Nutcracker. Seriously, so much fun. Each team was suppose to come up with a skit for a Christmas song. My team knew that they wouldn't be leaving our meeting until we had come up with something much more. So,we decided to pull pranks on the staff for the week before the party. We switched all the teachers' name tags in the hallways, toliet papered the office, filled the resource room with dodge balls, moved teachers' desks into opposite rooms, had the principal's car moved and the list of fun goes on. We made sure to photograph each act of mischief, reworked the lyrics to I'm gettin' Nuttin' for Christmas and then made it into a movie. It was hilarious, well. . .that is what almost everyone thought. :)

Since my grandma's funeral was two days before Christmas, we decided to spend Christmas in Utah. Which made this the first Christmas I've spent away from home. However, since the best thing about Christmas is being together, we made sure we spent a lot of time doing just that. Here are our other family favorites

Food: Yum!!!. We love baking our special holiday foods. Frosting sugar cookies is a holiday favorite.

Music: This year my little brother entertained us all with the new songs he had composed. He gained two new fans, who fought over who could be his #1 fan. (Which still hasn't been established.) However, both memorized one of his tunes and played it all holiday long.

We also love our musical Christmas programs.

Silliness: We like to laugh and we like to be silly. Enough said.

The true reason for Christmas: We always try to focus on the real reason we celebrate Christmas. This year we performed in a Christmas pageant that was like no other. :)

Adventure: The day after Christmas we planned on going to the prison cafe for breakfast, because that is how we roll. However, it was closed, so we went to the next most adventuresome place Olive Garden, because it was close by. We made up for the adventure by trying new menu items,wild and crazy we know.

Shopping: The day after Christmas we found ourselves out and about on an urgent errand when we came face to face with these spunky watches. How could we not get them?

Yep, Christmas is my favorite!!!!

Legacy

2012-01-08T20:06:00.000-08:00

This Christmas season I spent a lot of time thinking about the real meaning of Christmas, as we spent time with my beautiful grandma before she passed away. I thought a lot about the birth of the Savior and felt joy in the knowledge that because of our Savior death is not the end. We shed many tears for my grandma's passing, but we shed many more tears of joy for the knowledge that she is with her beloved husband and family again.

My grandma was a teacher and her life was the greatest lesson she could ever give. She didn't teach by lecturing, but by doing. She looked for the good in everyone, and then praised them every chance she got. She worked tirelessly serving where ever she went. She not only made places more beautiful, but people as well. My grandma left me a legacy of love, service, and kindness. I realize that each day I am building the kind of legacy I will leave to those around me. As I do, I find myself striving to love more, to serve more, and to be a little bit more the person my grandma believed me to be. That I know is a legacy worth leaving.

It Doesn't Get Any Better Than This

2011-12-27T19:12:00.000-08:00

I had to share this story, it is one of my favorite crazy ones of the year. It started like this. . . In September, I had tickets to the General Relief Society Conference, so I invited a couple of friends, and we took the new train downtown. It was a wonderful conference, and afterward we set out to meet some friends for Lebanese food at a restaurant we had heard about.

We began walking and talking, but the closer we got to the restaurant the more I began rubbing my eyes and squinting. Finally, we all stopped, stared, and turned around looking for a candid camera. Seriously, any downtown brings out all different kinds of people, bless them all. You see people dressed in crazy clothes, or not a lot of clothes, but this was definitely something I was not prepared to see. All around us masses of people only clothed in their underwear emerged. I'm not kidding about the masses, I'm not talking about one or two people, I'm talking about people everywhere. They started pointing and laughing at us. Seriously, "the underwear people" as I like to call them started pointing and laughing at us. They affectionately called us the "clothes people." The closer we got to the restaurant, the closer we got to Gallivan Center and the home of the "underwear people" and their event. You see, the had an undie run. Yep, people of all shapes and sizes (I mean all) came downtown and ran to the capitol. They donated their clothes to the homeless and were running for all different causes, and to tell the leaders of Salt Lake, not to get their undies in a bunch. At least that is what I heard echoing from across the street. Now I think it is great idea to run for a cause, give clothes to the homeless, and they sure got attention, however, I personally have a hard time taking people who are only wearing underwear seriously, umm . . . . . .that and I'm a pretty big fan of modesty. One guy stopped us and asked me if I didn't feel awkward for having so many clothes on. He was wearing undies and the head of a wolf draped on his head and shoulders, It's true, I know because that is all I felt comfortable looking at. Seriously, the head of a wolf.

Gratefully, we rushed into the restaurant happy to find our friends and other people fully clothed. We were momentarily distracted from all of the craziness by the delicious smell of food, only to be brought back to reality by the clanging of music and the jingling of a belly dancer. Seriously, what are the odds? The food was delightful, I'm not going to lie about that, but it took about 3 hours to eat, not an exaggeration. (I know I tend to exaggerate, but this really is the truth.) And perhaps it seemed even longer because of the jingling of the belly dancer, and the fact that one of my friends couldn't stop sneezing, coughing, and wiping her eyes, or that my other friend couldn't eat and just sat and watched us, or it might have been the "delightful view" of the street and people prancing around in their undies.

As soon as our bill was paid, we ran hoping to catch the last train home. This caused us to run straight through the plaza/home base of the "underwear people" who giggled at our clothes, and called us the "conference people." It was definitely a new experience to be made fun of for wearing clothes. Luckily, we squeezed our way onto the full train, only to have two of the "underwear people" squeeze in next to us. If I were making a list, this would be reason number 17 why you should wear clothes. So awkward, so uncomfortable. Then this guy spoke to his girlfriend, "Man, we had to hop on this train, that guy out there was crazy." His girlfriend adamantly agreed, and at this moment my roommate and I both looked at each other and burst out laughing at this comment from two people wearing only tiny, sparkly underwear. I guess crazy is in the eye of the beholder. However, I quickly turned away and thought of something sad because with only underwear on I could see his muscles and didn't want to get pounded. We then focused on the screen and realized the last train to our stop had already left and this would only drop us off halfway. I honestly, couldn't stop laughing at this point. Gratefully, we had our cellphones and called a friend to pick us up. As the train bounced along, my friend continued to sneeze and cough, and I just kept on giggling. Seriously, you can't make this stuff up, nope it doesn't get any better than this.

Revolution

2011-12-27T17:13:00.000-08:00

It is time to play catch up. . . . . so here goes.
In August we set up a family blog dedicated to being more healthy. We focused on eating better, exercising, getting enough sleep, managing stress, all kinds of things to make us more healthy. We each wrote a year long goal, and then put down goals for each month. We report how we have done at the end of the month. We’ve included healthy recipies, inspiration, and our latest racing news. We held our first family 5k the first of October and raced around the lake at Daybreak. It was soooo much fun. The kids loved it, and all of the adults did too. We can’t wait till spring to have another one. While it is all a work in progress, we are following this quote that we included on the back of our t-shirts "The miracle isn't that I finished. The miracle is that I had the courage to start."

Here are all of the participants posed before the big race. We were missing two of our fiercest competitors and can't wait for them to run with us in the spring.

Everyone lined up ready for the race to begin.

Ready, set, go. . . ..

And they're off.

Some of our first place finishers.

Victory!!!!!!

There is nothing we can't conquer!!!!

Rock, Paper, Scissors

2011-11-08T21:49:00.000-08:00

We made sure we stuck together during the Halloween parade at school, because apart was awkward. Awkward, as in "Cool costume, um. . .yeah are you paper? Oh, cool. . . . .um. . . . . . .yeah."

Vegas Ragnar

2011-11-01T19:58:00.001-07:00

I sometimes wonder what in the world I get myself into, and that is exactly what I was thinking two weekends ago when it was 85 degrees in Vegas and I was running straight up hills. I also had this thought at 2 in the morning while I was running on a desolate road, and again on my third run in the middle of the day after getting 2 hours of sleep. I swore to myself that I would never again in my life run a Ragnar, and then somehow driving home I heard myself telling one of my teammates that yeah, I just might run the Northwest Ragnar with them? ? ? And, although running 188 miles day and night is crazy, I don't know it was kind of a fun crazy.

Ragnar-You take 12 crazy people and they decorate two vans and dress up like zombies or wear tutus and Elvis costumes. Then they ring cowbells, and cheer through bullhorns. They jump up and down alongside the road, and dance to their own beat day and night, and it is crazy, but it is seriously fun.

(Somehow in the middle of the night we found ourselves going into a gas station for water, and the next thing you know we are doing the can-can with the clerk. Only at Ragnar when I have not slept.)

Van teammates-Crazy, fun ladies. Oh the stories I could tell.

The Scenery-Vegas was billed as having a "beautiful red rock" landscape. Hmmm. . . . .it seemed more like barren desert, but I guess that is beautiful in its own way?

Roadkills-You get one roadkill for every person you pass. How could I not take on the challenge?

Becoming tough- This headband says, "I eat hills for breakfast." which is about as far away from the truth as you can get. I hate hills, but they couldn't be avoided, and so I ate them as best I could and toughened up.

Running in the middle of the night-seriously the middle of the night. Craziest thing ever running at 2 in the morning with your headlamp on, a little tail light on the back and a reflective vest. However, I'm not going to lie it was my best run for two reasons. One, it was cool and serene, and I actually liked it. I just looked for the flashing red tail lights of the runners and waved at the vans stopped alongside the road cheering us on. However, the second reason it was my best run was because it was desolate and dark and I didn't want to get kidnapped. Fastest run in weeks. :)

Three runs in 24 hours- There is nothing that feels so good, as checking off each box as you finish a run in this marathon of runs.

The finish line!!!! As your last runner finishes, the whole team waits for them and then you all cross the finish line together. It really is a team effort. Loved it!!!!

It will be fun!!!

2011-10-19T06:24:00.001-07:00

This will be me this weekend. (The one having "fun" not the one running over people in a van and going to jail,that would not be fun.) Craziness, I know.

Ha, Ha, Love it!

2011-10-09T21:29:00.000-07:00

There are Just Some Things People Should not do

2011-09-18T21:11:00.000-07:00

The other week I found myself in charge of a pie eating competition, which not only requires you to buy pies, sweet talk free bibs, and rally participants, but it also requires you to judge people stuffing squishy pies into their face. Nobody should be asked to watch, let alone judge something like that. Especially, someone who has a very weak stomach. Seriously, it was pretty gross, but I must admit I was holding my own. That is I was holding my own until, a hot shot guy looked up at me and smiled with whip cream oozing down his face. I think he thought he had found a sympathetic face, and so he moaned "I don't feel so well." This was of course followed by pudding dribbling out of his mouth. It was exactly the worse thing that could happen to me. I of course did what any weak stomach person would do. I started to gag, threw my roommate in front of me, and dashed off yelling at her to finish judging. In the end, this tiny looking lady won, without a drop of pie on her face. After everyone was cleaned up, I made my way back over to the contest. The guy now had a shiny clean face, and he came over to me and smiled. "I've never had a girl look at me before and want to throw up." He exclaimed. I tried to apologize, but that image kept entering my head. My roommate tried to make amends and piped up, "Oh don't worry, it's not you, she just has a weak stomach. She almost throws up every night when I talk to her while I'm brushing my teeth."(Which again is something people really should not do, it is gross.) However, he didn't hear this explanation because he was to busy running off to the root beer chugging contest, which again is really something people . . .

A Must Read

2011-09-10T22:19:00.000-07:00

Loved this so much I wanted to archive it on my blog.

What teachers really want to tell parents
By Ron Clark, Special to CNN
updated 9:12 AM EST, Tue September 6, 2011

Editor's note: Ron Clark, author of "The End of Molasses Classes: Getting Our Kids Unstuck -- 101 Extraordinary Solutions for Parents and Teachers," has been named "American Teacher of the Year" by Disney and was Oprah Winfrey's pick as her "Phenomenal Man." He founded The Ron Clark Academy, which educators from around the world have visited to learn.

(CNN) -- This summer, I met a principal who was recently named as the administrator of the year in her state. She was loved and adored by all, but she told me she was leaving the profession.
I screamed, "You can't leave us," and she quite bluntly replied, "Look, if I get an offer to lead a school system of orphans, I will be all over it, but I just can't deal with parents anymore; they are killing us."

Unfortunately, this sentiment seems to be becoming more and more prevalent. Today, new teachers remain in our profession an average of just 4.5 years, and many of them list "issues with parents" as one of their reasons for throwing in the towel. Word is spreading, and the more negativity teachers receive from parents, the harder it becomes to recruit the best and the brightest out of colleges.

So, what can we do to stem the tide? What do teachers really need parents to understand?

For starters, we are educators, not nannies. We are educated professionals who work with kids every day and often see your child in a different light than you do. If we give you advice, don't fight it. Take it, and digest it in the same way you would consider advice from a doctor or lawyer. I have become used to some parents who just don't want to hear anything negative about their child, but sometimes if you're willing to take early warning advice to heart, it can help you head off an issue that could become much greater in the future.

Trust us. At times when I tell parents that their child has been a behavior problem, I can almost see the hairs rise on their backs. They are ready to fight and defend their child, and it is exhausting. One of my biggest pet peeves is when I tell a mom something her son did and she turns, looks at him and asks, "Is that true?" Well, of course it's true. I just told you. And please don't ask whether a classmate can confirm what happened or whether another teacher might have been present. It only demeans teachers and weakens the partnership between teacher and parent.

Please quit with all the excuses

The truth is, a lot of times it's the bad teachers who give the easiest grades, because they know by giving good grades everyone will leave them alone.
And if you really want to help your children be successful, stop making excuses for them. I was talking with a parent and her son about his summer reading assignments. He told me he hadn't started, and I let him know I was extremely disappointed because school starts in two weeks.

His mother chimed in and told me that it had been a horrible summer for them because of family issues they'd been through in July. I said I was so sorry, but I couldn't help but point out that the assignments were given in May. She quickly added that she was allowing her child some "fun time" during the summer before getting back to work in July and that it wasn't his fault the work wasn't complete.

Can you feel my pain?

Some parents will make excuses regardless of the situation, and they are raising children who will grow into adults who turn toward excuses and do not create a strong work ethic. If you don't want your child to end up 25 and jobless, sitting on your couch eating potato chips, then stop making excuses for why they aren't succeeding. Instead, focus on finding solutions.

Parents, be a partner instead of a prosecutor

And parents, you know, it's OK for your child to get in trouble sometimes. It builds character and teaches life lessons. As teachers, we are vexed by those parents who stand in the way of those lessons; we call them helicopter parents because they want to swoop in and save their child every time something goes wrong. If we give a child a 79 on a project, then that is what the child deserves. Don't set up a time to meet with me to negotiate extra credit for an 80. It's a 79, regardless of whether you think it should be a B+.

This one may be hard to accept, but you shouldn't assume that because your child makes straight A's that he/she is getting a good education. The truth is, a lot of times it's the bad teachers who give the easiest grades, because they know by giving good grades everyone will leave them alone. Parents will say, "My child has a great teacher! He made all A's this year!"

Wow. Come on now. In all honesty, it's usually the best teachers who are giving the lowest grades, because they are raising expectations. Yet, when your children receive low scores you want to complain and head to the principal's office.

Please, take a step back and get a good look at the landscape. Before you challenge those low grades you feel the teacher has "given" your child, you might need to realize your child "earned" those grades and that the teacher you are complaining about is actually the one that is providing the best education.

And please, be a partner instead of a prosecutor. I had a child cheat on a test, and his parents threatened to call a lawyer because I was labeling him a criminal. I know that sounds crazy, but principals all across the country are telling me that more and more lawyers are accompanying parents for school meetings dealing with their children.

Teachers walking on eggshells

I feel so sorry for administrators and teachers these days whose hands are completely tied. In many ways, we live in fear of what will happen next. We walk on eggshells in a watered-down education system where teachers lack the courage to be honest and speak their minds. If they make a slight mistake, it can become a major disaster.

My mom just told me a child at a local school wrote on his face with a permanent marker. The teacher tried to get it off with a wash cloth, and it left a red mark on the side of his face. The parent called the media, and the teacher lost her job. My mom, my very own mother, said, "Can you believe that woman did that?"

I felt hit in the gut. I honestly would have probably tried to get the mark off as well. To think that we might lose our jobs over something so minor is scary. Why would anyone want to enter our profession? If our teachers continue to feel threatened and scared, you will rob our schools of our best and handcuff our efforts to recruit tomorrow's outstanding educators.

Finally, deal with negative situations in a professional manner.

If your child said something happened in the classroom that concerns you, ask to meet with the teacher and approach the situation by saying, "I wanted to let you know something my child said took place in your class, because I know that children can exaggerate and that there are always two sides to every story. I was hoping you could shed some light for me." If you aren't happy with the result, then take your concerns to the principal, but above all else, never talk negatively about a teacher in front of your child. If he knows you don't respect her, he won't either, and that will lead to a whole host of new problems.

We know you love your children. We love them, too. We just ask -- and beg of you -- to trust us, support us and work with the system, not against it. We need you to have our backs, and we need you to give us the respect we deserve. Lift us up and make us feel appreciated, and we will work even harder to give your child the best education possible.
That's a teacher's promise, from me to you.

C.S. Lewis

2011-08-22T21:28:00.000-07:00

Love this:

"No man knows how bad he is till he has tried very hard to be good. A silly idea is current that good people do not know what temptation means. This is an obvious lie. Only those who try to resist temptation know how strong it is. After all, you find the strength of the German army by fighting against it, not by giving in. You find out the strength of a wind by trying to walk against it, not by lying down. A man who gives into temptation after five minutes simply does not know what it would have been like an hour later. That is why bad people, in one sense, know very little about badness. They have always lived a sheltered life by always giving in. We never find out the strength of the evil impulse inside us until we try to fight it; and Christ, because He was the only man who never yielded to temptation, is also the only man who knows to the full what temptation really means-the only complete realist."

Egg on my Face

2011-08-07T01:16:00.000-07:00

I think I'm turning into a Danny Tanner cleaning clone. Lately, I've been spending hours deep cleaning and grinning in delight as my new steamer cuts through stubborn stains. Unfortunately, I sometimes get carried away. The other day as I was scrubbing, I quickly bent down to grab something and somehow slammed my forehead on the side of the dresser which led to blood spewing out of my head and an immense headache. The first thing I did was make sure I didn't get any blood on my newly cleaned floor, then I iced it, finished cleaning and thought I was good. However,that night at a party, several people commented on my Harry Potter like gash, and how I should have gotten stitches because the gash would soon be a permanent scar. I stared at them in horror until one of my favorite friends gave me hope with an old family secret to prevent scarring. He told me to take the skin off an egg put it on the gash, and then put the egg white on it. Some of you may be shaking your head in superstition, but I didn't have a lot of options, and I'm a believer in random remedies. And so, I soon began my egg skin, and egg white remedy. This is as good as it gets:

I'm not going to lie, I got a lot of funny stares and laughs at the egg on my face, but I remained strong and now that scar is looking good. Which leads me to believe that sometimes egg on your face isn't so bad.

Four Places at Once

2011-08-06T02:58:00.000-07:00

TA DA!!!! The seemingly impossible is made possible at Four Corners. Arizona, Utah, New Mexico, and Colorado all meet together in one spot where you can twister it up and be in four places at once.

Cross off number 23!!!!

Prison Food

2011-07-10T16:03:00.000-07:00

There are some things in life that are just too good to pass up, and that is why when my roommate and I were driving by the prison and saw a sign that said, “Serving Time Café-Open to the Public” we immediately decided to plan lunch there with our other roommate. Thoughtfully, we decided not to disclose the location to her and gleefully blindfolded her and drove to the front of the prison.

We pulled up facing the prison declared we were here and took off her blindfold.

She took one look at the prison and exclaimed, Um. . .Oh. . . we’re at the prison, ah. . . hmmm. . . “ Yes, all the secrecy was worth the look on her face. Then laughingly, we turned the car to the building next to the prison where the cafe was located. She seemed to have a few reservations, but we assured her that we had read only the best of prisoners can work there. A friend also told us they go through the culinary arts program at the prison as well. We walked through the door and were welcomed with a white board displaying delicious specials and a sign on the wall that said, “Please do not leave tips, we cannot take them.” I smiled loving the place already. The servers/prisoners greeted us with warm smiles and yummy food. Seriously, yummy. Guards, staff from correctional services, and people wanting yummy food littered the room, all happily munching. We liked it so much we went back for breakfast another day and loved it then. What can be better than fluffy pancakes for $2.00 and this sign on the white board?

I've always believed that the best food comes from random, little places, and I don't know a place more random than the prison.

Crash!!

2011-05-29T22:42:00.001-07:00

Last Monday was my first day off track, I usually spend that day sleeping in. However, instead I found myself driving back on the freeway from a doctor's appointment in Provo. As I was coming around the mountain, I noticed the flashing lights of a patrol car off to the side of the road, and some tire debris in the road. I suppose this is what caused traffic to slow, because the huge truck in front of me slowed, and so like a good driver, I slowed, and the driver behind me, well . . . . I suppose he did not slow. Because bam like a rocket with a thundering boom, my whole car was propelled into the other lane? Which was miraculous considering that I should have been pummeled into the huge truck in front of me. I guess my head hit the back of the seat something fierce and my clippy shattered into a million (ten) different pieces. Once my head snapped back up, I prayed something fierce and swung my car off the side of the freeway. It all seemed like a fuzzy dream. I'm not sure how I wasn't hit by a million (ten) different cars. Off to the side of the road, I said a prayer of gratitude and then with all the natural instinct of an insurance agent's daughter, I grabbed my accident report guide, information, and shakily stepped out of the car. A new policeman pulled onto the scene and had me come sit in his car. It was there in his car with the paramedics and firetruck racing onto the scene that I had my next three thoughts. My first thought was "Oh no, how am I ever going to get my paper done for class tonight?' Which was followed by, "Hmmm . . . I wonder if my professor will give me another day, since I've been in an accident?" Which was followed by, "What in the world am I doing thinking about a paper, when I was almost killed?" Yep, I was honestly thinking about a paper, as the paramedics were knocking on the window. This was a small indicator to me that my priorities may be slightly off. And so while my car is pretty banged up, and I'm still waiting to hear its diagnosis, I'm okay, and I'm determined to take what I learned from this crash to get my life back in balance, so in moments of craziness I am thinking about what is most important.

Blackberry Kisses

2011-05-15T09:46:00.001-07:00

"As she approached the corner of the barn where the sugar maple stands, she plucked a few blackberries from a stray bush and popped them into her mouth. She looked all around her-back at the house, across the fields, and up into the canopy of branches overhead. She took several quick steps up to the trunk of the maple, threw her arms around it, and kissed that tree soundly."
Walk Two Moons
"Oh I just loved that part." one of my girls gushed. "Me too!" another one giggled. And so when deciding on which kind of treat to bring in to share with them at the end of our book group, I knew I had to bring in blackberries. What I didn't know was how much they truly loved this book. As I laid out the blackberries, the girls began to gush,"Oh, Miss R, Oh, can we kiss a tree with the blackberries." I started to laugh. However, they continued to gush about how they would always remember this, and how every time they came back to visit they would look at the tree and try to find their blackberry stain. Of course, that got me right there, because I am a sucker for memories. And so while the rest of the class was down eating ice cream at a party, my small girl's group took big bites of blackberries, rubbed them on our lips and kissed a tree outside of our classroom soundly. We came back in giggling, and then the girls begged to finish our discussion. We went back to our favorite moments from the book, and of course, as I started to read mine, I began to cry. I do it every time I read this book,(it is one of my favorites) but as I looked around the group, I noticed their eyes were all glistening as well. The next little girl began, "Please excuse me if I cry," which immediately set me off into tears again, and then she began her part, her voice shaky, her eyes wet. We strained to hear her soft, shaky,beautiful words. When she finished, I looked around at these girls who begged to stay longer in our group each week to read together, who asked for their reading group to be moved up so we could discuss earlier, and who giggled, swooned, cried, questioned, and learned throughout this book. I started to tear up again, because it is moments like this that every teacher lives for. Moments when you see this light click on, where they have found a love of reading and learning. And just like that blackberry stain that lingers on the tree, I hope that they will always remember this moment, this book, this experience. Like they say in the book, Huzza, Huzza!

The Last to Know

2011-04-17T09:40:00.001-07:00

I found out the other day, that I'm engaged, again. It happens every year, except as always, I'm the last to know. This year, just as class was getting ready to start a teacher came in my room all smiley. I looked up and smiled at her, she skipped over, "Hey, what's new with you?" I assumed she wanted to know about my leg, because that is the important topic, so I smiled, "Well, my leg is doing so good. Look at how well it can bend." She kept smiling, "Uh huh, anything else?" "Um. . . I just found out I graduate this summer." She just smiled, so I smiled, then her smile got larger. "Is there anything else going on?" She then began to giggle. I stopped smiling. "Um. . . .nope." I tried to smile again, but suddenly I felt very uncomfortable. "Well" she began, "I heard you've been kissing Math Boy ( a friend who comes in to help me with my crazy math antics) in the hall, and that you two are in engaged." Suddenly, the little rumor makers in my room are very busy. I roll my eyes and sigh dramatically. "Nope, not true at all." I look out on the sea of students who swear they've seen UFO's, killers, and bloody claws in their chicken nuggets, and I'm shocked someone actually believed them. I assume this is the end of the rumor when the next day, a former student who is now in college, comes in to visit. He walks in and smiles, I smile. His smile gets larger, and I immediately stop. He beams, "So, I hear you're engaged." Once again, I roll my eyes and sigh dramatically. "Nope, not true at all." I respond. He shakes his head, "But everyone is talking about it." I roll my eyes and sigh dramatically, "Just because everyone is talking about it, doesn't make it true."(Spoken like a true teacher) A few nights later, I am slipping into the middle school for a former student's big acting debut, when all of these 8th graders come rushing at me. "Oh, my goodness it's so good to see you" they shout. We rejoice in our reunion, until they are smiling even larger than usual. I back away, they cheer, "We hear you're engaged!" People start turning their heads, I roll my eyes twice, and sigh extra loud as I repeat," Nope, not at all." I've decided it's tough being engaged, especially when you are the last to know.

Physical Therapy

2011-03-17T08:14:00.000-07:00

Once again, I find myself learning how to walk. I'm praying this is the last time in a long, long while. I spent the two weeks before surgery trying to shake a cold that wouldn't go away. I repented of dairy products and spent all my time drinking an insane amount of liquids, soups, and anything with Vitamin C. I even found myself with a Neti Pot in my nose. ( I was desperate.) The day before surgery I was just a tad stuffy, and so they gave me the green light. I don't know if I've ever worked so hard and been so excited to have surgery before. I even brought my own crutches to the hospital, I was ready for this surgery. I however, wasn't ready for the after part. I remembered my last ACL surgery and the crutches for a month, and struggling in therapy for weeks and weeks to be able to roll an exercise ball and bend my knee. It was the most nauseous, sleepless, and painful summer of my life. However, this surgery with a graft from a donor was amazing!!!! I was able to eat and sleep that night, and the pain hasn't been that bad. I went to physical therapy two days after surgery (seriously two days) we took off all the wrappings and my knee looked so good, (well that might be debatable, but I thought it looked good) my therapist started moving it, which I thought would be impossible but it moved, it moved. I think I said, "Oh my goodness ," and "Wow" a million times. My therapist was equally impressed and he even had me start putting weight on it. Wow!!! Oh my goodness! Surgery was two weeks ago and after therapy today, I found myself crutchless, and braceless. It is a miracle! Now I'm just working on my physical therapy, which if you have ever had physical therapy may look easy, but is really sooooo HARD!!!!! Last week, my therapist, who I actually like a lot, had me put an exercise ball behind my back and do squats, which might not sound hard, but oh my goodness! He smiled and said, "Can you feel that you are favoring your right leg?" I smiled, and said through gritted teeth, "Yeah, that is because my left kneecap feels like it is going to explode and my whole leg collapse." My therapist smiled back, "Well just as long as you're aware of it." Yesterday, he had me walk around the gym in a figure eight backwards with one eye closed. That is right, figure eight, backwards with one eye closed, it is as difficult as it sounds. Each rotation he also made me change which eye was closed, which made all of the other people in the gym think I was winking at them as I stumbled around. However, I'm all for anything crazy, because with ever lopsided figure eight, my knee is getting stronger and I'm on my way to walking normally.

Bear Lake

2011-03-13T17:23:00.000-07:00

Presidents' Day Weekend I was sick. However, for some reason, I still decided to go up to Bear Lake with 20 other girls. I spent most of my time asleep, or blowing my nose. However, I still loved being with so many friends in a beautiful cabin in the snow. I should probably also mention there was also a chocolate festival. Chocolate covered raspberries, seriously, that alone was enough of a reason to go.
These are some of the other highlights:
On the way up we stopped at Gossner's Cheese Factory. How can you not like a place with flower boxes and squeaky cheese?

I also liked this place because it's very unpretentious with signs like this:

Ummm . . .Root Beer flavored milk, who makes Root Beer flavored milk? And who could resist buying some? Not me, although, I still haven't tried it, well, because it's Root Beer flavored milk, and ummm. . . .I'm saving it for a special occasion.

If you look closely you can see the beautiful lake, it is a gorgeous place.

Coming home, how could we not stop for Aggie Ice Cream, which may not be good for a cold, but sometimes you have to live on the edge.

Cupcake Wars and Basketball Dreams

2011-03-03T12:31:00.001-08:00

A couple of weeks ago, happiness struck twice. First, I was asked to be a cupcake tester at a cupcake war. Umm. . . . . 19 different cupcakes, judged on appearance, theme, and taste. Count me in!!! It was heavenly until around number 11 or so. I mean even a little taste of 19 cupcakes is a lot. Seriously, a lot and those little ladies kept coming in and saying, "Oh did you get a taste of the middle, because the middle has my special filling." I'm not going to lie, I was ill by the end, and the monkey brain cupcake just did not get a fair shake. Sorry monkey cupcake, I did give you a great on your appearance though. After the cupcake tasting, I decided never to eat cupcakes again, well until my mom gave me this recipe, which is amazing. Try it.

After coming home and resting a little, we took off to the Suns game!!!! I love being a Suns rebel rouser. We ended up invading the Jazz stadium and found our Suns magnetism attracting other Suns fans who ended up sitting by us. Every time something good happened, our new friend would say, "That's what I'm talking about Home Skillet!" and then he would give us high fives that never connected. Let's just say our Home Skillets weren't super hip, luckily, our team was. Take a look at the score, and know happiness.

You Don't Know What You've Got Till It's Gone

2011-01-09T19:09:00.000-08:00

I often hear people complaining about having to go running, or exercising, or to the gym. I know, because I just might be one of those people. However, my New Year's Resolution is to never, ever complain about running or exercising again. My reason began in September, when I was training for a half marathon. (By training, I mean I was a complete slacker and ran a few long runs.) However, when I did run, it felt like someone was taking a knife and slashing it into my knee. After running, my leg would give out on me, and I couldn't even turn over in bed without it hurting. I stopped all physical activity, and pleasantly my knee felt better. However, there comes a point when you have to move again, and so I set up an appointment with a nearby orthopedic.

They took an x-ray and that big screw from my ACL reconstruction was still nicely attached. I breathed a sigh of relief. They sent in a P.A., he moved my leg around, looked at the x-ray and said it all seemed fine. Which should have caused me to breathe out another sigh of relief, except for the memory of my leg giving out on me and nearly falling over as I tried to get up from sitting on a plane. Or the memory of a knife slashing into my knee. So, I shared these vivid memories with him. He didn't seem phased and started to tell me all about all of the people who are just fine and have little tears in their knee. He said that was probably my problem. I don't think I looked convinced, so he started telling me about jeans. Yep, jeans that you wear. He explained how when you have a pair of jeans for a very long time, they just naturally rip because they are so old, but you still wear them because they just have a little tear. I was very confused at the meaning of this story because I am not 80 years old. I think I even turned around just to make sure that there wasn't some old person in the room that he was really talking to. However, he really was talking to me, and I left with no questions answered, but a clean bill of health to do what ever physical activity I wanted.

So, I ran, and the knife slasher, leg giving away came back. So I did what I should have done in the first place, and I called the doctor who did my ACL surgery and scheduled an appointment. I may have had to drive a lot farther away, but it was worth it. When I told him the jean story , he said he was going to immediately call and tell them how ridiculous that story was. I nodded emphatically. I was feeling so vindicated, that I forgot that this must mean there was a much bigger problem. He quickly looked at the x-ray and then moved my knee and it jumped. He stared at me and asked me if I felt it. I did. He shook his head and said, "Well unfortunately the graft is gone." My head was swirling, "Graft, graft." Then I knew. My hamstring used in the reconstruction was now gone, torn, stretched, gone. I wasn't quite sure this was really happening when he continued, "Yeah, that is the bad news, but the good news is I had a cancelation for tomorrow, we could do surgery then." I was speechless and unable to come in the next day, or for that matter until March. He put me under strict orders to not run, twist, turn, yeah, pretty much move. (But I can bike, thank heavens for that.) During music, I tried showing the boys a choreography move and about tipped over, so I've decided this is serious business. Which leads me back to my New Year's Resolution, and I am serious I will never, ever complain about the amazing ability to run or exercise again.

I Was Born in a Small Town

2011-01-09T18:21:00.001-08:00

It's true, I was born in a small town, and I love it. One of the best parts of Christmas is coming home. I love the slow pace. I love going into a store and always seeing someone you know. I love the values and the priorities of the people in town. Most of all I just love being at home with my family. Every other Christmas we are small in number, as you can see from the pictures. However, it was still wonderful. We played games, and watched movies and made yummy food. Pretty much we just enjoyed our small family in our small town, and it was perfect.

The Golden Nutcracker

2010-12-27T10:44:00.000-08:00

So, I'm not going to lie. I sometimes get a little carried away and create productions out of small things, but isn't it more fun that way? Last year, I was in charge of the school's faculty Christmas party, and I created this golden nutcracker trophy for the grade that had the best decorated table. (I thought it was a brilliant way to get people excited about having to decorate their own table, bring their own food, and supply their own gifts.) Well, I kept talking it up and egging people on and soon we had some pretty nice tables. However, I may have talked it up a little too much and the office staff blindsided me with an over the top skit and decorations. They stole my trophy right out from under me. Well, ever since that day I vowed I would get that trophy back. (Like I said, I get a little carried away.) The office has also been scheming all year. They told me in October they had their theme all picked out and then they started the smack talk. I knew the office was going to be good, and so I began to frantically think of a clever idea. At the end of one of our team meetings, I told everyone they could not go to Thanksgiving Break until we had our skit. Nervously, two of my team members told me they would be out of town during the party. I gave them my teacher look, but it didn't work, and I found myself frantically scrambling for an award winning idea. The theme was Countries Around the World, so I decided we would be "Country." (clever, right?) We dressed up as cowboys, rode in on stick horses, brought cowboy caviar, and recreated the Grand Ole Opry. Those missing teammates, I made into wanted outlaws. The office was gypsies without a country (definitely not as clever) and told each person's fortune. Mine said, "The Golden Nutcracker will allude you again." Gratefully, the office was not real gypsies, and we won, we actually won. Who needs an academy award, this was much, much better.

Here is our little country Christmas skit:
(I hesitate to post it because it is embarrassing, so embarrassing, but so fun, and I promised the majority of my readers I would post it (my family.) So enjoy!

The Pilgrims and the Indians

2010-12-27T10:28:00.001-08:00

I love Thanksgiving; it is one of my favorite holidays. I love all the yummy food, being with family, and focusing on gratitude. This year we celebrated Pilgrim and Indian style with all the cute kids.

We visitied with my wonderful grandma.

In attendance were two new sweetheart babies.

We ate delicious food.

We celebrated my niece's 16th birthday, and she had her first date with her dad. How can she be that old when I am still so young?

We had a true blue Cougs party. (The food was great, the company was great, the actual ending of the game was not so great.)

Of course, the best part was just being together.

FALL

2010-11-07T19:41:00.001-08:00

I have a friend who took her blog and made it into a book, as a journal of her life. I loved that idea and want to do that. However, I recognize I have huge gaps in my life on this blog, and so in an attempt to lessen the gaps here is a quick catch photo catch up of fall:

Hiking in the fall is a must. This is one of my favorite hikes, Bridal Veil Falls.

For Fall Break, I flew down to Arizona to hang out with my parents. My mom and I went to Time Out for Women. It was a much needed time out from the world and a chance to focus on hope. We had the opportunity to make kits for a women's shelter in Phoenix and learn how we can have and be a hope for others.

To get into the spirit of Halloween, we got a group to go to The Organ Loft, which features silent movies and this amazing old man in a tux who plays this sparkly organ. It is so cool! If you live in Utah, go. They had the old silent Phantom of the Opera movie. It was quite an experience.

We also decided to do a little ghost hunting and went on a storytelling adventure around Salt Lake. Our storyteller was a lot of fun and the tour took us to all of the famous haunts of Salt Lake. This particular picture was taking at Fort Douglas, where a mischevious ghost named Clem supposedly plays tricks. They said to check our pictures and see if he might be in them. Do you see him?

At the Rio Grande, which was once a train station and now houses a Mexican restaurant, they have a very special ghost. This is the purple lady. She supposedly got in a fight with her love who had just come home from the war. In her anger, she gave him back her engagement ring. In his anger, he threw it. In her haste, she ran for it, but didn't look where she was going and was hit by a train. They say her ghost haunts the bathroom. I'm not sure why, but they say she does. We didn't see her, but others have seen her? And she told them, she was pushed. Ooooooooooo!!!!! Anyway, they have this likeness of her for all to see. All in all, it was a pretty fun time, perhaps a little weird, but filled with lots of good stories.

The end to these fall adventures was Halloween. This year I was the famous Math Girl at my school. I also made Math Girl her own costume and she was me. My class thought it was the most clever thing ever done. However, besides the sixth grade, most people don't know Math Girl, and so when little children pointed and asked their parents who I was they just said, "Um. . . . some Math person, or I think she is suppose to be Wonder Woman, but she has the W's upside down." Oh well my children knew, and I used my powers to only eat one of those divine sugar cookies they give each classroom. Only one, truly a feat for a super hero!

Give Me This Mountain

2010-11-07T15:31:00.000-08:00

This year on a river rafting trip my ward's theme was, "Give Me This Mountain." Ever since that trip, I haven't been able to get those words out of my head. I think the words have struck me so much because it seems like everywhere I turn there are obstacles and challenges that seem too overwhelming and too daunting.

As I was reading about Caleb who spoke these words, I found that he was sent to scout for the Israelites after they had been brought out of bondage from the Egyptians. After scouting for land, all of the scouts but Caleb and Joshua brought back a depressing report of how they couldn't inhabit the land because of the walled cities and Anakims, who looked like giants. After hearing this news, the Israelities did not dare go into the land, they didn't have the faith. And so forty-five years passed, until there was a new generation that would go down into the land. This task still seemed daunting and Caleb was now 85 years old. However with full confidence he requested to go down into the land saying, "Give me this Mountain." I love those words, because Caleb had such trust in the Lord that he was ready for whatever challenge came before him, whether it was big or small.

As I've been working on applying these words in my life, I thought of a recent hiking trip I went on with a friend up a mountain he had described as being inhabited with huge boulders. I found that he had exaggerated quite a bit, but it was still tiring and steep at times. However, once we reached the waterfall, my mind forgot all of that work, and I sat moved by the beauty and peace up there. We then turned and moved to a place overlooking the Salt Lake Valley. Once again I was moved by the view. As I sat there, I pondered on the huge mountains in our lives, the power to triumph, and the beauty in and after the climb. I've come to understand that our Heavenly Father has not left us alone to conquer our challenges. This gives me the courage to say, "Give me this mountain."

Sometimes Awkward Things Happen to Nice People and Sometimes Nice People do Awkward Things

2010-09-19T20:45:00.000-07:00

When I was in grade school, my friends and I would tell each other about our craziest dreams. I learned later that one of the best dreamers, never really dreamed her dreams at all. She made them all up!!! I thought that was crazy, because I've never had to worry about making up crazy dreams or events, they just happen to me. In college, my roommates and I even created a signal to help out in all our the awkward moments. It was the sign for come and save me from the awkwardness. Lately, I've thought I need to bring that signal back because nice people need other nice people in awkward moments.
Awkward Moment 1
Just the other day I parked in the underground parking downtown, as I hurried into a few places to look at paintings. After finishing in my allotted one hour time, I hurried to the exit and reached into my pocket for the parking ticket. Unfortunately, it was no where to be found. I fumbled through all of my pockets and then sat down on a couch and went through my purse. No ticket! I figured this had to happen to other people, so it was probably not that big of a deal. I then walked out to the garage and found the parking attendant on his little golf cart and explained my predicament. He had me look through all of my pockets and purse again with him watching. "Maybe it's in your car." he offered. And so, we walked over to my car, and that's when I discovered I was missing my car key! I tried to act calm as I fumbled through my purse and mindlessly chattered. Finally, after no success, I smiled at the dear man and broke the news to him. "You know how a minute ago I didn't think there could be anything worse than losing my ticket, well it's all about perspective. You see, now I've lost my car key." He just stared and reiterated, "You mean you lost your car key too?" I smiled and told him I was going back in to retrace my steps. He told me to make sure and look for my ticket while I was at it. Luckily, I found the key right there on the couch, but as expected, no ticket. However, I ran back jubilantly and drove my car down to the gate with the man blazing the trail ahead in his golf cart. Unfortunately, something was wrong with his pass and even though he kept swiping and hitting things, the gate would not let us by. As he was working, my eyes fell upon the words "Lost ticket $20." I moaned and looked up at the old man. He smiled. " Don't worry we don't want you to have to pay $20, so we'll figure this out." (I love nice people.) After several more attempts, he just shrugged and suggested we go over to the other gate. "If you'll give me the $2 for your time, I can get you out of this one." He smiled and then there was an awkward moment of silence because you see I didn't have $2 in cash. And so, I put on a brave smile and calmly explained this to him. He just looked at me, and in that awkward moment, I remembered my change compartment and told him to wait. I then proceeded to count out nickels, dimes and pennies. I believe the old man wanted to throw his hands up and say, "Why me!" but he remained calm and continued to try and get his darn pass to work. After countless attempts, he did throw up his hands and in that awkward moment I smiled and told him I had a dollar twenty one, plus more pennies. He scratched his head and backed away from my hands filled with pennies. "Don't worry about it. Maybe we can just have you go around the gate right here. I think there is just enough room that you might be able to make it." And so, although I am a law abiding citizen, under his guidance, we maneuvered my little car around the gate. I smiled in gratitude and once again held out my bulging hand of pennies and nickels. He quickly backed away and waved his hands. I think that was his signal of "Please, please leave."

Awkward Moment 2
The other week I found myself at a BBQ next to a guy who was sitting a little too close and staring a little too intently. It caused me to chaff my nose and mouth from all of my nervous rubbing at whatever I assumed he was staring at. After some awkward conversation about my eye color, I decided to do us both a favor and leave. I quickly got up to go, but faster than the speed of light, he grabbed my hand in a surprisingly vice like grip. "Please just stay 10 more minutes to talk. Please." Now, I'm sure he was a real nice guy who just hadn't figured out personal space or something, but I felt pretty awkward. So trying to muster all of my calm and casualness, I began chattering about why I had to leave, all the while trying to pull my hand away without making too much of a scene. Unfortunately, this wasn't working very well, and I was pretty much glued to the spot. I wasn't quite sure what to do. I could break out of the hold using my self defense instructor's move, but that might be a little too extreme, and I certainly wasn't going to just sit down and talk for ten more minutes. And so, I just stood there hoping the awkward sweating of my hand would soon allow me to get away more easily. Then out of nowhere a girl popped up and exclaimed, "Oh my goodness it is you!!!! When you first came in I thought it was you, but I wasn't sure. It is so good to see you!" Then she proceeded to give me a hug and pull my arm away from the guy. "We have to catch up. Let's go over here." And so, she pulled me across the yard, and I looked up into the face of. . . . . someone I have never met before in my life. Although, I was relieved, I felt awkward again, because I had no idea who this girl was who thought we were so tight. Thankfully, she just smiled at me and said,"Sorry, I have no idea who you are, but I just saw what was happening and although it was kind of funny to watch, I could tell you felt awkward and needed some help." I let out a sigh of relief and gave her another big hug of appreciation and thanks.
And so, when my friend who continued to say awkward things at a party looked at me and said, "Can I run things by you, before I say them out loud, so you can make sure they're not awkward." I agreed. Because although, he obviously doesn't know I'm not his best pick, everyone needs someone to help them out in an awkward situation, especially nice people.

The Evil Teacher

2010-08-15T18:03:00.000-07:00

Every year, each student in my class writes a story that we publish. I tell them to use their imagination to make it something really great. After brainstorming, my students brought up their story maps with their idea. There were stories about animals, sports, candy, aliens, and then one of my students came up to my desk with a huge grin on his face. I looked down at his story map titled: The Evil Teacher. I looked up at him, he looked down at the floor as his grin turned into a chuckle. Then I looked down at the list of characters and sure enough my name was first with a great description. I cleared my throat, and he responded, "We are suppose to use our imagination right?" I smiled and gave him back his story with the promise that I would get first edits each day, in which he always handed me the story with the words, "Remember you said imagination right?" Now I must admit, I've never wanted to be a villain, but a ruby crown and long nails that allow you to open up a nail salon are tempting and seeing a student enjoy writing is priceless.
Here are a few of my favorite descriptions of me from his story:
"Dave!!" Miss R thundered.
"Put down your stupid book and pay attention!"
"Yes teacher, I mean Miss R, I mean madam!" Dave stumbled.
"Alright then, get working on your assignment." Miss R said with an unholy tone. Miss R staggered over to her desk and sat down. "Stupid little kids. I'd eat them all alive, if I were allowed too." Miss R mumbled. Then Miss R had an evil, but brilliant plan. What if I make the most loved actors in the world, evil! Then everyone will love me! Miss R thought to herself as she rubbed her hands together evilly, with a crooked smile.. . . . . .

Suddenly, Miss R appeared out of nowhere. She was wearing long purple robes that touched the ground. She wore a bronze crown covered in rubies. She began cackling. But what caught Dave's eye most about her, is she had nails like Freddie Kruger. Her nails were so sharp and long she could open her own nail salon business. She had a devilish look on her face.
"Hello victims." Miss R said.

I'm sure you're dying to know how it ended, however, as an evil teacher I can't tell you. I can only cackle and scrape my enormous nails together.

Oh How Lovely was the Morning

2010-08-01T21:46:00.001-07:00

After the hustle and bustle of NYC, we were all excited to go upstate to beautiful Palmyra, NY. I must say I am a small town girl at heart and the lush foliage and home town atmosphere was delightful. As we drove from NYC to Palmrya, rain poured down from the sky. We reached our hotel and hurriedly ran inside as the steady beat of the rain pelted the ground. Then we ate a quick dinner and headed to the outdoor Hill Cumorah Pageant. This may seem like a highly illogical thing to do, but I grew up hearing about the miracle of The Hill Cumorah Pageant, and I believe life isn't always about logic. My grandma often told us about her long ago trip to The Hill Cumorah Pageant, and how it began to rain the morning of the pageant. As she voiced her concerns aloud about the rain, a lady from the town spoke up, "Oh don't worry about the rain. I don't know what those Mormons have got, but it always stops raining for the pageant." Grandma said it made her proud to be a Mormon and sure enough that night the rain stopped. Well, we were all ready for our own little miracle, but while we knew it would stop raining when the pageant started, we knew there was a long time of rain until the pageant started. So we took out our umbrellas, and dutifully sat for about an hour and a half as rain ping ponged off them. Shortly before the pageant, we went to the refreshment stand for some popcorn, and there we also picked up some ponchos. We slipped them on and began to munch on our popcorn. My brother looked up at my poncho and shared with me the news that there were actually arm holes in the poncho. And so just after the opening prayer, I took off my poncho in search of the arm holes. I was twisting and turning the poncho, when the actors came on stage, the music began and. . . . . . the rain stopped. Perhaps a highly unlikely thing to happen at that moment, but not when miracles are concerned. I put my poncho on the ground and stayed dry the whole night. That night I was reminded of the beauty that miracles are everywhere. It seems we spend our lives searching for something miraculous, when the truth is tender mercies and blessings are occurring all around us. We only need to open our eyes to see them. This set the tone for the rest of our trip to Palmyra, as we visited places where truly miraculous things happened, things that logic cannot explain.

Here we are before the pageant waiting for the rain to stop.

The beautiful rainless pageant.

The Hill Cumorah pageant was so good, we went a second night. This time there wasn't a rain cloud in sight.

The next day we went to all of the LDS church history sites. It was amazing to walk in the places so important to the restoration of the LDS church, places where the Prophet Joseph Smith walked. Here we are at the Smith Family home.

Then we walked down to their second home and looked out upon their farm.

As we walked back from the Smith family farm, we were able to see a beacon of hope: The Palmyra Temple.

Later, we walked up the path to the Hill Cumorah where the Prophet Joseph Smith Jr. was given the golden plates by the Angel Moroni. Being in these places, gave me the chance to gain a stronger testimony of the events that took place there.

The beautiful promise from The Book of Mormon.

Our family walked, pondered, and felt the love of our Heavenly Father in The Sacred Grove. The minute we walked in we felt an overwhelming feeling of peace. I know that this is truly a miraculous place, a place where the Prophet Joseph Smith saw God the Father and his Son, Jesus Christ. It is a place of prayer, of power, and of love.

The Sacred Grove left me singing "Oh How Lovely was the Morning"and meaning every word of it, because it is truly a place of peace and miracles.

The Big Apple

2010-07-14T22:08:00.000-07:00

Ahhhh. . .. The Big Apple. How could I resist a trip there with my parents and brother? And so, after a red eye flight, we rubbed our red eyes and put on big smiles for The Today Show, then jumped on a double decker bus for a delightful narration of the city. We hopped off in China Town to bargain for t-shirts, bags, and hats, took pictures of ground zero, St. Paul's Cathedral, St. Patrick's Cathedral, Wall Street, Radio City Music Hall, and pretty much every tourist site available.

Next, we made our way to Rockefeller center to go to the Top of the Rock. It was beautiful to look out on the city. We timed it just as dusk was approaching, so we could see the city at day and night.

Of course, Broadway left us "dancing through life" with nothing but "happy talk" for these amazing musicals.

Since I haven't made it to Egypt yet, we were lucky to visit the amazing Egyptian exhibit at the Met.

Ah. . . . . life on a double decker bus.

How could we not get a picture of the"Big" piano at FAO Schwartz?

My friend Rustin hooked us up with all of the latest and greatest places to eat. This is a picture of the huge cookies he raved about, although we brought my parents back hard,little, dry ones from the supermarket for a little fun. My dad groaned at the thought of us paying $4 for each small, dry bit of gunk. My poor mom tried to be extra positive about them, but she was fighting a losing battle. We were all grateful to pull out the huge, chunkers of delight.

It is pretty evident in New York who is a tourist, but why not make things even easier. We all donned on these fabuolous I love NY shirts, that my mom and I thought would be darling for a family photo. (And do they not look great?) My dad and brother gave in, and we smiled as our little tour group roamed around the fascinating Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island.

Our shirts were so moving that this street performer played a song just for us, New York, New York.

You meet all kinds of people in New York. Which means we shouldn't have been surprised when Bartholdi the sculptor of The Statue of Liberty plopped down at our table to visit. Unfortunately, I got the giggles and ended up with a stomachache from laughing so hard. I would tell you what was so funny, but as with most hilarious events I'm not sure the hilarity of the situation can be adequately expressed.

Of course, I had to get a picture with my fame. I even threw caution to the wind and bought a necklace there. Mind you it was up on the third floor, the one floor which only causes small gasps at the price, rather than fainting.

A visit to New York would not be complete without a trip to Central Park. I love the sanctuary away from all the busyness. Central Park is beautiful and huge, although it is only the 3rd largest park in New York. (Those tour buses help get all the facts for you.) We spent a whole morning there and were grateful for a small sprinkling and slightly cooler temperature, compared to the heat wave of 100 degrees with humidity that New York happened to have while we were there.

Walking across the Brooklyn Bridge at night was a must.

Finally, we threw our hands up and said goodbye to New York City and headed to upper state New York, which is another story for another day.

Don't Judge a Home by its Flower Pot

2010-06-08T08:43:00.000-07:00

People say, "Don't judge a book by its cover." I say, "Don't judge a home by its flower pot." You see, I have been working really hard to give my house a little personality. However, we've had some minor problems. For example, a friend offered to hook up my new DVD player and TV. He ended up tripping on the cord, landing on the DVD player, and completely breaking it. The other cord broke off in the TV, and yep, it broke the TV. Next, he tried to help hang a picture, he drilled incorrectly into the wall and the picture leaned, so he drilled just below it to fix it. Both holes then converged into one huge hole that still did not work. After that, I put away all tools and decided to work on something that couldn't be messed up, Flowers. You put them in a pot, water, and beauty, or so I thought.
Well, I looked all around until I found these beautiful flowers.

I brought them home and planted them delighted with the beauty surrounding my house. I was also relieved that nothing had gone wrong. After looking at their beauty, I decided to buy some more. Just as I was running out, a cold, dark storm began to blow in. I hurriedly ran to the store but was soon confused. Where my once beautiful flowers had been, I only saw weeds. However, on closer inspection, I noticed the weeds were actually my beautiful flowers closed up from lack of sun. 'Oh no!' I thought and ran home to see this

"NOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!" I cried. "Not again." My roommate came home to find me sitting on the front step in dismay. She took a look at the flowers, "Oh, hmmmm, those are . . " "the most beautiful flowers." I finished. She stared. "Seriously, they are beautiful." She continued to stare. "I mean it, when the sun is out they are beautiful." She didn't believe me, so I waited until the next day when the sun came out, and pulled her outside. My roommate was shocked. "Oh my goodness," she exclaimed. "They really are beautiful, but you would never know it when the sun is gone. Wait, a minute" she smiled, "You can give a lesson on this in Relief Society. You can talk all about the beauty inside, and how you really need to get to know someone to see them for who they truly are just like your flowers." I stopped her, "But nobody is going to see the beauty inside these flowers, because nobody ever comes over in the daytime."I argued. And with that encouraging thought, I can't decide whether or not to keep these beautiful to me, but ugly to everyone else flowers. However, I think we've all learned a good lesson: if you ever see a home with ugly flowers outside, don't judge too quickly because inside they really may be beautiful.

Unfriended

2010-06-01T19:57:00.001-07:00

Facebook Profile Picture #5

I'm not a very good facebook friend, nor am I a very interesting facebook friend. (Which is why this is my fifth profile picture in 3 years.) I'm not on facebook a lot, so I don't make a lot of comments to others, and I don't comment a lot about myself. However, this semester I found myself writing extremely long papers that required many breaks, and so I soon found myself frequenting the lives of all of my friends on facebook. There is something hopeful about knowing that even though you may be writing an examination of curriculum today, someone else is happily eating M&M's, watching their favorite T.V. show, or getting married. Soon I began to get sucked into the political, sporty, random, and awkward posts and pictures of friends. During finals week, I found myself writing a lot more and checking the lives of everyone else a lot more. It was during that time, I noticed one of my huge political friends hadn't had a lot to say in a while, which was pretty weird. It was then that I decided to take a look at his profile and see what was going on. That is when I noticed that I no longer had a friend by that name. Slightly stunned, I assumed what any nice friend would assume, he had quit facebook. Now I was about to let it go, but I've always been a curious person, and so just to prove my theory correct I checked on a mutual friend's friend list. And that is where I found him. Shocked, I began to check out other friends and there he was in all of their friend columns. Which made me wonder how we were no longer friends. Had we had a big fight, a misunderstanding, some name calling? Nope, I hadn't talked to him since he asked to be my friend, and we visited like the old friends we were. Which makes me ask the questions, "Who unfriends friends they asked to be friends with? What makes you unfriend a friend?" And the big question, "Are you an unfriender?" (Although, unfriend is not a real word, it just seems to fit.) And so as I write this post, it occurs to me that I may have been unfriended by others who have purposely hit the delete button on my profile picture. However, I guess when I settle down and think a little more rationally, I realize that really anyone who I don't know is gone, and anyone who wants me gone, probably doesn't deserve to be in my friend column anyway.

The Couch Analogy

2010-05-09T18:10:00.000-07:00

Analogies are on the end of the year test, so I'm use to helping young people make sense of seemingly baffling comparisons. However, it has been a while since a completely random stranger has tried to give me an analogy to happiness in my life. Which I suppose is the cue for the random furniture owner's couch analogy story:
You see I found myself the proud owner of a beautiful new home. A beautiful new home however, that had no beautiful new couch. (Or other furniture, but this story is about the couch.) I searched high and low, and yet I still couldn't find the couch I wanted. Trying to sell the fun of sitting on the floor to my roommate wasn't working well, and so the pressure was on to either find my perfect couch or pick up a loaner from D.I soon.
The afternoon after I moved in, my parents and I drove off in quest for this couch. We happened upon a new store, which we quickly scoured with no luck, until our eyes lighted on a couch that made both my mother and I say, "Hmmm." (Which was much better than most couches were getting.) Next, we began the intricate couch testing process. We sat, took the pillows to the windows, sat, searched the store for throws and other pillows to bring out different colors on the couch, sat, looked at it from every angle, sat, discussed every selling point and every flaw, and then, of course, we sat. 45 minutes after all of this testing, I took one last picture and told the owner we might be back.
He and my dad who had been visiting like old friends during our couch testing looked at me, "Why wouldn't you want this couch?" I looked up at him, "Well I like this couch, but I don't know if I love this couch, so I want to keep looking." This caused him to smile big and say, "Dear, can I ask you another question?" Well I have dealt with a lot of salesman lately, so I thought I had heard every question. I smiled back, "Sure," Then he began, "Are you married?" Like I said, I "thought" I had heard every question. Not figuring out how couches and marriage correlated, I assumed he had a rich, handsome son he wanted to set me up with because he was so taken with my couch testing skills. I smiled, "No." "Well dear, let me just give you a piece of advice. You see buying a couch is an awful lot like finding a husband. Eventually, you just have to make a choice and choose one. Dear, there is no perfect couch. Just like there is no perfect guy. We are all broken. (Which I really hoped the couch was not.) The trick is to just choose a couch or a guy you like bring him home and break him in." He finished and smiled real big. I wasn't quite sure how to respond to this cheering sales pitch on couches and husbands, so I just stared ahead. My dad, a real big shopper, smiled, "That's right, I like this couch. Let's get it." I looked at them both and smiled, "If I'm buying a couch, I'm buying a couch I really love, so we're going to keep looking."
My dad sighed, and we were off to the next store, a store I had looked in several times. However, today as I was walking over to the tables, I was stopped in my tracks at the sight of the perfect couch, MY PERFECT COUCH. That's right, a couch with the color, texture and style I had envisioned. After cheering out loud, I looked at my mother and smiled. "We have to go back to the other furniture store."My mom looked perplexed. "Why?" "Because, I want to go back to Mr. There is no Perfect Couch/Husband and have a few words with him. (I got up on my soap box.) I'm going to tell him how glad I am that I didn't settle for his okay couch because I found my perfect couch. And I'm going to tell him that sometimes when you're looking for a couch or husband it might just take a little more time, patience, and work." Yeah, I was on a roll. And I may have gone back, except this other store actually had two slightly different styles of my perfect couch. Which caused me to walk back and forth between them for an hour and a half. My mom exhausted exclaimed, "I sure hope you never fall in love with two perfect guys because you'll never be able to choose."
However, I did choose a couch, and I love it. Although, I must admit Mr. Couch Analogy was in part right, it wasn't exactly perfect. That's why I've spent weeks looking for new pillows. And I guess it's true nobody is perfect either, which is why I still smile at nice guy's unfunny jokes because maybe they are the perfect couch, they just need new pillows.

The Clay Aiken Fan Club Reunites

2010-04-05T08:18:00.000-07:00

It's true long, long ago my girls and I were shameless Clay Aiken fans. We voted for him every night, hung his picture on our door, (and others' doors), raced to buy his first CD, and swooned at his concert. With a bond like this we knew we would be friends forever. And so, we decided when we turned 30 we would all reunite. We decided our happy reunion would be at the Oprah show in Chicago. Well, we were off by a year, and Oprah didn't comply with tickets. However, our heart was set on Chicago and so off we went.
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Some of you might know that March in Chicago is pretty cold. However, we weren't intimidated, and so we donned our coats, parkas, scarves, gloves, and hats and set out on our adventure.

And here it is. . . . . . beautiful Chicago from Navy Pier. Back in 1871, the great fire of Chicago burned almost 1/3 of the city down. However, those Chicagoans are known for their "I will" spirit and immediately began rebuilding. Because of the fire, and the requirement to build from something other than wood, great architects thought outside the box and created these unique and amazing buildings. (I always love a good story about the places I visit.)

See this big smile, it comes from the friendly people of Chicago. It's true, we found nice people at every turn.

We had a big list of tourist sights to see, and one of our favorite picture spots was Cloud Gate or otherwise known as "The Bean."

Ahhhhhhh! So much fun, so many pictures.

We couldn't resist a chance to practice our old dance moves.

We had to get a view of the city from The Sears (Willis) Tower. It was amazing. Those who were more brave also got a view from "The Ledge," glass bottom balconies looking straight down 103 floors to your death. Needless to say, I got woozy just watching people standing on them, and so this was my best picture.

We had to do a little Ferris Bueller pondering at The Art Institute. Loved it!!!

Of course, our trip revolved a lot around eating. Here we are graffiting our names forever into Gino's East's wall. Well at least for a few days until someone else covers them over. However, the memory of the delicious food of Chicago will at least be etched in our minds forever.

While shopping our noses detected the most deliciously, intoxicating smell of caramel popcorn. Garrett's Popcorn became a favorite.

They take their hot dogs very seriously in Chicago and that means no ketchup. However, some people love their ketchup so much, they couldn't be stopped. Although, as you can see, I tried. The traditional Chicago dog has onions, peppers, tomato wedges, mustard, a dill pickle, relish, and celery salt. It was delicious.

What could be more fun then shopping on the Magnificent Mile? Stores at every turn.

You didn't think we would go all the way to Chicago without getting near to Oprah did you? Here we are outside her studio with O hoodies on.

OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!! Can't get enough of the O. (Sitting on her old studio chair, coincidence that we are both wearing pink at this moment? I think not.)

Well just like back in the day, we are still pretty crazy. Yep, we got these shimmering rays of fun to light up our night on the town at the theater, which was fabulous. Our hair had me humming "Me and my friends are Jem girls the whole night." Yep, pretty crazy.

One last picture on the train to the airport and our reunion was over. And although, we haven't listened to Clay for a long time, we had a wonderful time remembering the time when we did and an even more wonderful time creating new memories. Because the best part of this trip wasn't Chicago, it was the Clay Aiken Fan Club reunited again.

The Life of a Celebrity

2010-03-14T15:57:00.000-07:00

If you have ever wanted to be a celebrity, I highly recommend becoming a teacher. It is true, suddenly, everyone in the whole community knows you and all about you. (Okay, money wise teaching is nothing like being a celebrity, but fame, oh the fame) Seriously, kids watch you, copy you, and tell their families about everything you do, everything you wear, and everything you say. Trust me I know, I'm a teacher. Even normal, seemingly random things that you don't ever think about, suddenly are the latest rage. For example, just the other day one of my students commented, "Miss R, I just love the way you point." "I'm sorry, what?" I replied. "You know, the way you point. It's so cool." She gushed. Uh. . . .soon after, everyone was practicing the way I point. Craziness, I've even started to have emphathy (well kind of) for the scrutinity of real celebrities. You see last year I moved close by my school. Now not only do kids watch my every move at school, but every store I go to I hear voices calling, "Miss R, Oh my gosh there she is. Look she's buying candy. Look her hair is in pigtails." It's a little much, and so I sometimes find myself driving farther away to avoid run ins. (It's just like those horrible pictures of celebrities in the tabloids. You never know when you are going to see someone you taught.)
Well to add to this craziness, somehow I found myself out with another celebrity, Mr. Favorite Middle School Teacher. It all seemed pretty harmless and fun at first. However, for some reason I didn't realize that this was much bigger than us. Soon, I found my inbox full of emails from former students, I was attacked daily by Middle Schoolers in search of gossip, my boards were filled with mushy notes from former students, and somehow parents and faculty started pulling me aside with sly winks. One parent who had a student in my class this year and last, popped in one afternoon, "Now I really need to talk to you about Paul, but first let's talk about more important things like Mr. Celebrity." "Ummm. . ." I stammered. "Yep, those girls found out where you guys were going for dinner the other night, and they wanted us to drive them there. Of course, I told them they would never get a table and they said, "Oh we don't want a table, we just want to look in through the windows." I stared. "Ummmm. . . . " "Now don't you worry, we didn't take them, but I just wanted to tell you how big this is." "Ummm. . . " And so, suddenly, there was a lot of pressure for this to work out. (Poor celebrites) It continued with girls wanting to become my bridesmaids, and Valentines given to me with our initails on them. Did I mention that somehow this got out of control?
A few weeks later, at parent teacher conferences, just as I was beginning to talk with my next student, a former mother rushed in."Sorry, sorry for interrupting but I just had to come in and say, "Oh my goodness!. I'm so excited for you and Mr. Celebrity. He is so cute, and you are so cute. We just love him, and we just love you. I just wanted to tell you everyone at the middle school and elementary loves you guys and talks of nothing else." Mortified, I smiled and in between her gushing, wondered if I should tell her it was over. But then I looked at the hopeful smile of the kids and the excited parents, and I decided I just couldn't crush their hopes. So, I just continued to smile and nod. I decided I'd just let myself go off track, and let things simmer down. Perhaps, I could hire a spokesperson to tell everyone like real celebrities do, and while they're at it they could take my freezing cold winter recess duty. Unfortunately, I'm not sure I could find someone who will work for apples, Tootsie Rolls and hand drawn pictures. And so, if you are thinking of becoming a teacher (celebrity) remember you may never be able to shop at the store without looking over your shoulder again, and your life may be the next big story on the students' tabloid page. However, I must admit, it's worth it for those hand drawn pictures, Tootsie Rolls, apples and your crazy fans, the students.

Mistaken Identity

2010-02-21T18:35:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I'm mistaken for things I am not. Of course, being short causes me to be mistaken for a kid at school. And for some reason I get mistaken for a store worker all the time, at any store. Somehow I am rummaging around the store, when someone comes up to me and asks me where something is at. I try to help them, but when I'm not positive about where something is they look at me and say, "You don't know? Don't you work here?' I'm not sure how I look like a store worker, but okay, maybe.
However, a little while ago I was truly mistaken for something I'm not. I was talking with a teacher about a book I had just read. We started wrapping up the conversation, and then she exclaimed "Hey, you're an environmentalist, I have just the book for you." I turned around to see who had just come into the room. When I didn't see anyone, I quickly turned back around and smiled. As she continued talking about how beautiful the book was, I wondered how she thought I was an environmentalist. Hmmmm. . . . I mean I try, kind of, um. . .I have cloth grocery bags, I love nature and um. . . hmmm. . . Then I prayed she wouldn't follow me back to class, because a picture of the overflowing trash can with students' papers in my room came to mind. Someone took our recycling bin, and not being an environmentalist, I hadn't replaced it. Then I thought about all of the Arbor Day and Earth Day contests that I never had my students enter. An environmentalist hmmmm?
Now, I would like to say I often hear conservative radio show hosts talk about how teachers are brainwashing children about global warming and save the earth campaigns, but I must say it is the other way around. Just a few weeks ago, my students wrote and gave speeches. They could write on anything they wanted. Usually, I get speeches about sports, fashion, and music. This year over three fourths of the class talked about global warming, saving the earth, saving the polar bears, and helping animals. They made a plea to recycle and save energy, Being a supportive teacher, I decided if it was that important to them I would take their challenge. Not only did I find our class recycling bin, but I also added another one by my desk. Then I even took the challenge to turn off one of the lights to conserve energy.
The light conserving argument had started a few months earlier when my class came running in and told me how we could save the earth by only turning on one light. I of course stared at them and shook my head. "Ummm guys why do you think they put two sets of lights in here?" I answered my own question. "Because you need two lights to see." I turned off one light. "Look you're all fuzzy. I can barely see you!" I exclaimed. Then I flipped back on the light and that was that. However, with their enthusiasm from their speeches, I started class the other day with only one light on and the blinds open. It actually wasn't that different. They came in and someone flipped on the other light. I smiled and said, "Your speeches inspired me, let's try only one light today." "Yeah!" They cried. "We're going to save the polar bears!" And so now, every time someone goes to throw away something, they cry, "Put it in the recycling basket, Save the polar bears." (Seriously, they are really worried about those polar bears.) And so while, I'm not sure that we're exactly saving polar bears, we are being more energy and recycling conscious. Why just the other day I rinsed out my grape juice bottle and threw it in the recycling bin at home. Which may cause people to mistake me for an environmentalist, and maybe that's okay.

What Matters Most

2010-02-07T20:55:00.000-08:00

Sometimes we are jarred out of the hectic rush of life, to reflect on what is most important. After Christmas, I found myself doing a lot of reflecting. We spent most of our time with my grandma in the hospital where we looked through old picture albums, shared favorite memories, laughed at treasured stories, listened to the Tennessee Waltz and My Sweet Little Alice Blue Gown, and just stayed with my grandma. It was really hard for me to say goodbye to my grandma, because I knew I would miss her a lot. However, I knew she had lived a good life and would be reunited with her loved ones who have passed on before.
As I reflected on my grandma's life, I realized what I loved most about my grandma didn't deal with prestige, awards, or degrees. In fact, what I loved most about my grandma had nothing to do with stuff. It was her staying up late and gabbing with me, teaching me how to make molasses candy, saving me from our dog, not yelling at me for breaking her door, and listening to my stories. It was the sound of her laugh, the peace from her prayers, and the love she freely gave.
Reflecting on my grandma's life makes me want to be more like her. She was someone who was always there at important moments. Someone who spent more time listening and less time talking. Someone who spent more time with those she loved and less in the attainment of worldly things. My grandma taught me many lessons in her life, the most important were seen in her example. In my rush of life, I plan to slow down a little and be more like her.

Christmas All Year Long

2010-02-07T20:53:00.000-08:00

I know it is February, but I believe Christmas should be in your heart all year long. And so, here is Christmas:

We started our holiday with the beauty and warmth of the Mesa Temple Lights.

Then we celebrated a few December birthdays.

Of course, we spent a lot of time looking for elf tracks.

We played in the beautiful snow.

We did a little tubing.

No holiday would be complete without yummy food. This gingerbread man was lightly garnished with a sack of M&M's

We brought back the family Christmas Crunch tradition, and life was good.

Everyone benefited with my niece's desire to get extra credit in French class. The yummy yule log.

My brother of course, put on his chef hat and gave us a good dose of healthy veggies. Add a little honey, lots of greens and limas, a few cashews, and presto!

We all loved our fun gifts. One of grandma's favorites was her Pepsi free.

We had big smiles for the holidays.

And that was our wonderful Christmas!

Mountain Trolls

2009-12-29T15:39:00.000-08:00

For years, I've harbored a sneaking suspicion that many guys belong to some unknown race of. . . . hmmmmm. . .mountain trolls? I was reminded of this a few hours ago as I noticed my brother chomping down two corn dogs. "Um. . .aren't we going out to eat in a few minutes?" I asked. "Uh, yeah, this is just my lunch." He explained without a moment's hesitation. Chomp, chomp, chomp. Hmmmm. . . . . You may have noticed unusual things like this as well. They answer in grunts and use as few words as possible in a sentence. They like shiny things like cars and pretty things like girls. They get a huge enjoyment out of running around and hitting each other.

A few weeks ago, I uncovered a huge herd (gaggle, sleuth, pack?) that had assembled right in my midst. There I am sitting in church when the first speaker begins to introduce himself. He smiles a dashing smile and then chuckles. "I just wanted to share a little about myself." He grins. "You may all know that the guys in the ward just had their Christmas dinner." Grin, grin, wink, wink. "Well for our dinner it is tradition that we always go to an all you can eat meat restaurant." All of the mountain trolls, I mean guys in the ward, begin to rub their bellies in delight. He continues "Well this year was no exception. And according to our great tradition we all weighed ourselves before entering our deluxe buffet." All of the guys are now salivating at the mouth remembering the moment. "And then after our glorious feasting of pigs and cows we weighed ourselves again." The guys in the audience are rubbing their bellies again. (Which strangely look much larger.) He smiles another dashing grin. "Well this year a new feasting champion was born and that champion was me." The guys are transfixed with their new champion and leader. "After stepping back on the scale, I the fearless mountain troll gained eight pounds." (Okay, maybe he didn't actually say mountain troll, but it was implied.) The guys quietly fist bump each other in celebration and mutter their pitiful poundage compared to the chief mountain troll. And, of course all of the girls in the audience are nauseous. Eight pounds? Seriously, eight pounds. In shocking story telling fashion, I shared this story with a guy. When I finished, he grunted. Enough said.

It's the Most Wonderful Time of the Year

2009-12-09T17:25:00.000-08:00

Once again the most wonderful time of the year has rolled around again. That's right, it is the second week of December, and I am officially off track. Never in all of the off tracks of off tracks, have I ever been so excited for an off track. I think I might have cried, if I wasn't so exhausted.
On Monday, I woke up at 6 am looked out the window, saw the snow falling, heard the wind blowing and smiled, yes I smiled with the happiness of every B track teacher. There would be no shivering on bus duty, no rowdy inside recess, no flying snowballs at kids' heads, or children skating on the ice to their doom. Nope, I just curled up in my little bed, smiled and went right back to sleep. It is one of the little things that makes this the most wonderful time of the year. However, being off track is not the only reason for such happiness. It’s that happy, hopeful, feeling that fills the air at Christmas. Somehow everything looks brighter and better during Christmas time. It’s the smile on the meanest teacher's face at the Christmas party. (One of the few I have ever seen.) It's breaking out into Christmas song every time you turn on the radio. It’s twinkling lights that make the snow seem sparklier. It's the mandatory eating of yummy food wherever you go. It’s people wearing clothes with elves, reindeer, and snowmen on them. It’s being with your family and friends. It’s happily giving to others. It's spending much more time thinking about others and much less time thinking about yourself. It's counting your blessings. It's the birth of the Savior, who gave us the greatest gift. Yes, it is the most wonderful time of the year.

America's Friendliest Marathon

2009-11-22T07:43:00.000-08:00

Two years ago I started training for the Richmond, Virginia marathon. Any marathon that has the word friendly in the title, and junk food stations on the course is my kind of race. Sadly, my training was cut short with the jabbing pain of a knife in my foot, which led to surgery on both feet. It was two very long years. However, I promised myself that I would run again, and that someday I would complete the marathon that I started so very long ago.
And so as soon as I could run again, I started training. In my excitement, I overlooked my timing of things. I was teaching school all day, going to school for my master's at night, training for a marathon and trying to have a social life? Hmmmm. . . . Life was a little crazy, and yeah, I was a little crazy. Stumbling out of bed on Saturdays for 20 mile runs, running home from school for a 10 mile run while little flakes of snow fell. Yeah, a lot crazy. Many people told me not to do the marathon; life was too crazy right now, I didn't have anything to prove they said. On cold, dark mornings and evenings during long runs, I agreed with them heartily. However, in the end I knew this wasn't about anyone else. It was about me. It was something I needed to prove to myself; that I could run again, that I could beat this marathon, and in the end I knew that I could do it.
And so I ran on, and we flew into Virginia. We were welcomed by Hurricane Ida who blew in torrential rain and wind for the occasion. I couldn't help laughing, what were the odds? We ran from museum to museum with our umbrellas flipping upside down, crossing lakes of water in parking lots, as the governor announced a state of emergency for the state. Miraculously, the rain and winds calmed down in the upcoming days and by Saturday it was simply cloudy and cool. Perfect weather for the race.
The course was beautiful. It ran in and out of the city from funky downtown stores, through Monument Ave, along the James River, and then down tree lined streets in their fall glory. Then there were the spectators. It isn't called the friendliest marathon for nothing. The spectators were amazing. They lined the streets clapping and urging us on. They brought oranges, grapes, doughnuts, and cookies for the runners. There was even a group handing out beer, and while I don't drink, the runners in front of me sure enjoyed it. At mile 22, I gratefully took some gummy bears that propelled me to the finish line.
Signs lined the streets full of encouragement. Two signs stuck out to me. The first was at mile 20. It said, "Every wall has a door. Break through." Of course, this made me a little emotional. Because, for me the wall is in your head. It is what stops you from trying and accomplishing your goals. It is what tells you it is not possible, and I realized as I stared at that sign that I had already broken through the wall long ago. I broke through it signing up for the race, I broke through it training every day when it was hard, I broke through it starting the marathon, and so at mile 20 I wasn't worried about a wall, because I knew that I had found the door long ago.
The last sign said, "Explaining why you are running a marathon to someone who has never run one is like describing color to someone who was born blind." It's true, I can't explain to you why you would ever want to run that far and long, and put in so many hours of training, but if you have ever run a marathon you know why, because at the end of the race the feeling is indescribable.

St. John's church, on our second day in Richmond. None of the pictures from the torrential rain shower turned out, but you can still see what it continued to do to our umbrellas. This is the church where Patrick Henry gave his famous, Give me liberty or give me death speech.

We went to so many amazing historical sites. I learned so much about the Civil War. It made me want to teach fifth grade. This is at the National Park Service Battlefield Monument with President Lincoln. It says, "To bind up the Nation's wounds."

Here are my parents ready for the 8k. Yeah! They were such a huge support to me.

It was still chilly that morning, and I had an hour wait from the 8k till the marathon. I wisely stayed bundled up.

"Say Hey ( I'm in Love with You.)" The Ipod gave some good tunes of inspiration, and while my little nano died, and I had to lug around this huge guy. It helped build ginormous muscles in my arm.

Pizza at the end of the race! Who are these people, the friendliest people in the country?

Here I am attempting to ease the pain. Yeah, pretty much couldn't walk very well the rest of the day.

Here we are all posing in triumph with our medals at the end of our races. Yeah!

Sunday we went to church and then went for a stroll on the Canal Walk. Amazingly, I could walk pretty well. The sun was shinning. It was a beautiful 70 degrees. A perfect ending to our trip.

The Tootsie Roll

2009-11-01T20:49:00.000-08:00

For years, I have done all that I can to sell the gloriousness of The Tootsie Roll. I even made a game for my students where one team is the Tootsies and the other is the Rolls. Of course, the winning sides gets Tootsie Rolls. I do this for the very reason that Tootsie Rolls are tasty, they come in huge bags, they are cheap, and they last for a long time. I have personally congratulated myself for bringing back the popularity of the Tootsie. My classes love them so much that one year our class theme was 'The Year of the Tootsie Rolls.'

Knowing of my students love for this tasty treat, my Halloween costume wasn't a hard choice. I knew it would be a big hit with my class. However, I did not know how big of a hit it would be. Of course, my class loved my costume, but I soon found out that the Tootsie Roll's popularity extends to all grades. Marching along the school parade route, I learned what it was like to be a celebrity. Parents would hold their children up to get a glimpse of me, as they would whisper, "Look it's a Tootsie Roll." Then as we tromped down the hallways, I was met with claps and cheers. "Tootsie Roll we love you." "You look good enough to eat." they yelled and screeched with excitement. Once I got to the fifth grade hall, I was met with the rumbling of screams, "Yeah, it's Miss Tootsie Roll!" They threw their hands in the air and whooped and hollered. It was then I realized I didn't need to spend all those years vigorously trying to increase Tootsie Roll's popularity, because wow, the Tootsie is loved by children everywhere.

Flight of the Navigator

2009-10-25T18:10:00.000-07:00

I know some people were worried I would never finish these posts, but have no fear this is the last installment.

One of the best parts of our trip was our cruise. Our ship's name was The Royal Caribbean Navigator. (Which every time I heard made me think of The Flight of the Navigator, which I haven't seen in forever but loved as a child.)

The first day aboard we went down for our safety training, and I secretly nominated myself line leader of B7.

As you can see, I took my secretly nominated postion seriously and located the life preserver right away.

One of the delights of the cruise was the yummy meals and great company from our dinning guests from Wales. They were lovely.

The ship had a million things to do. We swam, read books at the library, and went to a lot of amazing shows. The first day we started the fun by playing some minature golf.

Then we did a little ice skating.

Next we played a little shuffle board.

However, my favorite recreational activity was laying on the deck just staring out into the beautiful water.

Of course, the wind was a little intense sometimes. There were a few nights that it had us wobbling around, and lucky for me it was a great little resistance trainer running on the track. However, most of the time when we felt the wind, we just had to throw up our arms and say, "Ahhhhhh."

After all of our adventures, we came back to our room to find delightful towel creatures. We liked them so much, we even took a class on how to make our own.

Then we would collapse onto our beds in exhaustion. As you can see we had a great room, but with no windows you'd be surprised at how long your body will just keep on sleeping.

In the end, we had nothing but smiles for The Navigator.

The Labyrinth

2009-10-18T18:08:00.001-07:00

Legend says (although it depends on which legend you read) that King Minos built the Palace of Knossos as a labyrinth to house the Minotaur. He even imprisoned his architect Daedalus, so no one would find the way out of the labyrinth. Every nine years, he sent for seven Athenian boys and girls to be sacrificed to the Minotaur. Finally, the Athenian king Aegean sent his son Theseus to slay the Minotaur. Theseus succeeded in killing the Minotaur and found his way out of the labyrinth with the ball of string given to him by Minos's daughter, who had fallen madly in love with him. (This is the part where my students either start to giggle or roll their eyes.) He hurriedly sailed home to tell his father of his victory. However, in his haste he forgot to change the sails on his ship. They were to remain black if he had been killed but changed to white if he succeed. King Aegean waited outside his towers scouring the sea for any sign of his son's ship. Unfortunately, when he saw the black sails, he was so grief stricken he flung himself into the sea. Legend says that sea is named after him-Aegean. Isn't mythology so fascinating?

Well with a legend like that how could we not visit the Palace. And so on a cloudy day, we hopped on a bus to the great Palace of Knossos. Just after purchasing our tickets, the rain began to pitter patter. We decided not to let it get our spirits down and began to explore.

The Palace of Knossos is on the island of Crete. It spans 5 acres and was reconstructed by Arthur Evans. These people were so amazing they had aqueducts to bring in water and pipes to take out the sewer. You may have noticed all of the bull pictures. Archaeologists believe they worshipped the bull, or perhaps the legend of the Minotaur really is true.

The Palace is huge and looking down in it, you can picture it being a maze.

The throne room of King Minos. Amazing frescoes on the walls.

If you look closely you can see a lady working on restoring the frescoes. Patience.

The young prince with lilies, or is it someone else? Unfortunately, much of the palace is a mystery, and we can only guess. However, I imagined royalty in this picture.

.

We were wet, we were soaking, and we were having a wonderful time.

I don't know if you can tell how thoroughly soaked we truly were at this point. Every step was a squish of water pouring out of our shoes. However, as we waited for the bus back to the ship, we just couldn't help singing in the rain. This of course made quite a few of the umbrella carrying, poncho wearing passengers stare at us in wonder and craziness. However, nothing could dampen our spirits, because how many times in your life do you get to actually sing in the rain on the island of Crete? Unforgettable

Ephesus

2009-10-11T18:22:00.000-07:00

Our journey in Turkey began in Ephesus. Ephesus is mind boggling. Only 15-20% of Ephesus has been excavated. I was stunned as we toured the ancient ruins, there were so many. It is suppose to be the largest collection of Roman ruins in the Mediterranean. I loved it.

They say this is where Nike got its swoosh.

The Library of Celsius once held over 12,000 scrolls. I would definitely go there to read.

The public toilets, awkward, yet amazing.

The road where Cleopatra and Mark Anthony came into Ephesus.
They say the people poured wine on the road, the very first red carpet.

The Great Theater where Paul preached. Wow! The theater seats 24,000 and is said to be the largest theater in the ancient world.

Out of nowhere came the gladiators. Just watching the show made me cringe. I don't know how people watched the real events

Next stop the town of Didyma (which means twin, referring to Apollo and Artems.) These are the ruins of the Temple of Apollo. Medusa helped keep evil away.

The Temple of Apollo was amazing. I don't know if you can see how huge these columns are, but they were humongous. 166 columns were built. They were 60 feet tall and 6 feet wide. People made the pilgrimage to the temple to receive guidance from the oracle.

The last part of the tour was a light lunch of authentic Turkish cuisine. When I say authentic, I mean authentic. I am doing my best to smile, but really my insides are churning. How does one eat a fish that is staring at them? I could not, and so at the urging of my friend, I put the lettuce over his little head. Then I dug in, the best you can dig in, knowing that the fish's eyes are under a piece of lettuce.
However, besides the fish situation I found Turkey delightful, and so I bought two boxes of Turkish delight for the kids hoping to bring some of that delight home.

It's All Greek to Me

2009-10-11T16:41:00.001-07:00

Somehow this phrase never ceased to grow old in Greece. Every time we read a receipt, a street sign, or a billboard, it was always fun to say, "It's all Greek to me."

I must admit that Greek blood runs in my veins. My great grandfather came over from Greece. I grew up eating baklava, greek soup, writing to my greek cousin, and hearing stories about the wonderful Greeks. I had huge expectations for Athens, and it did not disappoint. In fact, I am already planning my return.

We visited the Panathenaic stadium built to honor the goddess Athena. It was built in 566 B.C. and redone in marble in 329 B.C. It is the only major stadium in the world built entirely of white marble. So cool! It also hosted the return to Olympic games in 1896. I once read about two runners who jumped over a fence to run at the Olympic Stadium in Greece. I'm not sure if it was in Olympia, or at the new stadium, but the thought of jumping did cross my mind. Can you imagine running where the ancient Greeks ran? So amazing. However, I was much to short to hop this fence, and those runners, well they were arrested.

Oh how I would have loved to see the old time Greek theatre with their elaborate masks and men playing all the parts. This theatre, the Odeon of Herodes Atticus, was just down from the parthenon built in 161 A.D. seating 5,000 people. Amazingly, they still have events there. When I go back, I will definitely be attending.

Here I am holding the whole porch of madiens, from the Erechtheum in my little hand. The most fascinating and horrifying fact I learned was that they kept a snake in the temple and felt that it was an essential for the safety of the city. They fed it honey cakes, and if it refused to eat the cakes it was a bad omen. I think it was a bad omen to have a snake in there in the first place.

The beautiful view from the acropolis.

Finally, my favorite the Parthenon. It clearly states on my life list that the Parthenon is a must and it was well worth it. The temple of the goddess Athena is magnificent and an amazing symbol of the ancient Greek life.

Last of all I have to share the great Greek food. Gyros, real Greek salad and baklava. My mouth waters just thinking about it. Greece was definitely amazing!

Never go in Against a Sicilian When Death is on the Line

2009-10-01T22:16:00.001-07:00

I never knew a lot about Sicily or Sicilians, except maybe a reference from The Princess Bride or that my grandfather charged up a hill there during WWII. However, I must tell I now know my life was missing something and that something was Sicily. Sicily was absolutely beautiful and those Sicilians, let me tell you, they have a lot of pride. They refer to themselves as Sicilians, before being Italians. (Kind of reminds me of Texans. :)

Our trip in Sicily began with a beautiful drive up the mountain to the quaint town of Taormina.

An amazing view from the town.

If there is one thing that I love, it is a good slushy. And let me tell you those Sicilians had the best slushies around. Delightful Granite, a yummy, lemon slushy.

Besides having a beautiful view and delicious treats, Sicily had a little spunk. We couldn't resist a photo with this guy.

Taormina also had a beautiful public garden donated from an English lady when she passed away. I would have loved to have spent a few days just strolling around here.

Looking down at this beautiful view made us want to experience the water below, and so we hopped on a cable car to the beach.

After wading in the water, I decided to carry my shoes to let my feet dry off. As I sat down to put on my shoes, I noticed tar all over my foot. (Okay, I know from the picture it doesn't look like much, but if you have ever had tar on you, you know any amount is too much. ) Somehow this didn't completely register to me and I tried wiping it off with my hand, which led to my hand filled with tar. I had not even a paper in my purse to get it off, so I walked along the street barefooted, until I found a bathroom. I rushed in (I know kinda gross with bare feet, but what do you do?) I got in there and found that this bathroom must have decided to go paperless, because there was not a single tissue paper or paper towel in sight. I finally gave up, pumped water out of the sink and just wiped the tar on my shoe, pants and sock. However, being filled with tar couldn't dampen my spirits, as you can see from our little cheerleading picture. Go Sicily!

Next stop: The land of my ancestors, Greece.

Rome if you want to, Rome Around the World

2009-09-27T21:32:00.000-07:00

Every trip deserves a little theme song, and I could not think of a better one then the B52's Roam for our trip to Rome. That's right, read the title again and soon you will be a singing along.

After years of teaching about the Ancient Greeks, Romans, and artists and sculptors from the Renaissance. How could I in good conscience continue to teach the children without ever going there? And so, with only my students' best interests at heart, I took one for the team and took a little trip.

I met up with some friends in Rome where we navigated ourselves from our delightful apartment to our tourist destinations latching onto anyone who spoke English, dramatically gesturing with our hands, and cheering whenever we made it to our destination. However, we got better and soon were running around Rome like, well, tourists. But I think we did pretty well, and I soon learned to say excuse me in the correct form to close friends and acquaintances. Amazing, I know. You should hear my good morning and thank you.

Our little group outside the Colosseum

The Highlights:

The buildings, ruins, sculptures and paintings
Most of my time spent in Rome was taking pictures saying, "Wait till the kids see this one. Did you see that painting? The kids are going to love this one. Oh my goodness, this will go perfect when we talk about the gladiators." Yeah, pretty much I loved every minute of what we saw and learned about in Rome. If you are fascinated by it as well, let me know. I have 8 different pictures of just mosaic tiles. My class won't know what hit them when I come back with my slide show O'Roma.

Just outside of St. Peter's square you can stand in two countries at once. Vatican City and Italy. However, this isn't the spot. Although, we took this picture because we thought it was at first. However, I like this picture better than the real one, because it has a great shot of St. Peter's square, and I loved St. Peter's.

The Colosseum was amazing and mind boggling. The architecture is amazing, and the thought of 70,000 people watching people and animals fight to the death-mind boggling.

Food:

For some reason, pretty healthy people see no harm in eating gelato once or twice a day while in Rome. It's that good.

Eating yummy pizza outside the Pantheon was fabulous. And although it may appear that I am consuming two huge pizzas, the other is not mine. I had to draw the line somewhere. I mean how am I going to eat two things of gelato a day, if I eat two pizzas?

Fountains:
I was at a football game yesterday and noticed that I was a tad grouchy and unlike myself. Why, you may ask? I didn't have any water. I couldn't bring any into the game, and I was too cheap to buy any water at the game. Which brings me to another reason I loved Rome. FOUNTAINS!!!! Everywhere you turn in Rome there are the most beautiful fountains, and some that are not the most beautiful, but all provide you with fresh, delightful water. I never had to worry about not having water, because everywhere we turned there was another fountain to refill our water bottles. Heaven!

A free refill of heaven

The Trevi fountain-Beautiful! (3,000 euros are thrown into the Trevi fountain a day, and they use that money to help stock a supermarket for the needy. I like that.)

Getting ready to throw my coin-Rome I'm coming back.

Night:
There is something magical about night in a beautiful city, and even with the graffiti, I thought Rome was beautiful. All around us people leisurely strolled along the strikingly lit buildings and fountains. We sat on the Spanish Steps savoring our gelato, visiting, and taking in the city. Our last night I stared out on the beautiful city through our apartment's panoramic windows and just sighed. Magical.

At the Victor Emmanuel Monument-designed for the first king of a united Italy.

Next stop: Sicily (I thought I would wrap everything into one post, but there is just too much. Then I thought I would at least write about all of them at once, but I am just too fidgety tonight, and so the saga will continue.)

Fakers

2009-08-24T17:24:00.000-07:00

I've taught plenty of little, sick fakers throughout the years. Usually, having them splash water on their face works well. However, anyone who looks a little too squeamish, I just let them go. My weak stomach always thanks me, just in case.

This morning I met a delightful, little faker. This was my conversation with Little Craig 5 minutes after class had started:

"Miss R my stomach hasn't been feeling very well this weekend and. . . . . . "
"Little Craig, do you feel sick now?"
"Ummmm. . . no, but like if someone punches me in the stomach at recess, then I'll probably be sick and need to call my mom."
"Well Little Craig, I don't think that will happen, so you should be okay."

After lunch recess:

"Miss R I was playing four square at recess, and I don't know how it really happened, but the ball bounced up and hit me in the stomach. So, I think I should probably call my mom and go home."
"Little Craig, I bet if you just go lay your head down on your desk for a few minutes and splash some water on your face you will feel much better."

Just after rotations:

"Miss R I don't know how, but as we were walking out of rotations someone bumped into me and their tote tray hit me in the stomach. Can I go call my mom now?"
"Little Craig, I'm sure if you just. . . . umm.. . . .Little Craig you are leaning a little too close. Little Craig, school is almost done, so if you'll just go put. . . . Little Craig, why are you making that face and leaning so close? Umm. . . . Little Craig why don't you go call your mom."

And so, Little Craig got out of the last 45 minutes of class, and luckily my stomach got out of what could have been a huge disaster.

Pictures

2009-08-11T20:22:00.000-07:00

My cute niece tells me she keeps checking my blog for the pictures from the 4th, and there are none. It's true, I just haven't been a big blogger lately. However, I am posting not only 4th of July pictures, but Arizona treasures, and one from the 24th. I think that these gems definitely make up for the long span in between.

The Provo Hot Air Balloon Festival

The one and only Stadium of Fire

That's right, it is one of the Jonas Brothers. I went in not knowing their songs, but thanks to the star struck girls behind us, we were all soon singing right along.

An Arizona marvel, "The World's Longest Map of Route 66"

That's right, you are reading correctly. It is located at Blanket Man, right by Meteor City.

"The World's Largest Dream Catcher" Watch out Texas, Arizona has quite a few world's largest.

"The World's Largest Piece of Petrified Wood" I swear that is what the sign says, so it must be true.

Nick happily eating a Pioneer Surprise snow cone on the 24th. How could we not order a snow cone named Pioneer Surprise.

Georgia on my Mind

2009-06-21T17:10:00.000-07:00

A couple of years ago, a friend asked me if I was from the south. "Ummm. . . no, I've never even been to the south." I said. "Well you sound like you're from the south. Every time you tell a story, you get a southern accent." He replied. I didn't believe him, well not until about the 20th person repeated his question. I didn't know what to make of it, until I went to Georgia. I came back realizing I've always been a southern girl at heart, I just didn't know it.
Why I love Georgia:
-It is beautiful!!!! Northern Georgia is filled with gorgeous trees, lakes, waterfalls and rivers. Amazing!

Beautiful Enota waterfalls

Brasstown Bald the highest point in Georgia. A gorgeous view of four different states.

I'm not sure this falls into the beautiful scenery category, but milking a cow at Enota was pretty cool.

-The people. There was something delightfully friendly about the people we met down there. I think it was their drawl, their slow pace living, their "God loves you" signs wherever we went. I loved it.

-The porches and rocking chairs. I am a huge porch fan, and I was overjoyed by all of the rocking chairs, swings and benches everywhere we went. We found them at our hotels, outside of restaurants, in the woods, and by the beach.

The guys resting after a southern meal.

-The food!!! We went to southern restaurants that served you family style. Family style means a taste of everything you could ever imagine. They would bring out fried chicken, okra, fish, pork chops, bbq beef, squash, yams, mashed potatoes and gravy, rolls, beans, cobbler, and I could go on. You might refer back to the last picture and understand now why they have so many rocking chairs to sit in after dinner.

One of my favorite meals cooked outside on the fire.

-Gold!!! We went gold panning in Dahlonega, the first site of gold mining in Georgia. After a lot of swishing and a sloshing, I found a small nugget of delight. One of the locals told me he figured it was worth about $20. Pretty good huh?

-Downtown Atlanta!!! Atlanta is quite different from the slow pace of the small towns of the north, but it was amazing. We visited the famed Aquarium, Olympic park, Coca Cola headquarters and had the opportunity to go to church there.

-Stone Mountain!!! We were impressed by the stone carving of Robert E. Lee, Stonewall Jackson, and Jefferson Davis. It is about 3 football fields long, and they say two school buses can fit on the back of General Lee's horse. We enjoyed a tram ride to the top, a visit to an old plantation, and an evening laser show with such spirited music as "The Devil Went Down to Georgia."

I must admit this morning I got off the phone with a lady from the south, and then I went to speak with our secretary. She started to laugh at me and asked why I had a southern drawl. I just smiled and told her, "Georgia's on my mind."

The Picture

2009-04-18T20:10:00.000-07:00

I should begin by telling you I have a very dramatic class this year. They tend to exaggerate pretty much everything, and for some reason they have taken a fascination to belly dancing. Every day they come in talking about how so and so was belly dancing waiting for the bus. Weird, I know. Monday, my principal and an educational book publisher came in to show them how to publish their own books. We hooked my laptop into the projector, and I navigated through the site so the kids could see where to go on their laptops. The guy stood by the screen pointing out the features. The kids were quite engaged and things were going well. However, the next step was adding pictures. He asked if I had any on my laptop, and I told him I had some great ones of the class that we could show how to upload. Unfortunately, when the picture gallery opened, it opened to the last picture used, which was that beauty in my last post with the head wizard. I momentarily forgot how HUGE pictures look on the projector until I heard, "Oh my gosh, it is a picture of Miss R belly dancing." Which set off a huge explosion of giggling and yelling. The man by the projector not knowing my imaginative students jumped in front of the projector waving his arms trying to block the image. In the confusion and my mortification, I kept yelling, "I am not belly dancing, it's just a picture with . . . . .the head wizard. This proclamation did not help things, the kids could not contain their giggles, and the guy could not contain waving his arms. And so, with a bright red face I shut down the program as fast as I could. That's when I made the executive decision to find a picture of a dog on the Internet instead. Later, I explained to the guy that it was just a picture of me and this thing called the head wizard, but I'm not sure that made things less awkward. And although I gave my kids a good scolding about making up stories about belly dancing pictures, they continue to beg to see the belly dancing photo. (The guy's head and arms were in the way, they told me.) I promised that one day if they are really good, I will show them the head wizard photo. I just hope they don't go home and tell their parents they saw my belly dancing photo.

All for the Low Price of. . .

2009-03-26T13:40:00.000-07:00

Alright, it's true I'm a sucker for infomercials and the gadgets they sell. I know most people make fun of them, and the people who buy the stuff on them. I however, think those people are probably very happy, just like the people on the infomercials. Now I have mocked my fair share of infomercials, but if I'm totally honest, my arms do get cold when I'm reading a book and Snuggie owners arms do not.
I must admit that my t.v. watching time at odd hours of the day and night has increased greatly and with that increase so has my infomercial watching. A couple of days ago in the wee morning hours, I was delighted to preview the Xpress, Redi Set Go. I was easily captivated in but a few minutes of watching. I mean you can cook steak, omelets, brownies, pizzas, chicken, sandwiches, and muffins all in less then 10 minutes. What about the mess you say. Not to worry the clean up is easy too. My mouth just waters thinking about the good that could come from that machine. I'm sure you're probably sold as well, don't worry I have the phone number. I also have the phone number for numerous other infomercials. I dreamily write them all down knowing I could have smoothies, clear skin, and Hip Hop Abs. However, I have one slight problem. It is my practicality. It's true while I love all of these new found gadgets, I'm just don't have the spontaneity to buy them. I guess I'm a window infomercial shopper. However, I did receive the pasta pot from some friends who had heard me talk endlessly about how great it would be. And I must say I have had perfect pasta for years with no hassle or mess. (Just like the commercial said) The Head Wizard (which I had to show you with this picture) also given to me by a friend who knew I was smitten with it, has helped me relax for years. You may laugh, but those who have experienced the Head Wizard only say, "Ahhhhh." One year my roommate got a clapper which we hooked up to the Christmas lights in our living room, and when you laughed just loud enough they would go off and on. Amazing, I know. Not practical, I know. But, if I lie awake tossing and turning anymore, the allure of the Redi Set Go infomercial may cause me to throw practicality out the window. And if it does, you're all invited over for dinner.

Running Out of Time

2009-03-08T09:30:00.000-07:00

I am officially running out of time. Tuesday I go back to the cut, stitch, and drill at the hospital. Knowing this was coming, I tried to prepare my best. My doctor said it would be 5 weeks before I could drive again, and so I decided I needed to make a list of everything I wanted to do before then. It took a long while to really figure out what I wanted to do before surgery. After considerable effort this was the list I made:

* run, a lot
* walk, a lot
* take the stairs, a lot
* play racquetball, ski, go to the gym, a lot
* enjoy standing up to wash hair, a lot
* plop down on the floor and sit Indian style, a lot
* "pretend" to forget things, so I can run back to get them, umm, yeah, a lot
* work hard at school, a lot, a lot
* stare at feet, wiggle them around, feel grateful, a lot
* drive to places I soon will not be able to drive to, a lot
* stock up on yummy food, mm hmm, a lot

I have worked very hard to accomplish these very technical goals, and now I am so exhausted, I think I will be ready Tuesday to rest, a lot.

FOUND!!!

2009-02-15T20:13:00.000-08:00

There is nothing more beautiful to hear then two words that should complete each other. When you hear the word missing, your heart longs to hear the word found. Gratefully, I can write the next post about the happier of the two topics: Found!!!

Here is what happened: Not more than a hour after posting the story of my missing glasses, my roommate came home and we began talking about the extremely important topic of my glasses. I know some people talk about politics, the economy, and global warming, not in our house. We deal with the hard hitting issues like missing glasses. Well I was just explaining to her my whole predicament (which she had heard everyday for two weeks) when I ran the construction worker, monkey theory by her. I explained that not only were my glasses missing, but my eyeliner, and ipod case. No sooner had I mentioned this, then she looked at me seriously and said, "You know I was just talking to a lady at work about this very thing. She had all of these random things missing, and when she went up into her attic she found a pack rat. A real live pack rat had been hiding her things." I just stared at her with my mouth agape. Now if you know anything about me, you know you do not mention actual people having creatures in their homes stealing things. We both looked at each other and laughed. "There is no way a pack rat is taking my things. It's just not possible." I laughed again, but only half heartedly, because my imagination was already getting carried away. "Dang it! Now I'm going to have to look, because you know I won't be able to sleep tonight." I told my roommate. And so I grabbed a chair and headed up to my room. My roommate graciously said she would come a running if she heard me scream. I set the chair below the attic opening, cautiously stood on the chair, reached up and stretched my arms out as long as they could go. . . . . . and I couldn't even reach the top. ( I was in line at a restaurant a couple of weeks ago, when a man turned around and said to his wife, "Look Chris I finally found someone as short as you." His wife then said, "Can I shake your hand." I thought the man was being ridiculous, because I'm not that short, but then again, I couldn't even touch the top of the ceiling with a chair. Maybe I'm shrinking.)

Anyway I got a ruler and tried to push at the opening, but it was stuck on too tight. That is when I realized I was being foolish. I got back down and decided to call it a night. I started to put back all of the things that I had moved and just as I was pushing my bed back, my eyes beheld a brown glint of glory. There behind all of the books in my bookshelf (which I swear I had moved) were my beautiful glasses. Yes, they were right under my nose; I guess my vivid imagination got the best of me. However, as I was recounting this story to another friend (yes, as I mentioned it is a hot topic) she told me about a true story where a lady was living in a man's closet in Japan ( for a year) and she would come out while he was at work and eat his food.
Scary, and on that note, I would just like to state that my ipod case is still missing.

MISSING!!!!!

2009-02-01T18:40:00.000-08:00

As Anne of Green Gables would say, "I'm in the depths of despair." Two weeks ago, (that is right two whole weeks ago) I remember taking off my glasses in my room; then I remember putting on my contacts the next morning in my room. (It was a crazy morning and my my roommate and I were both leaving at the same time.) Ever since, my glasses have been missing. (And I really loved these new glasses.) I have searched every nook and cranny of my room, and it isn't that big of a room. Every night just as I am falling to sleep, inspiration hits me of where my glasses could be, and then I tear apart my room. . . . . . .. but nothing. I have three fears: One, I will never find my glasses. Two, I will buy a new pair of glasses, and then I will find my glasses. Three, there is a man or a monkey who has stolen my glasses and is hiding with them up in the little attic storage in the top of my ceiling. (It does look like it has been moved slightly.) I'm not sure which is the worse scenario. I have three reasons for writing this: One, my memory will be jogged into remembering where they are. Two, you might answer this question for me: If you were a pair of lost glasses where would you be? Three, on the slim chance that a man or monkey is out in public wearing my glasses, you will be able to notify me immediately.

Something to Brighten Even the Smoggiest of Days

2009-01-25T16:41:00.000-08:00

The weather here is a little bit frightful, as in the inversion of smog is slowly killing us all. (Optimism is my middle name.) (I just heard we were ranked the most unhealthy air in America.) This tends to cause me to be a bit grouchy; however, last night I was reminded of the healing quality of Miss America. Ever since I was in college, we have been watching the pageant. Even if we were gone, we faithfully recorded the pageant, baked up some treats and sat back for the drama to unfold. Saturday morning I awoke at 6:30 am, looked out the window at the smog, shook my head and flipped on the t.v. To my delight, a show called Countdown to the Crown was on. (It has challenges for the contestants to perform to earn a chance to be in the top 15 at the pageant.) (How fun, I know!) I spent three and a half magical hours cheering the girls on to win a golden sash. It was a perfect bonding time with the contestants, and so when I arrived to watch the pageant I knew who I wanted to win, and more importantly who I didn't want to win. Unfortunately, my picks did not win, but it was still delightful.

Every time we watch the pageant, we reminisce about our all time favorite Miss America winner. We watched this clip every time we were feeling down. Once we popped it in our day was always a little brighter. The enthusiasm, the up and down movement, the dropping of the earring, and the eyes popping out; it all leads me to grin every time I see it. And so when you're feeling down on the smoggiest of days, just take a look at this little delight.

Thirty, Flirty, and Thriving

2009-01-18T17:26:00.001-08:00

I am a firm believer that when it is your birthday there are a few rules that apply:
-You may eat whatever you want to eat (two kinds of cake, homemade cookies from a student, and a hamburger, It's all fair game.)
-You don't have to eat things you don't want to (your oatmeal, V8 juice, or your daily carrot and apple combo.)
- Whatever you wear will look good.
-Nobody is allowed to be mean to you.
-You don't have to go to the gym if you don't want to.
-You don't have to feel guilty about not going to the gym.
-You don't have to lift a finger in housework.
I also believe that when it is your thirtieth birthday, you have to do something youthful, impractical, and out of the ordinary. Therefore, I decided that even though I had only been back from Arizona for four days, I was going to fly out to Texas for my birthday weekend. If you have ever been to Texas, you know why: Everything is bigger and better there. (That's what they tell me.) While there, we bought these Texas sized rings with fake diamonds glittering in the sun to document all of our experiences. There is nothing greater then 30 glittering ring pictures at delightful and crazy places to remind you that birthdays are a little slice of heaven. It was fabulous. Pictured are only a few of those delightful moments: The old school roller rink, Texas's largest flea market, and NASA (which is highly educational, yet as you can see, fun filled. I even touched a moon rock. How fabulous is that?)

As much fun as Texas was, I'm a sucker for celebrating my birthday with my class. There is something delightful about being at school with my kids for my birthday. And so, I came back and found my room decorated with streamers, balloons, and banners everywhere. To my delight, not only were there Happy Birthday banners but Congratulations banners. I guess I had made too much of a fuss about how important this day was. Then my class brought in cake, pop, and a karaoke machine. How can you not have fun with a karaoke machine blasting out tunes, you standing up on a stool, 30 kids chanting your name with their hands in the air swaying to your song? (Which happened to be The Itsy Bitsy Spider.) As one of my students told his mother about my performance, "She gave it her all."

That night I went out with my best friends and we had a bowling extravaganza of fun. (In case you didn't know, crazy socks always help you bowl better.) One of my friends brought the most beautiful cake into the bowling alley, where they gave us a candle and applauded when I blew it out. I've always wanted to have a birthday party at a bowling alley, and it was all that I had hoped it would be. Sadly, the birthday is over, but that is okay, because even though I once again have to eat my oatmeal and V8, I am now thirty, flirty, and thriving.

The Break

2009-01-04T11:10:00.000-08:00

My students write a little story called Fortunately. They start out with an event, then something unfortunate happens, then something fortunate happens, then unfortunate, and then fortunate. You get the picture. My favorite part is their imaginative unfortunate events. The craziest things always happen in their stories. Well, Christmas Break was just like their stories, except I didn't make up any of the crazy parts.
Here is my story:
A few days after my break started, I received a phone call from my mom.
Unfortunately, my grandma was sick in the hospital, so I immediately flew home.
Fortunately, she miraculously defied the odds and was able to come home. (Yeah!)
Unfortunately, the day she came home I became sick as a dog (miserable, moaning, awful sick), the basement flooded, and the ceiling began to leak. (My poor mother and father.)
Fortunately, I got better, we got the basement dried, and the leak stopped. (Phew!)
Unfortunately, I then started to break out into unfathomable, horrible hives. (A mystery still.)
Fortunately, they weren't the kind that stop you from breathing, and we had a fabulous Christmas. We even went out for a little run in the middle of the night.
Unfortunately, when we got back, the basement was flooded again. (Insanity!)
Fortunately, you can't keep a good person down.
Unfortunately, sometimes a good person will fall down while cross country skiing and do a little something, something to their ankle. (However, can you see the beautiful snow and sky? It was worth it.)
Fortunately, I gave it a little wrap and a little rest, and it is doing better.
Unfortunately, I had to leave the promised land of the hometown.
Fortunately, I got to visit friends in the Valley (or should I say Phoenix area?) and had a delightful time, they even turned on their air conditioners. (Air conditioning in January?)
Unfortunately, Utah isn't so accommodating and during my flight back it began to snow, and they shut down one of the terminals. We had to wait and wait, and then drive through ice to get home.
Fortunately, we're use to the snow and ice and got home safely.
And that is how the break ended, a little insanity sprinkled throughout, but as all stories should end, happy.

Merry Christmas from the Whole Family

2008-12-22T21:39:00.000-08:00

In the blink of an eye, life became crazy, and I didn't get out a single Christmas card. I hope this makes up for the loss, my mother's festive card of the whole fam. That is right, the whole family wishing you a Merry Christmas!

The Door Whisperer: A Spooky Story

2008-11-09T13:36:00.000-08:00

This is the true account of my brush with danger a few weeks ago. Read at your own discretion.

I will be the first to admit that I have a very active imagination. I will also be the first to admit you do not want to go with me to a haunted house. ( I tend to push, shove, and throw people into the face of danger.) I must also admit, I don't do very well being alone. However, I really do try to be brave, and I was doing just fine living in apartments. I knew my neighbors, there were always people out and about, and there were so many people together. Unfortunately, as soon as I got home from Africa I moved. (Yeah, it was a little crazy.) Fortunately, I moved to a nice new town home. Unfortunately, they are still building a lot of the town homes, and so that means few occupants, dark, vacant buildings, and a roommate who has been gone for the last four weekends. I of course, did what any person with a vivid imagination would do, I went to my brother's house every weekend. That is, I did until someone told me to suck it up and stay by myself. Unfortunately, I don't do well being thought of as a chicken, and so I decided to be brave and stay home. I devised a little plan to keep myself busy until I was so exhausted I would fall asleep. And so, I paid every bill, wrote in my journal, read my journals, organized my photos, read all of my friends' blogs ( they are all so great) and by about three I fell asleep watching T.V. I woke up a little after four, and I knew I was so tired I would sleep like an angel. I turned off the T.V., picked up my pillow, and walked over to the front door to turn off the lights.

(This is the cue for the scary music.) As I reached for the light, I heard a faint sound outside the door, puzzled I learned in closer and that is when I heard a man whispering. (Yes, it is true) It was at that moment that my heart leapt into my throat, I felt like I was in one of my nightmares. ( You know the kind where you can't move and all you feel is horror.) I however, found I could move, and I did. I leaped up the stairs with my heart pounding. I flipped open my phone, "Who to call, who to call?" In terror, I realized that I didn't have one person in my phone who lived remotely close. And so, I took a deep breath and tried to think more rationally. I knew I had a big imagination and so I wondered, "Was I just imagining the door whisperer?" I crept back down the stairs and went to the door again. Holding my breath, I listened again. . . . . Ahhhhhhhhh. . . . . . I heard the voice again, and this time I heard what he said, "There is no peep hole." All thoughts of being rational left me. Anybody who is talking about a peep hole at four in the morning is not rational. I hurriedly dialed my brother, woke him up, told him to stay on the line while I snuck out the back door into the garage, and hopped into my car. I locked the doors and raced out of the garage. As I drove by the front of the house, there was nobody there. Ahhhhhhhh. . . . . .. I was so spooked I couldn't stop my leg from shaking, which was bad because you have to brake when driving. I drove like mad, and then I got mad and decided to turn around and see if someone was really trying to break in. I am all for justice being served, and I had my phone out ready to call the police. (Nobody scares me like that and gets away with it.) Luckily, nothing appeared to be amiss, and so I drove to my brother's house and fell into bed relieved from worry.

(This is perhaps the anticlimactic part) The next day we all went out to the house and checked everything out. It seemed okay. And since then I haven't heard the door whisperer again. However, I have also not stayed home alone again, nor will I ever in the future. I really don't care if people think I am a chicken, nothing is worth having to be home alone and hear the "Door Whisperer."

Tanzania, Tanzania

2008-10-20T20:32:00.000-07:00

Here are a few moments of life in Africa:

-Each morning we awoke to the Ramadan call to prayer and the smell of burning trash. (Which they just piled up by the road and burned each day.) Every night began with the slathering on of deet, the pulling on of long sleeved clothing, and the tunneling into our mosquito net for the night. Each night, as I looked up at the ceiling, I gained more appreciation for that net, knowing it not only kept out the mosquitoes, but the spiders, the beetles, and the lizards.

-Each day as we came out of our gate we would see donkeys, cars, goats, Masai on bikes, and women carrying huge buckets on their heads, all sharing the same road.

-I learned to enjoy porridge every morning and rice and beans every lunch and dinner. (Okay, perhaps at the end of three weeks the word enjoy may be a tad bit generous, it is true I actually dreamed about pizza.)

-I learned to teach without a classroom, and then in a room with no desks, no chalkboard, and no books, to children who spoke only a few English words.

-The last few days, I wiped away happy tears at the sound of those children saying English letter names and sounds, colors, numbers and words.

-I found myself screaming in horror as two, fat, killer lizards fell from the ceiling onto the floor in the middle of class. Forgetting all restraint, I ran from the room. Of course, all the children did likewise and tried to calm me down. Call the animal police, but the other teacher killed them as she exclaimed,"The children play with them. They are their friends. They will not hurt you." Friends or not, I did not feel an ounce of sadness. (Do not feel bad for those lizards, they were awful.)

-I discovered that all those random wet spots all over the playground were actually student made bathroom puddles.

-We explored a Chagga bat filled cave, where Nick decided to take a picture of a sleeping bat. I decided to run for my life after it woke up.

-We marveled at the Masai sand and dung insulated huts with live chickens inside.

-We cringed at the gaping holes in the Masais' ears, which according to the Masai preacher, were first started long ago when their herds were far from home, and they would put the new lambs in those holes to help carry them home. It's true, that's what he said.

-We rode what they call the dala dalas. They are old vans that act like buses for the people, since most don't have their own cars. They are however, crazy. There is always a man hanging out of the door scanning the road for anyone who needs a ride. The use of seats is also optional. People sit on the floor, on your lap, or hoover over your head. The dala dala is never too full for more riders.

-We were able to go to a newly formed L.D.S. branch. In a place so different, it was wonderful to find the same peace.

-We heard testimony in one of the U.N. Rwanda criminal tribunal court cases. (Which are still happening, even though it has been over 14 years ago.) It was fascinating, extremely sad that the genocide ever happened, and hopeful that justice will be served.

-I hummed Lion King music throughout our safari, as we saw amazing animals. They were extremely beautiful, okay, some of them were not, (Have you ever seen a wildebeast?) but all were extremely fascinating. I also have never seen such beautiful sunrises and sunsets in my life.

-I found myself falling asleep in the campground to the lullaby sounds of hyenas, lions, and water buffalo, the campground without any fences or gates. Amazingly, I actually slept.

-I learned that things aren't what make us happy.

-This is how my students would say goodbye every day. They would pray, sing about Jesus, shout about how happy they were, and then sing a goodbye song to their teachers. It makes me ask myself the same question each day, "Are you happy?" Humbly, and gratefully I know I can always say, "Yes!"

AFRICA

2008-10-07T21:02:00.000-07:00

I'm finally almost 100% back from Africa. (I got home a little over a week ago, but my body has taken a little longer to get back.) Africa was a million different adjectives: amazing, despairing, fascinating, hard, heartwarming, heartbreaking, beautiful, frightful. . . . . . and the list could go on. I went with a nonprofit organization to teach, learn about the culture, and have some free time to explore. However, when I got down there I was truly overwhelmed by the immense need. It was hard because I knew I could not give back parents to all of the orphans, cure all that were sick, feed all that were hungry or give money to all that were in need. Looking around I felt very small and inadequate, however, I was reminded that I had two things that I could give in abundance to all I came into contact with. The first was knowledge. I am a firm believer that knowledge is power. We taught the children, the teachers, and the community. As a pastor we met said, " If you give me money I will cry and thank you, but I would rather you give me knowledge because after the money is gone, the knowledge will still be there."
The second thing I could give was love. My eyes were never dry as the children would run to grab my hand, sit on my lap, brush my hair, and squeeze in to be held. I spent most recesses with my arms around five or six children that didn't want to let go when recess was done. It was heartbreaking to realize that there are not enough hands to rock, hug, and love these little orphans. If only I could have brought them home.
I have truly been humbled and filled with gratitude. Whenever we told people we were from America their eyes would get big and they would cheer, "Oh America, that is our favorite country." We met many children named after American presidents, who have given great aid to the Tanzanian people. What a great country we come from, we are so blessed. It was however, also amazing to see these people who had nothing were so happy and welcoming. What a wonderful people and beautiful country. I would love to go back.

I of course have some delightfully crazy stories about falling lizards, swooping bats, sneaky pickpockets, and prowling lions that I will have to share next time.

THE FUGITIVE

2008-08-19T21:25:00.000-07:00

Last weekend was the big family reunion. Every two years we get together with my only first cousins, and we head out to the mountains for a weekend of good old fashioned family fun. We had a fabulous time doing yoga (can't you tell I'm completely relaxed) swimming, rowing in the boat, eating yummy food, playing badminton, and foosball (I accidentally hit the ball into our own goal three times, Crazily, nobody wanted me on their team for the next game.) The best part of course was being together. This reunion may sound like any other family reunion, except for a slight twist, and that twist was . . . . . the fugitive.

You see the first night as we were enjoying a delicious dinner on the deck, we noticed helicopters circling the mountains. My uncle told us there was a fugitive on the loose. While he wasn't a killer, he was a juvenile delinquent who had escaped from a wilderness program in the mountains. They had planes and dogs combing the area. We were warned to lock up our cars and the cabin. I looked back at the mountain, locked the doors and didn't think too much more about it. That is I didn't until two days later, when my mother told me some people had been by again to warn us about the fugitive. They said he was wearing a blue shirt and had brown hair, "Uh, huh." I said distractedly as I helped whip up a salad. However, not two minutes later, I looked up, and who did I see? That's right, the fugitive. There he was walking down the hall with my dad and uncle. Convinced that I was the only one who knew who he really was, I whispered to my mom, "It's the fugitive." And no sooner had I said that, then my dad came bustling into the kitchen and said, "We need to get this kid some food." I nervously whispered again, "It's the fugitive." My brother looked at me and said, "Yeah we know." Completely baffled, I watched as they led the fugitive to the table, had him sit, and started feeding him our food. Personally, I was thinking more along the lines of grabbing him, tying him up and calling the searchers. (I tend to err on the side of caution.) However, if you know my dad, you know he befriends all, and so they set him at the table with food and listened to the fugitive's story. (I shouldn't have worried so much, it's true all the guys were right by him at the table, and my seventh grade cousin gave me a glance of his pocket knife telling me not to worry, he had it covered.)
This is the story that the fugitive told:
At the camp where he was they would take away the kids' shoes each night, so they wouldn't run away. However, this fugitive still ran. In fact he had been running for 6 days, over 35 miles away from the camp, without any shoes. Crazy! He also had been running without any food but a granola bar, beef and cheese stick. He said they almost got him one time, but he climbed a huge fence and jumped. Then he hid in a little cave, so the planes wouldn't see him. He drank water from a nearby stream and took shade in the Aspen trees. At night he slept up on the ridge, and every night below him he would see all of our cabin lights on. He said, "You guys are the loudest people I know, I could hear you all the way up on the ridge." ( It's true we are a tad loud, and when you get over 20 of us playing a game of werewolf, it sounds a lot like real wolves howling at the moon.) And so after 6 days he lost his adrenaline and decided to come down and turn himself in, and what nicer people to turn himself into then the werewolf howlers. He came and knocked on the door, and asked to use the phone. My dad knowing who he was (I guess I wasn't the only one.) told him a lot of people were looking for him, that we would give him something to eat, and call someone.
Now here is where the story turns into a Hallmark Hall of Fame movie, but I promise it is true. The fugitive called his dad and his dad (who had flown across the country and hired his own private investigator to find his son) came to the cabin to get him. His dad knocked at the door and when he saw his boy he held out his arms. The fugitive nervously asked his dad what was going to happen, and his dad took out a picture of his son from his shirt pocket. (I swear I'm not making this up.) Then he said, "I put this picture of you here by my heart while we were searching for you. I just want to love you right now." And the fugitive went over to his father for a hug. Now I'm sure there will be heck to pay later, but I thought it was a perfect ending to the reunion. The message: Your family is there with arms outstretched to love you, even when you aren't at your best. Now isn't that nice? Hallmark you can come get the story rights from me, because this one is a real winner.

The Big Event

2008-08-07T20:24:00.000-07:00

The big event of the summer is finally here, I am officially braceless. I didn't think it would ever happen, but I still rotated my ankle during every kid's report, put on my makeup balancing on one leg, and pushed and pulled during every newscast, and I am overjoyed to say it finally paid off. My doctor even released me yesterday with the ability to jog on the treadmill with no brace. Can you believe it? Jog-no brace. I tore home to put on my running shorts (shorts, I could actually wear shorts) and walked into the gym. Amazingly, there was nobody staring or critiquing my fashion. Can life get any better? I guess so, because today I got to choose from any of my shoes, not just my fatty brace shoes, and I could wear anything I wanted. ( I know, I said I was over the fashion thing, but I must admit I have seen way too many episodes of What Not to Wear to know they will get you at your worst moment.) My students clapped and cheered my success this morning, and my foot is feeling great. Yeah!!!!! And so sadly, this concludes the last of my endless posts about my foot. I'm sure it has been fascinating reading, I know it was all I could think about. No worries though, I still have one more surgery to go. (Don't get too excited though, I am not going to write about it, well, unless it is as fascinating as this last experience.)

Fashion

2008-07-29T17:52:00.000-07:00

Okay, it's true in the fifth and sixth grade I tight rolled my pants, sported two different colored socks on each foot, and ratted my bangs to enormous heights. However, I had thought my extreme fashion days were over, but apparently thanks to my brace they are not.
One Sunday after church, I ran to a dinner wearing a long gray skirt and black shoes. I thought that this would help camouflage that fabulous brace of mine. It seemed to blend nicely. I guess it blended a little too nicely. I walked into the dinner and a friend said, "Oh, how is your foot?" I smiled and kicked up my leg."It's doing well, I just have the brace now." That's when she said, "Oh my goodness, I didn't even know you were wearing a brace. I just thought you were wearing a boot and a shoe." I would like to add here that she was serious. I'm mean it, she thought I was wearing a dress boot and shoe. Which leads me to ask, how many people do you know who wear one boot and a shoe to a dinner? Is that a new style? And further more, do I look like the type of person who would wear a boot and a shoe out in public or for that matter at home? The rest of the night I was paranoid that everyone was looking at my boot and shoe combo. And so, after that I nixed the blending and tried to make it obvious that I was wearing a brace. Which looked like a big, black brace and a stretched out brown shoe with every fashion ensemble. I just can't seem to win. Therefore, I've decided to just wear what I wear, and if it helps give people a little enjoyment talking about my new fashion statement, then that is the small part of joy I will give to others.

The Art of Walking

2008-06-26T21:37:00.000-07:00

It all began with that itchy, hard cast, then I moved to this summery boot (I lovingly call it ten pounder), and as of yesterday I became the proud walker of this sleek, little brace. It's true my days of all night reading, t.v. marathons, and plopping down in exhaustion are coming to an end, and I can't contain my excitement.
I must say however, I am grateful to my crutches for giving me bulging arm muscles, (Can't you see them?) a fabulous handicap sticker, ( it has propelled me to coolest teacher of the school status) and the opportunity to ride in a hip and stylish grocery racer ( those neon, orange flags really whip down the aisles.) Mainly, crutches have made me grateful for not needing them now.
Last week at my doctor's appointment, I was extremely disappointed with my failure to remember how to walk, and then with the pain involved. ( I had a little separation anxiety from my crutches.) My doctor therefore prescribed a couple more days of crutches and putting pressure on my foot. Monday, I began my first day of walking by myself. It was pretty amazing, Yesterday, I went in expecting to get out of the boot in another week or two. However, my doctor had me walk without the boot. ( I was scared out of my wits. ) Then he asked me if I still had my brace. (This brace and I go way back.) When I replied, "Yes." He told me I could wear it. Stunned, I actually started to clap and cheer. The patients in the other rooms could think what they wanted, I could not contain emotion to news like that. Then he gave me more good news, no brace to sleep in. I can not tell you how much happiness this caused my heart. You see the first three weeks in my cast I spent reading until 4 am, then the last two weeks in my boot I have spent ripping open seven Velcro tighteners every couple of hours to let my leg breathe and then strapping them back up and repeating. Last night, heaven.
Today I began my limpy, doo wop walking. I realize with no muscles in my leg, it is a bit dreadful to do and a bit dreadful to watch. ( I think people are afraid I'm going to tip over. ) However, it is me walking by myself, and I know that with each step my walking ability is increasing. (Speed walkers of the world watch out.)

The Truth about Life on Crutches

2008-06-01T20:00:00.000-07:00

It's been almost two weeks since my surgery and here are some of the lessons, strategies, and truths I've learned about life on crutches:

1-Whatever you do, don't break the toe on your other foot a few days before surgery. It will hurt like crazy, and make hobbling and hopping around extremely hard and hurtful.

2- Take medicine when it feels like they are still drilling into your ankle. Stop taking medicine when it feels like they are drilling on your head.

3- When you can't take the claustrophobia and itching of your cast any longer, do not lash out on your broken toe wrapping. While it may be liberating, it will hurt like nobody's business.

4- A good way to deal with insomnia is to read. However, a bad thing to read is murder mysteries.

5- Do not stare at people on crutches, they may fall from all of the attention.

6- Where there is a will, there is a way. It may require scooting, crawling, and pulling, but it is possible.

7- Never, ever bring 26 sixth grader's final book projects home to correct. No matter what you thought, you are definitely not going to want to correct them.

8-You may think you are cruising with speed on your crutches until you notice old people passing you by. Remember what your mother always said,"Don't compare yourself with others."

9-"Up with the good, and down with the bad." It's not just a good motto for life, but it sure helps going up and down stairs.

10- It is okay to ask for help, it is okay to receive help, it is okay to need help. (This is one I have to keep repeating to myself.)

11- Patience isn't just for other people, patience is needed for ourselves.

12- Bless my family and friends, without them I would not be surviving.

The next surgery should be in July. Then I will have a better post: The Truth about Life in a Boot and on Crutches.

The Children

2008-05-13T21:41:00.000-07:00

The truth is on Monday the kids were stinkers. and even though today was Jump Like a Frog Day, I just couldn't take it and there was no leap frog. And so, I decided I needed to remember why I love the dears so much. Therefore, I've decided to share my favorite lines and moments as of late. Enjoy!

(After learning I lived in an apartment) Oh, I didn't know you were poor, you wear such beautiful clothes.

(After learning that I am going to Africa) Don't do it Miss R, my cousin went to the same place you are talking about and they came up to him, pinched him and said, "You look good enough to eat." And they meant it Miss R, because they are starving, don't go, they will eat you.

(After a lesson on probability) Miss R thanks for teaching us how to gamble, can we bring you to Vegas?

(One dreary, cold winter morning) Miss R can I give you a hug, because Lindsey says you're not a morning person.

(During a game show moment) Wait, we had China but then you said we couldn't have a continent?

(During geography after the question, "What is the line of latitude at zero degrees?") Ecuador!

(On another cold, dreary day.) Miss R I brought my robe to wear today, because I'm not feeling well, and it makes me feel better. (Nothing warms your heart more than a sixth grader in a purple, woolly bathrobe)

(This is one of my favorite heart warmers) Miss R I made you a Mother's Day present, and I know you're not my mom, but at school I feel like you are. Happy Mother's Day!

Miss R a closed mind is a good thing, because an open mind is like open and so it gets out and gets bigger. Uh. . . wait, never mind.

Favorite grammar mistakes from country power points they made:

East meats West

Religion: Some are proteins

Bucharest: It is horrible and smells like guts.

Favorite phrase taped to a child's tote tray : Candy, it is a miracle!

Favorite thing they write on the board: Grammer Edit

I could go on and on with the funny ones, and then forever about all of their brilliant lines. It all comes down to the fact that they are adorable, and since tomorrow is "Chicken Dance Day" you can bet it is going to be great. (And I'm really not making up these holidays, I got them from a holiday website, and if I had the energy and thought process I would somehow have it link to the word website and then you could look at it, but that would require some figuring out, and like I said, it wasn't a leap frog day.)

The Good News and the Bad News

2008-05-04T00:08:00.000-07:00

It is official, my brother and I are headed off to Africa. We are going in September for three weeks to volunteer in a village in Tanzania. I really feel grateful that I will be able to teach children there for a short time. I know this will be a great experience of learning and gratitude. That is the good news, the bad news is that after the falling, the aching, and the spraining, I am finally going in for surgery in two weeks. I have come to face the reality of a summer filled with casts, crutches, and three flights of stairs. I have also promised to be optimistic, knowing that in July I will go in for surgery on my other foot. (It's the darn ligaments, they need to be tightened.) However, I really will be grateful for these surgeries, because my doctor said that after them I will be able to run again. And while I may not be running in Africa, I will be jumping for joy! (Cheesy, I know, but appropriate to my feelings)

Cutting a Rug

2008-04-16T20:01:00.000-07:00

It is true, I was cutting a rug with the senior citizens at their dance last weekend. It may be kind of hard to imagine my dancing ability and senior citizens, but pretty much we were awesome. My grandma is 91 and when she invited my brother and I down to the dance, I knew I would be getting a good work out in. If you know my grandma you know she is a whirlwind of energy. If you've never been to a senior citizen dance I would highly recommend it. (It really and truly was fun. The people there actually can dance, it was kind of fun to do more than just the old side to side shuffle.) There was even a high school kid who told me he comes every week just to learn to dance better, and I must admit he can dance a mean two step.
The dance started at 8:00 p.m. and as we walked in we were met by this 76 year old woman, who wanted to dance with my brother right away. My grandma put her right in her place, and let her know that he came to the dance with us and would first be dancing with us. Poor kid, he can't help he's a lady killer. We soon got into the groove as the band began to play, " There's a tear in my beer." ( A great oldie that we were all still humming the next day.) The band was really getting into it, and everyone was a twirling and a whirling. I learned some new moves with the two step and waltz and then "ding" 9:00 o'clock hit and everyone stopped and went to the back to sit, visit, and eat snacks. It was then I knew this was my kind of dance. After snacks we danced till 10:00 and then everyone grabbed their coats and headed for the door. (This is also my kind of short, sweet activity.)
The whole weekend was delightful, especially since I have the heart of a small town girl and being back in a small town dancing with good old folks, eating at the soda fountain/variety store, visiting with family, and driving around in the country all bring joy to my small town heart.

The Take Down

2008-03-16T08:22:00.000-07:00

When danger comes upon most people they have that fight or flight mechanism, I however, have always had that fall down to the ground and cover your head mechanism. Being the only girl in my family has helped me practice this over and over as my brothers would scare me. Because of this when it came time to sign up for our annual winter class, my friend and I chose self defense. At first, class was pretty easy, blocks, kicks, strikes, identifying target points and getting away from grabs. Good things to remember, not to awkward to do. However, a few classes into the semester we all watched in wonder as our instructor put down mats and then strapped on a huge chest pad, leg and foot pads, and then put on a head guard with a clear visor. "Is he bringing in someone to fight with and show us what to do?" we wondered. Then he called each of us back, one at a time, for the take down. Imagine walking toward imminent danger, while eight other people are watching your every move. You can hear the instructor's voice as you get closer whispering, "You're just walking along minding your own business. . . . . . " and then bam, he grabs you, and you have to use what you have learned to get away from him. Some of you are probably thinking he isn't really that tough, and that he probably lets you get away. Speaking as a young student who hesitated slightly, and then was picked up, thrown to the ground and pinned, I would beg to differ. Pretty much you have to give it your all, or you're a goner. However, knowing that he isn't easing up on you, makes it even more sweet when you get away, and I must say while it scares me to death, I've thrown him twice and there is no better feeling then that.
The most dramatic moment of class came last week as my friend was going to the mats for the take down. We were all watching intently ready to yell suggestions, or encouragement. However, we were soon screaming in terror as our instructor pulled out a gun. Now obviously, it wasn't real, but our instructor is a man of few words and the gun came out of nowhere. Next he took out his fake knife, and somehow I was the lucky victim. (My weak spot and a knife, not a good mixture.) However, it was a really good learning experience. This class has taught me how not to be a victim, and the simple, most effective ways to get out of bad situations. I highly recommend taking a class like this to everyone. Sadly, this week is the last class and somehow I find myself in a nasty ankle brace (slight running accident). However, I figure hurt people get attacked, so maybe I'll still go and just give him a good eye poking.

The Largest Ice Cream Cone in the World, and The Disappearing Mailbox

2008-03-08T17:31:00.000-08:00

I just had to share this delightful ice cream picture with everyone. My family was all together last weekend for a baby blessing and my sister-in-law gave my parents this amazing collage of family pictures all compiled into a poster. She sent all of the family photos to the place and guess which one they chose to enlarge and feature in the middle of that poster? That is right, this baby. The ice cream cone and I are now, as we should be, the pinnacle of all attention. And so of course the first comment out of every person who saw it was, "Whoa, somebody was hungry" and "Did you eat it all?" and so on and so on. Sadly, I must confess I did not eat all of this, not even with the help of two other friends. Perhaps one day, okay let's be honest, probably never. After all it is one huge ice cream cone.
The next most important event, after this ice cream picture of course, is the happy fact that I'm off track. I officially went off track last week, however, I spent most of the week in a math conference. Which makes it very unofficially. Truly, there is something heartwarming and hilarious about sixth grade teachers earnestly searching for new ideas on how to teach their students that 9 to the zero power is 1, and how to decompose a circle into wedges to figure out area. I must admit these are memories I cannot describe adequately. And so tomorrow officially begins my off track. I had decided to go on some little trips, but then I realized life has been crazy. I haven't really been home for months and might need to get caught up on what is going on here.
Let me illustrate how this thoughtful conclusion came to me.
Yesterday I went out to get the mail. To my astonishment, the mailboxes were all gone. My mind tried to grapple with how and where the mailboxes had gone, and then sheepishly I wondered how long they had been gone.
Next, I sat down to watch a movie. Just as I got settled in I heard, "drip, drip, drippy, drip." I could only take it so long until I began a battle with the kitchen faucet. In defeat, I looked at my roommate who calmly said this had been going on for a month. Who knew?
Lastly, as I was putting away my laundry, I noticed my favorite pink, sparkly sock. Sock as in one, that has been there for a year in hopes that I would magically find the other one in the laundry one day. Perhaps I need to clean out my closet. And the more I look around, the more I realize there is a lot to catch up on here. Of course the first thing on my list is a walk around the complex, the mailboxes can't have completely disappeared.

The Megatrons and Me

2008-02-17T18:16:00.000-08:00

Sorry, my last post may have been a tad grouchy. It's that darn inversion. It gets me every year. However, I am here to tell you that dreams do come true. I was awakened last week to a text at 5am. It stated that the whole district was delayed 2hrs. 2 wonderful, delightful, marvelous hours. It would seem that nothing could top that, and yet the beautiful sun has also been shinning in and out of storms. That has meant snowshoeing and cross country skiing. Yeah! I even got to take my students cross country skiing. Who wouldn't love skiing and plucking kids out of the snow? It is a delight and afterwards, those little darlings said things like, "Our teacher was the only person out there who did not fall. She is a superstar." Gosh, I love those kids.
And so it was with these happy thoughts I headed down to Bryce Canyon to cross country ski with friends. Little did I know it would be different, much different. Saturday morning as we ate breakfast at the lodge, I was lost in my own thoughts about how good life was with the clean air, beautiful sun, and my health returning. Suddenly, my ears perked up to the end of the conversation that had been taking place. "Ok, so who is doing the triathlon?" When those words were said and I saw the faces around the table begin to shake yes, I knew I was in trouble, big trouble. My head began to spin, and I frantically searched every face at the table and realized to my horror that everyone there was a . . . . . "Megatron." This bit of information might fill you with panic too, if you knew what a Megatron was. Basically, it is someone who does everything with megatronical force. (The spell checker is going crazy with these great words.) However, Megatrons don't know they are Megatrons. They think they are regular people. They say they are taking things easy and just having fun, which may be the case for them, but normal people like myself, who are gasping for air, have a hard time believing this. I like the Megatrons and do things with them, however, usually in outdoor activities, I like to make sure the paparazzi are there. The paparazzi are the friends who take pictures of everything and anything. Paparazzi make it possible to pretend like you are interested in their pictures, while really you are simply trying to breathe. However, on this trip I had failed to confirm that the paparazzi were coming. Big mistake.
We got on the trail and I optimistically tried to remember my superstar skiing status. However, these people were like machines. Up the hills, around the bends, through the trees. Push, push, push. I found myself falling behind, and so in my haste I tried to speed up and fell. Which shouldn't have been a problem. Except, we were skiing in the pre-made ski tracks and when I tried to help myself up by pushing my pole into the ground outside of the ruts, it sank down, all the way down, and so did the other pole, my hand, my head, my body, everything. You might say that the snow was pretty deep there. At this point I just started laughing because have you ever tried to get up on skis after falling down without using anything to push off of? It can be a bit of a problem, especially because I knew the Megatrons were so far ahead. However, where there is a will, there is a way, and later, quite a bit later, I got up. Victory!!!! However, this was just a small indication of what was to befall me that day. You might say it was a little bit of a rough day for me. However, in the end I just let the Megatrons go ahead, because the sun was shinning, and the canyon was beautiful and I really was having a wonderful time. And even though I'm not a Megatron, that is ok, because I have been told I am a superstar.

Bad, Bad News

2008-02-03T10:15:00.000-08:00

I really am not a complainer, and I hesitate to post this tirade, but I just received news that has sent me over the edge. Punxsutawney Phil saw his shadow and you know what that means. Six more weeks of winter are on the horizon. When I shared this news with my roommate, she said, "Yeah, I love winter." For goodness sake, that is what everyone around here says. I am not a hater of winter, truly I love skiing, snowshoeing, and the snow. But enough is enough. This winter has sent storm after vicious storm from gray, inversion skies. This winter instead of roads, we have ice rinks. At least they appear that way. They are all white, and all you do is slide on them. Which wouldn't be so bad if they ever closed things down and you could stay at home, but no. The weather forecaster will say, "Visibility will be nonexistent at times during the morning commute " and so I turn on my little radio with hope in my heart, but alas school is not canceled, nor will it ever be according to my optimistic principal. And so I make the trek which doubles or triples its usual time, and I enjoy my talk radio, as I watch people slide across the freeway, or as I stay in the same spot for an hour waiting for an accident to clear. Once at school, I spend the morning bus duty scooping children out of snowbanks and off of the slick sidewalks where they have fallen. I numbly go into my class where I am greeted with the announcement that it will be an inside day. That means me and the kids all day, no breaks. I really do love them, but they run back from lunch before I come back from getting papers in my box. Then they converge around my desk, eyes peering at every bite I take. Then they comment, "Yum, I love carrots, can I have a carrot? What kind of soup is that? Can I have a taste?" Next they watch like a hawk to see if I have a treat that they can sweet talk me out of. I haven't been able to sneak a treat in a month. If that isn't a good reason for winter to be through, I don't know what is. I also love the wonderful winter sounds in my classroom which go something like this, "Cough, cough, sniffle, cough, sniffle, sniffle, cough." Which inevitably makes me go, Cough, cough, sniffle, cough, sniffle, sniffle, cough. It is a tragedy. I drive home and the turn onto the street before our apartment known as "Suicide turn." Then onto the ice rink of terror where there are no parking spots, only mounds of snow. You just gun it and plow through. Unfortunately, getting out is much more difficult. However, I did see the sun yesterday and it made me cry. Okay, it might have been the fact that I was running in the freezing cold air, but I know spring will be coming sometime and this year I really, really will appreciate it. (Mom, don't worry the roads really aren't as bad as I said, I may have embellished a tad to get my point across.)

The Dog

2008-01-13T15:57:00.000-08:00

I tend to have problems with dogs. I think they can sense my fear. I however, have never had a problem with them at church, that is until today. Simply put, I stepped on a seeing eye dog twice today at church. Honestly, this girl's dog is so good and quiet you hardly know that he is there. That is kind of the problem, I just forgot about him, and bam my foot came down on his paw. (Which was a little worse because of my pointy heels.) Needless to say he wasn't so quiet then. Everyone around me soon knew he was there. I mumbled a sorry. The dog did not look happy. I was quite watchful of him for a while, but church is a good bit of time and soon I forgot about him again. Seriously, this dog is silent, and I really think he silently snuck farther under me, because the next thing I know I uncross my leg, bring it down, and bam the dog has been hit again. He jumped up, and that normally calm, loving dog is staring me down. It kind of made me a little nervous. Anyway the last hour of church, I slid completely away from him and his owner. It may have seemed a little anti-social to both of them, but a girls got to do what a girls got to do. Afterward his owner asked me if I was allergic to him. "Oh, no." I replied. "I just have a cold and wanted to lean my head against the wall." Which was true. I however, did not mention the fact that if I hit her dog one more time, I was afraid he would attack me. And although that would have made a better story, bite marks are not very becoming.

Lock Down

2007-12-17T21:54:00.000-08:00

I never posted this because I was too crazy that week, but I edited it and so without further ado here is the harrowing and dramatic tale of "The Lock Down." It was a normal, chaotic day at school. It was lunch and I was busily grading papers and trying to finish up Christmas presents for the students. Then the intercom came on calling all students in for an inside recess. My first thought was "Great Scott, it is not that cold." (The wind chill often sends the kids in from recess.) Then I breathed a very dramatic sigh, because I knew my well crafted work time would turn into entertaining fidgeting children. However, the secretary came back on the intercom and this time she said the most dreaded of all words at a school, "Lock down." Two words and I was struck with fear. I knew this was not a drill, and so I ran outside to usher in the kids. Then came the task of closing all blinds, turning off the lights, and locking the doors. Keep them out of sight, out of mind. I knew nothing else about the situation, and my students began to get jumpy. "What's going on?" they wanted to know and I had no answer. We talked about precautions, keeping ourselves safe, and how fear and jumping to conclusions help nothing, and so we tried to be as normal as possible. We quietly read a funny story to get their minds off the situation, and then I learned why we were in lock down. A member of the safety team brought the news that a citizen had reported a suspicious looking man with a shotgun in the neighborhood next to the school. Needless to say, I gave a word of caution about staying away from windows and doors, but acted as if nothing new was going on. I calmly continued the story, but inside my head I was going crazy. As I was reading, this horrifying thought kept reoccurring: What if he tried to get in OUR room. What would I do? Just like when I was little and would figure out where I would hide if a robber came in, I tried to engineer some other plan of safety. The scariest thought was I was in charge of all of them, my actions affected their lives. I had followed the safety guidelines, but there had to be more I could do. I suddenly wished I had taken more kickboxing classes, lifted more weights, and blast where was our baseball bat? I'm not sure how any of that would really help, but I still thought of it. It's pretty amazing what the brain can do. There I was reading aloud, while I thought processed how to kung fu the killer, and continued to pray. Prayer kind of battles out fear, and soon I was okay. I knew that I would be able to handle whatever I needed to. The lock down ended about an hour later. They never found the guy, there not even sure if there ever was a guy. They cleared the area, my students and I had a talk about what had happened, then we finished the day and sent them home. I personally left school right after the students. Even though, they said the area was clear, I didn't want to be hanging around after dark with the shot gun man, you never know. This experience did help our school learn what we needed to change in our plan and what had went well. I personally decided that even if we aren't playing softball in the winter, I'm still going to have a bat in my closet, just in case. But more importantly, I'll always have a prayer in my heart.

CHINA

2007-12-11T07:22:00.000-08:00

China was pretty much, well amazing. What I learned:
-It is possible to fly for almost 14 hours straight and live.
-The Chinese are still working on some of their translations of English. (See picture)
-The palaces are amazing. In the Forbidden City they built thresholds on every door because they believed that the
ghosts couldn't jump over them.
-There is no such thing as personal space, and I mean none.
-When you see the animal's head on the plate, it is time to stop eating.
-I am normal height in China.
-Pretty much any sign somehow stands for good luck.
-Crossing the street is a form of bravery.
-When a man can balance his body on a spear, lay on a bed of nails, and have a block broken on his stomach, you know
you are at a real Kung Fu show.
-If you want compliments go to the markets, all you will hear is “Pretty lady, pretty lady come look."
-Bargaining is an art, and you know you have made it when you give your final price, walk down the hall, around the
corner and they run to find you and concede defeat.
-At every palace or tomb everything stands for something, the color, the design, the animals. It all has some
special meaning.
-There is no singing, dancing, or signs allowed on Tiananmen Square, period. (If you want to try it, ask our tour guide
about the Texas dancers, not an amusing experience.)
-Pretty much everything is about Feng shui
-Looking out on The Great Wall of China is unbelievable. (If I don't have your address, email it to me, because you are not going to want to miss me and my acrobatic Great Wall christmas card)
-The Great Wall is about 3,700 miles, I did 1,785 steps to the ninth guard tower and let me tell you, whoo, it is not as
easy as it looks, all of the steps are different sizes.
-The word Olympics and Beijing are on every street corner, and wait till you see the Olympic buildings, amazing.
-Toilets are different in China, and you hope for a toilet that is “western style.” the other option is not pretty.
-The history of emperors and revolutions is fascinating.
-My laminated traveling companion Flat Stanley, given to me by a third grader for educational pictures, was a hit with
the locals.
-Cooked veggies, rice, noodles and meats should not be breakfast items or on the same table as breakfast items.
-Fruit is the favorite and only dessert served after a meal.
-Ballroom dancing, fan dancing, tai chi, singing, sword fighting, jazzercise, dominoes, and cards all come together
every morning at the local park.
-Being sick on a plane over the ocean for 10 hours is probably one of the worst forms of punishment for any person.
-Jet lag can help you accomplish much in the middle of the night, but it makes for a very tired morning.
-An open mind is important
-“There are always two sides to every story.” David ( our Chinese tour guide speaking of the Western world’s view of
China’s past.)
-The world is a big place.
-China is amazing
-We are blessed to live in America.
If I see you at Christmas or before I'll show you my pictures. They are super cool.

The Race That Was Not Meant To Be

2007-11-10T18:56:00.000-08:00

I've had several people ask when I'm running Richmond. Alas, it was not to be. The race was actually run Saturday, sadly without me. The story of this tragedy is kind of like A Series of Unfortunate Events. However, I'm hoping for a happy ending. Things were going along just great in my training, until one day I came home with a stabbing pain in my heel. Now normally an ice pack is my best remedy. Unfortunately, the pain in my heel did not go away, and when you feel like someone is pushing a rusty knife in your heel day after day you tend to worry. Thus, I went to the podiatrist. I have to hand it to him, he didn't mince words. He had me walk down this long, cheerless hall as he scrutinized my every step and then proceeded to tell me I had a deformity, I collapse my arch each time I walk, and that if I wasn't careful I might rupture my achilles. Feeling full of joy I went with him to get my feet taped, x-rayed, and started my 9 a day Advil regimen. Then I emptied my piggy bank out for state of the art orthotics. However, these state of the art orthotics haven't been so state of the art for me, but we are tweaking them, trying to avoid surgery. It's been a tad discouraging, but I am optimistic that it will all get figured out, and I'll be back in action soon. In fact my friend and I are starting a new goal: 800 miles in 2008. That is the happy ending I'm looking for.

Halloween

2007-10-31T20:28:00.000-07:00

Halloween at an elementary school is a pretty big deal. I had third graders stopping by my classroom daily to hear what costume I had decided on, and I must admit I had nothing. I had looked and looked but nothing seemed right, until one night while I was searching through costumes on the internet and inspiration hit. I saw that brainy, yet lovable Velma from Scooby Doo. Right away I knew this was the costume for me, and so I set about making this magic happen. Unfortunately, I didn't figure this out until Monday which made for a little bit of stress, especially finding orange knee highs. Who knew how hard orange knee highs were to find? Luckily, I found one pair of orange tights hidden away at a costume shop. Bless orange tights.
The elementary school day started with a fun filled Halloween parade through the school and then into the gym for all the parents to see. No pressure, only hundreds of eyes watching your every move and snapping up pictures that will be pasted in scrapbooks to remember you by forever. Unfortunately, I walked by my tall kids. (Nothing more needs to be said) Then we went back in the classroom for delightful Halloween games, stories and jokes. (I have a ton of them. Hilarity at its best.) As much fun as this was the highlight of my day came when the PTA brought in the sugar cookies. Never in the history of my teaching has the PTA ever messed up on their cookie count. Translated: They only bring in enough cookies for the kids. I don't know if they know about my love for those soft, sugary cookies and that gooey icing they bring to decorate, but I am disappointed every year. However, the heavens smiled down on me this Halloween, for after my students went out to recess there on the tray were FOUR delicious sugar cookies. FOUR! I did not mind that the frosting was gone, oh those cookies. I will happily admit I ate all four cookies for lunch, it was the best lunch I've had all year. As I was happily munching away on the cookies in came two gossiping little sixth graders with a story to tell. And this is the tale they told: Ryan broke up with Katey, and then Emily asked out Bradien, who said no because Ryan told him to, and Cindy who was really only going out with Bradien to get to Ryan paid Zack 10 dollars to ask out Katey as a joke, and then Cindy told Amber to bring it and Amber said she was going to kick Cindy's bleep, and. . . . . (Do you see why I have a hard time keeping track of my own stuff now?) Basically, this meant girls were bawling, rumors were flying and the sixth grade was in an uproar. But have no fear the fences were mended, the tears were dried and everyone was ready for more spooky Halloween fun to end the day. Simply put Halloween at elementary school is a pretty big deal.

Picture Day

2007-10-21T19:47:00.000-07:00

Picture day is a pretty big deal. As a teacher it is a lot of pressure. This picture is how you will be remembered by your students forever. Thirty years from now they will be talking to their children about you and they will pull out the old class picture and whamo! There you are. Big nose, poofy hair and wacky grin, or a picture of loveliness. I of course want to be remembered in a kind way, so I try a little harder on picture day to capture that look of loveliness. Now, I'm a thinker and since I had bus duty the day of pictures, I went down to have my picture taking before school started. I guess most teachers are thinkers because three other teachers appeared out of nowhere for pictures as well. We walked in to the picture lady, she smiled and asked teacher number one her name and then, click, click, took her picture. Teacher number two name, click, click, picture; teacher number three name, click, click, picture and then me. I'm sure you can guess something would go wrong, of course without it there is no story. And so I walked up to the picture lady, she smiled at me and said, "Teacher or student." Now let me remind you I teach at an elementary school. The top of the line is sixth grade, that is twelve. (I blame this all on being short. I'm not sure why being short automatically makes you a kid, but for me it does.) I smiled at her using my best oh this is not awkward at all look and said "Teacher." With that vote of confidence I got my picture taken, we can hope for the best, but at least there are retakes. As I walked back down the hall a mom met me to give me her child's picture money. I thought this was a pretty funny story, so I began telling her about it. After I finished I waited for her cue, You know the part where she would say,"You've got to be kidding me, you don't look like a kid." and then we would laugh and I would tell her about how my moisturizer must work wonders on getting rid of any wrinkles. Instead she said, "Well you know the other day when you came walking out with my son to talk to me, I thought to myself, who is this girl with Matt, Does he have a little girlfriend." There you have it, the story of life as a sixth grader.

Pictures from Home

2007-10-12T07:39:00.000-07:00

I've been meaning to post these pictures from home for awhile. (Unfortunately, life has been a tad crazy.) We had a wonderful time hiking, visiting, cooking, and going to the valley.

The Fatal Flaw

2007-10-07T01:27:00.000-07:00

I have a fatal flaw that I have lived with most of my life. However, this offtrack it almost did me in. You see, I lose things. Lose, however, is such a harsh word. It's more like I misplace things. However, it's not just trivial things, oh no somehow it is always big things, important things. For example, my debit card has been left in the drive through ATM so many times that the banker told me he was going to print me out an award for the most re-issued cards. (This however, is not all my fault, those darn machines, they spit out your receipt and you forget the card is still inside.) I have finally come up with a theory on why I misplace things. It has to do with teaching school. At school I am a cracker jack of responsibility. Remember 150 sixth graders names. Check. Keep track of 100 student's papers a day. Check. Make sure all the students do their assignments, turn them in, take them home to finish. Check. I know exactly where Miley's reading book is, where her math paper got put and what she did with her super hero story. However, once I leave school my brain overloads and must turn off. This is how the off track went. First, at the rental car agency in San Diego, I was so focused on where we would be going and the deal our sweet talkers were giving us, that I somehow left my wallet and the map on the desk. Have no fear just before we pulled away a good Samaritan came running out to give it to us. Phew! Next I went to the valley to a conference. Thinking that I didn't want to carry a bulky purse I took only my license. Unfortunately, sometime during my smooth driving that night I was left with empty pockets at the end of the evening. Thankfully, and I mean thankfully, it didn't get too far, only hidden away under a seat in the car. The next incident was my return flight home. After the flight, I sat waiting for my ride. Conscious that my purse was sitting up high on my luggage for a robber to steal, I responsibly put it under my seat. After a few minutes I wondered if my roommate had her phone and thought back to my last flight in from home, where my phone had been left at home (another wonderful moment in my life, try living without a phone for a few days, ugly, ugly, very, very ugly) I hurriedly got up, grabbed my luggage and took off to find her. Yes, that's right I left the purse there, and when I realized it was gone, it was gone. After a mild heart attack and a hour later my purse was turned in, with nothing missing. Bless all of the dear honest people in the world. This string of events doesn't end there though. You see last week I went into my school to make a few copies and start planning some curriculum. I ran out to my car in a hurry for an appointment, and what did I see? My keys locked inside. I went back inside and told the office staff I was never going to be responsible again and come in off track to work. And now you can see how this fatal flaw has begun it's festering again. However, I'm determined to squash it! So far I've gone a whole week without losing anything, well unless you count my prescription refill, or my friend's phone number, and . . . . ok, ok, nobody is perfect.

Off Track

2007-09-15T07:33:00.001-07:00

There are two words that combined bring a smile to me on even the souriest days,"Off track." Spaced conviently throughout the year off track gives weary teachers a moment to recoup and relax, and then come back with all the vehm and vigor they need to help inspire the minds of the future. I am sorry that the track system does not cross over into other fields. Believe me if I were in charge I would give everyone this option. I often tell people how great it is for the kids. They are antsy and crazy, then we go off track and they come back excited and ready to learn ,then the cycle continues they get crazy again and then. . . boom off track. I do believe that this also applies to most teachers, especially me. The words antsy and crazy best describe me before an off track. This year I was in desperate need of getting away. First, I headed off to Rexburg, where I had a marvelous time with one of my dear friends and darling niece, then I came back and headed off to San Diego. Here are some "stunning" pictures of that precious vacation time with one of my best friends. We ran, biked, snorkled, visited museums and gardens, shopped, ate yummy food, went to the temple and just laid on the beach and relaxed. Truly a piece of heaven. Now I sit in one of the greatest places in the world. Home, and I'm not talking about that apartment in the noisy city (ok, I know it's not that big and noisy of a city, but some days.. . . . ) I'm talking home, home. I just got back from a gorgeous walk outside and then spent the remainder of my time on the porch with Chomps, the cat, contemplating life, while the crickets played their tune and the wind softly blew through the trees. Truly poetic. By the time I get back, I'll be completely calm and ready to teach, that is until the cycle continues and December comes, then I'll be ready for another off track.

The Hike

2007-09-02T18:53:00.000-07:00

People in Utah are always talking about hiking Mount Timpanogos. They use very conflicting words to describe it like painful beautiful, steep, peaceful, bruised, and triumphant. I've always wanted to see for myself what kind of place gets that kind of description and so yesterday a group of friends and I began our climb. As we began I was ready for the steep, painful trails, and I will admit I was quite nervous. However, we climbed steadily up long switchbacks that gradually inclined. It gave me a chance to see beautiful trees, flowers, moose, deer, and goats. Once we got to the saddle part of the mountain, we ate lunch, and then began the climb to the summit. Now I will admit this was quite steep, and my friend icily turned to me about halfway up and said, "Is this steep enough for you?" I will admit I had been going on about how the first part hadn't been steep. Luckily, you could see the shack at the top and you knew you would only be hiking this steep trail for a little while. Once we got to the top, it was beautiful. You could see the whole valley. At the top we signed our names in a book at the little shack and felt a glowing sense of accomplishment. Little did I know that the real journey was just about to begin. I will admit right now I am a little unsteady on my feet. When I was in high school I was getting ready to hike in the Grand Canyon and my mother told me she was a little bit nervous letting me go, because I was a little clumsy. I objected and told my mom I would be fine, then I proceeded out the front door with my pack on and tripped down the front steps, scraping both knees. It is true, sometimes my feet have issues, but I know this so I'm a pretty slow descender. However, I was not prepared at all for this trip down. It had been a dry, hot year so there was no glacier, a fact that I'll admit brought me hope. However, the first part of the descent was sandy and steep and there was nowhere for my feet to be steadily placed, so I skidded down as best I could grabbing every flower, weed and bush, hoping that none of them were poison ivy. Finally, I was down and then we began our journey across the land of the rocks. Big rocks, medium sized rocks and small rocks covered the ground for as far as the eye could see. My ankles were twisting and turning. After a long, unending journey my friend asked me to take a picture of her to prove that we were in the land of the rocks. As I turned to take her camera my foot got caught in a rock. I was trying to be a good friend and save her expensive camera, so instead of catching myself with my hands, I held the camera up with my hands and landed with a hard thud on my shoulder. That was fall number one. Along the rest of the way down I continued my slow and steady pace. I felt bad for holding people up, so I turned to my friend behind me and asked if she wanted to go in front of me. She laughed and then said,"There is no way I'm having you behind me going down a mountain." and then she said, "I actually like having you in front of me. I just watch where you walk and then I don't walk there." Doesn't that just fill you with confidence. Fall number two came about halfway down the trail that I renamed "The Trail of Death." I caught my foot on a rock and bam I was down. However, I wasn't out, I was just a little banged up. Unfortunately, there was a fall number three, and that just about did me in. We had just over a mile left to hike. I was pretty tired, but I was enjoying the beautiful scenery. Note to everyone: Don't enjoy the beautiful scenery too much while hiking down steep switchbacks. Anyway, my foot caught on a tree root and as my other foot tried to find solid ground it hit a rock, which threw me off balance and turned me toward the edge of the mountain. Needless to say the edge of a mountain isn't a very good place to be, especially when you are falling. Luckily, my brain went into survival mode and said, "Grab something." So after me initial fall, roll, then slide down the side of the mountain my hands grasped a bush and I stayed put. My friend up ahead had heard the commotion and yelled to see if I was alright. Personally, at that moment I didn't feel alright. I wanted to just sit and cry and say, " I just fell down the mountain, no I am not alright." However, that is when my stubborn, little, tough mode perked up and I yelled, "I'm fine, really I'm fine. Let me just get up and I'll be ready to go." A minute later two nice ladies came by, and I watched as their eyes grew wide staring at the girl who was covered from head to toe in back sand. They gave me wet wipes and I cleaned up the best I could. Needless to say I took no more pictures after this and I chatted much less then normal. Mainly, I kept my eyes and thoughts on the trail. However, I am happy to report I did make it down the mountain in one piece. And as I sit writing this with an ice pack on one leg and a heating pad on my back I'm already thinking what I will do different for next year, because once you've seen the top of Mt. Timpanogos you'll definitely be coming back.

The Half

2007-08-26T20:27:00.001-07:00

Running is kind of a crazy thing. Runners are kind of a crazy thing, but I guess I've always been a little crazy. For the past month and a half I have been awakened by a shrill beeping sound and a big, glaring, red number 5 staring out at me. I jump happily out of bed (okay, okay I groggily shuffle out of bed) and go out and run. After about a mile I strangely feel happy (ask anyone who has run with me in the morning, we don't speak for the first mile.) I see all of the other crazy people out running, and we wave and say hello. It is the famed and much missed by me, runner's high. Needless to say last year was a big, bad year of sickness and I didn't get to run. This summer however, I began my epic journey back to health and running, and I completed my first goal of the Logan Half Marathon yesterday. Friday evening one of my best friends (bless her heart, she is the greatest) and I went down to pick up my packet and were only met with a slight awkward moment of going to an old woman's house to pick up my packet. (Hey, It wasn't my fault, they put the wrong address on the website. Luckily, she was nice.) The next morning at 6 am I boarded a school bus with runners of all ages merrily chatting about races, times, shoes, ipods, gatorade, gu, lost toenails, chaffing, defeats, triumphs. You name it, any subject that can correspond to running was discussed. The bus driver happily told everyone as soon as she has dropped us off, she was going straight back to bed, and like I said runners are kind of crazy, because nobody really wished that they were her. We are all too excited to run. Up the canyon at the start some people had already begun to do practice runs (not me 13.1, and not a step more), some people had begun their. . . hmmm. . .stretches (to each his own), and everybody was in line for the port-a-potties. Once we began everyone surged towards the front, but after about 3 miles the pack spread out and I started picking out my targets. I'm not a super competitive person, but there is something exhilarating in passing people. At first it was the old woman, (Hey, I have been passed by way too many old people in running.) She was the first to go, then the mother and daughter duo. Next I had my sights on big red up ahead. She however, was not taken easily, I inched ahead and then just as I breathed a triumphant yes, she came back up from behind me, daring me to take her on. We ran neck to neck for a minute or two and then I surged ahead. Yes, victory was mine. Can't you see how much fun a race really is. I did this for most of the race.( Ok, I did this but was also happily distracted by the great children's book playing on my ipod.) Sadly, my newly picked running enemy, old blue, was not caught. Oh well, there is always the next race. My sights are now set on the Richmond, Virgina Marathon in November. It is suppose to be the world's friendliest marathon, and I happen to be a pretty friendly person, which makes it all seem pretty perfect. At least that is what I'll have to tell myself tommorrow morning when the familiar shrill sound attacks and those big red numbers start blinking.

Nature

2007-08-16T17:53:00.000-07:00

I love being out in nature. I love hiking, backpacking, camping, and eating smores. However, there are just some things that make me a little wary about nature. It's the bugs, the nasty creatures, the big creatures, and even the cute little creatures (you never can tell when they are going to turn on you.) Today we had the opportunity to take about 120 sixth graders out to enjoy nature. They fished, played games, wrote using their different senses, and each group got to come with me on a fabulous nature walk. We discovered Gum Weed, Russian Olive trees, Alfalfa, Willow trees, Cattails and the list goes on and on. Things were going well, until I rounded the bend with my fourth and last group. My eagle sharp eyes noticed a few too many boys down by the creek crawling to get in the water. Needless to say I ran down to where the kids were. Luckily, there were some parents down there. Phew! Even more lucky, they were super responsible and were encouraging the children to get a snake out of the water. I of course yelled at the kids to get out of the water and get on the buses. One of the dads turned to me and asked why the kids couldn't bring the snake on the bus. As I was beginning my astonished reply, I turned to see a herd of 60 children, who a moment ago had been standing so quietly by the buses, now running quickly toward us. The dad turned to me and said, "Well they must have heard about the snake." I turned to the herd of children and began to wave my hands in the air yelling for them to turn around and go to the bus. Then I noticed that the kids weren't running toward the water, but they wre running toward me, and it wasn't that we're running to say hello to you look. Instead they were running at me with a fierce, warlike look in their eyes. They were definitely on a mission. I don't know where my eagle eyes were then, because it took me another moment (a very brief moment) to figure out that my life was in danger.I saw their water bottles, their water canteens, and their water chests. There was nowhere to go, but I still tried to run and then when the mob of little people had me surrounded I tried to protect myself. However, it was all over in about a minute. Needless to say I was absolutely and completely soaked. Which may have felt good, if I could have stayed out in the hot sun, however, the bus was leaving. Therefore, I got on the bus and with every step water poured out of my tennis shoes. Kids leaned toward the window as I walked by to keep from getting rained on. After the bus ride, I left my puddles on the bus and then swished down the sidewalk to my classroom where the air conditioning was on full blast. I don't know if I've ever been that cold before. I must say shaking for two hours while teaching is definitely a new experience. Needless to say, after today I have decided that while I still love being in nature, I need to add one more thing to my list of things to be wary about in nature and that is children.