so i see it's been a few days since I blogged..

This week has been okay. I've been a bit under the weather, but I'm starting to feel better. OTC drugs are good for me :-p (that's over-the-counter). I've been tired too but tomorrow is Friday and I'm super pumped about that!! Week-end! Week-end! Week-end! woo hoooooo!

Found out some not so fun news yesterday - Kappa Phi isn't doing intramurals this semester. I was so bummed when Katie told me that. I always thought that intramurals were a great way to grow in friendship! but apparently, most of the chapter from what i understand didn't like the competition part of the intramurals... From what I have gained from playing sports for almost 2o years, competition is part of sports and, in turn, intramurals. I guess I don't really understand. They probably just don't like playing sports or something. who knows.. ah well - hopefully Janice will get her team together and I can enjoy playing intramural sports for one last season! (tear!! sad day to make that realization...)

We started our 40 days of purpose groups this week! I really like my Monday night group and me and Wendy's Tuesday night class was super awesome this week! I think I love working with kids so much because they have so many questions!! And when I try to propose some kind of answer, I really have to think about and consider what I believe. That really builds up my faith and helps me realize how much I know or don't know, depending on the question.

Well, that's all I have for now. Please keep me in your prayers as I finish out these last two weeks at the elementary school. The hardest part of my week is sitting down to write lesson plans. Have a great weekend and stay warm and dry!!!

Once again I thank You!

Well, I truly admit I have no idea what I did on Friday at school... I think we did forward rolls. Don't know, don't care :-p It's not important really. It was an okay day. Nothing very exciting happened. Friday night I went and helped Jackie B with a secret project for 4 hours. By the time I got home, I didn't feel so hot, so I took some Benadryl and hit the sack.

Saturday I was supposed to go help with garage sale pickup, but when I woke up at 9, I didn't really feel much better so I went back to sleep till 11. Puttered around the house and went to a movie with Gin & Wen. 'In Good Company' is a good flick. I recommend it!! After the moobie I went to the church for the 40 Days of Purpose kickoff. Tailgating in 45 degree weather just makes for cold hands and cold hamburgers!! But it was fun and the 1.5 hr video we watched in the Sanctuary was really good, just really long.

Sunday has been pretty normal - church, lunch, hmwk, youth. Mike and the boys got home from hunting and Big Mike is pretty sick. He has a fever and I am thinking he has the flu. No bueno!! He's going to the doctor tomorrow (well, Beutel) to get some good meds and to get better. He hasn't vomited yet, so that's a good thing. Just keep him in your prayers! He needs to stay well so he can start the semester off on a good foot!! I am currently procrastinating... so I need to get back to my work!

Praise God for His everlasting love and the blessings He gives us every second of our day! I am truly blessed in my life and I take it all for granted. Praise Him for the gift of His Son and for loving us so much that He forgives us no matter what!

Shooting myself..

in the foot . .. Why am I such the procrastinator?! oy!

Today went well. Easy day of Road Runner - not too much stress at all. Yay! Tonight I went to dinner (Johnny Carino's) with some good old friends! We had such a blast. We got there at 6:30pm, it took us 15 minutes to get "all caught up" and then we laughed and gabbed until 10pm!! We nearly closed the place down!! It was great fun. I miss having friends like that . . I mean, spending time like that with friends. We all decided that we didn't need to drink and go to parties when we were in highschool simply because we all provided our own fun!! Holy cow, did we ever :) Good times girls, good times...
The only down side of that dinner was that I didn't get to do bible study with mike and I am having to do lesson plans for next week! Tonight! So! I'm off to do that...hopefully I can get enough done tonight so that it won't be so bad tomorrow. I'm getting really bad about this procrastinating thing... like whoa.
Have a great weekend everyone if I don't get to do an update on Friday!!

Ho hum . .

long day . . . not much to report . . . very tired . . . . maybe tomorrow something exciting will happen. Another blessing today though! God gave me ksbj all the way to Caldwell again!! :) Whoop. Have a great day, peoples!

Thursday to Tuesday ... Oops!

Wow. that stinks... i wrote up this whole long thing that covered last Thursday to today.. and some internal error occurred and didn't post what I wrote... so not cool. I'll just make it short and sweet.

Thursday and Friday at school were crazy. The kids played this game that was just really loud. They just screamed the whole time and gave me terrible headaches both days. Thursday, Coach Huddleston told me that I would start teaching the next week. Which meant I had to have a plan for all 4 days by Friday, the next day. Just a little bit of overload, but I got it all done. Friday night was meat night with all the friends and it was just a great time!! Great friends + great food = super great fun!!

Saturday was pretty lazy. Went to lunch with some Kappa Phi girls and just laughed and smiled the whole time! We had a ball! Headed to Old Navy after that and shopped for a lil while, good things were happening there :) And then went to a disco PAR-TAY and danced it up. Headed to Mike's to hang out and laughed more with everyone!

Sunday was pretty normal for me; church, lunch, youth. Went with Wendy to Kellie's new place and hung out for a little while but had to head out "early" because I had an assignment to do and also because the time on our parking meter was past due.

Monday, MLK DAY, went to Austin with Mom for lunch with Skeet Nancy and Dixie (my mom's brother and family). Then went to David's house and had a grand time eatin' it up! .... Wow.. most of my weekend revolved around food... interesting. Not a good thing when you're trying to watch that girlish figure. (No I'm not on a diet, please tell me you know me better than that! It's called eating healthy and being aware of the crap we eat on a daily basis..)

Today, Tuesday, has been long. Not bad at all.. just long. I started teaching today and everything went really well! Coach Huddleston complimented me on my lessons and gave me helpful pointers. I was able to help one of the "problem kids" today make a better decision for himself so that REALLY made my day! But now I have a headache again.. so I'd better get away from the computer.

Keep prayin for me! :) And I'll try to keep everyone updated more regularly.

Wednesday Jan 12

guess what. It's Wednesday, 3pm and I am already home!! Ha! I'll get to that in a second...

So Tuesday, got to school and had a pretty good day! Coach Huddleston asked me if I wanted to be 'worked into the rotation,' which means, teach a few classes. So, I said, "sure!" It really wasn't so bad. There were a few "um's" and "uh's" but I blame that on the fact that I didn't write the lesson so I wasn't 100% on what I was supposed to be hitting on. Overall, it went well! The second grade kids I taught were wonderful. I was almost shocked at how well they listened and how quiet they were! At one point, think I even stopped and stared at the class. I was in awe! Anyways.. it went well and I know I will do a ton better when I actually write the lesson myself. Oooo.. and I got a speeding ticket on the way home from dropping my teacher off at the airport. And I know it sounds horrible, but my mom isn't super worried about it, so neither am I. I mean, yeah, I was speeding and I got caught. I'm not mad at the cop. I'm not mad period. I broke the law and I got caught, so I got penalized. There's nothing I can do about it. Anyways.. I'm sure it should be bothering me more but whatever.

Today - I went to a meeting in College Station for a Positive Behavior seminar thing. It was cool I guess. Coach warned me that pretty much everything the presenters talk about are ideas Caldwell Elem already puts into effect. And this was true; nearly all the ideas and suggestions they gave should be obvious to any competent teacher or administrator. It was a bit of a joke. But I enjoyed speding time with those teachers and getting to know them better. I think I'll feel a lot more comfortable around the school now that I have some names and faces. And another plus!! The meeting started at 9am!! AND we went out to eat, AND we got to go home at 2:45!! Whoo!! So today has been good and probably will only get better!

Spurs play tonight vs Milwaukee; maybe we'll win! Ha.. yeah we will.

whoo hooo! Monday, Monday.. nah na, na na na na. na na, na na na na. (old song, don't ask. i probably learned it from listening to 'light rock' when i was younger.) Today went well! The kids did their weekly running thing. Roadrunner. It was probably the easiest day I've had yet! And probably the easiest until next week! Haha. All I did today was hold a hole-punch and punch holes in little cards. And yell. We (the other coaches and I) had a lot of yelling. I often forget how kids like to push and be mean when they are running. I think I missed that part of elementary school. Does anyone else remember this?
Anywho - after school, Coach H and I went to a meeting. Woo hoo. There were about 7 teachers in there, with the principal and basically they were like the "executive council" of the school or something. I dunno. It was okay. It got long - luckily, Coach needed to leave around 4:30, so I got out early too! hehe. It was sneaky.
Got back to CS, well, Bryan.. Been sittin at home ever since! It's only 9pm and I'm sleepy.... sooooo Goodnight!

Ha! Sorry for keeping you in suspense!! First day of school went great!! I wore my coachin' clothes :-p and new tennies and had my whistle hangin' out of my pocket -- the whole sha-bang! I had a great first day. LOTS of K-2 kiddos. Like, 400 kids between the ages of 5 and 8. yeah, that's a lot of untied shoelaces and tattlers. But it's all good. Came home after school and took a 20 minute nap which was great!! After that, headed over to Tigerland Stadium to watch the boys' alumni soccer game - it was intense! 1-0, old dudes. Yay! It was fun stuff. Came home, talked to Mikey on the phone for a lil bit and hit the hay, hard.

Day 2 was not too shabby either. The nurse came in for a 'head check.' Yeah.. that means a lice head check. Personally, I do not remember having head checks in elementary school. But since they live in a pretty rural area, I guess the probability of getting and spreading those nasty little guys is a lot higher. We also started a basketball unit. Picture this: a 3ft, 9inch kid playing with and dribbling a ball that is a foot in diameter! HOW CUTE!!! They seemed to have a good ol' time. They learned to dribble and they also went over the bones of the body. Yes... K-2 kids screaming out 10 bones -- VERTEBRAE! SACRUM! COCCYX! FEMUR! PATELLA! (yes, i'm listing all of them..it will amaze you) TIBIA! FIBULA! TARSALS! METATARSALS! PHALANGES! STERNUM! RIBS! sooooo Cute! And you know they said all of that in the sing-song voice of little children! And they really do know all those bones; it's simply amazing. After school, I drove home in the COLD and YUCK and changed into my soccer duds. Oh yes, that's right... Girls' Alumni game. It was SOOOOOO cold and windy! But it was a great time! I lasted a lot longer than I thought I would have. We didn't have enough old girls, so Pryor graciously gave us 4 of his 8 that were on his bench. I just couldn't tell Mike how much fun it was (only like, 8 times in our conversation last night did I say "but it was so fun," and, "we had a good time."). But, again, it really was fun!! I just love getting out there and playing and remembering the camraderie we all shared and the good times we had together and gosh, the great physical shape we were all in!! I often say that I would never go back to high school and do it again, but truthfully, I would go back and do soccer ALL over again. It was THE best part of h.s. So anyways, finished the game, went to Wings N more for dinner as we always do, then went home. I fell asleep SO quickly last night - it was fabulous!

And Day 3 - School was hard today. I was super tired and I am sore like crazy. My back is the worst. It's not so bad, but it sure makes me hunch over a little when I walk. I could go for a back rub right about now...ahem. hehe.. In class the kids worked on dribbling and passing the ball, you know, chest pass and bounce pass. It was good times. The morning drags on and then after lunch, it flies!! Ooh - I had a Dr Pepper with my lunch and it picked me up real quick. When I got home this afternoon, I sat for like 15 minutes and I checked email and all that good stuff. Now Mom and I are heading off to Wally World to get some goodies because she doesn't have enough sweet foods here to satisfy my sweet tooth!! Oh and the Spurs are playing tonight so I have to root them on too!!

I was reminded this morning to keep my eyes on the Lord and to give my day to Him. And also to run to meet Him. So many times we run away from Him. Isn't that a scary thought? We run away from the God who created us, who loves us so much and will never leave us. I pray that I can run to Him every morning, every minute of my day.

Looking forward to a Friday... :)

Today went well! Got goin close to 10:30 which put me in Caldwell at 11. I met my teachers and they seem to be really nice. They talk a lot, like any other teacher. I guess when you work with someone long enough, then you become pretty good friends. They talked about everything. It was crazy. But it was fun! I am ready to get started. I can only listen to procedure so much. I wasn't nervous at all this morning. Thank you Jesus! I read some in Romans last night and it was really the first verse that said something to me; "This letter is from Paul, Jesus Christ's slave, chosen to be a missionary, and sent out to preach God's Good News." (Romans 1:1) I had to remember that God is sending me to Caldwell to learn and to continue shining my light and being myself in these schools. After being there today, I am confident that I will learn plenty!
It was kinda funny - we drove over to the middle school this afternoon and I met my other teacher for the second 6 wks. Turns out, she is the grandmother of one my kids from Kids Klub. AND the school counselor is the mom of one of the kids from church! It's so crazy how small-town College Station is. Yes, College Station. We don't think about it that way, but when you've lived here as long as I have and when you have jobs and stuff like that, you get to make so many connections!
Living with Mom is going okay I guess. She just expects me to be social or something, but I'm plenty content in my room. I've just gotten used to it. Hopefully, once school starts back up for the college kids, I'll get to start back to 24/7 and Refuge.
Anywho.. I'm off to watch Thomas' movie -- Joe Dirt. Lemme tell ya, so far... it's a great movie. I think I've laughed like... twice. Let's hope it looks up.

January 2, 2005

okay.. so i'm a little nervous... I know that I am educationally ready for this, but I'm just not sure of myself. I don't know why I am feeling this way. I have never been nervous when I've gone to teach - at least, not like this. I know that this is satan giving me this self doubt. But i can't shake that he's right. Whoa.. that's scary. Since when is the prince of evil right?? Dang. If you're reading this, pray for me. But no one probably is cuz no one knows about it :-p haha Well, we'll see how this all goes down tomorrow. I'm just meeting the teacher and probably the rest of the school. No need for me to be nervous. I can just be myself and I'll be fine. Just smile and nod and let the glory of God shine through me. Whew. That i can do :) I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me - I know it's a somewhat overused verse, but it's the Truth so I claim it. Hallelujah for the Rock and the stable foundation it provides for me. praise God for his faithfulness and unconditional love. okay - I'm off to spend a little "quiet time" with my faithful Lord so I can learn how to better glorify Him in my new ministry environment.