Goin' against the Grain

I mentioned in a previous post that Matt and I will have a lot of decisions to make when he comes home, and some before he comes home. One of those decisions involves me and teaching. I have decided not to pursue a full time teaching job next year. There were some openings available that sounded like good possibilities (to apply for and see...), but there has been a tug at my heart to remain somewhat open and flexible. I have had the concern about the combination of teaching full time next year and adjusting to life with Matt home again. When I have mentioned this concern to professors or others asking my plans for next year, sometimes I apparently appear to have two heads. "Of course you can handle it." Maybe I would be able to handle it, but I do not desire the added stress on our relationship. I love Matt so much...that's why I married him. I am sticking by my decision to substitute ...but waiting on the Lord for a different direction if He has one. So, I'm not really writing this to justify myself...but sort of explain this...since it has been a very real, growing experience for me as I'm learning how to be the kind of wife I need to be for my husband.

As a teacher, time is very important for planning, correcting, faculty meetings, mentor meetings all in addition to teaching time... As a first year teacher, I would be pretty much starting from scratch for lessons, activities, ideas, etc. It's part of teaching, and a part that I really enjoy. However, next fall, I cannot justify spending extra hours away from home or at home but not really "being" home with my husband. When he comes home, I need to be free to take care of the things at home and be a blessing, support, and partner to my Matt. We found out this week, that October is looking more likely for Matt to be home than July. If possible, I would like to be out in California as much as I can. That just would not be possible if I'm teaching. My heart would be with him...and I wouldn't be giving the children/students what they need or my husband what he needs. When he does come home in October, we will have been married 22 months...12 of those he will have been away from home. Not living with your husband for over half of your marriage, however long or short, is significant. There is going to be some adjustment and I think some more dating all over again. Don't get me wrong, I haven't lost my love for him, quite the contrary. I would just like to be wise in prioritizing and making the place and environment he comes home to a loving and welcoming one. Then maybe as the year goes on, a long term sub position will open...who knows? I need to be open to moving as well...I follow and go with my husband, and we do not know where he will be working yet. We do not want to settle down because of the location of where my job is but where his is.

Since Matt has been gone, I have come to appreciate the many aspects of home responsibilities even more. When we were first married, I was going to grad school full time and working at the Y's childcare part-time and then full time as I phased out of grad school. I was busy with school work when I wasn't working or at class. Matt helped out a lot around the apartment. Since he has been gone, it has been almost a full time job just making sure everything is taken care of. It would probably help to have a different apartment ;) , but this is where we are!

Because of my flexible schedule, for the most part, I have been able to receive Matt's calls and IM's. Those are priceless. I am realizing what I blessing I can be to my Matt by staying home. Since we do not have children yet, I don't think I need to not work at all outside the home...but I need to keep in mind I married my husband not my work. I hope I am making sense. I was encouraged by a prayer for Matt's priorities this week from "The Power of a Praying Wife Book of Prayers" by Stormie Omartian. I'm going to share the whole prayer, it's found on page 70 of the little book.

"Lord, I pray for my husband's priorities to be in perfect order. Be Lord and Ruler over his heart. Help him to choose a simplicity of life that will allow him to have time alone with You, Lord, a place to be quiet in Your presence every day. Speak to him about making Your Word, prayer, and praise a priority. Enable him to place me and our children in greater prominence in his heart than career, friends, and activities.
I pray he will seek You first and submit his all to You, for when he does I know the other pieces of his life will fit together perfectly.
Help me to properly put my husband before children, work, family, friends, activities, and interests. Show me what I can do right now to demonstrate to him that he has this position in my heart."

This has been a little bit difficult and confusing. I spent 4 years in college to receive a teaching degree, then 1 year for my Master's...and in NY, I only have 5 years to get those 3 years of teaching in and a Master's to become permanently certified. This fall, I will have 3 years left (and we all know upstate NY is booming with elementary teaching positions)...actually dropping me down to 2 because of my decision for next year. Was all the time, education (and gulp, money?)a "waste"? I don't believe so, even though it doesn't make much sense to me. Will I ever use my degree beyond subbing? I do not know what will happen with all this, but I do know I need to be faithful to the Lord's leading for my life, my husband, and our family. My intentions are not to preach to others about how they need their marriage and families to be. This is where I am. Please keep us in your prayers! We appreciate it! I'll take some words of wisdom and advice too!

*I love you Matt!

Kissaroo and the Barnyard too!

So, I'll start with Kissaroo! I taught kindergarten this week, and I saw this book and thought it was absolutely adorable!! It's called, "Won't You Be My Kissaroo?" by Joanne Ryder and Melissa Sweet. I still need help with my links, so just check it out on amazon or something. I really want to get it! It's written for children, from a mom sheep to her lamb sort of ....but I'll let you in on a secret....I videotaped myself reading it and put it on the other blog I have for Matt for his birthday video. Yes, there's a reason why he's the only one who can read that blog. Nobody else would want to listen to me read a silly story, with lots of bloopers because I just copied down the text real quick at the end of the day and couldn't read my handwriting!

Sidenote: How cool is my family??? They sent I think 32 emails to Matt for his birthday!! Thank you family!! It helps to have a big family, but that's so awesome!!

The book is sort of written like a poem and talks about all different kinds of wonderful kisses...hehe. Good morning kisses, hello kisses, good-bye kisses, breakfast sticky kisses, "gotcha" kisses, and on and on. I think it's one of my favorites. So sweet! It's not one for a good plot though! However, I think it's one any parent would enjoy reading (well, Moms anyway) to their little one or even wives to their husbands (big points for any husband who reads it to their wives)! haha Hooray! I made a plug for Literacy! I need to use that Master's degree some time. Someday, maybe I'll share more of my favorite "children's" books. That's about all the kind of books I've read in the past 6 years, besides text books. I did start an "adult" book today, haha...ok, a novel, so we'll see how that goes.

This weekend, well, Thursday on, my parents are out of town. Roberts had a track meet, Christian Nationals, out in Indiana and my dad coaches, so he's often gone most weekends (until super early Sunday mornings ...for church). My mom went with him this time. Being the helpful daughter I am (ok, the boring one out of the 4 kids without much of a ...a...busy life, no that's not right. Yeah, I guess just the boring one right now), was stuck with, I mean left with the responsibility of taking care of the animals. Caleb, our dog is alright, but right now he stinks! It's pouring outside, and I'm thankful to have just finished feeding the animals. We all (the animals: sheep, goats, donkey, horse, ducks, Caleb... and I) got pretty wet. Several weeks ago Caleb must have sat on a skunk or, probably rolled on a skunk. Oh man he stunk! He's an indoor dog that's an outdoor dog at heart. He loves being outside, but he loves people too. So, he's in when the weather is bad and during the night or when the family is inside for the most part. Anyways, no, as far as I know he hasn't had another date with a skunk but anytime it rains and he gets wet...that scent just bursts on forth! I put off filling the water troughs till tonight, so I had to stand in the rain with the hose while he runs around sniffing things out. I was hoping the weather would call for several inches of rain...so I wouldn't have to fill them ;) just kidding..? At least they were all where they were supposed to be tonight. This morning, I was in a hurry (to go babysit Nathanael), isn't that the way it always is? and one of the ducks was out and the littlest lamb was in the wrong stall ma-jig. The last day I have to deal with you and this is what you do? We still have yet to figure out how that duck keeps getting out. She's pretty tricky! On the neat end, we have 3 eggs in a nest in the barn. We'll see if we get some little ducklings! Matt and I have discussed this whole animal issue when we have kids several times. This is our conclusion: We don't mind having fish as pets (haha) or at most, a dog. (Oh wait, we might have to have Matt's chinchilla, Yoda, for awhile...sigh...at least it's small :) As soon as our kids ask for the "bigger and better pets"....we ship them off for a weekend at Grandma and Grandpa's. They can help out all they want. (My parents waited till all us kids were grown up to finally get half the animal we wanted...a horse...they have a mini-horse.) Hey, maybe our kids can even persuade them to get a different animal, but it stays at Grandma and Grandpa's!! Grandparents really do spoil the grandkids waayy more than their kids. Hopefully, that'll still be the case when our kids come around! Our kids will be able to have the fun of "having" animals, but we won't have the mess! And, we won't be stuck with the animals, after the novelty has worn off for them and/or when we want to go on vacation!

*I love you...even though you like chinchillas...ew.

the joys of teaching

I really do enjoy teaching, but some days do come along that I feel like I need to reconvince myself. Subbing is a little intimidating sometimes because of the fear of the unknown: what the class will be like, quality of the plans, and countless other "little things" that could quickly turn into "big things". Yesterday, was one of those days I wasn't whole heartedly enthusiastic to get back into teaching...and then I received a call this morning for the same class today.

I was in a 3rd grade, and honestly, it was an ok day until 2 boys almost got into a brawl. The disrespect, even after being reprimanded, and feeling of entitlement on behalf of each of the boys was unacceptable and frustrating for me. I did the best I was able to in the situation with the amount of time I had, but it still left me feeling...ugghh. Is this really what I want to do? I really love the teaching part, but dealing with nasty monkey business isn't my favorite. I come home thinking, if my child ever said those things to his/her teacher...or did that to a classmate... I hope and pray my husband and I will be able to train our children, with the Lord's guidance, what is right and wrong and the proper place and respect children, I believe, should maintain and give to those in authority. I also hope these children learn too.

Yes, I was also the meanie or imcompassionate teacher when I received 2 requests for the nurses office by 2 little girls, one with a canker sore, the other a bruise she got a couple days ago. I think you're going to be ok! Am I really that bad that you want to leave on account of old bruises and a canker sore?? I do remember in 5th grade when we would race to sign up for the bathroom when the teacher would pull out her guitar. Come on now! I'm not singing Kermit the Frog songs ("It's not Easy Being Green") to you! We also sang Mariah Carey's "Hero" song. Umm, we felt a little, ...a lot, silly.

On the other hand, I had some really memorable times with these students. In Social Studies we read and discussed about farming and manufacturing. We talked about how goods are sometimes bought from other countries and we ship ours to other countries too. So, off the cuff, to make it "real" for them I told them, "if they were comfortable" to ask the partner next to them to check the tag on the neck of their t-shirt to see where it was made. You would've thought I brought in a 10 pound bag of candy! They thought this was the best activity ever! (Though I did have to emphasize NOT to take their shirts OFF...oh dear, talk about getting fired!) Students were coming up to me dragging their partner along by the tag to ask me how to read, "Indonesia" and "Malasia" and all sorts of different countries. Yes, I believe 2 or 3 were made in the good old U.S.A....I was actually surpised that many were. Watching the students make their connections and seeing that light bulb go off is such a thrill for me. These kids had down by the end of today what supply and demand meant, as well as scarcity and a couple other terms I thought were pretty hefty for 8 year olds. It was also exciting for them catching onto division with remainders.

And of course, there's always at least one flub for me when subbing. I took the kids out for recess and were just heading back in as another class was coming out. Literally, like 4 steps from the door, I watched as the little prop thing (umm, a classy piece of shingle I think), that stopped the door from shutting, fell out and left us with a locked door. The students were yelling, "AHH, we're locked out!" just as any dramatic 3rd grader would, and so I asked them what they do when this happens. "Uhh, this doesn't really happen. We could walk to the front door!" As much fun as it would be to walk alll the way around the school, most certainly disrupting each class with their windows open, we waited for someone inside to walk by and rescue us. Sure enough, within a few minutes we were back in the building to the classroom. I felt like a stupid substitute, but oh well, if that was the worse thing that happened to today...I'll settle for it.

I did take myself out for a McDonald's burger and milkshake tonight. That was my reward and wrap up to a good day! Those chocolate shakes are like a spa treatment! Well, I've never been to a spa...but I think I can make some connections!

February 14, 2008...next year will be way better

Today is Valentine's Day. Valentine's Day isn't a huge holiday for me. Let's face it, it's only been the past 2 years that I've had my Special Someone. I'm not opposed to the holiday, it's just not my super favorite. I think it can be a good reminder when life gets so busy to make sure you let your loved one/s know you love them and care. It's also kind of fun. Plus, I like any day that emphasizes chocolate. So, I guess my idea of the day makes it a little easier for me, considering our circumstances.

I did receive my favorite Valentine's Day gift today though...an email from Matt! It had been a week. I was so happy to see it! He's not having the best time...to put it lightly, he's literally working like 20 hour days. I wish I could do something. I wish I could be more. I wish I could give him a good gift. I wish I could massage his neck and shoulders and give him the rest he needs. I'm sure he's exhausted. I have dreams, almost every night, that he surprises me. He comes home for a short leave. Last night, I dreamt I went to see him. Dreams are so weird. You know, everything is so real. I can feel his hugs in my dreams. I really miss those. I can't recreate them in my mind, except for me looking on him hugging "me." So anyway, my prayers are for good rest for Matt for Valentine's Day, and also for a better working environment as a whole.

So what did I do today? I subbed in a 2nd grade classroom and spent the day with super sugar-high 7 year olds. I told them my favorite kind of Valentine Candy is Hershey Kisses, and I received some by the end of the day :) It was fun, but I was ready to go home and relax by the end. I also went out to dinner with Matt's parents at Uno's. It was a special time, and we laughed a lot. I had the buffalo chicken quesadilla. I know, it's supposed to be an appetizer, but it was soo good! So there, I stretched myself by trying something new. I didn't order my same old personal pizza or the potato skin pizza (a delicious choice). It's all about those baby steps...for me and Bill Murray!!

*I love you, Bubba!! Happy Valentine's Day! We're almost down in the 7 month range. Wow, that is huge! 7 months is a lot better than 12!!