Home Sweet Home

My new favorite thing is decorating my house. Room by room things are coming together. My bedroom, office and living room are complete! They've all been painted and are complete with furniture. The living room could use another couch perhaps and a few more things on the wall but that's little stuff in the grand scheme of things. I haven't decided what room I'm going to paint next but I'd like to get one more painted before I go back to work in a few weeks.

Man, where did the summer go. I feels like just a few weeks ago I had 80 days with no highschoolers or waking up before 7 am. Now I'm just a week and a half before its back work. I'm excited for the new school. I'll be teaching a new class and figuring out what to change/keep for another class. I'm really looking forward to it but the rest, relaxation, and getting stuff around my house has been great. I also haven't gotten as much of the school stuff done as I had planned.

So the majority of my summer consisted of upgrading things in my house (with the help of quite a few friends). Thanks to everyone who helped install things, move/donate furniture or help me paint aka Linda, Kristen & Ben, Ryan, and of course Mom & Dad (well mostly Dad) and getting hooked on a few too many reality tv shows (Ochocinco: The Ultimate Catch, Jersey Shore, and Jersey Couture just to name a few). Its been lots of fun but hadn't really gone on vacation. Until this past week. :)

The beginning of August is one of my favorite times of the year. The calendar turns to August 1st and I know the annual Mulholland trek to the lake is just around the corner. I've been going since I was a month old. I've rode in the car many times to New Hampshire, first from NY and then from VA. Due to work schedules and school, I've flown to the lake for the last few years. But this year I did something brand new, I drove to the lake! Sitting/sleeping in the car for about 12 hours isn't bad. However, driving the car for that long not so easy. I couldn't do it. After leaving at 5:30 in the morning and staring at the back of my parents car for a few hours I couldn't keep my eyes open and had to have my mom drive for a while. The way home though I successfully drove the whole way my self. The drive home was definitely interesting. It was broken up into two legs NH to CT then CT to VA. The NH to CT leg had no trouble until the confusion with the hotel. Dad gave directions and address to one hotel but Mom gave us the name of another. Both were on the same town on the same road and had coupons in the travel book. In the end we should have listened to Dad.

The CT to VA leg had a bit more excitement. We didn't get directions prior to leaving the hotel so we were kinda winging it on what Dad had told us and what the GPS suggested we should do. Here's the summary by state. Connecticut - the drivers there are crazy and I'm glad we stayed 2 exits from the NY state line. New York - we ended up driving through the Bronx but only 10 minutes of traffic and two homeless guys later we were in Jersey. New Jersey - well we had a fist pumping good time till we tried to get lunch, the Wendy's was closed and the Burger King had a weird entrance however after about 3 U-Turns we were fed and on our way. Delaware - Delaware is usually a huge pain , for the 1st time I think ever we flew through the yappy dog state in about a half an hour. Maryland - the most traffic of the entire trip Virginia - we sailed happily into the home state on good ole Route 15. All in all it was an unforgettable trip and Alyson and I successfully did not kill each other.

I'm getting better

Ok this time its only been 3 months since I've posted last. Let's see what's happened this time. I think the two biggest things are one of my best friends Heather had a beautiful baby girl Kylie is about to be 3 months old on Sunday and my younger sister Alyson turned 21 over Easter weekend. Heather having Kylie has been very eye-opening. I like babies so I love spending time with Heather and Kylie but I know I definitely don't want one full-time. Having a "rent-a-baby" (as the boys at work refer to Kylie) is just fine with me.

Alyson's 21st birthday was definitely a weekend to remember with a house full of people in Radford. Over the summer the decision was made to roadtrip down to Radford for Alyson's 21st. Convientely, Al's birthday fell on the Saturday of Easter weekend which also coincided with my Spring Break from work. So Thursday afternoon, my friends Becca and Francine and I headed down to Radford. One of my college roommates, Ashlee drove out from Richmond to meet us. Now you're probably wondering why drive out Thursday if she isn't turning 21 till Saturday. Well you see for the last 2 1/2 years Alyson has been an awesome little sister and quite often shuttled the 4 of us from home to where ever the night led us and home again. So we found it only appropriate that we give her once last chance to be our favorite DD. Friday night was girls night. We started with happy hour and appetizers before heading back to the house for girls night in complete with late night ziti. All this lead up to cake and Alyson's first legal drink at midnight. Saturday was a day full of bar hopping and drink trying. One stop & two drinks with lunch, next stop desert & another fun drink, back home for napping and primping before heading to dinner and out to the bar for the night.

For Francine's 21st we decided that a 21st birthday can have its lulls better trying new drinks/shots. Our solution a new game 21 things to do on your 21st. It went over fairly successfully at Francine's birthday so we did a little editing and created Alyson her own list. It had a variety of challenges for Alyson to complete before we headed home for the night, including the 21st item of "get out of bar without puking." All and all the night was successful with all 21 items being completed, some more than once.

I have saved the biggest news for last. I BOUGHT A HOUSE. As of Friday I will be the proud new owner of a 4 bedroom 2.5 bath townhouse. I will be moving 2 miles from my current address and cutting 2 stoplights out of my commute. Not to mention I will be less than a mile away from Heather, Tyler, and Kylie just in time for the weather to be warm enough for us to walk to each others' houses. Saturday will be a day full of painting and decorating my bedroom/bathroom. I will attempt to post my before and after photos in a timely manner. Maybe I should go charge my camera.....

I didn't fall off the face of the earth

Update on life since the last blog

May - Graduated college, went back to Sterling, and did lots and lots of subbing and e-mailing trying to find a teaching job

June - More subbing, got a sub job that lasted the rest of the school year, got an interview at PV, moved out of the parents house, found out Heather was pregnant

July 1st-4th - probably the most exciting 4 days of the month, July 1st - got called to work the first half of summer school, which is a pretty sweet deal work 16 days from 8-1 get $3,000 (the broke recent college graduate said yes, plus I still hadn't heard back about my PV interview or gotten any other interviews). July 2nd - teacher workday for summer school come home to find an e-mailing me offering me a teaching job at PV (I accepted of course), July 3rd - got my first coach purse from my favorite girls (and Ed), July 4th - turned 23!

The rest of July - I don't believe too many other exciting things happened other than finding out Virginia was pregnant (I made sure not to drink the water at Glory Days)

August - went to the lake for a few days, got to hang out with some of the newest members of the family, Dylan and Billy, (two of the cutest little boys ever). Then came home about 2 days before I started all my teacher workdays (which if you are a brand new teacher and new to Loudoun county is about twice the amount of days of a regular teacher) Lets just say after about the third day I had info coming out my ears and all I wanted to know was what classes I was going to be teaching. By the end of the month I knew I would be teaching Algebra I (mostly 9th graders) and Algebra II (mostly juniors and seniors with sophomores and freshman sprinkled throughout)

September - December - These months have kinda all run together. They've been full of lots of working, both at PV and Glory Days (bartending once a week either Saturday night or Sunday during the 1 and 4 pm games) plus tutoring and lots of other school type activities.

In most recent news, for possibility the first time ever my 8th block class did not drive me insane. I don't want to jinx it but just maybe these kids are starting to mature. Saying this probably means they will be horrible on Wednesday but at least I know I'm not fighting a losing battle. :)

Just So My Mother Will Stop Complaining

So for the last week or so my mother has gladly reminded me that I haven't updated my blog. I'm glad she has time to sit around and just check to see if there is any new info on here. It isn't like I don't call her almost everyday to tell her the exact same stuff that ends up on here.

Well, I have manage to survive teaching a full teacher load for my required two weeks. Well, really I skipped a day but life will go on. Plus, it was the only day I missed all semester and two out of 3 classes were in assemblies. So really, I skipped the easy day. Teaching the full load wasn't that bad at all. I now know for sure the last 5 years haven't been a waste and I still am that crazy girl who WANTS to teach high schoolers math. I think the hardest thing was not having the out of school time to work on stuff due to gymnastics and shooting (but we all know that I'm not giving either of those up).

I have worked my way back down and only have one class to teach a day. As busy has teaching all 3 classes was I would take that over the boredom that is starting to set in with only teaching one. I know realize why my cooperating teacher has read so many books this semester. As much as I am ready to get out of here, there's definitely some kids I'm going to miss. Some of them were even asking if they could come to graduation, it was really sweet. However, I told them they would have to be in Radford at 10 in the morning and many of them said they would just tell me congratulations on my last day here.

Last weekend ended my collegiate clay target career. It was extremely bittersweet. As much as I wanted to knock out a lot of the people on my team by the end of the year, I'm definitely going to miss it. But now I think I'm going to start going to shoots around the state with my coach next year. I could actually win some money shooting now!

So graduation is Saturday and I have to get all the stuff I have accumulated in Radford over 5 years packed up. This has taught me that the best time to clean out your stuff is when you have to move it 400 miles away. I have managed to throw away almost as much as I have packed. At the rate I'm going everything other than furniture would fit in one car. However, I haven't done much with my bathroom and closet. And I know I won't find much to throw away in either of those places.

As stressful as my life was about a month ago, teaching a full teacher load and having no idea what I was doing next year, things are quickly falling into place. I am going to look at a place to live next week, have an interview with a part-time job next wednesday and should hear back from a full-time job in the next two weeks or so. I guess I was stressing for nothing. I SURVIVED! Now all I have left is two and a half days of student teaching, a night or two out with my college friends, then its graduation and off to the real world, and I can say is BRING IT ON!

Wow Time Flys

Time flies when you're grading and planning lessons. Since I've posted last I have had a week of teaching one class a day and today was the start of teaching two classes a day. I think it will be a few weeks before I take over the full class load. I definitely need to get used to planning, grading, and teaching for two...classes that is. hehehe. I went from having 4 1/2 hours to plan/grade during the school day to having 3 hours with twice the stuff to do. This is also my first week of going to school all week since starting my student teaching.

I have learned the teachers pretty much would almost rather have a two hour delay than a snow day. Here's why, you only get so many snow days but their isn't really a limit on how many delays you can have. Plus, you get to sleep in a little later and instead of having the kids for an hour and a half per block you only have an hour. Basically the day flies by. Its awesome.

So on top of all my school work gymnastics and shooting have gone into their busy competition season. It seems like every weekend from now till graduation has something planned already for it. I know I like keeping busy but its getting a little exhausting, luckily shooting helps relieve the stress at least for a little while.

Now its time to vent. WHY DO KIDS INSIST ON WRITING SO YOU CAN BARELY READ THEIR WORK??? I seriously think they do it on purpose. Cause I've seen them write neatly from time to time but 4 out of 5 assignments I'm trying to figure out if its a 6, 8, or 0. And then there's their names. At least write your name neatly so I know who to give the grade to otherwise you're just gonna get a zero for not doing the assignment.

So today I took over another class. This class is essentially an honors class so these kids are used to doing a decent amount of work and usually its a little challenging. Well, on their warmup for today they only had to answer true or false that's it. They were all a little stunned but got working after I confirmed that all they have to do was choose true or false. With that one of the boys in my class informs me that I am his new favorite geometry teacher. I turned to him and told him that I wasn't going to be by the end of class. He looked confused and went on working. Well, today they started working with If-Then statements and basically the whole thing is rewrite sentences in different forms. By the end of class, the same boy calls out to my cooperating teacher to inform her that she is back to being his favorite geometry teacher. I just smiled and laughed to myself cause I knew he would change his mind.

Snowless Snow Day

So yesterday we had a "snow" day. It was really more of a "the roads are probably going to be slick let's just cancel school" day. I am completely not complaining. It was a nice relaxing day off that allowed me to catch up on laundry and other stuff around the house. Then today I woke up to a 2-hour delay. SWEET! I love to sleep in so the delay was excellent. On top of that the classes were only an hour which made the day fly by. It was decided today that I start taking over classes the middle of next week. I'll take over one for about a week and then I'll take over the other class. I'm super excited and nervous and that same time but I think I'll do fine.

I Thought They Taught Handwriting in School

I was grading papers today and putting them in the grade book and I had the hardest time trying to figure out whose name was on the paper. Common now its high school you would think the kids would know of the legibly write their names on their papers. Apparently, they like to sign their signatures on their papers so I can spend 5 minutes trying to figure out who to give the grade to.