Guess what?

Okay - so most people have probably stopped reading this - though I doubt anybody was really reading this anyways. Which is okay, because i mostly do this to keep the memories and help me in not forgetting what happens 20 years from now.

The biggest news since I last posted - Im engaged and getting married August 1, 2009. I am super excited. I have started the general planning but thats all. Nothing set in stone. I did buy stuff to make my "save the date" cards yesterday - now i just have to sit down and make them all.

Otherwise, I went to Mexico with Dave for a week (that is where he proposed). It was so pretty there and very relaxing. It was good to not have to do anything for a complete week.

Hum.. what else? I go back to work in a little over a week - the summer went soooo fast! And now the school year will start and that will drag. At least parts of it will. It seems to go so slow, until the last month of school. Then we look back, and cant believe how fast the school year went. Its kinda funny how that works.

Though, with me going back to work, I should be updating more regularly. I tend to do that more when i am at work.

Welcome to Monday

At this point in the year, I am counting down until the school year is done. I cannot tell you how many days are left at this point, but I know that we are less than 6 weeks. 6 weeks that I am hoping goes by VERY quickly. In all reality the next 6 weeks are going to be extremely busy at work. We have a lot of school activities that happen to fall towards the end of the school year. Activities, functions and field trips. For example, next Monday, Monica, Bob and I are taking our classes and going to the Museum to see Body Worlds. I am very excited about this - i have wanted to see it for some time and now I get to see it for free. Mind you, there are going to be 40ish students with us - but it will still be really cool.

The school that I work at - our prom is on Friday. Ticket are not selling fast. We think it is because we work in a lower class area and our students just dont have the money these days to fork out the $25.00 for prom. It's a sad fact, but putting food on the table or gas in the car so you can get to work is more important than a night of dancing at a prom. I am going after school today with Adriana to go and buy some of the prom supplies for the prom and then will take her out to dinner - probably to Red Robin or Fridays.. Something in that general area.

On Friday almost the entire staff of GVHS went to the Brewers Game. They lost, but we had a GREAT time. We always do. We laugh, eat, and just generally act a fool with one another. Its a good chance to just get together as a whole group away from the work environment and have a good time.

I also went to the Brewer game on Sunday (they also lost).. I think I should stop going to games.. I go on Friday and Sunday and they lose. I dont go on Saturday and they win - I see a pattern here. But, on Sunday I went with Dave, his brother Mike and their 2 friends Mooney and (I forgot his name). Going to a baseball game with 4 guys that grew up together is nothing more than an experience, and a quite entertaining experience at that one. They were all great and besides the fact that the Brew Crew lost - fun was had all around...

Well, time for my day to start so I need to go and round up some students.. Have a great week!

Bryan White Concert....

This weekend I have done more driving that any person ever wishes to do in one weekend. Though I am not going to complain about that at all - they were easy drives with very good company and an excellent purpose in mind. You see - My mom, our friend Denise and I drove up to Sault Ste. Marie, MI to see Bryan White. After 4 years I FINALLY got to see him again. It was long overdue and a VERY emotional and overwhelming trip.

On Thursday I drove the just over 2 1/2 hour drive to my parents house. Then, on Friday morning we left for MI and drove the 7 1/2 hour drive up to Sault. Ste. Marie (that includes our stop for lunch). The concert was amazing. It was Bryan, the Wilkinsons and John Berry. Each did about an hour show.

Then all 3 did meet and greets after the show. I was a little upset at one point because I didnt think I would get to do the fan club meet and greet. (I think I was the only fan club member there). Bryan was just going to sign for everybody. But thanks to the John Berry Merchandise guy (he went to tell Bryan that he had a fan club member there that drove 11 hours just to see him), Bryan had me come back stage to meet with him all by myself. I bet I was backstage for a good 15 minutes. Just me, Bryan and the 2 band members he had with him.

Those of you that know me, know that Bryan has been a huge part of my life over the past 12 years. He's been with me through everything and been a huge part of who I have become today. I didnt realize how much that was true until the emotions came out Friday night and the feelings of being overwhelmed started. I had forgotten how much his music meant to me.. and the chance of a one on one meeting was an amazing experience. It was more of a chatting time than the "hi, who are you, thanks" that you normally get at a concert, fan club meet and greet.

There is SOOOO much more to the story, but way to much to write. It really is a great story.. and those of you who are my friends and want to hear it in all its glory.. I will be more than happy to share it with you. Otherwise, I am just going to add some pictures....

Im back..

Alright its been a while since Ive poster. And truthfully I havent really been on-line all that often. Im on my myspace once in a while to check up on students but thats all. At work I have been really busy with grading and prom and lock-in. Doesnt it all sound like fun. I am getting into the busy prom time when I need to make sure it all comes together. DJ (done), photography (done), souveniers (done).. Buts, thats all so far. I still have to order food, get the students together that are going to help, etc. What Ive done so far is the easy part. On top of all of that we are doing a lock-in at our school with about 20 students (mostly girls probably). Somehow Monica and I were put in charge of that - amazing and no surprise. That will be April 18th. So, we have ah.. less than 3 weeks to pull that together (with the help of Krista and Lyndsy) once we come back from Spring break. Ah - spring break. After today (at 1:00 to be precise) I will be on spring break for a little over a week. Now dont get me wrong I absolutely LOVE my students - but the truth is we are all ready for a break from each other. It is starting to get warm and that means students are starting to get stir-crazy. This week has just been rough in general. Im tired, and worn out from trying to actually get stuff accomplished this week with classes of students that already want to be on spring break.

Alright - enough for now - students will be here in about 5 minutes so I should go and get ready.

Zoey's Christmas Pictures

My little Zoey (she is 2 now). Doesnt she look very excited to be sitting next to all the presents??

Here is Zoey again - only this time she is very excited about having her oh-so-pretty coat on.

Yikes, where have I been?

I have been such a bad blogger lately. It has been about 2 months since I posted last. Im not even sure why. There has been stuff to write about - hasnt there? I have been staying busy. I am done with my Christmas shopping - thank heavens. I have actually been done for a while. I did really, really good this year. I started early and stayed on track. I think I have 1 gift card left to buy for me dad, but I am going to wait to get that until I go up by their house on Saturday or Sunday.

Otherwise, work has been going pretty well. We are in the process of hiring a new science teacher - well we were. I believe our principal hired one yesterday - he will be joining out staff event on Thursday and then with the students on Friday - the day before the break. Paul (the previous science teacher, who will be missed dearly) went on to work at Potawatomi as their (somekind of ) betting manager. We will see how the new one works out.

I have had a forever amount of work conferences in the past week. Well, 2 - but in a week - that is a lot. I had one on Thursday for this math plan folder, CAB thing we are doing and then I had on on Monday (yesterday) on some Math Lab Algebra activities we can do with out students. They are good, and very informational, but some days I would rather be in the classroom - it is actually harder to prepare for a sub sometimes than to actually teach yourself - especially when I am not sure of the math knowledge the sub will have to know if we can do work, or review, something new, etc.

What else? Christmas is exactly one week from today - I am excited. I am going home again - this time for about 5 days. My birthday is in 10 days - I will be 27. I say that and it seems old, but in no way do I feel like I should be about to turn 27. Isnt that crazy?

Well, enough for now - I promise to try and update better - I have time - I just need to commit to it.

So much to talk about today - school, volleyball and Dave's accident

1st quarter is almost over - 2 more days to be exact before I start with a whole new bunch of students. Well, maybe "whole new" is not right - a lot of the students I would have had before - but there will be new ones that I havent had. This coming quarter I am doing geometry 1 and personal finance.

But, back to this quarter. Today, I am giving all my classes their final exam. It amazes me that students decide to ditch class on the day of their exam. For example: 1st hour - there are 15 students normally there on a day and today I had 6 there to take the exam. Right now it is 3rd hour, I normally have about 12 here during the class and Ive got 5 taking the exam. Students seem to think if they dont take the final that it just doesnt count at all towards them instead of the reality that if they dont take it its a 0/100 points. Which - as you may know - is a good chunk of grade. Will the students stay after school on Friday (the only time the exam can be made up) to take it? Most of them - no.. and for some of them it will make the difference in them passing or not. Its sad - but Ive stressed the importance of being here for the test and that if they miss it that it counts as a 0. I dont know what else I could have done to relay that info.

Now, onto volleyball - we had to forfeit again last night because I didnt have enough girls show up for school. Its extremely frustrating. I was talking to the principal and v-principal about it and we are almost to the point of bringing all the girls together and saying "are we in this to play, are you going to commit to coming to school and supporting the rest of your team? because if you're not - then this team/season is going to be over". What answer we would get from them, I dont know - but during practice i get maybe 3 or 4 girls that show up. And, i cant really punish the other girls for not showing up, because they we have to forfeit because girls didnt come to practice and we are punishing the girls that did come to practice. Its kind of at a standstill as to what will happen in the next couple of weeks - we have all of November left of the season - and im not sure how many of them we will be playing.

On another note - Dave got into an accident last night - Not Dave's fault. Some old guy broadsided him. So, now Dave has got the rental until his car gets fixed. Wouldnt you know that is how it works - my car finally gets settled and dealed with (almost - Im still waiting for a check) and now Dave has to deal with it all over again. The odd part - I guess in the past 3 weeks his brother and his brother's fiance also got in accidents that were not their fault - I think they were both rear-ended. What's the odds of that happening - all 4 of us have been in accidents (that were not our fault) in the past month. Kinda Creepy..

Happy Halloween! Dont let the spooks in.

Pictures from the Brewer Game

These are from just over a month ago.. I went to the Brewers game with Dave, my sister and her husband.. Here are a few pics..

My favorites (and only) sister in the world

From left to right:
Dave, Sean, Sheila, Me












Me and Dave

Why is it taking so long!!

Ergh.. The autobody shop that is fixing my car submitted the estimate to the insurance company on Friday(at 8:30am) and as of today (at 4:20) they had not yet heard back from them. How does it take 2 days to look at an estimate? I dont even know how they could deny it? What happens then? I dont even know. Now, here I sit and wait to find out whether my car is going to be fixed or not from an accident that happened over a week ago.. How ridiculous. Plus, it is 4:30 and I am still at work. I am here until 5:00, trying to get stuff done - then at 5, school has fall fest which is just a parent event. I think we are grilling out, having prizes and games etc. Then, at 7:45 I think I am going to the football game. It should be a busy night.

What a weekend

and what a weekend it was.

Things that happened:

1) I was supposed to meet Katie and Tina on Friday in Grafton for a fish fry. On my way there (I was getting off of 45 onto hwy 60) a truck ran into the back of my car. I was stopped on the offramp waiting to get onto 60, because I cant go if cars are coming and the truck behind me didnt see me or thought I had went and gased it (pretty hard by the look of my car) and rear ended me really good. His front bumper actually went up above my bumper - you can tell because you can see his license plate screw marks on the top of my trunk. Yeah, my car is not a pretty sight. At the time I didnt hurt at all - but on Saturday my neck was in horrid shape - it hurt like ever to move it. Sunday it was achy but not near as bad as Saturday. And today - it feels fine - luckily - I would hate to work all day with a sore neck. So, now, I am in negotiations with insurance companies trying to get it paid for. (Oh, and I did make it to the fish fry which was very good - I was just late and arrived with a smashed up car)

2) Hannah (and Pete) got married on Saturday. It was really nice. The ceremony was in the amplitheater at CUW. It was a little windy/chilly but not too bad. The reception was at the Eisner Museum downtown in the Third Ward. I had never been inside there, and it is really something. The food was great - very interesting. The guests were good - it was REALLY good to see some of my old friends from CUW that I havent seen (for the most part) since Theresa's wedding a couple years ago.

What else? Now I am back to the grind of work - with Monday almost over. I only have one more class today from 1:10-2:35 and the class usually isnt that much of a problem. Plus, with the weather the way it is today, the attendance should be low anyways. Im thinking maybe 6-8 students in class today. We will see though I guess.

Well, thats enough I have some last minute stuff to do before lunch and then class.

Almost Friday...

My volleyball girls lost all 3 games on Tuesday - but they did so in good spirit. The first game we lost by 2 and the other 2 we lost by about 6 or so. No so bad considering it was the first game, I only had 7 girls there total and only 2 that played last year. Plus, when we started playing I had to point out where the out of bound lines where and serving lines were, etc - since they had never played on an actual court before. But, I think they played very well together. They were not mad when they lost and they seemed to have a good time. Which, really, is all I am looking for. Since we are not an actual "school" league, I just care that the girls are having a good time!

Otherwise, the week is going pretty well. There have been some tense moments at work - but, nothing overly serious. And not even tense moments necessarily with me, but relayed to me by other staff members. All of which are legit and I see where they are coming from.

What else? Hannah and Pete's wedding is on Saturday. I cant believe she is getting married already in 2 days. How crazy is that - though it will be a good chance to see some friends from CUW that I havent seen in a while.