Change...

Oh the times, they are a changing.  I've never been a big fan of change.  I like what I know and what I'm comfortable with.  Change is new.  It's different...and unknown.  It's even a little bit scary.  But it can also be exciting at the same time.  And like the cartoon says, sometimes change can be good.

Without giving anything away, or speaking prematurely (even though things are "definite" as of yesterday, I don't think they're set in stone yet...the ink's not even dry) I know I can safely say that there are a lot of changes happening at my school.  And as of yesterday, I am one of the ones making a change.  I'm not entirely sure how I feel about it.  I'm OK with it, but I think it is also very bitter-sweet.  And I'll save more on that for another day...hopefully it will all be finalized before school actually starts next year.    :)

As my team (the group of 2nd grade teachers I am lucky to work with) prepares for change, I am reminded of the last time our grade level had a major change.  It was 4 years ago.  We've changed a little each year since then, too, but that year we lost 3 people all at the same time.  It was very difficult, but then it also brought 3 new people into my life that I am lucky to have been able to work with and be friends with.  But as I am feeling sentimental in the face of change, I would like to reminisce about that old team for a moment.  Those ladies were and still are some of my best friends.  I mean, who else would (at the beginning of the school year when we all had more important things to be doing) take the time to use spare fabric to recreate cheesy high school senior portraits of each other?  And who else would use those pictures, along with some other lovelies to create the best hospital room decorations when one of their own was diagnosed with leukemia?

And as much as I miss working with these ladies, I know the ones that have moved on are happy doing bigger and better things.  And as I've said, it enabled me to meet, teach with, and become friends with more amazing women.  So, I'm sure that this change (whatever it finally ends up being) will be for the best and will work out just fine. 

So for now, I'll leave you with a couple of quotes and a song:

~  "All changes, even the most longed for, have their melancholy; for what we leave behind us is a part of ourselves; we must die to one life before we can enter another."   ~Antole France

~  "Life is change.  Growth is optional.  Choose wisely."

Long Time No Blog...

Sheesh.  I'm terrible.  You'd think I was busy or something.   :)

Well, in an effort to put a smile on some of your faces, I thought I'd share the music that brought a smile to mine today.  While driving to and from t-ball this morning, I was taken back to another time with 2 songs that I just LOVE to sing to:

4 Non Blondes = What's Going On

and

Blind Melon = No Rain

True...they're not the best songs ever written.  Far from it.  But they're just fun to sing, and they sure brightened up my day a little bit.  Then on my way home from a movie with one of my besties (yes, that's right...I have besties), I heard another gem:

Spin Doctors = Two Princes



Well, that's all I can muster for today.  But I hope at least some of you enjoyed this musical trip to the past. 

Happy Mothers Day to all of you mommies out there!

Books...

Come on, sing it with me:  "Butterfly in the sky, I can go twice as high.  Take a look.  It's in a book.  It's Reading Rainbow."  Reading Rainbow...  Did any of you ever watch that show?  I don't think I ever really did.  But I've developed an appreciation for it throughout my years of teaching.

Anyway, I thought it would serve as a fun introduction for the wonderful topic of books. I idn't start loving books until I didn't "have" to read them anymore.  You know, when I wasn't being forced to read for school.  Now, I'm not saying that teachers shouldn't still require the reading of these books.  Of course they should.  I'm just saying that for whatever reason it didn't work for me.  I thought of books as work, instead of fun.  Now, though, I have a completely different attitude.  A good book is entertainment...an escape...a way to relax and get caught up at the same time.

What brought about this change of heart, you ask?  Well, as I've said a few times before...I am a self-professed nerd.  As I was doing my student teaching, the Harry Potter books were still relatively new and were all the rage.  So I figured, if I was going to be a decent teacher and be in on what the "kids these days are into".  I started reading out of dutiful soon to be teacher obligation.  But I finished reading the first 4 of the books (which was all that were out at that time) over Christmas break out of sheer enjoyment.  That was it.  The nerdy beginning of my relationship with books.

Seeing as how I've already gotten a little wordy, I'll try to keep the rest of this as short as possible.  But I'm going to share some of my favorites, with the hopes that you'll share some of your own.  And I'll end with some great quotes that were shared with me by a friend at school.  Here we go:

Favorites
(in no particular order)

* The Harry Potter series
* The Hunger Games series
* The Twilight series
* The Notebook, The Choice, and the rest of the Nicholas Sparks books
* Little Women
* My Sister's Keeper and the other Jody Piccoult books that I've read so far

Coming Soon
(books I've yet to read, but am eager to)

* The Help
* The True Blood Collection
* Water for Elephants
* Bitter is the New Black and other Jen Lancaster books

Quotes

* "It's not true that we have only one life to live; if we can read, we can live as many more lives and as many kinds of lives as we wish."    -S.I.Hayakawa
* "My test of a good novel is dreading to begin the last chapter."    ~Thomas Helm
* "Outside of a dog, a book is man's best friend. Inside of a dog, it's too dark to read."   - Groucho Marx


:)  :)

Pranks...

In honor of April Fool's Day...

Classic

The link above is for a classic prank on Ashton Kutcher's old show, Punk'd.  I never watched the show much, but I did see the Justin Timberlake episode.  The prank was so terrible, yet it couldn't help but be funny at the same time.

Now I, myself, have never really gotten into April Fool's Day...or pranks for that matter.  Many pranks are mean spirited and can end up being hurtful.  Other pranks can be found annoying or just piss someone off.  I would, however, like to reminisce about a few pranks in my memory:

~ My mom has always been afraid of snakes.  And when we were kids, we all knew it.  Well, my brothers would love to scare her (I do believe it was a tradition that started with Brad and was lovingly passed on to Josh).  Being that they're boys, they had one or two rubber snakes as toys.  And it wasn't unheard of for them to drop them from the top of the stairs as she was carrying laundry through the hallway.  She would stop.  Frozen.  Mouth gaping.  Silent. I mean, not a sound escaped her for several long seconds (I don't even know if she breathed). 

~ I have written about this next one before, but this time I think I'll give my dear, sweet older brother the benefit of the doubt by calling it a prank (rather than a mean spirited, intentional, repetitive, nightmare causer).  In the moments before I went to bed, Brad would sneak into my room and hide under my bed.  (I wonder how long he had to wait under there sometimes)  He would wait for me to turn off the light and get into bed.  But he had to time it perfectly...after I sat down, but before I picked my legs up.  He would simultaneously grab my ankles and scream.  Scared the living daylights out of me every time.

~ Have you ever smelled Corn Nuts?  If so, you know they only smell good to someone who's eating them at that time.  I've never had much of a problem with the scent, myself.  But a great friend and co-worker of mine HATES the smell.  So one year the other 2nd grade teachers and I decided it would sure be funny if we bought a whole bunch of Corn Nuts, put them in open containers, and scatter/hide them all over her classroom.  We also thought it would be good to give some to her students to eat in the morning and tell them to give her a nice breathy "Hhhhello" when the saw her.  But we ran out of time had a change of heart.

~ That same wonderful year at school, I had another fabulous friend and co-worker that was (still probably is) very afraid of snakes.  Well, it just so happened that I had just bought a tiny plastic (not even that realistic) snake for Mason.  So, again, us brilliant 2nd grade teachers thought it would be hilarious to hide it in her room.  Well, it got put in her lunch in such a way that when she opened her mini-fridge the lunch tipped over and the snake fell out.  She screamed, got on a chair, and I believe she told her kids to stay away so that they didn't get bitten.  It was greatness, and she was SUCH a good sport about it!

How about you?  Are there any pranks/practical jokes that you've done, had done too you, or even just heard about?  If so, please share them!

I'll leave you with another video.  This is something that I am literally surrounded with everyday...between the kids at school and my own monsters sweet angels at home.  You know, saying mean things just to take them back by saying they're "just kidding".

Just kidding

Friends...

It seems all to often that something happens in my day-to-day life that reminds me of something that happened on Friends (even though my life is about as different from those on the show as you can get).  But nonetheless, it is one of my all-time favorite TV shows.  Don't worry, this post won't be anywhere near as brilliantly thought provoking lengthy as the one I did about LOST.  But it should still be a fun trip down memory lane.

Sometime last year I posted something on facebook asking people to tell me their favorite Friends episodes.  There were a lot of great answers.  I thought I would try to find as many clips of those episodes as I could, and include some others just for fun.

~Recommended by:
     * Chris Andrews = The one with the quiz
     * Katie McSween and Kim Dickson= The one where no one's ready (although I couldn't find a clip
        of Monica changing the outgoing message...sorry)
     * Heather Roth = The one with the lobsters
     * Jaime Peavy = The one where Chandler and Phoebe flirt
     * Angie Rhodes = The one with all the football
     * Jenny Goodwin = The one with unagi
     * Dakota Moncrief = The one with the ATM vestibule

~Some others for your viewing pleasure:
     * The one where Ross says pivot
     * The one where Ross gets a tan
     * The one with Gladys
     * The one with the cheesecake
     * The one with seven

And I know there are many...MANY other hilarious clips out there (not to mention some of the more touching moments that I completely left off).  So PLEASE fee free to add some of your favorite Friends moments.

Lent...

I think we all know about Lent being the season of preparation for the death and resurrection of Jesus.  So, we won't get into all of that.  But today at mass, our Deacon referred to the season of Lent as "a cycle...but not a circle."  He said something to the effect of:  although it comes around each year, I would hope that we are not in the same place in our relationship with God that we were the previous year.  Hopefully, we are just a little further along...a little closer.  In that regard, I like to think of the cyclical nature of Lent as a spiral that keeps coming around, but also keeps moving us along on our faith journey.  I would also like to share a link to a Blog that I occasionally read.  I think this post is beautifully written.  (click here)

All that being said, I have a confession to make.  This is usually SO not like me (not the confession part, but what I'm confessing to).  Are you ready?  You're not going to believe this.....I can't.  I.  Missed.  Ash Wednesday.  I know, I know.  I felt (and still feel) horrible about it.  This is in no way a justification, but it is the only explanation that I have.  And it's a terrible one:  I was just so selfishly wrapped up in myself and my complaining about work and the week that would never end.  I didn't realize what day it was (aside from being the Wednesday of one of the longest weeks ever), until it was almost over.  I was very humbled and ashamed by that realization.

That led to a lot of reflection and contemplation about what I was going to do for Lent.  I won't tell you what I'm doing, because (just like advertising your tithing) it kind of negates some of the goodness behind it.  But I will share a link to a website I found that gives scripture verses to go along with an alternate view of "what to give up for Lent".  (click here)  On that same note, here are some things that were in our church bulletin this morning:

• Give up 10-15 minutes of sleep ~ Instead, use that time for prayer
• Give up buying nonessentials for yourself ~ Instead, give that money to someone in need
• Give up looking at other people's worst points ~ Instead, focus on their best ones

We also had a conversation with Hannah and Mason about Lent and why we give up things as a form a sacrifice.  They each decided on something to give up.  And they also decided that it would be good if they tried to do one kind thing for each other every day.  Not a bad idea.  (We'll see how well it works.)

And now, I will just leave you with this...The Prayer of St. Francis.  (click here)

Star-Crossed Lovers...

So, Kevin and I took the kids to see Gnomeo and Juliet on Sunday.  I thought it was very cute.  It got me thinking about the other versions of the play that I have seen. 

We had to watch (I mean got to watch) the original 1968 version in my Freshman year of High School.  Despite the nude scene, which we were warned to act maturely about, I found it to be very dull and slow moving.  And it did little to nothing to help us understand what Shakespeare's words meant.

The next year, though, Romeo + Juliet was released.  It was the version with Leonardo DiCaprio and Claire Danes.  I found it to be the exact opposite of the original.  In other words, I actually thought it was entertaining.  And I found that the acting made Shakespeare's words very easy to understand.  I thoroughly enjoyed it, even if it was a bit weird at times.

I found this website that compares the 2 movies, if you're interested.

It has also gotten me thinking about other stories/movies that share the star-crossed lovers theme.  Here are the ones I came up with:

* West Side Story
* Twilight
* Titanic
* Dirty Dancing
* Tristan and Isolde
* The Notebook

How about you?  Are there any others you can think of?  Or do you have any thoughts on Romeo and Juliet?