Not just crazy at school

School officially started on Tuesday. Many of the teachers (including myself) have commented about how ill-prepared we felt and still feel. Part of that feeling comes from having so many students (I have 28) and part comes from having fewer paid work days to just come in and work with your grade-level team and alone in your classroom. I think I was more nervous about starting this school year than any of the other years. It's just been insanely crazy. It doesn't help that about a month or so ago, we found out our math program was changing and we were trained in the program the week before school started!! Yeah, not cool. But, on the bright side, all the Title 1 school teachers are receiving new laptops by the end of September. I'm stoked!

The first week of school was not only crazy AT school, but here at home as well. On Aug. 21 (Saturday) the upstairs tenants moved out. They had to be officially gone by Monday at midnight. They were out by Monday afternoon. On Monday afternoon, we had a school open house to meet your teacher. After that ended and I was chatting with the stragglers who were still in my classroom, Kory came waltzing in and said: "We don't have any internet at home. Can I use your computer?" The internet box was COMPLETELY dead, blank, no lights on, dead! Kory has to have the internet in order to do homework for school. Remember, this was Monday. Kory goes straight from work to school on Tuesdays. UGH! So, he did what he needed to on my school computer and we went over to my aunt's house to take my mom out to dinner for her b-day. By the time we got home, it was late--maybe 8:30 or 9:00. Kory went to turn on the water and...nothing. No water, no internet, no electricity upstairs which wouldn't be a problem but the upstairs electricity is connected to our outside lights. Thankfully, Aunt Nancy let us come back over to her place and shower REALLY EARLY the next morning. I called my cousin, who owns the house we live in, Monday evening and told him and he said the upstairs tenant probably didn't know that turning off her water would shut off our water too. Anyway, he called Provo City first thing Tuesday morning and they couldn't come until Wednesday. Waterless, and internet-less for one more day, or so we thought. Oh no, friends. Wednesday came and still no water even after I got home from a LOOOOOOOOOOONG day at school. So, my cousin gets another phone call from me, Provo City gets another phone call from him and apparently Provo City was "too busy" to send someone out to turn on our water! WHAT THE *&!@%*#&*^*%? UGH! They guaranteed that our water would be back by Thursday. They're lucky that it was or they would have met the wrath of me!!! Oh, and Wednesday morning when my cell phone alarm went off, I looked over to check Kory's alarm clock and it was black. Nada. I thought "oh great! now our electricity has been shut off" I thought maybe it was just a fluke, but figured out that it wasn't after the bathroom lights wouldn't turn on. So Wednesday here's what the status quo was: no water, no internet, no electricity upstairs, and no electricity downstairs! YOU'VE-GOT-TO-BE-KIDDING-ME!!!!!!!! I come out of the bathroom and peek out through the blinds to see if anyone else was perhaps without electricity. I saw red flashing lights reflecting off the neighbors window and went outside to investigate. 4 firetrucks, 3 ambulances, and several cop cars were parked out on the main street and in the grocery store parking lot. That explains the loss of power which Kory said was back on at our place around 8:00am. Goll! Kory said he read a story on the internet that a delivery-type truck had taken a turn too fast and flipped and took out 5 power lines. That road was closed all day and well into the night.

Phew! Sorry that was long! I think Heavenly Father figured we'd had enough and sent us a consolation on Wednesday when my uncle stopped by to take us out to look at more houses: we got our house!! The HUD house we wanted fell through on the first offer that was submitted and we had the next best offer. It's basically ours now. We just have to get financing, which will happen tomorrow, and close with HUD. Pictures will come whenever we can get back over to the house and take pix. We are so excited and it's going to be fun to fix it up (cause it needs some lovin') and have our very own place. Plus, it's so close to my school that I can walk! :)

At least some good came out of this crazy week. My first graders are so stinkin' cute I can hardly take it! Just sayin'.....

Fun website

Wow, I'm a posting maniac lately. Check out this website. SUCH CUTE STUFF!!

www.ribboncandyquilts.blogspot.com

3 weeks

In three weeks from today, I will have 20+ new first graders staring at me, secretly wondering when it's time to go home! :)

I went to my classroom today and actually worked on stuff. I've been in and out all summer, but never actually stayed long enough to be productive. Today, I felt like I was productive. I moved my desk, bookshelf, and kidney-shape table back to their original locations (everything was moved for cleaning). That is an accomplishment because my desk is BIG and HEAVY but I just had to push it and it moved just fine. Then, I sat down and planned out my schedule for a "normal" day of school. It's rare that we actually have a "normal" day, free of interruptions, assemblies, meetings, early out days or other unforseen circumstances. That's basically all I did, but it felt really good. Oh, I also sat and thought about rearranging my room. It's not uncommon to find me rearranging student desks in my classroom because I feel like a change. For young kids, consistency is really good so changing their desks probably isn't a good idea for me, but I do it anyway. Plus, it's always fun to see the looks on their faces when their desks are in different spots. They also have this uncanny ability to be able to memorize where everyone else's new seat is as well. Hmmmmm........

I am looking forward to this year. The Kindergarten teachers talked all last year about how great our classes would be this year. Boy, I hope they're right. Two crazy years in a row deserves a break.

Addicted

Maybe one day, when I've come off this high, I won't bore you to death with my constant ramblings about my quilting. It's still a whole new world to me and there's tons yet to be learned but the things I've learned so far are seriously cool! In a way I am kind of glad my Quilting 101 class got canceled. The money I would have spent on that class went toward other 1-day quilting classes and I have loved every minute of them. Here's my latest creation:






It's called a crazy 9-patch. After the star quilt, this was cake. It would be easy for anyone anyway, but I started and finished (cutting, sewing, pressing) in a little less than 3 hours. So fun! Again, I had the ladies at the Cotton Shop oogling over my color choices. They said they should hire me. I would love that, but I doubt I would be helpful at all!! :) The picture with the green square that has the flowers--that was my inspiration fabric and I found other pieces using that one as a guide. I was proud of myself for choosing fabric with no help (I had help with the star quilt).

**Until I figure out why my pictures show up in HTML in my drafts, you just get bundles of pictures with no commentary. Can anyone help with this?**

Yeah, I'm addicted. I knew I was addicted when after finishing each quilt, I wanted to do it again. We'll see if I can control myself.