Baptism, Birthday, and Back to School- Oh, My!

Howdy Ya'll (like I'm from Texas or something- NOT! But I love Texas and really wouldn't mind living there. Anyways...)


Friday was a very busy day. (That was yesterday for those of you who have lost touch with time as the Internet sucks you into its timeless powers).


My oldest son got baptised. WOW! I can't believe that I have an eight-year old.



After the baptism we headed back to the house and fed everyone dinner. It was very tasty. Then my son got to open his presents. I must say he is very loved (loved=spoiled) by his family and relatives.























I must say that he LOVED his golf clubs (Thanks Grands Hughes) and his Darth Vader Lightsaber (Thanks Grands Millett). He got new clothes and enough legos to build anything his heart desires. My amazing wife (next post will be more bragging about her) made this cake for the party. My son wanted a white shirt and tie to match his baptism. That yellow spot was an Angel Moroni tie tack (it kind of melted). It was a fantastic day.


On a different note, I was able to sleep in this morning. No tutoring. Although I do have to say that Grandma S. (The grandma for the boy I tutor) did something for me and my class that was WAY ABOVE and BEYOND the call of duty. She is such a sweet, giving lady. She is (if you ask me) under appreciated by her grand kids. She bought me a class set of Write Source 2000 Hardback Reference Books. (It was well over $700). I couldn't believe it. I kept telling her that she didn't need to do that. But she wanted to help the school. What a great lesson others could learn from. No, I don't mean that you need to drop $700 + dollars in your child's classroom, what I mean is that she wanted to doing something POSITIVE for the school. She had the ability to donate nice resource books. Maybe all you can afford is a little of your time. That can be harder than $700 to give up.

That reminds me,I was reading an article in a educational professional journal. It stated that dads don't come to school and participate because they are made to feel unwelcome. Well dads, is that true? Being a dad (but also a teacher) I don't see it that way (again, being the teacher is most assuredly skewing my thoughts here), but I am curious to see if that is truly the case. I would hope that ALL dads WANT to be involved and would participate at all costs. Chime in by posting a comment on this thought! Do it now before you forget!

I have been teased by some friends about all my posts being about school (they keep telling me to relax- what ever that means). Well, anyways, I just wanted to say that I officially have 23 students this year (7 more than last year, and the biggest class I have ever taught here in this town). I found out that one student won't be coming and there is still one more that is up in the air until Monday. After 6 more hours today, I have just a few more odd and ends to take care of I can comfortably welcome the first day of school. My problem is that I get their wild haired ideas that take an extra 2 hours to get ready. I hope it was worth it. Being a teacher, school looming- it can all be overwhelming. But VERY rewarding.

Well, we are off to my parents to take them dinner. Happy Olympics to all and to all a good night.
Later...

WOW! That Is All I Can Say.

After spending quite a few hours at the school getting things finalized, I was able to go out and eat with my little herd and my parents. That was great. Then we did family night. It was fun to talk with my son about his up coming baptism. Next, we got the kids in their jammies and headed up to my parents house. Because we missed the Opening Ceremonies for the Olympics, my parents recorded it with the DVR. It was nice (and not only because we didn't have to live through advertisement every 5 minutes, thank heavens for fast forward, but we took a 4 and 1/2 hour TV showing, and watched the good stuff in less than 2! I think that China did a great job with it. I loved the drums, I loved the type-set boxes that went up and down. I think that the LCD screen that was like a football field+ was cool and I really liked the end where the guy "ran" around the entire upper rim before lighting the cauldron.

The Globe was neat as well.

Then we watched as the men's gymnastics took bronze (which is good, but they could have had silver). We left to come home after midnight. These late nights are killing me, but it is the only time my wife and I can sit together and actually talk without the traumas of parenthood preventing a moment to discuss life!

I have a church meeting a few minutes, then lunch, and back to the school. Tomorrow I am heading out to our D.O. (District Office for those of you who are NOT teachers reading this) for training. The district is paying for me to...(Wait, I should say they are REIMBURSING me IF I get B or higher grades) get my Masters Degree in Administration. In order to do THAT, I have to be a level 5 in our district (which I won't take the time to explain except for this: It is a program that allows me to make a little extra money by doing A LOT of extra-curricular/after school workshops, etc.) Anyways, all this is to explain that I have 30 hours of training for level 5 and some of it takes place the next two days.

I look at the countdown timer at the top of the page and my heart stops, then I think, hey, I am ready- BRING IT ON! :)

Well, off to my meeting. Have a great day, Cheer for the USA in the Olympics, and,

Later...

Bad Slacker, Bad!

So I totally feel like a slacker for my neglect on posting the last couple of days, but I have done anything but slack off! I have been busy, busy, busy!
Let's see, I last posted on the 7th, so this is what has happened:
On the 8th, I spent the entire day (ok, not the ENTIRE day, but most it) at the school actually making headway and feeling that I might actually pull off the first day of school! (We'll see how that actually comes off). I also found out that I was WAY under-insured on my house. So I had to almost double my coverage! But at least now if my house burns down I can actually build a new one.
As for yesterday (the 9th), I took my little family to the Castle Valley Pageant. It was a blast! It rained pretty hard for the first little bit and then cleared up. It was a wonderful and touching. It reconfirmed my beliefs (I think we need that from time to time) and reminded me yet again why I feel, say, and do the things I do. Anyways, this is best left for my new blog: http://ldspointofview.blogspot.com/ so check that out for more of this talk! :) We missed the opening ceremonies and got home late (like 12:30) and I crashed.

Today, August 1oth, has been a really good day. I was able to tutor this morning and help my mom pay some of her on-line bills (which I enjoy doing and she saves postage- not to mention she gets to live in the 21st century) and then I headed to the school. After 6 hours of working I got a ton done. A lot of the little things got done that needed to be done and I am now free to move on to getting serious about planning out my first week. I do a lot of community building with my class. We do a lot of interaction games and activities and slowly add in the math and writing and everything else. The kids like the approach and I like that they seem to get along better and have more fun. Anyways, my wife and kiddies showed up for the last couple hours and were my helpers/slaves. My amazing wife was able to organize all my math manipulatives and supplies (markers, crayons, etc.) that the students use. (Thank you Honey! You are a life saver). We came home and I was able to mow that lawn (even with all the dead spots we are getting :( ) but couldn't water the lawn or finish the garden as the water was too low in the gravity ditch. Oh well!
I am excited however about inside the house. We bought new window treatments for our game room/exercise room. The previous owners had hung vertical blinds that were designed to cover a sliding glass door. TWO of them side by side and they took up the whole wall for two smaller windows. I had NO sorrow in my heart as those babies hit the carpet! Then we hung a nice curtain rod and tan/brown suede curtains. It looks really cool (I know, I need to be better about including photos with my posts- I do try. Just like Pod casting, I am SO FAR behind on that- Oh Well!) We had just finished dinner after hanging the curtains when my parents walked in and said they were watching the kids while my wife and I headed to the church to see a couple who was celebrating their 50th wedding anniversary. They had the most amazing cakes. One was a grand piano and the other was a mountain camping scene. While there, I also got to visit with the mom of one of my soon be students. My little family is really good friends with the mom's daughter who is in college. She(the daughter) is coming to dinner with our family tomorrow. YEA! The kids love her to pieces and she is so good with them.
Well, the Olympics will only be on for a short while longer and I want to watch. So I hope these ramblings made sense. Nothing too humorous or crazy! Enjoy- Tell your friends about this blog. I mean, who can't relate to my crazy and usually problem riddled life! :)
Later...