I've still been extra busy with school stuff, and I've been thinking about school a lot, so I feel like writing something that's mostly not about school. Let's see...this might not be too exciting. Yesterday the girl who cut my hair asked me what I like to do for fun, and I literally said, "Uhhhh..." until she asked me another question. I hate answering that question. Yes, I do things for fun, but I never feel like they are exciting enough to say to someone to answer the question. Like I like reading (even though I don't do it too much) and watching my TV shows and going for walks. I feel like that sounds kind of lame. I feel like I should say I like rock climbing and going clubbing and writing bestselling novels or something like that.
Speaking of haircut...I got my hair cut. All my hairs. I'm expecting at least 1 kid will tell me I look like a boy tomorrow. But I like it, and it's been a couple years since I last got lots of hair chopped off, which is one of my favorite pastimes. But I don't like the part where I have to acknowledge many, many times that yes, I did get my haircut. And that'll be tomorrow. But then it'll be done. I like the salon I went to this time (I found a half price coupon on their website), and the girl who cut it was really nice and I actually liked talking to her, so I'll probably go back there. I wanted my hair to look like JJ Heller's, and I guess it sort of does, but I also think I look like a woodland fairy.
Something else I've been up to that's unrelated to school is cooking. Lots of cooking. Last year I tried almost no new recipes. I made variations of stir fry and quesadillas and pasta and other simple things I like to make. But lately I've been trying lots of new recipes. In fact, I have enough food to last me a long time and more ingredients I need to use up. Today I bought a butternut squash, and I might try to make fries with that tomorrow. So far, I've made sweet potato fries, honey whole wheat biscuits, whole wheat pizza dough, sesame noodles, and tonight I had curried pumpkin vegetable soup. I'm spending a little bit more on food for now, but I think it will even out, because I have lots of leftovers I'm freezing. Plus I'm not eating out or getting takeout really at all, which I did from time to time last year, so I'm saving money that way. I've been pleasantly surprised that the dishes I've made have been pretty good so far, especially since I've been missing ingredients in most of them! I think I was initially inspired to try new recipes by the random foods that Kaitlin left behind. Like wheat germ. That inspired the pizza dough. And sesame seed oil inspired the sesame noodles. A can of pumpkin inspired the soup. I use the ingredient search on allrecipes.com. It's pretty amazing.
School was pretty good last week I think. I don't really remember. That's probably a good sign that nothing too traumatic happened. We had picture day. Oh, Monday was Teacher Appreciation Day at Chick Fil A. Awesome. I got the free combo meal of my choice. I couldn't find anyone to go with me, but I went myself and just brought it home, because there was no way I was going to miss it! The school days still seem long because I still have to stay with my class in specials, so I don't get a break at all. I think this week I'm not going to stay with them though.
I got a filing cabinet in my classroom, so I'm on a quest to get organized. One of my students (the quietest one) told me my desk was a mess. She's kind of right. I have a couple big stacks of papers. Between my lessons and resources from college and then all my stuff from my first two years of teaching, there's a lot at this point. I went to school both yesterday and today to get started on the organizing, but I didn't make much progress. It'll be a big job. And I'm almost done labeling books in my class library, which was another big job. I'd kind of like to know if this is going to be my last year at Urban Promise, because if not, I'll continue to tackle this big projects, but if it is, maybe I could afford to lay off a little bit.
Last thing: one of the highlights of my day is at 3:00 when school ends and my class either gets picked up or goes to after care. Except for one girl. She's not officially on the after care list which means I keep her in my classroom until 3:15, and if she's not picked up by then, I walk her to after care. She's pretty quiet and reserved during the school day, but at 3:00 she kind of lets loose, and she's really funny. We either play mancala (she legitimately beats me almost every time) or she reads me a really simple book. Both are great. I'm really thankful for that time just to hang out with her.
Tomorrow begins another week. Friday's an inservice day, then I'm going home for the weekend. So four days with kiddos. I can do it!
Speaking of haircut...I got my hair cut. All my hairs. I'm expecting at least 1 kid will tell me I look like a boy tomorrow. But I like it, and it's been a couple years since I last got lots of hair chopped off, which is one of my favorite pastimes. But I don't like the part where I have to acknowledge many, many times that yes, I did get my haircut. And that'll be tomorrow. But then it'll be done. I like the salon I went to this time (I found a half price coupon on their website), and the girl who cut it was really nice and I actually liked talking to her, so I'll probably go back there. I wanted my hair to look like JJ Heller's, and I guess it sort of does, but I also think I look like a woodland fairy.
Something else I've been up to that's unrelated to school is cooking. Lots of cooking. Last year I tried almost no new recipes. I made variations of stir fry and quesadillas and pasta and other simple things I like to make. But lately I've been trying lots of new recipes. In fact, I have enough food to last me a long time and more ingredients I need to use up. Today I bought a butternut squash, and I might try to make fries with that tomorrow. So far, I've made sweet potato fries, honey whole wheat biscuits, whole wheat pizza dough, sesame noodles, and tonight I had curried pumpkin vegetable soup. I'm spending a little bit more on food for now, but I think it will even out, because I have lots of leftovers I'm freezing. Plus I'm not eating out or getting takeout really at all, which I did from time to time last year, so I'm saving money that way. I've been pleasantly surprised that the dishes I've made have been pretty good so far, especially since I've been missing ingredients in most of them! I think I was initially inspired to try new recipes by the random foods that Kaitlin left behind. Like wheat germ. That inspired the pizza dough. And sesame seed oil inspired the sesame noodles. A can of pumpkin inspired the soup. I use the ingredient search on allrecipes.com. It's pretty amazing.
School was pretty good last week I think. I don't really remember. That's probably a good sign that nothing too traumatic happened. We had picture day. Oh, Monday was Teacher Appreciation Day at Chick Fil A. Awesome. I got the free combo meal of my choice. I couldn't find anyone to go with me, but I went myself and just brought it home, because there was no way I was going to miss it! The school days still seem long because I still have to stay with my class in specials, so I don't get a break at all. I think this week I'm not going to stay with them though.
I got a filing cabinet in my classroom, so I'm on a quest to get organized. One of my students (the quietest one) told me my desk was a mess. She's kind of right. I have a couple big stacks of papers. Between my lessons and resources from college and then all my stuff from my first two years of teaching, there's a lot at this point. I went to school both yesterday and today to get started on the organizing, but I didn't make much progress. It'll be a big job. And I'm almost done labeling books in my class library, which was another big job. I'd kind of like to know if this is going to be my last year at Urban Promise, because if not, I'll continue to tackle this big projects, but if it is, maybe I could afford to lay off a little bit.
Last thing: one of the highlights of my day is at 3:00 when school ends and my class either gets picked up or goes to after care. Except for one girl. She's not officially on the after care list which means I keep her in my classroom until 3:15, and if she's not picked up by then, I walk her to after care. She's pretty quiet and reserved during the school day, but at 3:00 she kind of lets loose, and she's really funny. We either play mancala (she legitimately beats me almost every time) or she reads me a really simple book. Both are great. I'm really thankful for that time just to hang out with her.
Tomorrow begins another week. Friday's an inservice day, then I'm going home for the weekend. So four days with kiddos. I can do it!
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