A Few Favorites

Today I'm thankful for #1- A meeting. Today myself and 6 other teachers met with our principal and discussed the seven habits that we've been focusing on this year with our kids. We have started the Leader in Me program at our school which is Covey's 7 habits of happy kids. I thought the meeting would be long and boring - it went the whole day- but it actually was really great and I enjoyed the entire day.

#2- Dinner with friends. Maurianne, Kara, and I met and ate dinner at the Brick Oven after work. I love pizza especially at the Brick Oven with yummy rootbeer. I also love these girls and had a wonderful time visiting with them.

#3- Basketball. Maurianne and I went to the BYU men's basketball game. We only made it for the second half because we were late meeting up for dinner. We had a good time watching the part that we did get to see and I got excited for the basketball games we'll get to see in the next several months.

Muggle Day

Today I'm thankful for: #1- Muggle day. Today Raegan and I wore our muggle t-shirts to show that we are now all out of the fantasy world and are back to normal life.

#2- Puppets. Today we turned my room into a huge mess and cut up the upholstery foam I bought on Sat. Really when the kids get finished there is foam everywhere: in their hair, on the floor, all over desks. It's great - glad I'm not in charge of vacuuming every night.

One Last Time

Today I'm thankful for: #1- The Midvale YSA ward. I've enjoyed this ward for the past 2 years. It has been a second family and I'll miss the bishopric and their lovely wives.

#2- Graduating. As much as I've loved the single's ward I'm so happy to be moving to a family ward. I'm ready for a change. I'll probably wish I was back in the single's ward in a couple of months but right now after nearly 12 years of single's wards I'm ready to hear children crying during Sacrament meeting. To get to know the widows and all the cute old ladies who know so much more about life than I do. I'm ready to learn and grow in a new way and I feel that this change is good.

#3- Dinner. It's Sunday so of course I'm always thankful for dinner!

The End of It

Today I'm thankful for: #1 Art projects. I'm getting ready next week for my annual production of A Muppet's Christmas Carol. I'm pretty excited because this year I have 4 kids playing the piano for the songs and then 2 kids created the music tracks for the other two songs. The whole thing is 100% student produced. We're making our puppets on Monday and Tuesday and I usually get foam donated but with the busyness of Harry Potter week I didn't get it done. So today I thought I'm just going to go buy some. And I did. Cost a lot but the piece I bought I got 40% off and now I've got plenty of foam to make puppets for next year too. This project makes the biggest mess but I absolutely love it. 

#2- One last game. I've had such a wonderful time enjoying football with Kerri. I often think about how I felt that I just needed to move to Utah. I so didn't want to come. I had other plans. But the Lord knew what I needed and I've been blessed with such wonderful friends. One of which is Kerri. We have a good time. I've loved hanging out with Kerri and Kara and cheering for our boys in blue. Can't wait until next year- I love football season. 

#3-Love the Y! On our way out of the stadium Kara wanted a picture by the Y so we all got one too. There's always a lot to smile at when I'm with friends and enjoying sports. 

Dinner with Friends

Today I'm thankful for: #1- The end of Harry Potter week. I love it and we have so much fun but I'm so glad when it's over! We awarded the house cup to the winning house - the kids count all their gems and the house with the most gems wins the goody bags we bought. I also bought licorice to give to the other houses and called them candy wands.

#2- Everything taken down. We got all of our decorations pulled down boxed up and the big cardboard cutouts ready to put away Monday morning. I tell you I'd never do this without Raegan because even cleaning up is fun because it goes so quickly just visiting with her. We have a good time.

#3- Dinner with friends. We went to dinner to celebrate birthdays. We ate at Texas Roadhouse and it was so yummy. I love that place!! We even got the waitress to get us a couple extra boxes of rolls to take home and enjoy for later. Good food and good company what more could anyone ask for??

Harry Potter Day #4

Today I'm thankful for: #1- Herbology and Care of Magical Creatures. Today Reagan and I decided send our kids to special classes. I taught Herbology and she taught Care of Magical Creatures. In my class the kids looked at several different plants and described their magical properties and what they are used for in the wizarding world. We've got a bunch of imaginative witches and wizards. Raegan had the kids dissect owl pellets. The kids acted like it was so gross but couldn't get enough of it. So much fun!

#2- Shopping for the house cup. When we were through with work Raegan and I headed over to the dollar store to buy the kids prizes for the winners of the house cup. We have a pretty good time in a dollar store and compiled quite the little goody bad. 

#3- My apple cozy. I've been meaning to blog about this for a while and keep forgetting. Kris knitted this little gem for me. She left it in my box and Raegan saw it and told me that I had this little sweater for an apple. I just laughed and have been using this great little thing to keep my apples from bruising. I keep an apple in my bag for a couple of days and it's nice and safe by the time I want to eat it. 

Harry Potter Day #3

Today I'm thankful for: #1- This get up we wore to have the kids play Quiditch. Pretty stellar! LOVE LOVE LOVE it and the kids love those hats and know we're serious about having a fun time.

#2- A quest for the kids. Another one of today's activities was a search for magical items that had been enchanted to float near my ceiling all week. Peeves that tricky ghost stole them hid them all over the school. The kids had to solve math and language puzzles to find out clues that led them to the missing item. They were awarded house gems for each one they had found. They are so involved and engaged for over an hour and all groan when we tell them their time is up. I love to watch the 3rd graders and 6th graders work together.

#3 - The Hogwarts school song. We have taught the kids the Hogwarts school song and we invited Colleen on of the school's secrataries to come out and hear them sing it. She was so great asking the kids questions about all the activities we'd done all week. It was great and the song is hilarious

#4- Roommate night. We have what we call roommate night on occasion. Tonight's activity consisted of going and seeing my classroom all decorated for the magical world. Look at the awesome Harry classes Raegan found for all the kids to wear. We tried on some pairs pretty sure we look just like Harry here. Kerri battled He Who Must Not be Named with one of my student's wands and gave a little love to Harry too. So fun. 

Harry Potter Day #2

Today I'm thankful for: #1- Wand making and coloring shirts. Today on our agenda was making wands. The kids come up with some very creative things and I just love it. I'm also thankful for the wonderful mom who came in to help man the glue gun.

#2- Quiditch for P.E. This quite possibly is my favorite thing we do in P.E. all year. It is hilarious! Kids running around with water noodles between their legs. Half of them are carrying bats trying to hit dodge balls at kids who are trying to shoot basketballs and two kids running around looking for a small yellow bouncy ball.

#3- Time to color my t-shirt. We had the kids color their shirts in their house colors and to be fair I colored mine all the colors. I'm pretty excited to to see all of them wearing these!

Harry Potter Day #1

Today I'm thankful for: #1- An early Monday. I met Raegan early to get the last touches of our Harry Potter week in place. This included: Leaving a huge poster of Snape in Steve's office with a note saying Dumbledore had been replaced as headmaster. A Maunder's map declaring that "we solemnly swear we are up to no good." And a list of magical activities that will take place this week inviting him to any he'd like to attend. We also left a Belatrix poster in Brian's office with a t-shirt telling him we appreciate him being the keeper of keys and magical creatures at Hogwarts. 

#2- My cute kids who were so excited about this week. I'm so excited which is why I agree to go to all this work. Our first item of business was to be sorted. They sat on my stool and I placed the sorting hat on the head and the cd shouted what house they belonged to. Some of them acted like they thought it was so silly but they really wanted to put that hat on and find out where they'd be. I loved it. 

#3- The cool banners and snitches my kids are making. I have my students make their own house banners and these kids did an amazing job and then they fold paper snitches that we will bewitch the 3rd grader's ceiling with tomorrow afternoon. So much fun. 

#4- The very cool Harry Potter shirts we bought for the kids to wear. I picked up 60 very cool shirts and I'm so excited to pass them out to the kids tomorrow and see them wear them. It's going to be great!

Strawberry Sundae Crunch

Today I'm thankful for: #1- Kerri. This sweet friend got up at 4:30 to ride with me for a quick trip to Idaho to go to hear my cousin Kera's talk in church before she leaves. It was rainy when we left and by the time we reached the Idaho Utah state it was snowing pretty bad and the road was so slick so I turned around. We got back and went straight to sleep until 12:30 and got up and went to church. It was a good decision to turn around. I'm a little sensitive about safe driving conditions these days. 

 #2 - Sundays really I think they are the best part of the week. I think the yummy dinner adds a lot to that. 

#3- Roommates who'll do me a favor. My students just finished making these interactive books and I needed to select the winners who'll go onto district. My sweet roommates agreed to help me judge them so that I wasn't left to do it all by myself. It's just hard to choose when you know how much each team has worked on it. We sat on the floor and quickly choose our favorite 3. 

#4- Strawberry Sundae Crunch. When we go to the creamery I buy strawberry sundae crunch and Kerri buys Graham Canyon. Love both of them and they are both oh so good!. Tonight while we looked at the books we enjoyed a little treat straight from the carton. We're all about sharing germs around here. We don't drink out of the milk carton but ice cream straight from the carton, you bet! 

A Dream Come True

Today I'm thankful for: #1- Raegan and a shared love of the wonderful world of Harry Potter. Our Harry Potter week begins on Monday so that means that we spent the whole morning turning our classrooms into a very magical place. Raegan's sister-in-law works at a movie theater and hooked us up with these amazing movie posters of all the characters. It is pretty amazing and I'm so excited for the kids to come on Monday and enjoy the start of this fun week!

#2- A big old cheeseburger. Yes there's nothing quite like it. Love it every once in a while and In and Out is just so great! Definitely made us happy and ready to sit out in the cold night. Before the game we stopped by the creamery to stock up on our favorite ice cream and left them in Kara's freezer before we walked over to the game. Gotta have ice cream and we're lucky Kara will let us leave it at her place so we don't have to make a special trip to Provo just for ice cream. However, we wouldn't think twice about doing that either. 

#3- A Cougartail. Kerri and I have thought about these all season. We put it on our fall roommate bucket list and it might be my new favorite thing at a football game. So much yummy goodness. I could never eat it all by myself but it was oh so good! And the best part is Kerri's friend Ben bought it for her along with a little hot chocolate. We'd been talking about one and he disappeared during the 3rd quarter and we didn't know where he'd gone. He was gone really for most of the quarter and we were thinking that he probably had left and just didn't tell us. Then he returned with two hot chocolates and two cougartails. I was delighted because I had told Kerri it was a date and she said no and buying her hot chocolate and a donut strengthened my argument. 

Kara, me, Kerri, and Ben

Book Fair

Today I'm thankful for: #1- People who care. I said yesterday that I'm so thankful for the wonderful parents of the kids I teach and it's true they are wonderful but I also wanted to write about the many parents who expressed there love to me as a person as we visited. One couple whom I taught their son a few years ago sat down and looked at me and before I could start talking about their daughter's report card said, "First off, we want you to know how very sorry we were to hear about your dad." I appreciated them and love teaching their daughter. I'm also thankful for the fact that all 30 of my student's parents came on time to their appointments. Oh how that makes my life easier. No rescheduling or running behind. Wonderful!

#2- The school book fair. Our PTA gives us twenty dollars to spend at the book fair to say thanks for all we do. I love to pick out a few new fun books. It always makes me so happy. Besides I feel really appreciated.

#3- A relatively quiet night. Tonight I got home and just hung out with Tricia for a while and then we went to a birthday party for one of my friends for just a few minutes. Then we came home and both went to sleep early. I love a Friday night like this every once in a while. 

The end of a long day

Today I'm thankful for: #1- The yummy dinner that the PTA provided for us from Kneaders. I'm always thankful for their willingness to feed us when we're going to be at school for so long.

#2- The wonderful parents that I get to work with. I teach wonderful kids and that is because they have wonderful parents. I mentioned earlier that I enjoy visiting with parents and it's true I enjoy talking to these parents about how wonderful I think their kids are. And they really are amazing!

#3- Coming home late and having roommates to talk with that help me to unwind from the day. These girls are the best! Pretty sure I don't know what I'd do without them.

I can hardly WAIT!!!

Today I'm thankful for: #1-Caring and tough kids. After recess today one of my student's walks up to me and with concern on her face tells me that another student is crying. I go over to investigate and discover that he thinks that he popped his shoulder out of place. I look at him and he's white as white so I have him call his mom and send him to the office. Poor thing and he was being so tough. I thought was he just going to sit there the whole rest of the day until the bell rang?

#2- The Temple. Tonight it was ward temple night. I love being in the temple with my dear friends. I love it! Afterward we went out for ice cream and had a great time visiting.

#3- When we got home we got our tickets for Wicked in the mail. We are so excited about this little roommate trip! I can't wait!

I've Needed One of These

Today I'm thankful for: #1- A good day at work. I have a lot to do but I was able to get a lot finished at work. I have a good group that can independently work on an assignment and that helps a lot when I need to sit and get grades in the computer. 

#2- Relief Society Meeting. On the second Tuesday of each month we have a Relief Society meeting and tonight we made rice bags. I've wanted to make one for a while and have never taken the time do it. I was so excited that this was tonights activity. I only stayed an hour but was so happy to come home and start using it. 

#3- Almost there. I stayed up way to late but I am pretty much finished with grades. I have my first parent teacher conference bright and early tomorrow at 8 a.m. I usually get so stressed out over conferences that I get sick but I'm feeling just great. (I never wonder why I'm sick I get very little sleep and don't take good care of myself during this week. Not good but true.) I don't mind visiting with parents I actually quite enjoy it. It's the getting ready that's stressful. Writing comments for each student. Testing their fluency and reading levels. Making sure their grades reflect what they really know, ect. It's a big job. 

Beginning of a Busy Week

Today I'm thankful for: #1- Computers that make doing report cards a whole lot easier than they would otherwise be. 

#2- A free evening. I'm so behind with everything and tonight I just sat and worked on report cards. I need to be better at staying on top of everything but I just have such a hard time keeping on top of it and there's always so much to do!

#3- T.V. I'm thankful for a little noise in the background while I grade. I don't really watch much of it I just like the noise. Maybe I should listen to music. I wonder if that'd help me work faster? 

Smart Cookies

Today I'm thankful for: #1- Fast Sunday. Each month on the first Sunday of the month I fast which means I don't eat or drink for two meals. I also accompany this with sincere prayer. This month Tricia, Kerri, and I decided to join together with our family and fast and pray that we could get a few more dates around here. With all of us facing another birthday it's time to get serious about our situation.
During fast and testimony meeting I wrote the following in my new journal Raegan and Annette gave me. I didn't think it'd be a good idea to bear my testimony since I'd loose it and just start crying so I wrote my testimony and my thoughts.
2 Timothy 4:7 'I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept the faith.'
This is the desire of my heart to be able to say like Paul that I have fought the fight and have kept the faith.'
The Sunday School lesson today was about staying on course by seeking to learn and teach true doctrine, be an example of the believers, and to seek after righteousness. This is what I want.
-In Sacrament meeting Bishop Burrow asked the question: Do we realize what we have? as he bore his testimony. I have been thinking a lot about this the past 2 1/2 weeks since my dad passes away. I know that the only way I could face this tragedy is because of what I have. I have a firm testimony that this life is not the end. We lived before we came to this life and we will live together as families when this life is over. It is really what life is all about: being tried and tested and found worthy to live with God again. Without the gospel perspective where would that leave me? It would leave me mad, questioning why, and not knowing where peace in life can be found. But because of what I know I can face heartache, fear, and tragedy with faith and courage knowing that my Savior knows how to comfort me. That all trails have an end. That heartache can be soothed by the spirit and through of the Atonement of Christ. I know I am who I am because of the gospel. I know that in times of trial my testimony will keep me safe it will lead me through all hard things I'm so thankful for what I know because without it I would be lost.

#2- C.E.S. Fireside. Boyd K. Packer spoke for this months devotional about Truths Most Worth Knowing. I love to listen to the prophets and apostles speak. Their words always bring an added measure of focus on what matters most and what I need to be doing in my life.

#3- Smart Cookies- Tricia's mom bought these bits of yummy goodness for us for dessert. They are from a store called Smart Cookies and it's a good thing I don't pass this place on the way home from work because I'd stop and get one everyday after work and weigh a ton. Love sugar cookies!!

A New Water Bottle and a Lazy Day

Today I'm thankful for: #1 - A Saturday to sleep in and nowhere to go. I love football season but it makes weekends pretty busy when I'm always going to Provo to see a game I love it but I always love the buy week too. This morning Kerri and I sat on the couch in our P.J.s until noon. It made for a great start of the day.

#2 - The temple. Kerri and I went to the temple in the early afternoon and it wasn't very busy which was nice and I really enjoyed being there.

#3 - A new water bottle. One of my water bottle's lid got melted in the dishwasher this afternoon so I bought a new one and went ahead and bought a new one with a snow flake on it to welcome the 3 inches of snow that graced the ground this morning. I always love November and the first snow. Kerri and I even listened to a little Christmas music. It's a bit early but that's ok the snow made me excited for the holiday season!

Out to Eat to Celebrate Kerri

Today I'm thankful for: #1 - Fridays. I'm always so thankful when the week ends and I have a weekend to switch up the days I go to work. I have great students and I love to spend my days with them but I'm always so happy to have a Friday with a little extra time to get things finished and plan for the next week. Next week is report card time and it's going to be busy. I've got a lot to do before I meet with parents because I'm a bit behind which is nothing new. I'm always so happy when conferences are started because that means all the report cards are ready to go.

#2 - Kerri. To celebrate Kerri's birthday we went out to eat with friends and some of her family. We had a great time visiting and enjoying each other's company. My favorite was the yummy scone I got with my meal. I love a good piece of fried bread!

#3 - A little Mario and chocolate chip cookies. After dinner we came home and enjoyed cookies and ice cream and played Mario. We haven't played Mario for a while and it was fun. Around 10:00 everyone left and Kerri and I were watching a movie and were both falling asleep so we went to bed. It felt great to be asleep so early but I really should call it a night earlier every day of the week.

And So It Begins Again

Today I'm thankful for: #1- My classroom full of kids whom I like a lot. Today they were much quieter than they have been the past few days. I think they must be on a sugar low from all the Halloween candy. This group is a chatty bunch and I always find it so nice when they're a little bit quieter than usual. What ever the reason I'm happy because I enjoyed the time to let myself think. They're good kids just loud at times!

#2- Debbie and Quade who both agreed to stop by so I could give them a carmel apple. They were both on my list of friends I wanted to give an apple to. I was so happy when Debbie was on her way home to Park City and could stop for a quick minute and Quade needed to stop by our house so I could give him his little treat too.

#3- Birthdays. It was Kerri's birthday today and she let me make her dinner to help celebrate. I made some chicken lasagna. Kerri's sister, niece and nephew came over to spend the evening and that was lots of fun. Her little nephew is a bundle of energy and so fun to be around.

#4- The season premier of Burn Notice was on tonight so we assumed our regular positions on the couch and enjoyed the episode. I think this picture just might be my all time favorite picture of the day taken of us while watching a show. Too funny!