Finally!!!

Wow! Sit back...it might be a long one! Today is my first day back on the computer in what seems like forever, so I have a lot of catching up to do!

For starters, Todd and I have officially moved into our new house up in KC. (Technically, we are in Lee's Summit, but I think "word on the street" is that we can call it KC because we are in the area.) While we aren't 100% moved in, we are 95% finished with the upstairs and by we, I mean I. Todd did help by hooking up all of the electronics, putting furniture together, and moving the big pieces, but I am the one who has done all the decorating and unpacking. That's fine with me, though because I love to do that! I have tried to change up our style a bit from the old house. We do have our same bedroom "African" theme and the guest bedroom is still Red/White/Blue (we don't want to spend the money to change it yet in the hopes that one day it will be a nursery!!), but in the other rooms we have totally changed our decorating style. Our new kitchen is done in red/white/black just like the previous owners, and I bought Paris-themed pictures to go in there. I do want to go flea-marketing (Hayley--call me anytime you are up here to shop!) and try to find more French-style antiques. Our new living room is pretty much entirely new--new furniture, TV, etc. complete with a new picture of Claude Monet's "Dusk" to go above the fireplace.

This isn't our exact picture/frame, but you get the idea! We have condensed our old home office full of three bookcases of old teaching books that I never used, books we never read, and children's books that were never opened into 1 1/2 bookcases of books that we either read on a regular basis OR books that I hope to use/read later. (My favorite section is on the top shelf--my tribute to Broadway, complete with my "Wicked" playbill, broadway book, and snowglobe! I also plan on putting a picture of my mom and me together at "Wicked" on this shelf.)

I am planning on putting some pictures on here later once I find my card reader. Who knows where it is? I may have to go out and buy a new one! I also want to sign up for Jessica Sprague's online digital class, but I may have to wait until this fall to do that. As of right now, even with being off this summer, I don't know when I will find time to work on anything!

We are hoping to open up our pool this week. I actually wanted it opened a LONG time ago (especially in the middle of painting and painting and painting every room in the upstairs!), but since we had so much other stuff to do on the house, we didn't open it. Well, now the time has come. Todd's dad has tried to help us out, but since he doesn't really know what he's doing either, it's like the blind leading the blind in our backyard! The pool is uncovered, we've added a chlorine tab and have "shocked" it, but we think there is a leak somewhere by the filter. The filter and/or pump just doesn't seem to be working as well as it should (not that I know what it should be doing anyway!), so we are having a man Todd's parents know come out to our home tomorrow night to look at it and tell us everything we need to know. He used to do pool stuff for a living, so hopefully, he knows what he's talking about!

On the school side, I have been up to Chrisman High three days for curriculum-writing meetings. The district is trying to align the core curriculum for all three high schools, so I went to help out and was able to meet some new people. It was pretty funny--One of the classes I am teaching next year is English IV for seniors. I wanted to be in that group because it's a class I've never taught before, and I thought it would be a good way to figure out what I need to do to prepare. Ha!! Basically, it came down to another girl who has never taught English IV and Me! Two people who have NEVER taught this class were the ones writing the curriculum! I think it worked out because we were able to do whatever we wanted!! We ended up making/outlining six different units--one for each "Trister" (also something new--they don't have quarters/semesters, they have 3 tristers for each semester). We are planning on teaching a Cultural/Social Relationships unit with The Pianist or Kite Runner (both books I have never read!), a research/real world unit, two "optional" units--basically we can teach anything on the optional list, and then a Gender/Identity unit (Hayley, this is where the photography poetry will come in!).

I also found out that I will not have my own classroom next year. While I was initally upset because I was told in my interview that I would have one, I think I am actually exited. I don't have to "decorate"--something I usually spend a week on! and I can just concentrate on what I am teaching. I do plan on setting up part of our garage with shelves (the leftover ones from our old office) and putting those materials that I will use next year on them. That way, when I know I am getting ready to teach Of Mice and Men, I can just take everything related to that book with me and only have that at school. I was promised a file cabinet, so I figured I can use that for storage. We'll see how it goes!

Well, I think that's enough for now! I have a birthday party to go to tonight--it's April's little boy Maddox's first birthday (April is Todd's cousin he works with everyday). We got him an Elmo toy cell phone that sings and tells the numbers when you push on them. It's really cute!

Thanks for hanging in!