Back and forth between Bratislava and Vienna

The next day, we toured around Bratislava for a few hours in the morning, and then headed to Vienna (only thirty-something miles away!) in the afternoon.

Let's start with Bratislava. We started by hiking up to the Bratislava Castle (inhabited since 3000 B.C)! Unfortunately, the whole thing was covered in scaffolding and undergoing renovations so it was closed to tourists. This was disappointing.


After our picnic lunch, we walked around the city taking pictures:

You know you're American if you pose with statues:


Vienna was a spontaneous decision. Max had never been there so it was reason enough to go. We power-walked all around the city and were able to see the main attractions. Click here for Max's version of the play-by-play of stuff we saw there... Here I'll just post some random pictures in no particular order:

Above: We ate NUTELLA ice cream in one of the many city squares. NUTELLA! ICE CREAM!
Below: We stopped shoving food in our faces long enough to pose in front of St. Stephen's Cathedral.

Below: When we're not eating or posing, we're behind the lens. Max is taking a picture of some fabulous building and in the background is the Rathaus (mayor's building):

Above: The two very nice people who spoiled us rotten on this trip. I call them mom and dad!
Below: For all of his eccentricities, you can't go to Vienna and pass up a peek at Sigmund Freud's house.


After walking around until we were ready to collapse, we headed back into Bratislava for dinner at the Slovak Pub, which my dad had heard about from a local. Authentic and CHEAP Slovakian food:


We had the most amazing garlic soup (I think I can still taste it!), and some kind of dish with special Slovak cheese made from sheep. It was incredible and I recommend going to Bratislava for no other reason than going this restaurant!

On the road again

We had an eventful travel day from Wroclaw, Poland, to Bratislava, Slovakia.

We woke up in Poland.

We ate lunch in the Czech Republic:

We booked a hotel in Bratislava, Slovakia:


We ate dinner in Hungary:



We had ice cream for dessert in Austria:

Weary in Wroclaw

We drove three and a half hours to Wroclaw, Poland. In looking over the pictures I took of Wroclaw, I was momentarily puzzled by the few number of them, and then I remembered Oh yeah, we were EXHAUSTED!

We started out with lunch at an out-of-the-way restaurant. We were looking for traditional Polish, but happened upon traditional Georgian food (you know, the Republic of Georgia, not the state!). We figured that never in our lives would we get an opportunity to sample the fare of such a small country so we went for it... and we weren't disappointed!


Next, we found another church tower to climb for views of the city. The view was worth the stairs and all the pigeon poop:


We posed for lots of pictures at the top. Here's one where I am reminded once again that I married a goofball!


And here's me and dad:


When we got back down, we were extra tired. Did I mention it was also one of the few very hot days we had? We rested inside the church we had just climbed:


We walked around the town's square a bit more and then collapsed on a bench. At one point, mom said "What we really need is a big air conditioned mall". And then we all laughed warily because 1) they don't "do" malls in Europe, and 2) air conditioning is rare here too.

But whaddayaknow? We happened to walk a few blocks out of town and to Max's great delight (hope you heard that with sarcasm, folks!), we came upon a four story, nicely air conditioned mall!! My parents were, of course, besides themselves to run into a bit of America all the way over in Poland. So we humored them and spent some time there :).

We finished the day with a very late (and yummy!) dinner back at the hotel. This finished our last day in Poland, and all in all we very much enjoyed it. It's definitely not a very well-known tourist destination but I would definitely recommend it. Great prices there too!

Next up: an eventful travel day!

Proud of Poznan

The next day we headed for Poznan, Poland from where we were staying near Gdansk. We decided to go to Poznan because it's the town that my dad's grandfather is from! Anyway, the trip was supposed to take four hours. But let's just say that the Polish roads aren't the best (yes, Michigan has worse potholes, but at least the speed limit is 70 in the U.S and not 40. FORTY!!). Also there was some construction and that slowed us down so all in all it took us about seven and a half hours to get there.

We had some fun on the way though. We saw, outta NOWHERE, this giant Country Western saloon themed restaurant and hotel and we stayed there for lunch. I'd never seen anything themed up this much ever. Not even Disneyland. Or Dollywood. The pictures don't show much of the decor, but just the fact that they gave us all cowboy hats when we asked the waitress to take our picture should give you an idea of how it was:


We finally got to Poznan ("my people", dad kept saying) and didn't know what to expect, as it wasn't a popular tourist attraction. But it ended up having a lovely square with very colorful row houses and some cathedrals:


It also happened that there was a display that boasted of Poland's independence from Prussia in 1919 in that very city square!


That evening, we ate at one of the many open air restaurants lining the city square. Here I am laughing at some of Max's antics (or some chest pain, I can't be sure...):

Gluttons in Gdansk

When we drove to Gdansk, Poland, we decided that we wanted to stay outside of the city itself, thinking it would be cheaper. We rolled into a little town on the coast of the Baltic Sea called Sopot, which turned out to be an expensive resort town. We inquired at a few different hotels who quoted us 100 dollars per night, per room. By the grace of God, we found some very cheap and very rustic (though clean) cabins NEXT to a nice hotel. They were equipped with two rooms and a bathroom:


And that night, when the drunk party animals in the cabin behind ours kept us up till all hours of the night, we comforted ourselves by thinking about ALLLLL that money we were saving!

The next day, we took a short commuter train into the city of Gdansk (which used to be called Danzig when it belonged to Germany for all of you history buffs out there). This is what the city looked like by the end of WWII:


Here's what it looks like today:

We hadn't been walking around for too long before we seized the opportunity to pig out on some pierogies:


Then we went into a very small museum and saw the tallest tile stove in Europe. Over ten meters high!


As it turned out, there were a lot of tall things to see in Gdansk; next we climbed 406 steps up to the top of the oldest brick church in Europe (St. Mary's Cathedral). Here's the view looking down on the church spires:


Here's the rest of the town from above:


At the very end of the day, we went back to Sopot and Max and I walked to the touristy/happenin' place by the beach. We bought a whole bag of Haribo candy from those colorful bins and ate them on the beach as the sun was setting on the Baltic Sea. I don't have a picture of that, but let me assure you it was a sight and taste to remember!!

Our trip part 1: gallavanting across Germany

I promised pictures from our trip, didn't I? Well now that we're all settled at home in France, here they are (in installments, bien sur). Let's start with all the places we visited in Germany.

Our first sight was good old fashioned German traffic ("stau") on the drive from the Frankfurt airport to Berlin. We were stuck in it for four hours. Passengers gathered on the grassy median to socialize, drink, or ask other drivers what was going on. We tried to stay patient, happy, and awake (stupid jetlag!)


We started our one day tour of Berlin with the Holocaust Memorial in the middle of the city (new since May of 2005). The 2,711 concrete blocks are meant to represent coffins. Despite the somber atmosphere, we can't help but smile for a picture:


Next up, the Brandenburg Gate:



We stopped at a cafe after this (one of many in ten days!). Max poked fun at my dad's compass and insisted that he knew which way was North in his head at all times. For the rest of our ten day trip, my dad would stop randomly, cover his compass, and quiz Max on where North was. What is it with boys and their competition!?


Next, we went to Checkpoint Charlie. Here we are in front of some of the remaining wall. To think we were seven when it came down!


We ate at a Persian restaurant for dinner in eastern Berlin. Here Max is drinking Dugh, a yogurt drink mixed with mint herbs. It was a little salty, and very delicious:


The next day, we drove three hours to Rostock (and nearby Warnemunde) in northern Germany on the Baltic Sea. We ate an incredible seafood lunch in Rostock. We ordered a seafood salad and potato and shrimp soup that were TO DIE FOR.

We hopped on over to Warnemunde, a popular seaside resort, and immediately checked out the candy stands. Because we needed desert, that's why. There was tons to choose from, but these looked especially colorful:


Here we are in front of the Baltic Sea. Way too cold up there to go in, so we battled the wind to take a picture:


Mom and I had ice cream for dinner (spaghetti eis!!). Because we're grown ups and we can!


Max and Dad opted for something "healthier" (ha!) and ate Doner Kebabs while we walked around town:


Never sick of posing:

Some kind of record

Tune in next week for the full detailed report of where we went and what we did on our Central European Road Trip, but I had to share yesterday's highlights with you:

We ate breakfast in Poland.
We ate lunch in the Czech Republic.
We booked our hotel in Slovakia.
We ate dinner in Hungary.
We had ice cream for dessert in Austria.

Life is good!

It's in my blood

No, I haven't dropped off the face of the earth. We've just been driving around central Europe... For a more detailed description of where we've been and where we're going, see here.

We've spent the last few days driving through Poland. We're at our third and final city in this country: Wroclaw. And one thing has been consistent in all three Polish cities (well, you know, besides all the Polish people): ice cream, which is called "lody" here. Every where you go, people are milling around with waffle cones or soft serve cones piled high. You can't pass ten people without at least one person eating ice cream. There are lody vendors every few yards, and the going rate is pretty cheap!

So needless to say I'm in ice cream heaven here. And it's totally justified that I pig out on lody everyday because I'm part Polish and this is apparently what Polish people do!

I knew there was a good reason I'm addicted to ice cream...

Finally in Europe

... and we'll be here for about three weeks to visit with my parents. Ordinarily, we would have just gone to their house, but this time, Mom and Dad picked us up at the Frankfurt airport and we are going on a European road trip for two weeks!

First stop? Berlin. It was quite an adventure getting there. After twelve hours of transatlantic flying, we got in the car for what was supposed to be about a six hour drive. The drive ended up taking TWELVE hours. Yes, 12! We got stuck in a four hour traffic jam (called "Stau" here in Germany). We were inching. We drove one mile in two hours. People were getting out of their cars and socializing. Others were walking along the median (and making much better progress than the cars!). After the traffic jam was over, it took us about an hour and a half to detour around the accident that caused it all--thank you, GPS!

We finally made it to Berlin after 24 hours of travel. It was good to pull up to the apartment and meet my parents' friends that we were staying with.

The next day, we set out to See Berlin In One Day. We took the underground train into the city and then we walked around to see the sights. We saw the Holocaust Memorial (new in the city since 2005), the Brandenburg Gate, the top of the Reichstag (parliament building) overlooking the city, and Checkpoint Charlie. I so wish I had pictures to show you the sights, but I haven't uploaded them yet...

The Holocaust Memorial (especially the museum underneath) was definitely very heartbreaking and haunting. But a must if you are visiting the city. The Brandenburg gate was a very cool structure. And it was at the Starbucks right across the street that we ran into some old missionary friends of ours that are now living in Sweden! There was much excited screaming when we recognized each other. They were in Berlin with the family for the U2 concert! Then later we stood in line for about an hour to get to the top of the Reichstag (long lines for free stuff!) to get a great view of the city. And Checkpoint Charlie was definitely worth it--especially to see parts of the wall that were still hanging around. We ate dinner at a little Persian place in former East Berlin with excellent prices and very yummy food!

But maybe the highlight of Berlin (for my dad anyway) were the Dunkin' Donuts locations that we saw. Donuts!!! In Europe!! This trip rocks...

Later this morning, we are heading to Rostock on the Baltic Sea. Let's hope that there are no more massive traffic jams!

Small preview of a 20 hour horror film

Well, we've finally moved out of our apartment and into our in-laws. You'd think that moving in stages over a period of weeks would be a smart thing to do, but you'd be wrong. It was a terribly drawn out business... Glad it's finally over!

When it was finally over and we had thrown out the last bag of trash, we captured the cats and brought them out to the car. They were not pleased. In fact, Mrs. Hufflepuff was so upset, she left a permanent claw mark in the fabric ceiling of our car! We set out for our in-laws' (a 90 minute drive) to the tune of three angry cats yeowling in three part harmony. We stopped briefly at Burger King for dinner, and while Max ran out to get our food, I took some footage of the cats' indignation (you'll note that Gizmo, our calico, is suffering in silence here):



And this was them relatively calmed down! When we were about thirty minutes away, Mowgli decided she had had enough and barfed in the little plastic basket she was sitting in. (Max: "Hey what's that smell??"). Then, as she had barf on the end of her tail and on her paw, she decided it wasn't very comfortable to sit there anymore, so she moved to a different plastic basket and sat down. I thought she sat down, anyway, but it turns out she was just squatting to poop. Poop! In our car!! With no litter on it!! Do you have any idea of the stink we went through for the next thirty minutes?!?

On top off all the hoopla, Max's allergies decided that three cats shedding hair in such a small confined space was not acceptable and so he spent most of the trip sneezing violently and trying to breathe.

If this is going to be a preview of the twenty hour trip it will take to drive down south in August, we're in BIG trouble...

And everything's wrinkly

We've been living out of a suitcase since the middle of June, first with our trip down south, and now splitting our time between the in-laws and our nearly empty apartment. When we're at my in-laws, it's all fun and food and new barn kittens and reading and crafts. When we're at the apartment it's all cleaning and scrubbing and packing and apologizing to our cats for being gone!

In early August it will be Go Time with all of the unpacking and setting up and getting comfortable. We will also be hunting for the best deals on our shopping list: refrigerator, washer/dryer, dining room table, dishes, TV stand, and guest room furnishings. Oh yeah, and it will be time to go back to school and start my job.

But let's not think about all of that right now... too much fun to be had first!

Overheard

What happens when a frugal man has to sift through hundreds of dollars worth of groceries to throw away/give away before a big move? A lot of gut-wrenching emotion, that's what.

Today I cleaned the bathroom from top to bottom, while Max cleaned out the cupboards and fridge in the kitchen down the hall. In between my trips to the kitchen faucet and back (refilling my soapy bucket), I witnessed his progress as he systematically put all the food we owned (opened and unopened) onto our counters. Our kitchen looked like this (but with all the counters filled):


And as I scrubbed down the bathroom, I would hear these comments every so often coming from the kitchen (imagine a gut-wrenching-whiney tone of voice):

"Aargh!! So. Much. Food."
"EIGHT CANS OF GREEN BEANS?!?"
"We have FIVE whole jars of spaghetti sauce. FIIIIIIIVE!"
"What are we going to do with all of this food?"
"OOOHHH! My bread flour!! That stuff is EXPENSIVE!!"
"Hey, how long have we had these croutons?"
"We have so much uneaten food, this is making me sick. SICK!"
"Did you know these two boxes of cereal aren't even OPEN?"
"Seriously, this is making me want to vomit..."
"I think I just vomited."


Here he is, choking back the tears. Note to self for future moves: stop stocking the pantry months ahead of time, not just weeks....

On a related note, Hannah, do you need any food?

You're welcome

If you are a teacher, then you know that dissing the No Child Left Behind legislation is part of the territory. If you don't like something about your job as a teacher, it most likely has something to do with NCLB. In fact, lots of things can be blamed on NCLB... it's a perfect scapegoat in so many ways.

If you're a teacher and you love dissing NCLB (who doesn't?). Or if you're not a teacher and are wondering why we all constantly whine about NCLB, then this hilarious comparison is for you!

But mostly I just want the house, please

It's too bad that buying a house isn't like buying a shirt. With a shirt, you just pick out the one you like best, bring it to the cash register, and voila! Pay for it and go. With a house, it's more like: pick the one you like best, hold your breath till the offer is accepted, spend the next week knee-deep in paperwork, run up your cell phone minutes talking to the realtor and the mortgage lender, pack pack pack, clean clean clean, pray pray pray. And in the end, it might fall through anyway.

Of course, it doesn't help matters when the seller is being a jerk. Not only is she in the midst of what I can only assume to be a nasty divorce (aren't they all though?), she has actually sold the house twice before in the last month and both sales have fallen through. So she's been fighting her ex, she's been burned by two previous buyers, and she's making us pay for the sins of them all by rushing us along (and trying to rush the 75 other people involved in buying/selling a house).

I alternate between wanting to give her a hug and wanting to kick her in the pants.

Found and Lost and Found

We found The Awesome One yesterday. We promised ourselves that we wouldn't fall in love with a house but OOPS, it happened. In a way, that's a good thing because the first day we were having issues with Max loving one and me hating it or me loving one but Max hating it.

The Awesome house has many wonderful features: all hardwood floors, super energy efficient because of the top of the line AC unit and the double paned windows, 3 bedrooms/2 bath/2 car garage, FANTASTIC neighborhood, beautiful landscaping and fenced backyard just to name a few.

That evening we put in an offer. When we got home, we looked up the address on zillow and it told us that the house was already pending sale. Max and I were crushed, to put it mildly. We emailed our realtor but had little hope. We had a back up house that was almost perfect, but it wasn't The Awesome One, you know?

The next morning, our realtor called us and said, yep, come on over this afternoon and we'll look at more houses because this one is taken. So basically any hope we may have had was gone. Max was very upset (it's a money-saving house....he was in love!) and we both were quite sad. We went about our day's errands (fingerprinting for my new job and visiting Max's new school) feeling quite subdued. I was praying the whole time that Max especially would have peace about this unfortunate situation.

We were in the truck, and I asked Max how he was feeling. He quite calmly said that he was starting to feel okay about this whole situation, feeling like it was all going to be alright anyway. No sooner had the words left his mouth when our agent called!

She told us the house was still available. [Excuse me, can you repeat that? I'm not quite sure I heard you correctly over the traffic!] Apparently the buyer had committed loan fraud! So the seller was kind of back at square one.

To say we were shocked and overjoyed is a bit of an understatement. I believe Max cheerfully cried: "God's MESSING with us!!"

After our offer, her counter offer, our counter counter offer, and her counter counter counter offer, we accepted. Then she accepted our acceptance. Then there were rainbows in the skies, it rained down candy, and unicorns frolicked in the fields.

So barring any other catastrophe, we are going to be PROUD homeowners! We cloae in mid-August so keep praying and keep your fingers crossed! Pics are up on Facebook for family :)

We'll take The Awesome One

The last three days have been the longest and sweatiest of my life. Day 1, we drove over thirteen hours to a hotel in Arkansas in the hillbilly-pickup-with-no-air. By the time we got out of truck, I could have wrung out my underwear and created a nice salty pond on the side of the road. Day 2, we drove about 7 or 8 more hours until we found our storage unit, at which point we spent three hours unloading 90% of our earthly belongings from the truck. In the middle of the day. In the sweltering heat. There was a short moment of panic when we were wondering whether the couch would fit into the storage unit, but we made it work!

Today we spent all afternoon looking at houses with our very nice realtor in her very nice air conditioned car. We saw twenty houses. I would say about eight to ten of them, we walked in and then walked right back out. A piece of crap is a piece of crap; it's that easy to tell. Many of the homes we looked at were between 20 and 40 years old, 3 bedroom, 2 bath. We saw so many houses, took so many notes, that it started to all blur together. We started dubbing houses by their characteristics: The Smoky One, The Eighties One, The Moldy One, The Wheelchair Accessible One, The Wood Paneled One, The Busy Corner One .... the list goes on!

Tonight, we are going over some paperwork and thinking about our top three choices. Tomorrow we'll meet with the realtor again to go revisit our top three, and then she'll show us the next set of houses. I don't know if there will be twenty houses in this set (I imagine not), but she's been great in working with us to maximize our time here!

Despite the heat, this is definitely shaping up to be an exciting time for us!!

It is WAY past my bedtime

The pickup truck is packed to the hilt (and not everything fit!). We've nailed down the tarp as best we could. Now, all that's left is a very short night's sleep before we attempt to drive at least 12 hours down South (we'll still have about 8 more to go on Day 2) driving a contraption that looks suspiciously like the Beverly Hillbillies!! No air and no cruise control either. Should be fun.

But hey, at least we get to do some serious house shopping when we get there and after we unload all of our stuff in a storage unit! So that will definitely make up for the trip :)

Sometimes I wish I was a cat

Because cats don't have to pack. In fact, cats don't have to do anything except eat, drink, sleep, and poop. Max and I, however, have been very busy with putting things in boxes. And then putting more things in more boxes. It never seems to end!

Here is how Mrs. Hufflepuff has been helping out:


And if you're really a cat lover, you'll enjoy this one too:


I can hear you go "Awwwww..." all the way over here!

Moving On

I've been mildly enjoying my summer vacation. I say mildly because Responsibility sneaked up on me outta nowhere and bit me on the butt. I have a final paper due this Saturday for my grad class. I have to go back to school and hold another meeting to finish up an IEP on Thursday for this girl. That has great potential to be World War 3, but I'll keep you posted. On top of that, we are attempting to pack up about 87% of our stuff so we can bring it down to Texas next week when we go house hunting (we'll be dropping it off in a storage unit). Nothing stresses me out more than seeing this:

Packing up and moving is a tiring, back-hurting process! And I shudder to think how many times my dear mom packed up a family of five to move us across the country, and across the Atlantic.

But I do have some fun things to look forward to. Lunch out with friends! House hunting! Visiting with family! A trip to Europe! I guess it's all about perspective...

Stick a fork in me...

.... I'm DONE!

And to celebrate, I went to a local park with lots of my colleagues and ate pizza and ice cream and cake. Then we all went mini-golfing (I even made a hole-in-one! By bouncing the ball off of three different sides! So totally planned!).

For round two of celebrations (have I mentioned I like to milk celebrations??), Max and I went to see "Star Trek" at the movie theaters because I had won free tickets from a radio contest a few months ago. Max was very annoyed with me when I couldn't seem to say "trek" and always said "track" ("It's 'treeeek', 'trEk'!!!) After that, we went to the Melting Pot for some very yummy cheese fondue. And the grand finale? Ice cream at Cold Stone!!!

I wish every day was the last day of school!

Can I Crash a Bonfire Somewhere?

All week, I've been stalking the lunch ladies. Not because I'm hungry all the time (that is completely unrelated), but because they are the ones with the steady supply of boxes. And I'm in desperate need of cardboard boxes as I am packing up my classroom AND the apartment. So I've been lurking in the hallways, and snatching up box after box before any other teacher can take them. I'd created a literal TOWER of boxes in the corner of my office, waiting to topple over at the slightest sneeze.

Tomorrow is the last day of school, and all week I've been procrastinating on filling those boxes. Today I finally forced myself to pack up... and it was surprisingly easy! I didn't realize how little of my stuff I had actually brought to the job as this particular resource room had a lot of resources already there! So I ended up filling seven boxes, then cramming most of the rest of the empty ones into our car. I made sure I could see out the windshield and the rear-view mirror, but other than that, my long drive home was PACKED! Haha.....

On a related note, now that I am leaving this job behind me for good, what's a girl to do with 997 business cards??!?

Say It Like It Is

I have a little first grade boy with autism on my caseload. Let's call him Tommy (I know I've written about him before, but I can't remember what fake name I gave him!). Tommy has a full time aide to help him successfully mainstream in his general education classroom. You should also know that Tommy has a very powerful imagination and he will frequently make up stories or exaggerate what is going on.

 

Yesterday, Tommy came to school with mosquito bite on his forehead. This, of course (as anyone who works with kids on the autism spectrum might know), was devastating. It completely paralyzed him from getting any of his morning work done. Miss W (his aide) decided that some quiet time in his bean bag chair with an ice pack on his head may be just the cool down time he needed in order to start his day. So there he was, holding a blue bean-bag-type of ice pack on his head, calming down. Miss W was sitting off to the side with her back to him as she completed some paperwork.

 

Suddenly, Tommy says: "The ooze monster is here! The ooze monster is here!!"

 

Miss W responds (without turning around): "We're not telling stories today, Tommy. Please sit quietly while your classmates are working"

 

One minute later, Tommy pipes up again: "No, Miss W, I'm SERIOUS! The OOZE MONSTER IS HERE TO GET ME!"

 

Miss W finally turned around, and when she did, she saw that the ice pack had exploded and there was indeed OOZE all over the poor kid's face and shirt!

 

And that is why SOMETIMES we should take kids seriously....

Five more days until pee-pee freedom!

It's the beginning of the end.

 

And I've come to realize that I am very thankful that I'm in the type of job that has a clear beginning and ending. Our occupational therapist, who works part time in the hospital setting when she's not at school with us, said how lovely it is to have a job that ENDS. At the hospital, it's constant; sure, there may be patients that are discharged, but there are always other patients waiting to take their place. There is no automatic vacation. Nothing depends on the seasons.

 

Gosh, it must suck to have a "real" job....

 

Then again, when you are doing the potty dance in front of all your students, you start to envy all those other people in those other jobs who have the luxury of peeing whenever the thought occurs to them.

Hoarse as a Horse

Today was Field Day. Why we don't save Field Day for the last days of school, I will never understand, but there you have it. All the teachers are now wondering what they are going to do with their students for the next six days of school...

 

I was recruited to be in charge of the 4-square station. Remember 4-square? It was huge when I was a sixth grader. Anyways, we had K-2 rotating through all the stations this morning, and grades 3-5 rotating this afternoon. Each station lasted between 9 and 15 minutes. This means that I yelled out directions (you know, to be heard over all of the other field day events) TWENTY-ONE times to twenty-one different classes. So you can imagine I'm pretty hoarse.

 

It was pretty amazing to see the progression of physical coordination that each grade/age was capable of. For the Kindergarteners, the directions were simply to "bounce the ball to your friend"... but even that proved to be too difficult when I realized that some groups weren't playing because LOOK I SAW A CATERPILLAR or LOOK I HEAR AN AIRPLANE!! The first and second graders weren't that much better--they even had trouble running after a ball when it was hit out of bounds to go pick it up. It was almost like watching a cartoon: a child would run to get it, but just as they were picking it up, they would inadvertently kick it further, until they were halfway across the field!

 

As soon as I got the third through fifth grade groups, there was a big jump in physical ability. But then it I had to shout out complicated directions about what constituted an "out" because they were SO COMPETITIVE. The fifth graders were downright cutthroat--they had NO mercy!

 

After a full day of standing and walking around, sun exposure, and yelling out directions, I am BEAT!

Almost Summer

Is anyone else out there having trouble focusing on the tasks at hand instead of anticipating all the glorious things you'll do once summer break is here!?

Kids Gone Wild

Only two weeks (nine more days) until the end.

 

It's that time of year where the kids forget every rule and procedure you've taught them since September. No one can sit still or keep quiet. Kids are jumping up from their seats like popcorn and blurting out more often than bidders at an auction. Teachers are walking around looking tired from the strain of staying patient. Teachers are scrambling for any activities that would pass the time and at least are semi-educational. Administrators are strongly encouraging us to "stay strong until the end" and cram all the learning we can in these last few days (ha!).

 

This final whirlwind of activity with field trips, field day, and packing up the students' work and projects, and boxing up the classrooms will all end on June 12th with one collective sigh of relief from teachers and students alike (not parents though... let's face it, some of them may be mourning that day!). 

 

I, for one, CANNOT WAIT !!!!!!!!!! 

And I only passed out once from holding my breath and biting my tongue

Yesterday morning I had an IEP that I had been just dreading. (An IEP is a yearly meeting for a student with special needs where progress on goals, results of current testing, and setting future goals are discussed). Do you remember my sixth grader with Down Syndrome who sometimes has "accidents" at school? It was for her. Let's call her Greta this time.

 

The meeting had potential to be very contentious as we were recommending a different school/program for her and the parents are adamant about keeping her here. We only have a resource room here, not a self-contained classroom for the mild to moderately cognitively impaired (which is what she needs). She's been getting by with a full time one-on-one aide, but next year with four different teachers... she would end up full time in the Resource room! And that's good for nobody.

 

I hate leading the kind of meeting where you know at the outset that no one is going to get along. For days and weeks I had imagined an impassioned screaming match, with upset parents poking us in the eyes with pens or paperclips. I wanted to be sensitive to these parents: they are still in a kind of denial about what Greta can and can't do and I haven't felt like they've come to grips with the kind of education her future necessitates. You know... like they want us to make sure that she knows her science and history when she clearly has bigger fish to fry. Functional skills, anyone?

 

So there I was yesterday morning, feeling like I'm walking some kind of tightrope: trying to keep the peace, stay calm, stay objective. I wanted so badly to communicate to the parents that we care a great deal about Greta and aren't just trying to kick her out, and at the same time be assertive about what the team feels is the best placement for her.

 

In fact the meeting didn't turn out to be the World War III that I had imagined. Yes, the mom threw a silent temper tantrum (thinned lips, head down, brows furrowed, and body turned away from us). Yes, the parents made not so subtle accusations against me as well as the classroom teacher. Yes, there were tears from mom. Yes, there was shocking information presented at the meeting (such as she won't be able to get a high school diploma in the state of Michigan because she wouldn't be able to pass Algebra II and Chemistry). Yes, it was VERY tense when the principal explained that the only way they would be able to keep Greta here is if they took us to court. But ultimately? The parents agreed to go visit some different programs next week. A victory... of sorts.

 

So after a TWO HOUR meeting (a personal record in my four years of holding IEPs), we adjourned.

 

The mom pulled me aside afterwards and said: "I really appreciate the way you handled the meeting. You've grown a lot too this year".

 

Wait a minute... was that even a compliment?!?

On Becoming a Professional Hoop-Jumper

One of the reasons why I am still an untenured teacher after four years of teaching is because we move around a lot. I was certified in Michigan, then taught in California for 2 years; I've been teaching in Michigan these past two years, and next I'll be teaching in Texas for who knows how long?

 

You might be able to imagine that it caused some major headaches (and even tears!) when I started teaching in California and had to deal with countless hoops to jump through to get my California teaching license. I won't bore you with the details but suffice it to say that two years wasn't anywhere CLOSE to enough time to complete the endless list of requirements.

 

But at least California let me start teaching before I started hoop-jumping. I just got off the phone with human resources in Texas they were all like: "Oh by the way, you can't step foot in your classroom until you get your Texas teacher certification". What??? Why wasn't I informed of this earlier? You mean I can't start hoop-jumping once I get there? The lady hinted that I might want to get that started soon since it can be a long process.

 

I am so sick of each state having such a GOD COMPLEX. Here's been my experience.

 

CA: "We are soooo special. We really can't trust Michigan to do a good job training their teachers. I mean, we have English Language Learners here. What's that, Sarah? Your Hearing Impairment certification equips you to teach ELL as a language acquisition expert? I don't understand. You had better just do what we say. Also, you have to go through a rigorous mentoring program called BTSA (don't worry, it will only take 80 hours on top of your day job to complete!). Because as a Michigan teacher, you just might strangle your students, and we want to make sure you're not doing that. Because we are the best state ever and we have to make sure we weed out those whackos from the midwest...."

 

TX: "No, no, no, you can't even start being a teacher out here until we give you a special piece of paper saying that you are qualified. You already have piece of paper from Michigan, you say? Well, you probably just colored a coloring book in college to get that. Or maybe you sang a song. In either case, we need to make sure you pass our basic skills test, for one thing. Michigan basic skills are SOOO much different than Texas basic skills. I mean, can you even add? Texas is special. You have to do special things to teach here or else you're going to screw up our students..."

 

MI: "Hey, we made this teacher do THREE SEMESTERS of student teaching--one for each area of certification--which we can guarantee is more than any other state requires. Because Michigan is superior. So just let her teach in your state. Trust me."

 

My next move? Get Nationally Board Certified!!

The Final Stretch

After finally becoming an aunt, and after a fabulous long weekend spent in Washington DC with old friends, we're finally back home. Back home, and back to reality.... These days, reality involves our car dying--the entire electrical system seems to be fried. We drove all the way back to Michigan without being able to touch the blinker, or the headlights, or the AC, or the radio, or the windshield wipers because if we did the car would stall. On the turnpike! On long stretches with no shoulder on the side of the road due to construction!

 

I also came back to three more weeks of school (that's 13.5 days of school, to be precise), and three more Saturday classes. I know the light is coming closer at the end of the tunnel, but it sure seems like an eternity from here to summer break!!!

I'm an Aunt!!

My nephew, Romeo, made his grand entrance yesterday!

Let's be Honest

moar funny pictures

Next I'll Teach her the Poker Face

Have you ever seen school age children try to shuffle a deck of cards? It's comical, unless you're in a hurry, and then it's just maddening. I was playing my favorite game ("BLINK!") with a second grader today who insisted on shuffling. I watched her awkwardly try to move cards around by taking two or three cards at a time and put them in the middle of the deck. Finally I asked her if anyone had taught her how to shuffle. Then I tried to show her where to put her thumbs and her fingers and her index fingers so that it would work. It took her two or three tries before it kinda-sorta-kinda worked. It was all pretty funny, especially when cards went flying through the air at one point.

 

I'm not sure at what age you're supposed to master shuffling cards, and it's definitely not a goal in her IEP (ha!) but some life skills are worth interrupting academics for ... right?

Nothing but the Truth

I had two fourth grade boys in my writing group today. One is so ADHD, he has the attention span of gnat. Actually, a gnat's attention span may be an improvement. The other boy has Aspergers and struggles mightily with anything abstract. We are working on something their classroom teacher wants me to help them with: to write a personal narrative about truthfulness, or a time you were truthful.

 

My student with ADHD (we'll call him "Wayne") hasn't started his graphic organizer/thinking map yet. I tell him to draw a big circle in the middle of his paper and write "Truthfulness". I blink, and he's out of his chair, looking for a sparkly pencil grip.

 

I turn my attention to my student with Aspergers (let's call him "Paul"). Paul has written a first draft already. I read it over and it is all about the bass he caught with his dad. Something about a boat and a live well. I ask him to tell me what part of the story is about being truthful. He launches into a monologue about how the boat didn't have a live well and he decided to make one, and his dad said it didn't have one, and he felt something heavy on his fishing pole, and it was a mackerel, and, and, and, and....

 

I glance over at Wayne, who has drawn all kinds of tiny circles on his thinking map that are clearly too small to write his ideas in. He spends the next few minutes interrupting Paul and erasing.

 

I grab a blank piece of paper for Paul. We're going to write a new story together, one that's actually about truthfulness. I ask him to draw his circles. He's a pro at drawing circles.

 

Meanwhile, Wayne is writing things like "I don't lie" and "I tell my dad the truth" in his thinking map. I prompt him: "Can you think of a time when you told the truth when it would have been easier to tell a lie?". He responds: "I'll tell you the truth: I like racing cars. Do you know the speedway off of exit 140?". He launches into a discussion while I attempt to redirect his thinking.

 

I turn to Paul and ask him about a time when he told the truth. "I sleep in the morning and my mom kept waking me up and shaking me and I said no and she said go take a shower." He looks very hopefully at me, wondering if this is the answer I'm looking for...

 

Truthfully? I hate teaching writing!

When Your To-Do List is Bigger Than Your Motivation

I worked hard today. I plowed through much of my IEP paperwork. I was busy doing actual work during every minute of my planning time and every minute of my unexpected free time when some students went on a field trip.

 

Why is this actually blog-worthy? Well......... let's just say I'm generally not this productive at this time of year.....

Saturday, I Miss You

I'm taking a class this spring for my Masters of Curriculum and Instruction. It meets over the course of five Saturdays, the first of which was this weekend.

 

I'm lucky enough to be taking the class with four other teachers that I work with, so that made it a bit more bearable. I generally like going to class and learning new stuff, but I'm finding that it's easier to like that kinda stuff when it's in the summer and I don't have lots of Other Stuff going on to distract me. You know, like teaching...

 

Anyways, there have been a lot of complaints about this particular professor (let's call her Judy) because she assigns so ... much ... work. And, as teachers, we feel it is our indisputable right to be spoon fed and coddled when it comes to higher education simply because we are required to continue our education if we want to keep our teaching certificate. See? So it's only fair: if you're making me do this, then you had better be making it easy!!

 

So as much as people complain about Judy, I rather think she's ingenius. Instead of teaching us every Saturday, she's divided us into groups and given each group an article to read, summarize, and present to the class (complete with assessment activity). Brilliant! We all learn, and she doesn't have to teach! She also seems big into group work and presentations and projects. This may be fine for some people, but personally? I would just rather you lecture for four hours, and give me a test. Tell me what to memorize and I'll regurgitate it perfectly later, you will be so impressed.

 

But no....

MOM is "WOW" Upside Down!

It's the season to be thankful for mothers... And I'm sure that kids across the nation are busy making homemade gifts and writing sweet sentiments as a part of their classroom activities.

 

This year, I had the opportunity to see some completed "MOTHER" accrostic poems in a second grade classroom. I took the best of their responses to share with you here:

 

M om is kinda messy

O ften lets me take two cookies

T alks so much I think my head will explode

H ere was a rose and I gave it to her

E xpert at teaching

R emembers a lot

 

Haha! I'm sure those moms will be thrilled no matter what the kids say...

 

I was talking to one of our paraprofessionals who used to work with a third grade boy with autism. Students with autism typically have no tact and will just say it like it is. That is why the paraprofessional had to have a conversation with that kiddo about why "obese" might not be a good choice for the "o" in "mother" !!

 

Best Week Ever

It's called "Teacher Appreciation Week" and it's the coolest. There are treats in our boxes every morning (one time, a gift card!!). Between parents and the district, lunch is provided all week! Monday was Italian; today was soup and salad; tomorrow is Olive Garden and ice cream sundae bar (!!), and yesterday we had a chocolate fondue fountain in the lounge with lots of goodies to dip!!

 

It's so nice to feel spoiled...

Life List

Have you ever heard of a "life list"? It's basically everything you'd like to do or experience in this lifetime. And since I just turned 27 on Saturday, I thought now would be a good time to share my life list!

 

It's not complete, but here it is in no particular order...

 

1. Go to a STOMP show.
2. Ride in a limo.
3. Take an art class (painting or drawing).
4. Own a dog (working on it!!)
5. Plant a vegetable garden.
6. Win a free trip (to anywhere)
7. See newborn kitties (will accomplish this on Saturday!)
8. Spoil my grandchildren.
9. See a play on Broadway.
10. Go on an African safari in South Africa (so you-know-who will stop bragging that he's been somewhere I haven't been!)
11. Write and publish a book.
12. Own a house with a nice backyard.
13. Early retirement ;)
14. Host a murder mystery dinner party.
15. Surprise my parents by showing up unannounced on their doorstep... in France.
16. Learn how to work the sewing machine and then make stuff!
17. Take a year off of life and travel with the hubby in a motorhome all over North America.
18. Eat a greek salad... in Greece.
19. Play a small role in a community theater/play house.
20. Read "Les Miserables" en francais.
21. Live really close to my sister.
22. Have a reason to carry and give out business cards.
23. Eat freshly caught fish.
24. Go on an Alaskan cruise!
25. Visit either New Zealand or Australia... or both!
26. Eat an entire gallon of ice cream at once. Or, at least, as much as I can eat...
27. Go on a short term missions trip.

What's on your life list?