Larissa and I have had a fun and enjoyable Christmas break so far. We went to my families Christmas party in Stansbury Park on last week, Dec. 19th. It was a lot of fun, except driving on snowpacked freeways to get there. We also stopped at Larissa’s friends wedding reception on the way.
We have spent the last week with Larissa’s family in Orangeville. I never thought I would be spending so much time where Dad grew up….
Anyways, I went snowboarding with Larissa’s brother and sister up Huntington canyon on the day of Christmas Eve, which was a lot of fun. Her dad acted as the ski lift, dropping us off at the top and picking us up and driving back up after every run. I don’t know how much he enjoys doing it, but it is really nice of him to do so. He says it beats spending the day at work, so I guess that’s good. The snow was really good, and there weren’t that many people at first, but more came later in the day.
Larissa’s sister got Guitar Hero World Tour for Christmas so we have played a little bit of that. She has beaten everybody that played her, except I finally beat her on one song. She was upset because I ruined her dynasty, but, I got some confidence back…enough to take on my brother Adam (and win).
Here are just a few pictures I have taken with my new camera:
Archive for ◊ 2008 ◊
11. He makes me want to be a better person.
12. He is a very hard worker.
13. He has taken me places I’ve never been: Disneyland, the beach, Africa…
14. He starts the car and scrapes my windows for me every morning!
15. He’s a good cook. If only I could get him to do it more often…
16. He’s a BYU fan.
17. He wears clothes I buy for him, even if he doesn’t like them, just so I won’t feel bad.
18. He helps me with grading for school.
19. He lets me have most of the closet space.
20. He helps clean the house.
As many of you know, my birthday was on the first. It was a big one: 25! Jason made me a cake, took me to dinner, and took me shopping. He gave me the Sleeping Beauty DVD and a sweatshirt. My students were quite excited too. My 9th graders think it’s weird that their teacher is only 10 years older than they are because “teachers are supposed to be old already when we’re born!” They wrote me notes on my white board and sang to me. It was a good day.
We haven’t updated the blog in awhile so I though I would just give a quick update. Larissa is as busy as ever with her educating of adolescent minds. She is doing an excellent job though, and that isn’t just my opinion, she scored off the charts on her evaluations last week.
I have been busy with school and work, but it hasn’t been too bad. Just in case anyone is interested, I will be graduating in December 2009. I will then be applying to grad school at BYU, and….perhaps another large university north of BYU. Larissa is completing her reading endorsement through BYU and has a couple years to do that, so I am stuck to going somewhere close. I am taking a GRE course right now to prepare myself for it, and will most likely be taking it sometime in January. I am learning big words like “loquacious” and “amalgamate.”
I got this idea from a girl in our ward. She made a list of 100 things she loves about her husband. I want to do the same, but I’m going to do it 10 by 10. So here is the first 10 (not necessarily the top 10).
1. He’s handsome!
2. He lets me listen to country music in the car even though he doesn’t really like it.
3. He eats whatever I cook.
4. He acts interested in my Middle School stories.
5. He likes to surprise me.
6. He thinks I’m the most beautiful girl in the world and makes me feel like I really am.
7. He lets me cry on his shoulder but isn’t the one making me cry.
8. He is a worthy priesthood holder.
9. He has great musical talent. I love to listen to him play the piano and the guitar and sing.
10. He’s willing to do anything for me. (Like driving from Orem to the airport in rush hour traffic in 20 minutes to give me something I forgot. He didn’t actually do that but he offered!)
I LOVE YOU JASON!
So people must think I have fallen off the face of the earth! But no, I’m still here. I have officially survived the first quarter of this school year. It has been a little overwhelming. I have 3 preps this year, and even though it is only one more than last year, it feels like a lot more work. Plus, on top of my teacher responsibilities, I started taking classes this semester to get my reading endorsement. I have learned so much in such a short time! I am excited to continue on into the program, but it is more work.
Tomorrow, I am getting on a plane and flying to Denver for the National Middle School Association’s national convention with a few other teachers from my school.
Although I feel I never get a break, I still love teaching!
It has gotten pretty cold out, so I decided to take out the air conditioner yesterday. After I had removed the A/C and was going to close the window I noticed there was a big ol’ black widow hiding out in the frame:
I fought with it for about an hour by spraying it with insect killer (it may have worked eventually) and cutting it with scissors (I only cut off a couple legs and was too scared to cut at it’s body). Surprisingly there was enough room between the window and the frame that just shutting the window wouldn’t smash it. So I grabbed -something- (I won’t say what it was, I just grabbed the first thing I found that fit) small enough to tape to the window and fit in the frame and pushed it closed and smashed it. It was a yucky mess! I’m glad I didn’t get bit though when I took out the A/C, I’m sure my hand must have been very close to it.
Well, it has been a whole month since either me or Larissa has posted to our blog. Sorry to any readers we might have had….
Things have been pretty busy for both of us. I started my senior year at BYU. I have mostly geology classes which is great but I have been gone a lot for field trips. Larissa doesn’t like it too much when I am gone. I guess it is good to know that I am loved enough that she misses me so much. I started out the semester on a field camp from Aug. 18-30th, before regular classes started. I spent the first week camping in Albion Basin near Alta, UT. We mapped the rock formations, faults, and other geologic features. The second week we did a little bit more traveling and went to Zion NP, Bryce Canyon NP, and Capitol Reef NP, with a few other stops along the way. I took quite a few pictures. They can be seen in the Geology 210 Gallery.
For another geology class, (Petroleum Systems Analysis) we spent a few days in Wyoming looking at anticlines, trapping mechanisms and other structures. You can see those pictures here: Wyoming Field Trip
Over Melon Days weekend, instead of going down to Green River as usual, I went to a career fair in Laramie, WY called the Rocky Mountain Rendezvous. A lot of oil and gas companies were there such as ExxonMobil, Anadarko, Shell, ConocoPhilips, Bill Barrett Corp, and many more. I was able to interview with a few of them looking for a summer internship. Unfortunately most of them were only looking to hire grad students. I knew that going in but it was still a great opportunity to do some networking with the recruiters and also to get some valuable interview practice. I learned a lot about the petroleum industry, which was really exciting.
This last week was the muzzleloader deer hunt. Jeremy and I went out on Saturday, Sep. 27th. I was able to get a couple long shots off (~250yds) at a pretty good sized 4×4 buck. After that I only saw a 2 point and didn’t want to shoot at it. I was able to go again on thursday with my cousin Clint. He spotted some big bodied deer from far away so we went to get a closer look at them. I hiked through the quakies that we figured they must have layed down in and pushed them out to him and his nephew Kaden. Kaden got a shot and just missed, but I never saw them. We hiked up a mountain to try and find them again. We came around a corner and I saw them and called back to kaden and clint so they could get a shot as well. There were 2 big bucks, (bigger than the two I saw on saturday, and a smaller buck). They started to take off so I took a shot and missed… They were only about 50 yds away so it was very embarassing and frustrating. I don’t really have an excuse for missing this time. The gun is missing a the colored part of the sight, but I really don’t know how I missed. We never saw them again. I think the gun needs to be sighted in. I’ll just blame it on that.
Well, we will try to do better at posting more regularly. We are having a great conference weekend and enjoying the inspired talks.
Well, summer vacation is officially over. I went back to school on Monday. This will be my second year teaching at Crescent View Middle School in Sandy, third year teaching total. For the first time, I will be teaching 9th grade. As frightening as that thought was to me at first, I am now very excited. I have some really great kids! I will still be teaching a couple of 7th grade classes. They are co-taught inclusion classes, which makes me quite apprehensive, but they also are great kids, just struggling, so it should be fine.
I can’t believe how tired teaching makes me! I am having a hard time readjusting to the early mornings and busy days. I get home and just crash on the couch, exhausted!
I mentioned to Larissa a long time ago that she should cut my hair. I couldn’t ever convince her to do it, but for some reason the other day she said she would do it! We went to the store and bought a hair cutting kit before she could change her mind. She did REALLY good. I thought I might have to wear a hat for a few days but it actually looks great as you can see in the pictures. I’m happy she did so well because now she will be motivated to cut it again. I think she is actually excited for it to grow out so she can cut it again.
Comments