Fall is Coming... But Not Much

I think fall comes a lot faster when you are a teacher. Of course, this is my first year teaching, so I will not claim to be an expert by any means, but here are the facts:

1. The school year was over and I had exactly 1 week before summer camp started to have a "summer break".

2. Summer camp was 6 weeks long but felt more like 2 seconds.

3. Summer camp ended last Friday and I have been in my new classroom EVERY weekday since trying to get things set up... Yeah, still not done...

4. Teacher meetings start NEXT WEEK (YIKES!)

5. All of the above means that I have been at a school for all but a week since summer started... Yeah, I may not be teaching summer school next year...

Do not get me wrong, I am super excited to start my first year of real full-time teaching. I mean after student teaching last year, I must admit that the thought of actually getting paid to teach (although let's be real... teachers are not getting paid much as we all know) is pretty darn exciting. Still, it seems that it is all happening REALLY fast. At the same time, I wish it would go faster. I want to get to that point where I know my students and we have great relationships in our classroom. I want to understand them and laugh at their silly fourth grade jokes and enjoy all of their different personalities, I want to get to the point where I understand how they learn best and I can teach in ways that help them grow and improve more than they thought they could, I want to give them the tools they need to meet their goals and teach them things that encourage them to make new goals that they never even considered before.

Still I know that first I have to get through the week of trying to hang posters on textured brick walls (I hate 3M products more now than I did that night our picture frame fell off the wall and tried to kill us in our sleep), through labeling EVERYTHING, through meeting new teachers and staff members and trying to remember all of their names, through new teacher orientations, through parent open house/curriculum night (this is really the scariest thing... I don't like thinking about it, and through the first few weeks of planning lessons and setting routines. I know I have to do all of these things before I can really have the chance to be the teacher I want to be...

This is likely why I have been listening to Christmas music all week while setting up my room. I feel that by the end of the first semester (around Christmas time) I will know my students better, they will know me better, and I will finally be where I want to be as a teacher. So although fall is coming, I wish it would just come a little faster and move right on to winter. Not to mention the fact that I am getting sick of shorts and the sweaters in my closet have been calling my name for days ;)

So here is to Christmas time, 155 days left for anyone else out there who is counting.

Summer Camp!

Wow we have not blogged in FOREVER... Sorry about that... Anyways, I'm posting now so better late than never I guess.

This summer I am getting my first real taste of being a full time lead teacher in a classroom. I get to be a second grade teacher for the summer camp at the school I have worked at for a little over 4 years. I have worked during this summer camp many times before, but usually as an aide or something like that, never as a lead teacher in a classroom.

Obviously, after going to school for 4 years to teach, I'm pretty excited to get into a classroom. Summer camp at this school is a lot more relaxed than the actual school year, so I feel like it is a nice way for me to ease into teaching.

It is the third day, and I am loving it! I get to plan and do lots of fun hands on arts and crafts, science experiments, and other fun things that can sometimes get pushed aside during the actual school year. Plus I am with second graders, which is a little bit younger than I am used to, so me and the kids get to do some things that are more cute, fun, and creative than I normally get to do!

One thing that I was really worried about for this summer was setting up my classroom. I know it sounds silly, and Josh told me again and again, "The kids won't come in and cry if you don't have your bulletin board decorated. It won't be the end of the world." But I had to explain to him, as I shall explain to you, decorating the classroom is almost all for parents and other teachers. I mean yes, I want it to be fun for the kids, but at this age the kids will LOVE just about anything. Teachers and parents on the other hand are much harder to please. And the teachers at this school are awesome! They always do super fun and creative things in their rooms, even to the point that they get out actual sewing machines and making things... can you say over my head?

Anyway, needless to say, I was stressed about the whole thing. So I spent three days last week before summer camp getting my room all ready. I decided on a camping theme, I looked at every walmart, dollar store and teacher store around for inspiration (By the way, decorating a whole room is NOT cheap, as I soon saw, hence me trying to stick to the dollar store P.S.Thanks Kelly for that box of stuff, the bulletin board stuff came in handy!) and tried to find ideas online from other teachers (yeah for free teacher-to-teacher forum websites!). I came up with a room that I thought looked good enough not to be the lamest classroom at camp and decided that I was happy with the room.

Well, today I found out that I won the contest at camp for the most creative classroom design! I had completely forgotten about the contest, likely because I did not think I had a chance in the world with all of those other great rooms! I'm super excited! And, after the gift cards I won for the prize, it doesn't look like I lost a lot of money decorating the classroom after all!

Anyway, I know it seems like a silly victory, but it is a nice way to start of my teaching experience, so I just wanted to share it with everyone. I'm sure you are just dying see pictures of my classroom now, (lol not really but I'll show you anyways) so take a look:

I've Been Awarded

Moriah awarded me the Honest Scrap award.

I am supposed to tell you ten random, honest things about myself. Here they are in no particular order.

1. I am super shy, but I must be getting pretty good at hiding it, because most people have no idea… One of my new years resolutions is always to become more outgoing ;)

2. I hate being late, but I also hate being early. I feel like being late seems rude because it is as if you don’t find other people’s time valuable, but being early seems rude too because people may not be ready for you yet… This means I have to be right on time, which usually means I have to sit in the car or drive around the block a few times before I go inside… This one drives my husband a little crazy sometimes ;)

3. I am a vegetarian. People always ask me why and I never know what to say. Most people make this choice for health reasons or because they get sad when they think about killing animals… but for me it is not that at all. I am just 100% grossed out at the thought of eating the muscles of something that used to be a living thing… something that used to walk around and have blood pumping though it… YUCK! P.S. because this is my reasoning I am never ever offended at all when others eat meat around me, if you like meat, that is fine by me :)

4. I have a really weird thing when it comes to sweet and salty food. I love them both, A LOT! After I have something sweet I have to have something salty, and after I have something salty I need something sweet. As you can imagine, it turns into a pretty dangerous cycle. Because of this, I can often be found eating weird things like olives and chocolate chips. My husband makes fun of me for this, and I cannot blame him lol

5. I used to tell my sisters that I would never get married, and if I did I would be in my 30s at least. I knew I would want to finish college and be on my own for a while before I got married. Well, I met Josh while I was in high school and that pretty much killed that plan. Of all the things that I have done in my life, I have to say that getting married is by far the best! I love my husband more than anything and I love being able to spend every day with him. Lots of people thought I was crazy to get married at 19, but if they could have married my super awesome Josh, they would have gotten married at 19 as well.

6. I also used to tell my family that I would NEVER have children… The fact is, lately I have really been thinking about wanting a baby. (Don’t get too excited mom, I still have a few years to go). However, Josh and I always have to plan WAY ahead for everything (we can't help it, we always have to have a plan), so this won’t be happening for a few more years.

7. I was deaf until I was around 2 yrs old. I guess my parents just didn’t notice. My mom actually has my baby books in which she wrote about how I was such a nice quiet baby, not loud like my sister lol.

8. I LOVE Biology and Chemistry. I actually considered switching my major to biology at one point… I just had not idea what I would do with that kind of degree lol.

9. Large groups of people completely freak me out. So do small groups of people if we are in a small room. I start to get claustrophobic, feel like I can’t breath, and I have to leave… I REALLY need to get over this fear though, it is REALLY annoying!

10. While I am sure I will love teaching, I dream of having an artistic career (yes, I am super jealous of my graphic designer husband). I have always wanted to learn more about photography… Oh dream jobs ;)

I am awarding 3 more people...now it is your turn!

Dawn
Josh
Jon

Christmas in January

Okay I know, this is a really late holiday post… but let’s just say we are busy. Who knew that taking time off of work and school would result in A WHOLE lot of playing catch-up (hmm… never noticed how much that phrase sounds like ketchup… weird). Anyways, Josh and I are back into the full swing of things and I finally have some time to write a little bit about our winter break. It seems the perfect time to blog is when I can't sleep and it is 1AM :)

So, we went across the country to a place that is much colder than our nice little Phoenix desert. Much colder was a nice change, but I think we are both happy to be home and warm :)

We got to hang out with Josh’s Uncle Jon, Aunt Dawn, and their wonderful kiddos. This means much fun and always includes playing cards, cooking AMAZING food, and having the luxury of lazing around a little. Here are some pictures to highlight this part of our trip:

Cooking!

We like to make new fun foods! Like these crab thingys lol

And these yummy fried toffee apples

We always make sure to find time to play cards!

Josh and the kids

Super sweet Tatum :)

Dawn!
Jon!

Taylor being crazy
They are perfect for each other :)
The whole fam
Their Christmas Eve morning tradition: Beautiful.

We also got to see Josh’s immediate family (mom, dad, brothers) who we do not get to see that often at all. It is so nice to just get to sit and catch up with them during this time, they always have the funniest stories to tell ☺

Matt

Josh's mom got a really cool brownie pan :)

Josh's dad was Santa

Then we got to have Christmas with both the Johnson and Farmer side of Josh’s family. Can I just say that Josh has a BIG family? I come from a mother who has three sisters who all have 2-3 kids and one of which is married (which means I guess my family is a little large on one side), and a father with one sister who has no kids. This means I have 2 sets of grandparents, 4 aunts, 1 uncle and 8 cousins total… This is the family I am used to.

Josh comes from a mom who has 2 brothers and 2 sisters (some married some not), who have from 0 – 4 kids each (and some of those kids even have kids!), and a dad who has 2 sisters and 3 brothers (some married some not), who have from 0 – 2 kids each. So, my husband has two sets of grandparents, 7 uncles, 7 aunts, 16 cousins, 3 first cousins once removed (I think that is what you call your cousins’ kids?), and even more that I haven’t met or can’t think of how to label…

Pardon me because I am sure that my math is going to be off somewhere in there, but you get the point: Josh’s family = big (almost 2 times mine) and/or my family = small. I love being part of a big family now, it is different and always full of lots of fun things and silly stories. However, it does make for a Christmas of moving around! This means that we got to have lots of Christmases. Here are some pictures:

This is what we got to see while we sat at a dead stop on the highway for over 45 mins on Christmas morning. I think we counted 9 cars that had crashed in our 1 hr drive (well is should have been 1 hr)... A white Christmas was so much more fun when I was younger.

Although we were pretty late, we did eventually make it to the Johnson family Christmas, and it was a lot of fun!

Then it was off to the Farmer Christmas!

Farmer siblings!

The whole gang

Wow guys, that was a lot of pictures huh? Sorry if I got carried away, it is just that Josh and I had sooo much fun, and we wanted to take lots of pictures to share our Christmas with everyone! Having a new camera that we love using helps too lol. Anyways, that was our holiday, we hope you all had a great one as well.

P.S. Stay tuned as Josh and I should be updating the blog soon with some pictures of our new guest room... fun fun :)