Life as I know it

Merry Christmas

2011-12-25T08:35:00.003-09:00

I haven't felt very festive this year. Maybe it's because I didn't go to tuba christmas. Maybe cause I didn't put up a tree. Maybe it's because there has been a lot of stuff that has happened in the last couple weeks that has made me stressed out. I'm voting on the latter. I know Christmas means more than just a tree, stockings, gifts, etc., it's a time for remembering the birth of Christ and being thankful. (And I'm trying to be thankful). It's just been a rough couple of weeks.
To start things off my job is giving me fits. I've made it through half the year and part of me wants to stop teaching. The kids are great (for the most part) but there are other things that are making it difficult. To the point of either I'm teaching at another school or I'm not teaching next year. There were a few days I was angry about all of this and then I talked to the union and talked to Bryan and just decided that they were winning if I was angry.
The next little fun surprise was that Bryan became unemployed. I'm still trying not to be angry about this one. I realize that it's not my job but I don't think he was treated fairly. That's the part that angers me. Hello people grow up and be adults.
And finally, it looks like we will be going to court. So I have to take time off (unpaid) from work. Ugh. Oh well.
Enough with the bad things.
We had a very snowy November and then December has been kinda bipolar. We have had "warm" windy weather (like 80mph wind gusts) that has melted snow and caused ice. Then we've had a good bit of snow. Monday the 12th school was closed for a snow day. We just got like 9 inches of snow in a 6 hour period and no one was ready for it. Thankfully all the big snow this week has been while winter break has happened. Thursday it snowed all day and we got about 5-6 inches and then it really snowed that night and we got an additional 12 inches. That was fun to shovel. Thankfully the neighbor across the street came and helped out with his snow blower. It was particularly nice since the plows left a huge berm at the end of my driveway. *Random side note: The plows are never here right after if snows, we usually have to wait a couple days for them to do our street. It was a big surprise for them to be out right after it snowed.* Well last night it started snowing again and we have probably about 4 or so inches of additional snow. At some point today I'll get out and shovel the driveway since I have to go to the airport tonight. I'm flying to Illinois to see my family for a few days. One last snow comment. We have shoveled so much snow that we have a snow pile in between our driveway and the neighbors that it's taller than I am (by quite a bit).
This week has been a lot of cleaning and organizing. My friend Carol moved into the 3rd bedroom about a month ago so almost everything in there got moved into the living room so that it could be sorted and have the appropriate thing done with it whether labeled and stored or thrown away. It has been a slow process and it's not quite done yet. I've also reorganized my room.
Bryan has cleaned the kitchen and his room and has been very helpful with all the other projects. Although it's a struggle to have him unemployed, I have really enjoyed the time I've gotten to spend with him. When he was working 60+ hours in the week and I only saw him a couple hours on the weekends, it made it really difficult to be happy with our relationship. My frustration was mostly with his work. Although I never have felt that they treated him the best there. It's been nice to talk and sit on the couch and watch a movie or cook together. Heck it's been fun to shovel the driveway together. This whole thing has really made me appreciate him and our relationship a lot more. I know that it will be rough for us financially for a little while but we'll make it. He's been looking for work and working on finding money to go to school and finish his IT program.
On this past Wednesday, a new teacher at school (Kevin) and I drove down to Portage so he could see some glaciers and on the way back there was a Dall sheep about 10 feet from the side of the road. As we continued down the road there was at least half a dozen more viewable (not all that close to the road but a lot closer than usual). He came over for dinner too and I made indian tacos. They were tasty, as they always are. Of course I'm kinda a fan of fry bread.
Speaking of food, I'm making prime rib for today and it smells so good right now. Well I guess I better be productive.

Midterms

2011-09-15T20:40:00.004-08:00

I can't believe school has been in session for a little over a month. Things are going so well. I have 104 beginning band students. It's not 104 of them at one time. I have it broken down into 3 classes, 49, 14, and 43. It's not too bad. I'm also taking a class in Love and Logic. It makes for really long days. I've also added community band to the list. I'm also attending a training at the end of the month for a week that is an all day thing (with 3 hours of class afterward).
The kids are sounding good. I'm enjoying this year a lot more than last year but there are times things are still rough. It's getting better.
The kitchen still isn't finished. It's a sore subject at my house. Oh well. I'll get it done. I can't believe I've been in my house almost a year. It's crazy how time flies.

This is the weekend that I get to drive back on the road into Denali. I'm pretty excited. It should be awesome. I'll probably take a ton of pictures. I'm still not totally ready but it won't take me long to get everything in order.

Well, life goes on and that's the way I know it.

It's that time again

2011-08-14T14:52:00.004-08:00

Even though I've been back at work since last Wednesday, the kids come back on Tuesday. It's going to be a busy week. As usual inservice with the music teachers was awesome. It's great to see everyone, even though I don't really know many of them. One more day of inservice and then students. I'm kinda excited. We'll see how it all goes. I need to finish some copying and some planning but otherwise I feel pretty good.
In other news the kitchen is still in about same state as it has been for a week. All my staining last weekend made me really sore. My low back bothered me for several day. I guess 6 hours of staining isn't the best thing for your back. I still have 14 doors to stain and I'll get to them. The flooring is about half done. I'll be glad when this project is done. I think I'm going to paint the hallways a light seafoam greenish color. I'm thinking of a yellow for the living room wall. We'll see though.
I really need to do some cleaning and I know life is going to start getting busier. Well I better get on to doing something productive.

My crazy kitchen project

2011-07-23T04:25:00.003-08:00

Anyone that knows me knows that sometimes things get a little out of hand when I start with a project. I joke with my family that my kitchen project is like the bathroom project I did years ago at my parents house, which started as I was going to repaint the ceiling and instead I remodeled the bathroom. What can I say.
When I moved into my house I noticed that the water dispenser didn't work on the fridge, having grown up as a tap water drinker it didn't really bother me. Bryan moved in and wanted to see why the dispenser wasn't working. We forgot about it for a while and finally at the beginning of June we decided to look at it. Well the fridge was wedged into it's place but looking behind the fridge with a flashlight it looked like we might have mold. We decided to get the fridge out. Easier said than done. It was wedged pretty tightly in there. I ripped out the two cabinets next to the fridge, one base cabinet and one wall cabinet. The wall cabinet came down in one piece; however, the base cabinet was pretty much obliterated. Well there's one cabinet to replace. We pulled out the fridge and there was mold, a whole big section of it and to top it all of the flooring under the fridge was starting to peel up. At that point we decided we were going to replace the floor. The more we talked about it, the more the project grew. Bryan knew I wanted to extend the kitchen out a little farther and possibly get rid of the bar in the kitchen. As we decided on flooring we talked about how to put down the flooring and deal with the cabinets. Needless to say one day Bryan came home from work and I'd taken almost all of the wall cabinets down. Once again I jumped into a project head first at full speed. The next day I had all the base cabinets torn out. In this time I had also replaced the section of moldy wall. My friend Cathy helped me get the first load of cabinets. I debated on whether or not to keep the duct work, after a trip to Sears and some drooling over a very nice cooktop/oven, I decided to rip it out and patch up the hole in the wall. (On a side note we looked at a downward draft oven that pulls all the stuff that your range hood pulls up down instead. We like the model that has a gas cooktop and an electric oven). I finished getting the rest of the cabinets we needed for the project, a grand total of 16. After the drywall work finished drying I primed the wall and we hung all the wall cabinets and started to put down the base cabinets but ran into a flooring snag. We then decided that we were going to rip up the carpet in the dining room and put down the same hardwood laminate that we had gotten for the kitchen in the dining room. After putting down some plywood, which was the flooring snag from the carpet, we finished the base cabinets on that side. I left town for a couple days. When I got back we took out the cabinets on the sink side, painted the kitchen and dining room one one side a lovely shade of blue and put up cabinets. Now we are working on the flooring and staining the cabinets. We have put temporary countertops on until we have the money in the budget for the new ones. When we put in the final counters, we'll replace the sink. We have gained tons of cabinet space, the cabinets go into the dining room but it flows nicely and it looks good. Bryan has about 1/3 of the floor done and I'm slowly staining the cabinets. We got the fridge back into place finally instead of in the middle of the floor, it's not totally set since we need to connect the water line (which we replaced the old lines cause they were leaking, hence the mold and the non functioning dispenser). The stove is still in the middle of the floor but Bryan will have the flooring under the stove done soon so that can go back. (As a side note, he works about a zillion hours so the process takes a bit longer but all the work he's done looks great.) Like I said, I've been slow staining the cabinets, I'm not sure if it's the smell that bothers me or if I'm unmotivated. Bryan's mom is going to help me stain the cabinets this weekend.
This project has been insane but the end is in sight. Even without being done I can tell you that the results are amazing. I've appreciated all of the help. Bryan has been wonderful in being patient with me and going along with my crazy idea. He even picked out the shade of blue that we painted in the kitchen and dining room. I'm very lucky to have such a wonderful man. And we're already started planning next summer's project. I will post pictures of the finished project along with some of the process. It's been quite the transformation but it is so much more functional for two people who enjoy cooking.

A bit of catch-up

2011-07-23T04:05:00.004-08:00

It's 4AM on a Saturday morning, I haven't been to bed yet and I'm not really tired. I was reading the last book in the Hunger Games series, called Mockingjay. I started it yesterday evening and I finished all 400 pages of it about 45 minutes ago. It was hard to put down. The whole series was that way though. I like/hate books like that. I like them because they keep you interested, but I hate them cause there is more to life than spending countless hours (in one day) reading. It's a nice distraction from my projects; however, it's not really a good distraction from sleep.
There are only a few weeks of summer break left and time has yet again gone by so quickly. I don't know if it's because I spent some time traveling or if it's been because I've been buried under a huge project, but time has flown by.
As I look back on my blog (a bit ashamed for lack of posting) I realize there is a lot to update. The end of the school year went pretty well. My parents came up to visit and were here for the spring concert. It's the first concert they've seen of mine since I've been teaching. 3,000 miles does make it hard to be here. I biked to work on the last day, partially because it was bike to work day and partially because I must be insane. It's only 6 miles. Backing up just a little bit we got new neighbors. It turns out that they were neighbors at the apartment too. It was hilarious when we figured it out. They're pretty cool. Jumping forward again into May. I took the train to Fairbanks with an overnight in Talkeetna, it was awesome. Bryan and I went to a movie and then to dinner on his birthday (right after he got off of work), we came home and were going to go out again but apparently the front stairs had a different idea cause we spent the evening in Urgent Care because Bryan miss-stepped on the stairs. He was home from work for two weeks. He joked that the only way he could get vacation was to injure himself. It wasn't truly time off though cause he did go in several times to do paperwork and such. We did get to take a train ride together though.
We also started to remodel our kitchen. I think I might make a whole new post for that one since this one is getting involved.
We've spent a great deal of time remodeling. I've got a fish tank now with a billion fish in it, ok really only 26. 13 of those I bought, the other 13 came as a surprise.
I've spent a little time traveling making my way down to Ketchikan, Metlakatla, and Wrangell. I fly to Illionis Tuesday to visit my family and some friends. I arrive there 8AM on Wednesday morning since I'm on a red eye flight. On the upside, I get to fly first class.
Well I think I'll wrap this one up and give the kitchen the post it deserves. In 10 hours I have to pick up Bryan's dad from the airport and about 4 hours later pick up his mom. We have his parents in town for the weekend. I guess I'll probably do some cleaning today as well, and maybe get some sleep.

Time just seems to fly

2011-03-31T06:06:00.003-08:00

I can't believe that March is over already. The school year has flown by and I know the next month and a half will fly by too. There is just so much to do before the school year ends. We still have 3 performances left, the area band festival, the spring concert, and sonic boom. On top of that my parents are coming to town for the spring concert. It's the first time they've every seen a performance with me as the conductor. Having all of my teaching jobs in Alaska, it's been difficult for them to see the performances live. It'll be fun to have them there.
In other news...two weeks ago my furnace went out. It was quite the adventure to have it fixed but thankfully we were only without the furnace for a few days. Saturday is not the best day of the week to have the furnace go out. Thank goodness for space heaters and lots of blankets.
We got a little bit of snow last night/this morning. It's not a lot but it's a change from the great weather we've had for several days now.
Time to get ready for work.

Happy St. Patrick's Day

2011-03-17T06:34:00.003-08:00

It has brought snow. I looked out the door this morning after Bryan had made a comment about it snowing while he was tying his shoes. Yep, it's snowing. I guess that means I need to break out the snow shovel again. It's not a lot of snow so it'll be easy to shovel.
Well I know it's been a little bit since I wrote on my blog (I'm sorry). Spring break came and went. I still got up early and went to bed (for the most part) when I usually do. I finished my bathroom project. It looks good. (I still need to figure out why the tub is draining slowly though). I'm glad to have it done. Sadly I didn't accomplish too much else over break. I did manage to get out of town for a couple of hours driving down to the peninsula with Seth (Maz was in NY and Bryan was at work). Of course we did our driving while the paint was drying.
There are still boxes in my kitchen that need to be unpacked but first I need to find a place to put them. I guess that's one of the problems when you take two people who have lived on their own for several years and both enjoy cooking, and then put them in one kitchen. We have a lot of baking pans. I'm not complaining, I guess I'll just have to do some more baking. Those are a little less hard to find places for than the additional box of canned goods. I also need to figure out where we are going to put the other Kitchen Aid.
In more exciting news, I got Blue Man Group tickets for when they come to Anchorage in May. I got them in the mail on Tuesday. :) It'll be fun to see them.
Work is work. I'm preparing students for several more performances. We have area festival in April, along with our spring concert, and then Sonic Boom in May. We have just over 9 weeks of school left and we have testing starting at the end of the month. I have a feeling this quarter will fly by. There is still a lot to do before the performances. It should be great though.
I'm looking at finding summer work just so that I can be money ahead. I'm thinking that maybe I'll drive a bus. We'll see. I also need to finish my things for grad school, geez I haven't worked enough on that.
Well it's that magical time where I need to get ready for work and shovel my driveway.
Happy St. Patrick's Day!!

Lots of stuff and not enough sleep

2011-03-01T05:58:00.002-09:00

As I sit on my couch, I see a pile of boxes. I'm not complaining about the pile of boxes, it just means I really do have a roommate and I'm not imagining it. This weekend was spent moving stuff and I haven't really recovered. Of course I have been tired for longer than that. I really just need more sleep. I've tried but my seems to think that 5AM is a wonderful time to wake me up regardless of when I went to bed. Of course last night I fell asleep on the couch for a little bit.
In other news. Spring break starts this week but it feels like this week is going to drag. Last night I thought it was Tuesday. I think it's the being tired. I have so much to do too. But thankfully next week I can do my stuff and get some sleep.
If I could actually get my brain to work then I'm sure I'd have more to put on here but right now it's not working.
Till next time.

something like life

2011-02-17T20:54:00.002-09:00

There are times in life when you can’t seem to get it right, but of course you can’t explain why you can’t get it right. There seems to be far too much of that in my life. Of course there seems to be a lot of times when I wonder what in the world is going on. There are also those moments when it feels like the enitre world is stacked against me and no matter what I do, it just puts me farther behind. Oh well, what doesn’t kill us makes us stronger, or just harder to live with. I really can be ornery. There isn’t much that I can do about that.

My bathroom project still isn’t done yet but I’ve been so busy or so tired that it’s hard to finish that. I need to get it done before I have a roommate taking over my bathroom. I have the Durock up around the tub. I just need to hang the green board (well and mud and tape it), put up the tub surround, and paint. It’s not hard, it just takes time.

This weekend I’ll be in Illinois. I need a new phone, an eye exam, and a haircut. Oh, and I need to buy some new clothes and something more formal looking for concerts. Lots to do on my four day weekend. Yesterday and today have been parent-teacher conferences. I haven’t had as many parents as last time but I’ve still seen a good amount. I am however looking forward to getting on the plane tonight.

Well since I started this, I had a whole slew of parents come in. Still not as many as first conference but it's alright.

Things are a bit of a mess....literally.

2011-01-18T06:00:00.004-09:00

Just as I thought I was getting everything more in place, I started making a big mess again. While my parents were visiting my dad noticed that the grout didn't look right. I acknowledged that and decided I'd deal with it after they left. As a person who has had tiles fall into the bathtub while showering, I can tell you it isn't a very pleasant experience. So I decided to find out what was going on. I removed the grout from around a tile and pried up the tile. Mold!!! Needless to say I'm in the process of ripping the tile down. Seth and Maz came over for dinner yesterday and Seth helped me take down tiles. It's almost done. They weren't put up there very well either. Oh well. After I get it all down, the wall cleaned up, and the mold taken care of I will put up a tub surround and paint. It wasn't exactly the way I wanted to spend yesterday but that's life.
In other news my Winter concert is in a week and a half. Friday I had 3 of my classes play in the atrium at the school (it's a big open area when you walk inside.) They did pretty well. The concert should be really good.
I've had a few weird phone problems lately. Sorry to anyone that it has affected. I think it's all back to normal.
There are times I feel like my life is a bit of a mess. I have no regrets for the way things have turned out but sometimes I wish I had a clearer picture (personally and professionally). I've done a lot of great things in my life, I have a degree, a job, a house, great family, and great friends but sometimes I feel a little incomplete. I also tend to be a bit confused at times, but there's nothing new with that. Other than that everything is great (or at least I'm going to believe it is).
It's been pretty cold here for a few days, the temperature hasn't gotten above zero but thankfully that should be ending. There is talk of snow this week, we'll see what happens.
Till next time. :)

Goodbye 2010

2010-12-31T21:02:00.003-09:00

Well it's New Year's Eve and I don't think I'm going to miss this year. It had a lot of ups and downs, too many tears, and lots of smiles. Lots of laughs and plenty of frustration. I've lost a job, moved, got a new job, bought a house, and had plenty of confusion. I have no regrets.
It's been a fun two weeks having my parents visit. My mom finally saw a moose today, she's thrilled. We've gotten a lot of good things done.
I don't have much to write right now but I will later.
Happy New Years. xoxo

grilling in the snow

2010-12-14T17:18:00.004-09:00

cause that's how I roll.
And I wanted steak

Sitting in the quiet, enjoying the peace

2010-12-12T09:11:00.003-09:00

Although I live alone, there doesn't seem like there are a lot of times that I just enjoy the peace and quiet of my house in the morning. Perhaps it's because so often I'm getting ready for work or to go somewhere. It's so peaceful here this morning, just like a Sunday morning should be.
The past couple of weeks have had a lot of ups and downs. Beth came to visit, Anthony moved, Maz and Seth left for the holidays, and work has been a new adventure everyday. Not to mention every other aspect of life. This past week seemed a little rougher than usual. I'm not sure totally why but it was. A lot of long days. The upside is that I spent some time with Bryan, who in an attempt to cheer me up after a really rough day on Monday gave me my Christmas present. I feel awful that I wasn't more excited about it on Monday but I just felt so emotionally drained that it was hard to do anything other than be blah and occasionally cry. Of course since then I have told him about a zillion times how much I've liked it. Every time I go into my garage I smile, I'm still so excited about it.
In other news we've had tons of snow. I'm not a huge fan of the shoveling part but I still enjoy the snow. I've lost track of how much snow has fallen.
Well I'm off to make breakfast and have a great day.

Happy Thanksgiving and other things

2010-11-25T06:48:00.004-09:00

It's turkey day and I can say that my turkey is in the oven. I baked pecan pies last night along with a carrot cake. Today I need to finish cleaning, make mashed potatoes, stuffing, and green bean casserole. It will be a nice small gathering at my house. I'm excited for my first Thanksgiving in my house. I'm glad that Beth got to come up here to spend time. I'm thankful that Anthony, Mazio, and Seth are going to be here too. Sadly Bryan has to work. I'm not sure if anyone else is coming. I invited some people from church to come but we'll see if that happens. I'm not worried either way. I'm very thankful for my many blessings and for all the wonderful people in my life.
The weather has been a little weird this week. I woke up Monday to freezing rain and icy roads. School was still on, it was a scary drive to work. Beth flew in on Monday so thankfully Anthony went to get her. Monday night I got a phone call that school was canceled on Tuesday. I spent the day picking up and hanging out. I didn't really go anywhere. Tuesday afternoon I got a call that school had been called off for Wednesday too. 6 day weekend. The main roads were fine but the side streets were pretty icy. I wasn't quite as productive yesterday as I had been Thursday. I guess that's why there is this morning.
I have to admit that I miss my family and friends that aren't near me. I love all of you and wish you the best this holiday season. I'm very thankful for all of the wonderful people in my life. It's wonderful to have friends and family. I'm grateful for the wonderful people in my life here in Anchorage.
Sometimes life takes us down some interesting roads and sometimes we just have to sit back and enjoy the ride. Life isn't always easy but it's worth it. Just remember to take the bad in with the good. It makes us who we are. Live through the rough times and learn something and embrace all the good times and cherish them. Cherish the people who mean the most to you. Remember that you're not perfect and neither is anyone else. Forgive the mistakes and others short comings. Find peace in your soul. Love with all your heart. Be an example.
I may not be perfect but I try my best. I'm learning here too.

Happy Halloween

2010-10-31T19:26:00.002-08:00

It's been a never ending amount of chaos it seems. Work has kept me crazy busy which is fine but it leaves me exhausted. I still have boxes to unpack among other things. I've been shooting fairly regularly. I'm getting pretty good. I've had more and more bull's eyes, both with my .44 and my 12 gauge. Anthony has challenged me to shoot at 50 yards with the shotgun. I'm doing pretty well. Yesterday I hit a bull's eye. I'm getting better. One of the guys at the gun range (Eric) is pretty good looking. What can I say.

I've been in my house about a month and in that time I've replaced the garbage disposal, the washer and dryer, and the dishwasher. Not really the cheapest things to replace but clean dishes and clean clothes are important. I've enjoyed my fireplace a lot.
I see a lot of Bryan and Anthony. I'm not complaining. They come over to do laundry, cook on the grill, and just hang out. I appreciate them keeping me company. I can't complain.
This morning I sewed pants and a hat for Bryan for his papa smurf costume. I also gave Anthony a mohawk. It's been a fun adventure. Bryan asked me if he can come over Wednesday to hem some pants. At least it's Wednesday and not Thursday. I have a meeting on Thursday.
This last week I had parent teacher conferences on Wednesday and Thursday. It made for long days. I survived and I saw about 100 parents. Not too bad.
In other news, life has been kinda weird but this isn't really the place for that. If you wanna know more or can give some good advice give me a call.

Happy October

2010-10-04T06:38:00.003-08:00

I finally have internet in my house. The fall here has been pretty nice so far. I definitely missed the fall colors when I lived in Southeast. I'm slowly but surely getting unpacked. Friday we replaced the garbage disposal. Anthony put his finger through the trap under the sink, which was rusting out. Of course then we had to replace that too. Friday night I did a load of laundry to find that my dryer had seen better days. Saturday I went to Sears to look at a new one. I ended up buying a new washer and a new dryer. Now all I need is a new dishwasher and I know all my appliances will work well.
It's been interesting unpacking. I can't find the hardware to my futon. Angry face. That means I can't find one of my allen wrenches either. I ordered new futon hardware. I'm a little annoyed that it cost $20 for shipping. It's not like Alaska is a foreign country. Why does shipping have to be so much. Just put the stuff in a priority mail envelope. Oh well.
My parents got me a grill (and a table saw) for my birthday (which is in a couple days). So Saturday Anthony and I grilled steaks. Amazing!!
I have about 15 boxes still in my living room that need to be unpacked. Several of them though I think can go in the garage, because they are empty canning jars.
I believe that Anthony and Bryan are going with me somewhere for my birthday. I have no idea where we are going. I have birthday coupons to several places. I don't know what time Bryan gets off of work and Anthony gets off at 7pm. So we'll see what happens. I'd spend a quiet evening at home, but I was told I wasn't allowed to.
Anywho, it's that wonderful time where I finish getting ready for work.

I think I'm crazy

2010-09-26T18:40:00.003-08:00

This week has been a little crazy. It seems that my run of one more thing with the bank finally ended (Wednesday). Then I was scheduled to close on Thursday. The bank was having telecommunication issues. Lame. Finally Friday I closed on my house. It seemed like that took forever. We closed a week late and it was a frustrating experience leading up to closing. I've been moving in this weekend. It took us a large part of yesterday and several hours today to get everything moved to the house. Now it's time to unpack. Yuck!! Why do I own so much stuff?
I've debating if I want a roommate. I'm not sure yet. I figure after I get settled I'll have a better handle on it. It's so weird having my own room (let alone my own house) after sleeping on a couch for months. I don't know what to do with myself. I currently don't have tv or internet in my house, but I'll get there (eventually). My tv and blueray player are still at Bryan and Anthony's apartment. It will be there for a little bit. I figure I can always go watch tv there and borrow their internet. Now I just need to finish unpacking, grocery shop, buy curtains, and get settled, on top of working my full time job. Joy. It'll be great.

Apparenlty I'm bad at keeping up at this

2010-09-19T10:19:00.003-08:00

Happy Sunday Morning!!

Sorry it's been so long since I updated this. Here is the run down.

August 12th was the first day of inservice. The 18th was the first day with students. It's been a wild ride. I teach 5 periods of band. 3 of those are beginning band. There are times that it is less stressful than my last job. Probably a lot of times. It's been fun. There are times it is very trying but we are getting through it. Overall I'm enjoying it a lot.

I'm buying a house. That has been an insane process. I was supposed to sign on Thursday but there was some last thing that the bank needed, which seems to be the norm. Now it looks like I'm signing tomorrow. That means it gets recorded on Tuesday and I can officially move in. I'm excited. It will be great. I'm excited to be in my own place and paint and all the other things that go with it. It's an 1100 square foot house. 3 bedrooms, 2 bath.

I've done some work on both of the boys cars. We done spark plugs and wires on Anthony and Bryan's cars. I'm a little banged up and scraped up but that comes with the territory. I really have missed working on cars.

Life is good. I wish I had more exciting adventures but life has been a little stressful between the house and everything else. I can't complain though it's all looking good.

Where did the summer go

2010-08-01T08:58:00.003-08:00

The bull moose I was calling.
My classroom.

Seriously where did the summer go. Registration is this week for school and teacher inservice starts next week. I have new teacher orientation (for 8 hours) on the 11th and then inservice the 12th through the 17th. First day with kids is the 18th. My schedule right now looks like I have 3 periods of beginning band, team time, prep, advanced band, and intermediate band. It should be fun. I need to finish up my project, finish organizing my classroom, and find a place to live. I should probably pick out band music too.
I'm still looking for a place to live. I've toyed with the idea of buying a house. I even got prequalified for a home loan. At times I think I'm a little nuts. Oh well.
Let's see what else is going on. Bryan got his car back from the mechanic. There are a few more things that need to be done to his car, like the suspension but the car works and that's what counts. He and I have both been driven a little crazy recently but I think that's what happens when you have 3 people in a 2 bedroom apartment. It's a long story and it's not really worth getting into.
I've spent some time in my classroom and that's been good. The other night I decided I hadn't been out moose watching in a while so I went and did that. I've started calling moose too. Anthony was too happy when the moose started walking towards the car. It wasn't so bad when it was a cow but he wasn't too happy with the idea when it was a full grown bull moose. It was hilarious. I'll admit, it's never a dull moment in my life. I wonder if I can call bear too. I doubt that I'm going to try it. I haven't seen any bear since I've been in town but I don't go looking for them either.
Last weekend I went and saw Everclear in concert. It was fun.
That might be all that I can think of right now. Well besides that all of Bryan's coworkers seem to have some opinion about the fact that he and I should be together. I just laugh. I find it funny that they all tell him. I stopped in to his work last night and one of the other customers teased him about me. I about died laughing. I find the whole thing amusing. A few of his coworkers want to hang out with me because they think I'm a good fit for him. It makes no sense to me but whatever. I'm just going to enjoy chuckling over the whole thing. I find it particularly funny that if I show up they all feel the need to tell him his girlfriend is there. Oh the things that amuse me.
Well I'm sure that's it.

This is sad....

2010-07-18T11:15:00.004-08:00

....It's been a month since the last time I posted.
Here's the recap..(in no particular order)
I drove the Alcan Highway. It was amazing, some of the road was in terrible condition but the scenery was fantastic. On the drive I saw 1 moose, 3 bear, 4 buffalo, 1 caribou, 1 deer, 2 sheep, 6 elk,....and a partridge in a pear tree. Just kidding about the partridge. I would say the best part of the drive is from Fort Nelson, BC to Whitehorse, YT. I met some really friendly people. I was in awe of the beauty of everything. That drive should be on everyone's bucket list, seriously I mean it. On that drive I also drove on the scariest bridge I've ever been on and remembered that I dislike driving down steep, curvy downgrades behind people that ride their brakes. I made it back to Anchorage in one piece and I was ready to be back in Alaska.
Recently I drove down to Seward, which is about 130 miles from Anchorage, just for the heck of it. I got to Seward, filled the tank, and drove back. Another beautiful drive but sadly I didn't have my camera. I was very annoyed with myself that I didn't take it but I guess that just means I'm going to have to drive it again.
Going backwards a little to between the Alcan and the Seward highway excursions. I've hiked up Flat top mountain to the 2nd saddle, which isn't all the way to the top but there is always next time. I've walked from Pluto to Neptune and back on the Coastal trail. On that trail we saw a Bull Moose several feet from the trail, thankfully enjoying whatever he was eating and ignoring us. I've seen more than a dozen moose in a span of 3 days, including the smallest calf I've ever seen. Anthony figures that it was about 2-3 weeks old. It was so cute. That reminds me Anthony and I were at Village Inn the other day for lunch and a moose and her two calves walked right past the restaurant. It never ceases to amaze me when we see moose. Megan came up for the 4th and we went hiking up Flat top but the wind was gusting so bad that we only hiked Blueberry trail. It was still a 2 mile hike.
I bought a gun. I bought a Smith & Wesson .44 magnum revolver. I went shooting the other day with Anthony. I know, I know that's big gun. I've always wanted a gun and honestly I've always wanted a S&W .357 magnum double action revolver. I went to several guns stores and looked at lots of guns. I discussed what I was going to do with a gun and they recommended a .44. I'll admit it is a little much for home defense (or self defense) but it's a good size against bear. I have no intention on ever having to defend myself against a bear, but who really does plan on it. I can tell you one thing, that gun kicks like a mule. I wasn't sure what to expect the first time I fired it. It's really fun to shoot though. The same day I bought my gun, the gun store was selling a 12 gauge shot gun for $140 so....I also bought the shotgun. What can I say.
Other than all my outdoorsy adventures, I signed my contract with the Anchorage School District. I've been less than successful on finding a place to live, so I'm still sleeping on the couch at Bryan and Anthony's apartment. I've spent time in my classroom. I got a Costco membership. I've been to the restaurant supply store. And....I've spent time on my homework. I have also be the household taxi cab. While I was visiting Tasha in Wrangell (and catching the smallest halibut) Bryan's car broke down. The transmission is toast. So, it's a good thing I've got my car. I have to say running two guys to and from work and trying to get things done in my own life is exhausting. There are days that it's hard to get anything done for myself because of the shifts they work.
As of right now my life as I know it....Living out of a suitcase in a closet, sleeping on an uncomfortable futon in the living room, being exhausted all the time, but enjoying Anchorage.
I even got a box out of my storage unit yesterday because I wanted something of mine. I grabbed the box of spices. I know that sounds weird and it's an odd security blanket but it works.
Well I'm off to be the taxi driver and go to church.

On the road...still

2010-06-18T04:50:00.003-08:00

Good Morning Fort Nelson.

I left Edmonton yesterday morning and drove through a lot of area that was kinda the middle of nowhere. After about 700 miles I made it into Fort Nelson. It's not a big town and it in the Northern Rockies. Today will be a day of mostly driving in the mountains. The plan is to drive the 600 miles to Whitehorse and stop there for the night. 600 miles is the shortest amount of driving I have done on this trip. I have to drive through the Northern Rockies, so it will be lots of mountains today. Yesterday I drove down several steep grades and over one of the scariest bridges ever. It's a metal bridge so you don't get the same kind of traction you do on a regular bridge. It didn't help that I also was going up an incline. I could feel the car fish tail around a little bit...not a fun feeling. Well I made it through and then I saw a moose on the side of the road doing moosey things. I would've stopped to take a picture but there wasn't really anywhere and it was hard to get a good shot. Oh well. Today and part of tomorrow I will have no cell phone reception, doesn't that sound exciting. I'm ready to be back in Alaska. I'm enjoying my road trip but after 2400 miles I'm ready to be home. I have about 1300 miles left to go. Time to eat breakfast and hit the road.

Hello June

2010-06-16T19:31:00.003-08:00

Crazy month alert!!

When I last left you on my blog adventure, I was getting on a ferry to go to Haines. Well 25 hours on the ferry later we arrived in Haines. We drove to Tok. It was a beautiful drive, the road was interesting (hello road construction needed). We stopped in Tok for the night. The next morning (june 1st) we drove to Anchorage. What a great drive. The mountains were beautiful, the Matanuska glacier was cool and huge, and the road was windy. After we got to Anchorage it was unloading the Uhaul into the storage unit. Thanks Michael for all the help. Yay Moose's Tooth.
Wednesday was Michael's birthday and we went and saw Iron Man 2 and went to dinner. Thursday I had an interview with Clark Middle School in Anchorage. I also got on a plane to go visit my parents and pick up my car. The plane was delayed for 1 1/2 hours. Lame. I got in Friday morning. Saturday was Mr. Cox's retirement party, that was fun.
Tuesday (June 8th) I got a phone call as I was sitting at Bill's apartment. It was Anchorage....I got the middle school band job!!! Super excited. Bill and I went to see Prince of Persia after that...I wasn't exactly focused. The rest of that week was pretty melo..thank goodness.
I've made a trip to IKEA for a chair and a dresser.
Tuesday we loaded up my car and I got on the road. I drove around North Dakota for awhile as my parents called places to see if anyone had a room...Finally we found one (in the middle of nowhere). So after 14 or so hours and 1000 miles later, I was in for the night. This morning I got on the road and drove about 700 miles to Edmonton. I'm currently sitting in my hotel room. Tomorrow I drive to Fort Nelson then Friday it's Whitehorse, with me getting into Anchorage Saturday. It'll be about 3600 miles by the time I get in but it'll be great. Heigh ho, heigh ho it's off to bed I go...gotta get on the road in the morning.

Aufweidersehen Metlakatla

2010-05-30T05:24:00.003-08:00

As I sit here debating what time I should start waking up the boys, I reflect on my time here in Metlakatla. I've met some amazing people and had some good times. Granted there have been plenty of hard times too but that's part of life.
We got the truck all packed up Friday evening and spent part of Saturday cleaning. It's really clean. We relaxed and hung out the rest of the day. I know that no one got to bed too early, I was the earliest to bed and I didn't get there until a little after 11PM. Of course I woke up sometime around 4:30AM.
Today I get on the ferry from Metlakatla to Ketchikan and then immediately get on the next ferry bound for Haines. I get into Haines Monday morning and get on the road bound for Anchorage. I should arrive in Anchorage Tuesday in the early afternoon. It should be a beautiful drive. Joyce, the middle school math teacher, is coming with me. We are both excited about this trip. We should have a great time.
It's been great to have Bill here even though at times he has kinda driven me crazy. We went out the road on Thursday and had a great time. We also hiked up Yellow Hill. I took some fun pictures. The best pictures are the ones of Bill with a slug. It's the biggest slug Bill has ever seen and it's about average size here. It was about 3 1/2 inches long.
I better get the boys up and have breakfast. We have the suitcases to put into the truck along with a few things to drop off in Ketchikan.

What more can happen

2010-05-23T13:29:00.005-08:00

I'm not sure where to start. It's been a bit of a crazy week. I had to go to the doctor last Friday (5/14) because my eyelid was huge. The doctor said I had a hordeolum, it's a sty inside the eyelid. I got eye drops and was instructed to use a hot compress 5-10 times a day. It's been just over a week and it looks a million times better, it's not completely gone though. So I'm still wearing my glasses, which bugs me a bit. I prefer to wear my contacts, oh well. Work has been....well work. Not too much to report. I went to graduation Friday night. Then I went to several graduation parties. It was fun.
I have spent quite a bit of time packing and I have 2 rooms completely finished. I've moved almost all the boxes into one room. My dad said it will make it easier and then I can appreciate all of the stuff I have done. I'm not sure if it has done any of that but oh well. I have a little bit to do in the bathroom, some odds and ends in the spare room, all of the living room and kitchen till I'm totally packed. I need to pick up the Uhaul tomorrow. It feels like I still have a lot to do, but I'm not sure that I totally do.
Bill got into town yesterday. It's great to see him. I showed him around the island a little bit yesterday. He was very fascinated by skunk cabbage and by the small crabs on the beach. It was pretty funny. At times I forget how hilarious he is. He fell asleep on the couch last night and when I got home from Nicole's I woke him up to go to bed. Right now he's asleep in a chair. Same old Bill.
Today has been a bit of an odd day. I woke up at about 7:30AM and called my parents to tell them about the skunk cabbage and beach with Bill. A few minutes into the call my phone died. I tried turning it back on, nothing. I went and plugged it in (even though I had plenty of battery life before it shut off) Nothing. I grabbed Bill's phone and called my parents and explained what happened. I then called Verizon and spent quite a bit of time trying to get something sorted out. What a frustrating experience. They are shipping me a new phone but they are sending it to my parents. The ship via FedEx, which doesn't deliver here. The option was UPS, I can't guarantee that I'd get it that way either. Well after I finished going rounds with Verizon and was incredibly fed up, I was trying to find an old phone and Bill's phone rang. It was my phone. Bill was calling to ask if I had his phone. Apparently Bill had woken up and come down stairs and tried to look for his phone but found mine. He tried to turn mine on but it wouldn't. After a few minutes, my phone turned back on by itself. We talked to my dad, who called Verizon. He told us Verizon was going to call me. They called, weren't a lot of help. I'm still stuck with a phone that isn't really working. I won't get my "new" phone for almost two weeks. It will probably get to my parents on Tuesday but there isn't really anyway to get here before I move. I'm not impressed with my cell phone carrier at this moment. Well we'll see how long my phone works, but I bet it's not going to be for long. When I get this other phone, it will be the 3rd LG EnV2 I've had in a year. The screens died on the first one in less than a month of having it. I'm not impressed. We'll see how this all works. I can tell you though it's hard to have job interviews if your phone doesn't work. Also driving over 700 miles while moving with no phone.....not exactly the safest thing. I can do it but I'm not thrilled. I'm sure this will all work but it seems like it's always one more thing. AAAAHHHH!!!!
I think I might go back to packing, which I hate doing on Sunday but it has to get done. I am really happy to have Bill here.

And the craziness continues...

2010-05-19T21:55:00.003-08:00

Another week down since my last post. What a week. Work has kept me busy and so has packing. Neither of which are really fun right now. Most of my classes are going rather well. Lots of singing and music.
Last Sunday I went for a bike ride. It was nice to get my bike out. The sun was shining, the weather was great. It was a beautiful day to be outside. I also made a pork roast in the crock pot and had dinner with the Longs and Alveys. I'm going to miss them. I'm grateful for the friends I've made here.
I've spent a good deal of time packing. Not my favorite activity. Oh well it has to be done. Bill is coming up to help me on Saturday. It'll be great to see him and it's nice that he's coming. I think he's excited to come to Alaska even if it is to help me pack.
Not much on the job end of things. I'm still looking for a job. We'll see what happens. I did get a lead on a possible job today. We'll see what comes of it.

What's next....

2010-05-12T20:52:00.004-08:00

Packing is probably the most physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausting activity ever. There is nothing like putting your whole life into a box, or lots of boxes. I really dislike packing. I don't have nearly enough done but it's hard to live in your house and pack it. Thankfully, I'll be house-sitting for my friends (and neighbors), the Longs, starting Monday. I'm going to take care of their dogs and fish while they are gone and I'm still in town. I'm grateful for friends.
The experience of getting ready to move without knowing exactly where one is moving is a little terrifying. As of right now, I'm moving my things to Anchorage and putting them into storage. I'm ok with that. I still don't have a job for next school year, but I'm not totally worried about that either. I'm sure I've said that statement several times, including on here. I will admit that I'm at times completely terrified of the unknown in respects to this. I have faith that it will all work and I'm going to trust that things will turn out the way that they should.
I think I have 14 boxes packed. This doesn't count the tubs that I already had "packed." Including those, I think I have about 20. I'm leaving some of the furniture I brought. The only furniture I'm taking is my bed, futon, 2 coffee tables, kitchen table and chairs, 3 bookcases, and the tv stand. I'm getting rid of my dresser, couch, and a coffee table. As I look around my house I ponder about what needs to be put in boxes and what can go into the Uhaul as is. I don't see any reason to put most of my tools into boxes or some of my instruments. I'm trying to think of all the things I need to pack, but not be overwhelmed by it. I'm almost done packing the spare room and the bathroom. The other spare room has very little in it. There are only clothes in my bedroom that need to be packed, and some stuffed animals. That leaves the kitchen and the living room that really need to be packed. Maybe it isn't as overwhelming as I think it is but still it seems like a lot. I just need to do some everyday. I also need to work on my final project for my Multicultural education class.
I guess I have a good bit to keep me busy.

Trying not to countdown

2010-05-09T07:05:00.003-08:00

Happy Mothers Day to everyone out there. I hope you have a wonderful day. I'm loving the sunshine here in Metlakatla, this makes 3 days of sunshine in a row. Yesterday was spent doing packing and waiting for an interview. I also fell asleep on my couch at one point. Today it will be church and then maybe a walk. Friday afternoon Megan and I went and hiked up Yellow Hill, then I drove out the road with some friends. It's been a pleasant weekend, but I still don't like packing. I know that I need to pack, but it's the process that bugs me.
Last Tuesday was the Spring Concert. It was my last concert here in Metlakatla. I might have lost my mind when I planned it, it was a K-12 program. The whole concert was a little over an hour long. The kids did a great job. It's all down hill from here. We have about 3 weeks of school left.
I can't believe I move in 3 weeks. I still don't have my next job yet, but I'm not worried. I know something will work out. I have lots of faith. My plan right now is to move my things to storage in Anchorage, then fly home and get my car. I then plan to travel for part of the summer (and sleep on friends' couches). We'll see how it all works.

Sunshine and Blue Skies

2010-05-02T12:30:00.004-08:00

The title should say enough. Holy cow what a gorgeous day. The sun is shining, the tank is clean.. Sorry movie line. Can you name that movie? I'll give you a hint...it's finding Nemo.
Anyway. Last night Megan, Jacob, Taelyn and I went out the road. I let Megan do some driving. Then we went out to Point D. I took tons of pictures. We had a great time. It's been a great weekend. I can't wait to get outside and spend more time in it. Oh and deep fry snickers.

2010-05-01T15:43:00.003-08:00

Happy May Day!! I can't believe it's May. 29 days till I move....somewhere. Tuesday night is my last concert in Metlakatla. A small part of me is going to miss it here, but it's only cause I will miss the friends I've made and my students. I need to do some packing but it's hard to figure out what to take and what to throw away. When you pack it feels like you're going through everything in your life and deciding if some part of it has value. I'm probably not the first person that thinks packing is not only physically draining but mental draining as well. There are so many moments that I just want to scream. I just want all of this to be over. In ways I wish I knew where I was going next. I feel so discombobulated. I have faith that everything will work out and I will end up where I need to be, but it's hard to just take that leap of faith sometimes. I packing up and leaving without knowing exactly where I'm going to work next year. It's an odd feeling. Everyone says it takes a lot of guts to just leave without anything certain in the future. I know that I can find a job. I know I'm employable, especially since I turned down two jobs. At times I wonder if I did the right thing but then I feel like there is something better waiting for me. I don't know what but I'm excited to find out.
This week has been a rough week at school too. I got back from Music Fest and things just kinda hit the fan. Oh well. 4 more weeks.

April crazyness

2010-04-25T00:59:00.003-08:00

I don't even know where to begin so I guess I'll start with Do (sorry music joke).
April has been a little bit of a crazy month. April started with the high school principal leaving. We then had testing. I had my performance review with Anchorage. I passed that. The next step from there was to have an HR screening interview. Meanwhile, I had an interview with Copper River School District. I also received an email from the Northwest Arctic Borough School District about a job in Kotzebue.
I went up and saw a foot doctor and went to the job fair. I had 4 interviews that day. To not drag all the details out. I passed my HR screening interview. I got offered the job in Kotzebue, which I declined. I had an interview with Copper River School District while at the job fair. Later I had a final interview with Copper River School District. I got offered that job, which I also declined. I also interviewed for a job in Tok. The job fair was an intense experience.
Tuesday we left for Music Fest. This year it's in Juneau. We took the ferry for 36 hours from Ketchikan. My students did well and I'm proud of them. My choir of 6 sang on the big stage Friday evening. Earlier in the day I had one student do a solo on the clarinet and my twins did a duet. I wore a bright orange shirt and styled my hair in a faux hawk. It was awesome.
After that I flirted a little with Tyree (the orchestra director at Thunder Mountain). I flirted with him quite a bit on Saturday too. It was so fun. It is great talking with him, and as a bonus he's cute and gives good hugs.
In about 10 hours I get on a ferry for 36 hours. It's going to be another long ride. I'll survive. At least I have had a great time. Everyone said bye to me and I told them all to keep in touch. The directors here are a great group. I got a lot of hugs. If I get a job outside of Southeast Alaska, I'm going to really miss them. Tyree and I talked for awhile after the meeting, that was fun.
We'll see what life has in store for me next. :)

Last quarter of the 2009/2010 school year

2010-03-31T06:23:00.002-08:00

Where has the school year gone? I can't believe there are only 8 1/2 weeks left to the school year. I have so much to get done. I have Music Fest, the Spring Concert, my multicultural education class, packing, finding a job, finishing out the rest of the school year, etc. All in about two months.
March has been a busy month. I've traveled most of it. It's nice to spend some time at home. April is going to be the last big push to get things ready. Music Fest is the 22nd-24th and then it's about a week till the Spring Concert. It should all work.....I hope.
There continues to be way too much drama at school. Last week tenure teachers finally got their contracts. Non-tenure still haven't. The rumor I've heard is that they will offer them after the next board meeting which is I think the 3rd week in April. I'm really hoping to have found a new job by then. This school year has really left a bad taste in my mouth. I'm ready for the end of May. (well sort of).
I've applied for a job in Anchorage. They called me this week. I have a performance review to pass before they continue with the application process. I need to prepare a tuba piece, a vocal piece, and then practice some piano. It's going to be interesting. I get to do this all over the phone. They will email me the piano thing right before I have to play it. The piano part of this is the only part that actually makes some sense to me. I don't totally see how my own performance skills on my main instrument and voice actually shows what kind of teacher I am. I have no problem going through this hoop, I can play my instrument and sing a song. My piano skills are getting better, I just need to practice more. So much to do.
Well off to have a couple really long days. Today and tomorrow are parent teacher conferences. There isn't really anytime to go home between either. We'll see how these go.
I'm off to get ready for the day.

It's been too long

2010-03-21T20:18:00.003-08:00

So, I apologize for neglecting my blog this past month but I've been busier than can be. I've spent 2 days home so far for the entire month of March. I'm finally home from some of my travels. It's been a wild ride but fun. We had the regional basketball tournament at the beginning of the month up in Sitka. I was then home for about 2 days and then left for spring break. I got home today. It feels like all I've been is busy. I have about a month until Music Festival and then about a week after that is the spring concert. Crazy. Time flies.
I'm trying to think what is worth recapping. The pep band rocked out at Regionals. I think we played at about 13 games. (This is what I get for having my kids play for 3 schools including our own). Heck there would've been 2 more games to that list but I took pity on them. The day we left John, the Sitka director, made breakfast for the directors. Four of us showed up. It was fun and the food was good.
Spring break was nice. It was great to see my family. Lots of good food. I went and talked to my cousin Mackay's class. She's in 4th grade. I talked about Alaska. It was really fun. I finally saw Avatar and the Princess and the Frog. I did some shopping and shipped stuff up to me. I had a good time but it felt kinda hectic. I enjoyed going up to the spice store and going grocery shopping with my dad. I dislike the clothes shopping I did but I needed some clothes that fit so it was more out of necessity. I got to see my little brother's new dog. He got a basset hound named Missy. She's adorable. He adores her and she really likes him. It's a good fit.
I've applied for some jobs for next school year, all in Alaska. I'm just going to go where I'm supposed to go.
Well, the time changes are still messing with me so I think I'm going to get some shut eye. Happy spring!!

Wait, it's February?

2010-02-01T05:31:00.004-09:00

When did that happen? Now hopefully February goes as quickly as January did. I can't believe how busy I've seemed to be and I still have so much to do. I better get cracking.
This last week has been a great week for food. I've made enchiladas, baked ziti, homemade pizza, sweet and sour chicken, and spare ribs. Tonight it's breakfast for dinner, mmmmmm biscuits and gravy. I've also done my fair of kid watching the last couple weeks. It's been fun.
Work is still there and keeping my occupied. I wish I had a great story, but I don't. I have the next two weekends off from basketball. Then it's two more weekends of games and then Regionals. After that it's like a week of school and then spring break. Wow that's soon.
This school year has gone by quickly. Now I just need to finish up some homework and I'll be good.

Semester 2

2010-01-21T05:40:00.003-09:00

Yesterday marked the start of the second semester. It went pretty well. I have a few more students in my classes. I'm not complaining. The high school remodel seems to be right on schedule, it should be finished about Spring break. There is a music room in the high school that is getting purposed as being a music room. I turned in an equipment list for basic equipment that I need in the new classroom, i.e. chairs, stands, etc. It looks like they are pretty set on there being two music classrooms, now if only they can be convinced that they need two music teachers. With the new semester, I also now have a TA (teacher assistant) during my first hour. Hopefully I will get a little more organized. We also had the new phone system installed yesterday, I once again have a phone in my classroom.
In other news, my heater finally got fixed. That's a good thing. I also made a poppy seed cake from a recipe that I got from a friend. It is awesome. I plan on taking the rest of it to school today. The last thing I need is a whole cake sitting around my house.
I wish I knew something more exciting but sadly work is about all I have right now. Just a side note though, yesterday was sunny and 48 for more than half the day, it was amazing.

First week back done

2010-01-09T17:35:00.003-09:00

Well this week went by pretty well I guess. Monday didn't feel like a Monday, but man Tuesday did. The rest of the week went pretty well. Friday was crazy just cause the kids were nuts. I'm glad today is Saturday. I've spent sometime today finding all the paperwork I need to mail in with my PFD application. I still need to find my W2 from 2008. What a hassle but luckily after this it should be pretty easy.
It's that time of year again to fill out residency and work permits on the island. Apparently a memo with the applications went out this week, but I didn't get one. I received an email about the memo and responded saying, 'what memo?' Well I went to the district office for mine. (Apparently I'm the only one that didn't get the memo.) Oh well.
It's nice to have a weekend off with no basketball games. Next week we have games Thursday and Friday. It's going to be a busy two months with basketball.
We are officially on the IFA ferry schedule as ours has gone in for regular maintenance. I'm not really excited about the ferry situation but oh well. It's not like I go over to town very often. It just means that I'll be going less. I guess we are going to be having the IFA service until about April. We'll see what happens. I'll be glad when we have our ferry back.
I don't think there is too much else to report. I better get back to looking for my W2.

Back to the daily grind

2010-01-05T05:12:00.002-09:00

I'm not sure that my life is really exciting, or at least that I make it sound that way, but sometimes some interesting things happen to me. Sunday, in the early morning, I got on the ferry to head back from Wrangell. I got on the ferry and went to sleep (woohoo 3AM). I woke up about 8:30 so that I could get ready and everything for our 9:30 arrival. I doesn't take me an hour to get ready in the morning, I just like being up and ready to go. Well about 9:15 they make an announcement that it's probably going to be 10AM before we dock. There was another ferry docked that was having mechanical problems so it couldn't leave. At 10 we were still out in the channel but starting to go around in circles. It was announced that it was going to be another 15-30 minutes. There were several more announcements made that sounded exactly like that. I finally stepped off the ferry at 11:15AM. The rest of my travel Sunday was very uneventful. I got home and walked into my house and my oil heater wasn't working. I checked all the usual things....nothing. I called Siri to see if I could borrow an electric heater since it was 44 degrees in my house. Her son Anthony dropped it off and tried to see if there was anything he could do to make the heater start. We checked the oil tank, I have plenty of oil. We tried a variety of things with the heater, still nothing. I called my landlord. 'I'll come look at in the morning.' I think it was about 50 degrees when I went to bed. Luckily I have electric heaters in my bedroom so it wasn't too cold in there.
I got up and went to work yesterday, during lunch I got a phone call from my landlord. 'I think you're out of heating oil.' Not possible. I told him that I had checked it the night before and had quite a bit. So they checked to see if there was water in the filter. Well they drained the water and cleaned the filter. Still no heat. When I got home my landlord and someone else were working on the heater. I guess it was leaking some oil and maybe the pump isn't working right. I don't know what else is wrong with it. Basically as long as the exhaust to a different heater is the same, I'm getting a new(er) heater. Thankfully my landlord brought over another electric heater to run in my house. This morning when I woke up it was about 60 degrees, that a lot warmer than the 45 degrees on Monday. I hope that they can get the whole heater thing figured out. Till then my house smells like heating oil.
School yesterday went surprisingly well. It is nice to be back in the swing of things. I don't think anything really exciting happened. Two weeks until the first semester is over, not that the second semester is going to bring any real changes. I guess someone counted up the days of school that were left and as of today there are 143 days. That seems like a lot and the next break isn't until spring break. It's going to be a long haul getting through January and February but that's how it goes. The kids have the 19th of this month off for teacher inservice.
We also got the reminder notice that our regular ferry will be getting serviced starting next Monday. Mumble, mumble, mumble. The Inter-Island ferry, or IFA ferry, will be running "in it's place." Our ferry runs twice a day Thursday through Monday. So it makes two runs to Ketchikan and two runs back to Metlakatla. When we have the IFA ferry it makes one run from Ketchikan to Metlakatla at 11AM and goes from Metlakatla to Ketchikan at 2PM. Simply put, it's not possible to get to Ketchikan and back on the same day via the IFA ferry. We are going to have to do this for at least the next 3 months. I guess I'm not going anywhere. I'll deal with the ferry thing for spring break when I go somewhere but that will probably be the only time I'm going to leave the island, unless I float plane it. The joys of living on an island in Southeast Alaska.
Well I'm off to start another day.

Happy New Year 2010

2010-01-01T20:36:00.003-09:00

Happy 2010!!! I'm still up in Wrangell. Last night Tasha and I went and did karaoke. Woohoo!!! We had so much fun. We were pretty much the only ones that could really sing. It was fun. Today has been pretty laid back. I didn't get out of bed till after 10AM. I like sleep. Tomorrow is my last day in Wrangell. I get on the ferry at 3:30AM on Sunday, well that's what time it leaves, I'll be on it earlier than that. Then it's back to work Monday.

We'll see what the new year brings.

The last post for 2009

2009-12-31T16:45:00.003-09:00

Happy New Year's Eve!! I'm spending New Years with Tasha and her husband Adam. I believe we are going out for pizza and maybe some karaoke. It should be fun regardless.
Today Tasha and I went out to Pat's lake. It was a nice little hike, much shorter than yesterdays. It was still very pretty. At least today there was no almost falling off a cliff. I failed to recount that tale about yesterday. When Tasha and I were going back down the trail from Rainbow Falls, we were going down some steps and I slipped. I then proceeded to start to roll towards the edge of a cliff. I caught myself, but it was pretty funny. Ok, well I'm laughing over it. I'm a little sore still from the slip but it's all good.
I'm having a great time visiting Wrangell and will be sad to leave and go back to work. I take the ferry Sunday to go back. I decided to get a cabin for the ride from Wrangell to Ketchikan, that way I can sleep in a bed till I get to Ketchikan. The ferry departs Wrangell at about 3:30AM which means I need to be there around 2:30AM. We get into Ketchikan at about 9:30AM. I should be able to get several hours of good sleep.
I hope everyone has a safe and happy New Year.

Rainbow falls

2009-12-30T12:51:00.004-09:00

King of the Hill

Hiding

Rainbow Falls

Ta da

Stupid Stairs

The sign at the Trail head

Today Tasha and I went out to Rainbow falls. It was quite a hike. It was a lot of stairs, but the view was great and we had a good time. I started out with the hoodie on but later was way too warm so I hiked most of the trial without the sweatshirt. We may have had a little too much fun and went a little camera happy.
Yesterday we went out to Petroglyph beach. That's what the prior post of pictures. It's been great being up here visiting Tasha. Good friends and some good food. Woohoo!!

Some exploring

2009-12-29T12:18:00.003-09:00

Day 1 in Wrangell

2009-12-28T17:06:00.002-09:00

I arrived in Wrangell yesterday afternoon at about 4pm. It was a pretty uneventful ferry ride. Tasha picked me up from the ferry terminal then we went back to her bowling game. She plays on a league and it was couples league last night. We went to her inlaws house for dinner that night, it was fun. We had a good time hanging out.
This morning, after being woken up by my mother at 6AM which I fell back asleep afterwards, I finally got out of bed about 8:30. It was nice to sleep in. Then Tasha and I were kinda lazy for awhile. We went and had lunch with her husband Adam at a diner in town. Mmmm double bacon cheeseburger. Then Tasha and I went out the road. We were going to go to Pat's Lake but when we tried to go up the road we lost traction. Then Tasha was going to back down it, instead we started to slide backwards. We then started to slide sideways. It was kinda funny. We luckily didn't end up in the ditch and we made it safely back onto dry (not ice coated) road. We drove around some more. We went to 10 Mile pipe, which is literally a rusty looking pipe sticking out on the side of the road that fresh water flows out of. I'll admit that I drank out of it. Apparently everybody does. It was pretty good water. It was kinda funny though drinking out of a pipe on the side of the road. Other than that, it's been a pretty lazy day. I'm glad I'm on break.
We'll see what tomorrow brings.

Another beautiful Alaska Morning

2009-12-27T08:50:00.003-09:00

It's a beautiful morning this morning. I'm glad the sun is shining because I'll get some good pictures while I'm on the ferry. It was nice to be here in town last night. I enjoyed hanging out with Bryan, Caitlyn, and Megan. Bryan got on his flight this morning back to Anchorage. As I'm writing this, Megan and Caitlyn are still asleep. I'm good and tired but I can sleep some on the ferry and when I get to Tasha's. Yesterday morning was also a beautiful morning up here. I have some pictures that I should post.
Yesterday was pretty laid back. We only got to see Sherlock Holmes because there was an enormous line for Avatar. It's ok. We had a good time.
I'm excited about the ferry ride and the awesome weather. I think it may be about 40 degrees here this morning. It feels great.
Well off to the ferry I go.

One of my christmas presents

2009-12-26T17:39:00.002-09:00

My Christmas present from Bryan.

Merry Christmas and etc.

2009-12-26T10:13:00.003-09:00

Oh it's so nice to be on break. I can't believe how quickly a week of it has already gone, but still it's been great. Good food and good friends is really hard to beat. I've had a great week. My parents sent me an ice cream maker and Harry Potter 6 on bluray. Sadly I had to wrap them myself (well Bryan wrapped the bluray). Cara stopped over and filled my stocking, I also had a stocking at Siri's. Yay friends. Dan and Cara also got me a bop-it, I've never played bop-it but it looks fun. I had gone over to Dan and Cara's before heading over to Siri's on Christmas morning. (Of course after I loaded all the other presents in the car). I handed out presents over at Siri's and received the gift Bryan had gotten me. It was hilarious opening the box. So he had taped down all of the loose parts of wrapping paper and then after ripping all of that off was a boxed wrapped completely in duct tape. I about died laughing while trying to get all the duct tape off. Inside the box surrounded by some packing was a ring box. I jokingly asked if I should be worried. I opened the box to find a very pretty opal ring that I had admired over summer. I was absolutely amazed that he had remembered that I said I like the ring back in July. The stone even matches the necklace that he had bought me over the summer. It was such a sweet gift. Oh and he got my ring size right too. (Major kudos). It was a great Christmas.
It really has been a great week. I've had a great time. It's been fun hanging out with Bryan and all my other friends.
I'm looking forward to going to Wrangell tomorrow. Tonight we're going to go see two movies. Sherlock Holmes and Avatar. Woohoo!!
I'll write again later.

Fun times

2009-12-21T07:15:00.003-09:00

Have I mentioned that I love being on break? I really do. It's been so nice to just have a break. Yesterday was a fun day. I had a good time at church and I went to go take care of Siri's dogs when I got a text from Bryan. We texted back and forth a little, come to find he and his family had just docked. Well I ended up picking Bryan, Siri, and Jacob up while they were walking back from the ferry. Then I dragged Megan and Caitlyn off to make more perogis with me at Nicole's. It was once again a fun time. When I dropped Megan and Caitlyn back off at their mom's, I hung out a little while and then Bryan and I went out the road (and drove around town). We just drove around and talked. It was really nice to talk. I'm glad that he and I are friends. While we were out driving around he sent a text to Siri stating that I had left him out the road. No response. Well then I sent a text saying I left him out the road. No response. Finally as he and I were sitting at my house play Super Mario Bros Wii (which was hilarious) his mom called me. 'Did you really leave him out the road?' 'Do you think I would really leave him out the road?' 'No but I was just checking.' Lol. I still find it amusing. After we got done playing Wii, we went back to Siri's and wrapped some presents. We were quickly running out of tape and wrapping paper so we'll pick up some today and finish wrapping.
I think I may go over to Ketchikan a day early to see a movie, especially if Avatar is still playing. Before that however, I should make cookies, do some homework, and do some work around my house. I have a feeling that break is going to fly by, but it's going to be fun.
Side note:
I have learned that the more people that get involved in your life, the more difficult some things can be made into. (Without any effort on your part). Sometimes the parties involved just need to deal with things themselves and not listen to everyone else that seems to have an opinion. I have found that people that love you (friends, family, etc) want to give their opinion to you but sometimes it's just best to ignore it and do what you feel is right. Breakups can be hard, but when there are no hard feelings and it's pretty much a mutual thing, sometimes it's just best to talk it out and not listen to everyone else. (Especially when people want to try to pick sides and there are no sides to take.) Thankfully things in this particular instance have turned out for the best and we are friends but it could've been different. I'm grateful for the voice of reason and for guys that know how to be adults. I'm also glad for a small void in my life that is filled back in.
I am so truly blessed in my life. I have great friends, an amazing family, and a wonderful amount of faith. I miss my family this holiday season but I am there in spirit. I am grateful for the people I get to spend my holidays with. I hope that everyone has a wonderful holiday season and lives everyday to the fullest. Take the gift that you've been given and make the most of it.
Happy Holidays!!!!

Good friends and good food

2009-12-19T19:27:00.003-09:00

First things first, I'm glad to be on break. It was a nice week, particularly because the stress of the concerts wasn't there. I'm so glad that I decided to do it the week earlier. It took a lot of pressure off of the last week before break. Once again I'm glad to be on break. Pep band has been going pretty well and we're having a good time. I'm glad I have such great kids (and alumni).
As per the title of this post, I'm so grateful to have wonderful friends (and of course family even though I'm not with them). This afternoon Nicole invited me, Darcie, Cat, Darcie's mom, and Cara over to make perogis. Mmmmmmm. We only made ones filled with mashed potatoes today. Tomorrow we are going to make saurkraut filled one. Mmmmm. I have about 30 perogis from just today, I'll have more tomorrow. I put two large bags in the freezer and one in the fridge. I plan on having perogis for breakfast tomorrow. I'm so excited about it. I had such a great time this afternoon. It makes me happy that I decided to stay here over break. We had great conversation and just an over all good time. We made tons of perogis. If I were to take a guess we probably made about 200 or so. It was so fun. I don't know how many we'll make tomorrow, but it'll be fun.
I think I have an incomplete in my Multicultural Education class, that's a bit of a relief. Now I need to finish my homework.
I've had a bit of a trying week personally. I've felt very low and alone. I called my dad in the middle of the night to talk to him. I've never called my parents in the middle of the night. I've lived alone for 5 years and I've never felt homesick or so alone. It was bizarre. I feel a lot better today. I've dealt with a lot of just emotional baggage, I think everything kinda finally got to me. I've been going so hard for so long, it finally just all caught up. I had a good cry and I've moved on. I've been through a wide range of emotions but I really feel that I need to get it all out. I've always been so strong that it really bothered me to feel the way I did. I think that I've dealt with it and I'm better for it. I definitely have found some of my limits. But I feel at peace now.
I have few concrete plans for break. I'm getting on the ferry on the 27th to go see Tasha. Prior to that I'm going to do some work around my house and just relax. (Maybe play some video games) I also need to do some homework. I don't know what I'm going to do when I go see Tasha besides hang out.
It'll be a great break.

What a month

2009-12-13T13:37:00.004-09:00

Sorry it's been so long since I've written here, a lot has kept me busy. So much has happened in a month. I spent weeks continually getting ready for the concerts. The concerts were last Tuesday and Wednesday, they were awesome. The groups did really well, I was very pleased. The concerts got rave reviews from everyone that attended. It was the biggest turnout we've had for a concert for as I've been here. I've never been hugged by some many people. What a great feeling.
Let's see, what else. I have had college classes kicking my butt. I've had way too much to do on top of everything. I'm going end up having to take one of the classes over again. Two classes with all the homework on top of teaching and everything else has been way too much. My life seems so insane.
I have no idea where I'm going to be six months from now. Honestly I don't really know what's happening in January. I don't know if the threat of termination is still there or not. I'm honestly not worried about it. I'm just going to keep doing my job. There is a small part of me that wants to stay (which is a recent thing). All year I've really felt like I wanted the heck out of here and there is just this tiny part of me that wants to stay. Now I feel a little torn. It feels like the community is finally starting to back me a little too.
I just know everything is going to work out. I know that I'll go wherever I need to be.
Well this is the last week of school before break and I'm staying in Alaska the whole time. I'm spending the first week of break hanging out here with my friends here then I ferry off to Wrangell. I'm going to go see Tasha for a week. Watch out Wrangell here I come. It will be great to see her.
In the last month I've found my self single again, stressed out, and not ready for basketball season (which started this last weekend). Our first games were this past Friday and Saturday. Got to love pep band. I'm definitely not ready. I am ready for a break. I've been thinking about where I want to spend my spring break, I don't have any great ideas. My mom is hoping that I'll come home to visit. We'll see.
I don't know much else. I'm relieved to have the concerts done and I'm ready for break. I've got all the Christmas presents wrapped. I've been enjoying my new tv.
Oh and I had a great Thanksgiving. I hung out with Cara and her family, it was great. Good food and good friends, can't beat it.
Well I think that's about it for now.

Too much travel

2009-11-14T13:48:00.003-09:00

What a busy week. I flew to Anchorage on Saturday and had a great time. Rikki and I went to Village Inn, where Bryan works, to celebrate Cara's birthday. We had a good time. Then we wandered around Anchorage some. It was fun. Sunday I went to church while Bryan slept. I made a few contacts, they hope I move to Anchorage. Monday I ran a couple errands and took a nap. When Bryan was up we went to a nice restaurant for dinner and then saw a movie. It was a nice date. Then we wandered around some and then got donuts. The donut place is a 24 hour shop and the donuts are good. On the way back to his apartment we saw a moose strolling down the sidewalk going the opposite direction as us. I didn't notice until Bryan shouted "Moose". Tuesday was pretty laid back as well. It was just nice hanging out with Bryan.
Wednesday morning I left of Chicago. I went out to dinner with my parents and friend Beth. Mmmm Red Robin. Thursday, Friday, and today were spent at the National Orff Conference in Milwaukee. I had a great time. I can't begin to describe how fun it was. I'm currently sitting at the airport waiting to board the plane to go back to Anchorage. I should arrive there about 10:15PM, which is 1:15AM Central time. I've been up since 6AM (CST) so I'm hoping to sleep on the plane. I depart Anchorage tomorrow morning at 8AM, so I will probably be getting up about 6:30AM. I don't get into Ketchikan until about 1PM and the ferry leaves at 4:30PM. By the time I get to Metlakatla, it will be 7PM. That includes one more time change. What an exhausting amount of travel. I might be asleep by 7:30PM tomorrow night. I'm exhausted now. Nothing like going home tired and then having to teach right when I get back. Oh well, that's how it goes.

Watch out here I come

2009-11-07T06:05:00.003-09:00

I was overjoyed to get on the ferry yesterday afternoon. I'm currently sitting in Ketchikan, I'll go to the airport in about an hour. I arrived over here yesterday and Megan and I bummed around for a while. This included going out for Thai/Chinese food. Mmmm. We had a good time. Then we just kinda hung out the rest of the night. It was fun. This morning she's going to cheer practice and I'm getting on a plane to go to Anchorage for a few days. The one hour time change meant that I've been up since about 5 this morning. Wednesday I'll be changing time again when I see my family and go to the National Orff Conference. It'll be fun to see them. I love hanging out with my family and my friends. It looks like the only day my friend Beth has off this coming week is the day I fly in, so I'm trying to convince her to ride down with my parents to come pick me up and then we'll all go out to dinner. I think there is Red Robin in my future.
Not only will I be going through some time changes, but some major weather changes. It's been wet and windy in Metlakatla. It's been in the low 30's in Anchorage and in the upper 50's/low 60's in Antioch. The forecast says snow in Anchorage Monday. Weird weather is what I'm used to, I did grow up in northern Illinois. It'll just be nice to be on this trip. I've really been looking forward to it. I'm glad that I get to see Bryan and my family. It's been several months since I've seen them. The only downside is the long hours on a plane. Today I'll spend about 5 1/2 hours on the plane. Wednesday will be about 6 1/2 hours, that's also the same for next Saturday. Then next Sunday is only about 4 1/2 hours. That's only a total of 23 hours on planes. Wow that's a lot.
I don't have much to report about from work. We had parent-teacher conferences Wednesday and Thursday. Those were long days, but they went pretty well. I think I saw a total of 12 parents, which is way more than I saw last year. Nothing really exciting happened I supposed. The high school secretary did put in her letter of resignation though, very sad face. She's a great secretary. I can't believe how she's being treated. It really irks me. Apparently some people missed in their education classes on how secretaries run the world. I was given very good advice in an education class, NEVER get on the bad side of the secretary and the janitor. Definitely words to live by.
On another side note, as I was leaving town I read on the marquee by the school that they are celebrating principal's day on Friday. What the heck is that and why are we celebrating it? The administration isn't that good, well at least at the high school/middle school end of things. I just googled principal's day and it's May 1st, so why are we celebrating it November 13th? I'm glad I won't be there for it. Instead I can be home celebrating my parent's 30th wedding anniversary. Wow they've been married a long time.
Another week down and the coming one should be way more fun. I'm looking forward to it.

Happy Time Change?

2009-11-03T04:12:00.003-09:00

It's that time again where almost everywhere else in the US changes from daylight savings time. Does anyone know what time it is? My computer and cell phone say one thing and my watch and other clocks say something else. It cracks me up. In case you forgot (or didn't know) Metlakatla doesn't change time. It is kinda nice to not have to reset my clocks twice a year but we are the only town in Alaska that doesn't change. It still amuses me.
I have parent-teacher conferences tonight and tomorrow. Joy (not). I'm sure it's going to be loads of fun, sitting in the high school gym at a table waiting for parents to come talk to me.
I'm excited for Friday. I get on a float plane and get out of here for a week. I fly to Anchorage on Saturday. YAY!!! I get to spend a couple days with Bryan. Then I fly to see my parents and go to the National Orff Conference in Milwaukee. I'm not looking forward to dealing with the time change but I am looking forward to all of the above mentioned things. I'm also excited to see Bill's new apartment. I think moving out was harder for him than it was for me. He'll be living about 10 minutes from our parents. Well that's two kids out of the house. Jamey's still living at home, which I guess works for him. I think my mom likes having some one of her kids living at home. She'll have a hard time when we're all some where else. I'm probably going to be the only one that lives far away. If I were to move to Anchorage, it would be cheaper and easier for me to get back to see my family. I'm strongly considering the move to Anchorage, not because I want to be in "the city", but because it might be a good move for me. It will be easier to be involved in church and a lot of other things. Not to mention being able to see Bryan more often. I've made some great friends here, but I don't think I'm supposed to be here after this school year. I know that no matter what things will work out. I'm not too worried about what happens.
Well now that I've been up for an hour and a half, I might as well do something productive.

Another week about over

2009-10-30T07:32:00.002-08:00

The 1st quarter of school ended yesterday. Today is an inservice day. :( I'm not really excited. We are doing something with curriculum mapping, I think. I don't know. No one really knows what we're doing. It seems to be the story of my life, well as far as school is concerned. It's been the goofiest month. I have had a week free of run-ins with the principal. That's a nice thing, even if I do hold my breath every time my classroom door opens. Life isn't fun when you have a bully for an administrator. I don't really feel like the superintendent is doing that great a job either. Oh well. 1/4 of the school year is over with. I'm so glad. I've started my job search for next year. I'm looking for a music job in Alaska. It'll be easier for me to move within Alaska than moving back to the lower 48. I'd like to stay in Southeast, but we'll see what happens. My boyfriend has mentioned several times that I could move to Anchorage, which is where he is. I wouldn't really mind that. It would be nice to see him more often, seeing him every three months has it's challenges. I've concluded that no matter what happens next year, I'll be fine. I'm either going to find a music job and work full-time, or sub/drive a bus and go to grad school. Regardless of what I do, I'll make it.
In non work related news, sort of, it's another frying Friday. My parents bought me a deep fryer for my birthday. Last Friday Jodie, the new high school english teacher, and I deep fried halibut and homemade french fries. It was totally awesome. The deep fryer is probably the BEST GIFT EVER!!! (I probably said that about my KitchenAid when I got that). So we are going to deep fry some food again tonight. There is nothing more stress relieving (at the moment) then cranking up the music and deep frying some stuff. Jodie and I had an awesome time last Friday and I'm sure we'll have a good time this today. I love good food and good company.
One last note about work (I feel that work is mostly tri-tones, sorry music nerd alert) my student did make it to Honors Festival. I'm pretty sure she had a good time. From what I hear everything went well, but everyone noticed that I wasn't there.
I'm off to go work on grades and sit in inservice.

Drama, drama, drama

2009-10-18T07:05:00.003-08:00

That should explain it all. All there seems to be in my life is drama. Ok, that's not completely true. My personal life is just wonderful. My friends aren't causing me stress, neither is my boyfriend (thankfully when I talk to him it relieves the stress). The drama is all just work related. I feel there is a witch hunt and I'm the witch. It all started when the high school principal decided I didn't need to go to Honors Festival. He felt I'd be missing too much time. Not only do I have a student going but I have responsibilities there too. Obviously that's not really important. That drama is still going on and Honors fest is next week. I was pretty much told that they felt that it was too hard to find a sub for me. What?????
Last Tuesday I had my first formal observation by the high school principal. What a joy. NOT! At least he sent me an email about it the day before. (I really hope that the elementary principal does my second observation). I had my meeting with the principal on Thursday, because I used a sick day on Wednesday (stupid fever and headache). Apparently I'm too nice and friendly, and I give too much praise. Huh????? *I raised an eyebrow at this* (I really don't get it). Then the conversation turned back to Honors fest (let's beat that one to death some more). He went on about how it is done is Oregon (where he's from) and on and on and on. Wait, I thought I lived in Alaska....when did we become Oregon. When did what works there work here? This is Southeast Alaska, nothing is the same here as it is anywhere else outside of Alaska.
Then went on and on and on about something not related to him at all. Sorry last time I checked I had an elementary principal. So the high school principal has nothing to do with the k-6 end of my job, but he seems to think he does. Then he went on about my numbers and how I couldn't blame the schedule. HELLO!!!! I can blame the schedule, there about 10 students that can't be in the music program during the regular school day because of the scheduling. I see most of these kids after school on my own time. I also explained how I have no feeder program at the elementary and how I've been trying to get one for as long as I've been her, but that's been shot down too. Does he not realize the amount of work that I do as one person. Apparently not. Anyway, then he told me how the school board and administration are not happy with me and if my numbers aren't up by the semester they are going to terminate me. What!?!?! I don't even know where to start with that one. That's a big thing to speak for the school board, considering from what I hear the school board likes me. Also, I can't control my numbers. Hello the schedule!!! I have a year long contract, they can't terminate me without buying me out. (unless I'm doing something illegal I suppose which I'm not) Now if they really want to get rid of me then why don't they just buy me out now and let me go somewhere else. Don't worry the union is involved in this. I'm telling you witch hunt. The only reason I go to my job is to work with the wonderful kids that I see everyday. I really like the students. My job can be a lot of fun, it's also a lot of work. I keep looking for the positive in life. One last little negative note, I don't know if the pep band is going to Regionals or if the band and choir are going to Music Fest.
On a positive note, I'm going to the National Orff Conference in Milwaukee in November. I'm taking my personal days to go because more school drama. I'm going to spend 3 1/2 days in Anchorage visiting the wonderful man in my life that I haven't seen since the beginning of August. Then I fly to Chicago to stay with my family (and drive my car) for the duration of the conference. It's going to be a little hectic but the Orff Conference is always fun. I'm looking forward to the time off. Everything else is going pretty well. We've had some great rainbows here. I've got some great teacher friends and great other friends. I wish I got to see everyone more often. I'm planning a road trip for the summer to drive my car from Illinois to Alaska. By then I will have lived two years without it and I think that I will probably need it by then. We'll see what happens.

Why am I so tired?

2009-10-07T06:07:00.003-08:00

I haven't figured out why I'm so tired. I've been getting plenty of sleep. I got up early yesterday morning to finish getting things ready for my birthday. I had some friends over for soup and cake. I made a ton of potato soup. Almost literally. I cut up about 10lbs of potatoes, 3 onions, 1lb of bacon, and 7 cans of evaporated milk. We didn't even make it to the second pot of soup last night so I took a pot of soup over to a friend of mine. I also made bread, pound cake, and red devils food cake. It was awesome. I have lots of leftovers. I'm ok with that.
I don't feel any older, usually. It was funny yesterday when the kids kept trying to guess my age. My birthday got put in the school bulletin, so I think everyone knew. It was hilarious. I had two students yesterday who also had birthdays, so we sang to them. It was also the superintendent's birthday so I took the choir to go sing to him.
It was a fun time.
Work seems to be going well this week. I have tons of stuff I need to get done though. We start pep band rehearsals tomorrow, I have songs to finish arranging for the band, I can't find my copy of Finale, and the list goes on. This also includes that fact that I have homework that I need to do before I get really far behind. Oh wait, I already am behind.

Where did September go?

2009-10-04T09:00:00.005-08:00

Holy cow the last month has totally gotten away from me and I don't know where this one is going either. Where exactly did September go? All I can figure is work got into full swing, my classes have kept me busy, and I don't know what else has happened. I go to work everyday and I'd love to say it's better than last year, but I don't know if it is. I still have no elementary curriculum, my schedule is insane, and I'm taking two classes. Well I'm technically taking three classes. Two of them are for my Alaska certificate, the other is a graduate level class that was part of inservice week. So I technically have 9 credit hours, and my classes are starting to kick my butt. I don't know if this was a good idea to take all of this. I'm sure that I'm busier this year than I was last year. I thought your second year of teaching was supposed to be a little easier than your first. I don't think that was ever referring to life here. I'm on my 3rd high school/middle school principal and my 2nd elementary one. I'm not sure how I feel about either. (This is my second year at this school). I hate turning in lesson plans every week. I also really dislike when teachers decide to change their schedule and don't tell you about it till the day that they've decided that they are coming to see you. I'm not that hard of a person to find. I'm always in my classroom and all the teachers have email. Angry face.
Until Thursday of this past week, there has been no phone in my classroom. Thus no way to get a hold of me. It's very exciting and I'm sure not legal. Thursday I was brought a school cell phone, that I now need to keep track of and make sure that everyone who needs my number has it. At least it's better than nothing.
I can't believe how busy and tired I am. Holy cow. Well that's life I guess. I don't even feel like I'm keeping my head above water anymore. I also can't find my copy of Finale and I need to arrange the Christmas music for my band. I also have pep band rehearsal starting this Thursday. It seems to always be one more thing.
I hate to start rumors, but I'm pretty sure that I won't be coming back to Met next year. I'd rather be in a place where the administration supports the program. I don't feel like I have any support at all. I don't know where I'll go yet, but I'd like to stay in Alaska. If I don't find a job up here, I'll probably go to grad school full time. That will be a hard adjustment again. I have lots of faith that things will work out how they are supposed to. Who knows maybe things will change significantly here, I doubt it but hope springs eternal.
Oh and there was the best rainbow Friday. That's the picture up at the top.

Back to the swing of things

2009-09-06T17:07:00.003-08:00

Well I'm enjoying a three day weekend (and it's the only one I get till my break for thanksgiving) and exhausted from the first week of school. My schedule is insane, but that's par for the course. I am teaching a total of 13 different classes. I have 9 elementary, high school choir, guitar, middle school band, and high school band. We have two new principals. It started off as a rough week but it is getting better. I had a week of inservice before last week. It's been crazy.
Summer flew by very quickly. As a recap I left Metlakatla on Memorial day and flew into Chicago on the 26th if May. The following Monday I went to Carbondale for a week. Then I was back in Antioch for a week, then off to the east coast for 2 weeks. I was then back in Antioch for about 5 days. I flew to Anchorage on the 3rd of July for a week and a half. I was then back in Antioch for 4 days before heading off to Missouri. After returning back from Missouri there were two weeks left of my vacation. The first weekend in August I drove down to Belleville to see a friend. I left Illinois on the 10th of August and flew back to Anchorage. I was in Anchorage till the 20th when I came back to Metlakatla. I did a lot of traveling. It was a great summer.

Pickles, Pickles, and more Pickles

2009-08-02T03:09:00.004-08:00

Oops, it's been a while since I've done an update. I'd blame the fact there is no internet at my relatives homes in Missouri, but I've been back for a week since then. So that doesn't really work. After a few days of being home from Anchorage and seeing Harry Potter, mom and I left for Springfield Missouri. Talk about driving to the middle of nowhere. I've been to some pretty middle of nowhere places but driving down there really seems like driving to the middle of nowhere. We got together with the family and I proceeded to scan about 400 pages of genealogy. (If I never have to scan anything ever again it will be too soon). Scanning was all I did for a day and a little bit. I lost track of how many hours I was scanning. After leaving there we drove to Southern Illinois with a stop at Lambert's. It's the home of the throwed rolls, if you've never been there go, cause it's fun. We got 2 1/2 bushels of peaches to can while in southern Illinois, 2 bushels of Redhavens and 1/2 a bushel of white peaches. Mmmm peaches. After getting that canned, mom decided we really needed to do pickles and other things.
Last night I did 36 pints of dill pickles while mom was working on some kind of sweet pickle that she likes. Apparently no one else likes them that well because there are still a whole bunch of leftovers, or they don't know what to eat them with. Either one. We currently have three batches of pickles going. I need to work on more dill pickles because are the most popular out of the three we are making. I of course don't have my other awesome pickle recipes with me because I hadn't planned on doing pickles this year. I have quite a collection of recipes.
Among all of this, I somehow pulled something in my lower back which makes everything I do slightly painful. Oh well, I will survive. I'm off to make more pickles.

Back to sitting and waiting

2009-07-14T20:13:00.003-08:00

I'm back to sitting in an airport. This time I'm in the Anchorage airport waiting to fly back to Chicago. I have a layover in Dallas, TX. It's over a 5 hour layover. I'm going to try to fly standby on an earlier flight, there is a flight leaving at 7:20AM and 7:40 AM. My plane lands in Dallas at 6:23 AM. I'm hoping to make it flying standby. It would be great if I could. It just means that I would have to drive back down to O'Hare to pick up my luggage. The last place I want to be right now is in the airport. I almost didn't go. I'd rather stay in Alaska. It has been an amazing trip. I've been to some glacier, Denali, Flattop Mountain, and an assortment of other places up here. I can't believe how fast the time has gone by. I got here about a week and a half ago and I can't believe it's time to go.
The glaciers were beautiful, Denali was amazing, and I love Alaska. The amount of daylight was a change for me. Where I live, which is about 700 miles south of Anchorage, the sun goes down and it gets dark for more than 3 hours (or less). Being up here and it still being rather light out at midnight was a change.
We'll be boarding the plane in about 15 minutes so I guess it's time for me to wrap this up. Back to the Midwest for a few more weeks then back to Met.

Sitting and waiting

2009-07-03T13:25:00.004-08:00

I'm currently sitting in O'Hare airport waiting for my flight to Anchorage. I of course got to the airport 2 hours early because that is what is recommended and got through security in 10 minutes. So now I have (currently) 1 1/2 hours till my flight leaves. I have a layover in Salt Lake, ok I have a run to the next plane because it's only 30 minutes. Then on to Anchorage. It works out to about 9 hours of flying. Nothing like having a hobby.
As a look back. The road trip went well. I enjoyed seeing my friends in Atlanta, cousin in Louisville, and friends in Carbondale. On our trip from Louisville to Carbondale, a truck tire blew and came flying at us. All you heard was a POP and saw tire flying through the air. I got us to the other lane so as to not be hit by the tire, or what was left of it. It is never a dull moment.
Other than that, it's been a pretty relaxed week. I've slept part of the week out in the tent until Bill took the tent to go camping. The last two nights I slept in his room. I think it was a fair trade.
I've concluded the hardest part of being at my parents' house is the lack of my own space. When I used to come home I had my old room to hide out in. Now I have the tent, sort of, or my car, occasionally. It's really hard living out of a suitcase in the living room and not having any where to really run away to. The closest thing I have is the tent. Oh well. It's only three more weeks after I get back from Anchorage. I will survive.

Happy Father's Day

2009-06-21T02:04:00.003-08:00

Good morning from Virginia. This morning is it for us here in this state. We will be driving to Kitty Hawk later in the morning. It's currently 6AM and I don't plan on leaving here till probably 10AM. After Kitty Hawk we will drive to Rocky Mount to go see Beth's Aunt Mickie.
Virginia has been fun. We went to Colonial Williamsburg and historic downtown Yorktown on Friday. Saturday was a very lax day. Beth and I went and played out in the York river as the big excitement of the day. The only other really exciting thing was having brownie sundaes last night. Oh and I did buy a new computer yesterday as well. It's the new 13" MacBook Pro. It's awesome.
So far the trip has been going well, it's been going more smoothly than I figured it would. You never know what will happen when you put three women in a car for long periods of time especially when my mother and I are in there.
It's been rather warm here as well. Friday it was 89 with way too much humidity and yesterday it was 95 with some humidity. I forgot what hot and humid was like. Thank goodness for air conditioning.

Good Morning Delaware

2009-06-18T02:46:00.003-08:00

Monday (at 3 AM) my mom, friend Beth, and I started on our two week excursion to the East Coast. We stopped in Kirtland, Ohio as our first official stop on the trip. We spent some time there. There is some church history there, thus the reason for the stop. It was kinda cool. I like history, no matter what kind. We continued on through a small section of Pennsylvania, just about the entire state of New York, and stopped for the night in Vermont. New York was beautiful. I've been through most of New York state, but mom and Beth had never been there. I did a majority of the driving that first day.
Day Two - We woke up in the beautiful state of Vermont and hit the road for Ben & Jerry's. The directions weren't as clear as they could have been and we ended up on a scenic highway. There was a sign pointing to Waterbury, the town where Ben & Jerry's is, so we took that way. If you are ever in Vermont, drive Rt 100. It was gorgeous. We saw a couple waterfalls, took some pictures, and enjoyed the drive through the mountains. I'm glad we got off the beaten path and went. I love back roads and this one was amazing. We made it to Ben & Jerry's and took the tour. Nothing like free ice cream. Of course being there you can buy a pint of anything they make. There were flavors I hadn't heard of. Mmmm Ben & Jerry's. After spending too much time in the gift shop and eating a pint of ice cream, for lunch, we started on our way to Maine. It was a beautiful drive through the rest of Vermont and New Hampshire. We drove up to Wiscasset, Maine to a little roadside stand for the best lobster roll in Maine. It was awesome. For those of you that know me, know that I am not a seafood fan. I grew up in Illinois and seafood was anything but fresh. After moving to Alaska, I realized my problem wasn't the seafood, it was the lack of good seafood. The lobster roll and crab cakes we had there were amazing. We then drove out to the ocean, and I played around in it, and then settled for the night.
Day 3 - We explored a little more of Maine, including going to LL Bean. That was fun. The store was huge. We had too much fun there and probably spent a bit too much. We had crab roll from a street vendor that tasted good. Then went to go find a yarn store that mom wanted to see. We made it there but sadly, for mom, they were closed. So we got back on the highway and started our drive down the coast. We drove through Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Conneticut, New York City (well the Bronx), New Jersey, and finally settled for the night in Delaware.
Today we will drive down to Virginia to go see one of my uncles. We'll spend a couple of days there before we head out on the road again. It should be a fun little drive.

Nothing like a hot shower

2009-06-13T06:28:00.003-08:00

After replacing the hot water heater, it still wasn't working. Well last night we went to the Spot, it's a drive up burger place with homemade rootbeer and orange soda on tap. It's great. We got home and debated what to do about the hot water problem. I also tried to figure out where everyone was sleeping because we have a too many people, not enough beds problem. Just then mom called out from the bathroom, WE HAVE HOT WATER. What a wonderful statement. Yay hot water. Well I went and slept out in the tent last night. Someone has to try it out before the road trip. It was great. It was also really nice to take a hot shower this morning. Now I just need to figure out what else I'm going to do with the day. I need to finish getting all the directions to the various places we're going on this road trip put together. Well it's something to do.

What spews water all over the cellar.....

2009-06-12T05:05:00.003-08:00

If you guessed the hot water heater, then you would be correct. Yesterday I took a shower that was anything but warm, but with 5 people in the house and everything being old, I didn't think too much of it. Well I did wonder why the water wasn't getting warm, but considering I've taken really cold showers before, I just did my thing and got out. It turns out that the water heater had died and was spewing water in the cellar. This is one of those times that having a cellar, which has a sand floor, is a great thing. My parents went and bought a hot water heater last night to remedy the problem. Well after spending hours working on it last night and a little while working on it this morning my dad ran out of time to get it working, so we still have no hot water. I didn't really get the whole story about what isn't working right now, but I believe it has to do with the electrical wiring. Hopefully this problem gets remedied soon, if not, I have friends and relatives who will let me borrow their showers. It's never a dull moment here.
In other news, the road trip is officially (mostly) planned. We depart (my mom, friend beth, and myself) on Monday for Maine. We will be gone for about two weeks. Our stops include Ben and Jerry's, L.L. Bean, Atlanta, a few relatives' homes, and a variety of other places. We will be to 8 states I haven't been to before. I will have been to all of the east coast states by the end of this. Woohoo. It will be a lot of driving and I'll take a lot of pictures, but it should be awesome.
After a few days to recoup and do laundry before I leave for Anchorage for a week and a half. Ok, to help with the confused look on your face....I'm going to go visit friends in Anchorage for 12 days then fly back to Illinois and finish off the rest of my summer break. So yes, I'm flying to Alaska to fly back to Illinois to fly back to Alaska. Just for the record, Anchorage is about 700 miles away from Metlakatla. I leave for that trip on the 3rd of July. I leave to go back to Alaska for the school year on the 10th of August. Are you confused? Don't worry, I still am not sure what time zone I'm in. I've been here for three weeks and I'm still not running on local time, but I'm not really running on Alaska time either. I can't seem to pick a time zone right now. I'll go to bed at about my normal time on Alaska time, which is about 10PM there or 1AM here. Then I'll get up at about 6AM here, which is 3AM in Alaska. Five hours of sleep isn't quite cutting it. I think I may need to take a nap. Oh well.
I will do what I can about posting pictures and news while on the trip. It'll be an adventure.

I haven't died but I feel like a chicken with no head

2009-06-06T05:37:00.004-08:00

I promise I'm still here and I haven't completely neglected my blog. I came back to Illinois on Tuesday the 26th of May and the time change is going to kill me. It's only three hours but in the two weeks I've been in Illinois, I've only had one night of normal sleep. I spent almost a week at my parents house where there are less beds then there are people. My parents have been adventurous and slept outside in a tent for several days while I was there. Monday I left for Carbondale for about a week. It's been nonstop since I got here. Well it's been nonstop since I got into the Midwest. I've been to the movies 5 times. I think I was going through withdrawal. I've been out to some restaurants. Yay. I've also been out walking because I don't want to ruin my great weight loss. I also, while being in Carbondale, have gotten a pedicure, cut my hair, and gotten my nails done. Wow I sound like a girl.
It looks like I have a busy summer planned, but I will try to keep everyone up to date.

Memorial Day, seaweed, and packing

2009-05-25T05:53:00.003-08:00

Happy Memorial Day!!!

Today is the last day I'm in Metlakatla for about 2 1/2 months. I get on the ferry this afternoon to go to Ketchikan and then I fly out tomorrow morning. It'll be fun. Right now, I'm avoiding doing some packing and cleaning. I have the last load of laundry in the dryer right now. I can't believe all the things I still need to get done. I have a few dishes to do, a little bit left to pick up in my living room, the trash to take out, and finish up packing. It's not too bad. I'm also going picking seaweed with a friend of mine this morning. We won't be gone too long. I should still have several hours when I get back from that to finish up things.
The last week was pretty great. The last day with students was Wednesday and Thursday for the teachers. I had most of my work done before Thursday so I helped other teachers pack up most of the day. I still can't believe how fast the school year flew by. One year down....a lot more to go, until retirement that it. But I'm not going to think about that. I'm going to have a great time on my travels.
This summer will be spent road tripping, attending weddings, and other wild and crazy things. (like sleep and cooking). It should be a fun summer. This is the first summer since high school that I haven't been working. What a crazy thought.
I better get back to my to do list. I hope to see many of you soon.

One week left

2009-05-17T06:50:00.004-08:00

Here is one view from the top of Yellow Hill.

Just a few more days left of school. The kids are in school till Wednesday and then there is a day of inservice. This past week went by very quickly. It was sea week, so there were a couple of my elementary classes that I didn't see. The 7th grade, and most of the 8th grade, went on a survival trip Thursday and Friday. So my afternoon was pretty easy those two days, I had two students. All week I worked on filing music. All of the band pieces are now in score order and in a spreadsheet. I also figured out what parts I'm missing too. I've also inventoried all the band instruments. I've been trying to put all my purchase requests together too. There is so much to do before school is over. I have a few more organizational things to do at school plus some cleaning at my house. This school year has really flown by, even though at times it felt to have dragged.
Wednesday I hiked up Yellow hill with some friends. It was such a nice day. We took their dogs with us. They ran around. My camera battery died not too long after we got to the top but I still got some great pictures.
Just a week until I get on a plane to go back to Illinois. I'll be back there May 26th till August 10th. I have two weddings to be at and a friend having a baby. It will be a fun summer.

It's all down hill from here

2009-05-09T05:28:00.003-08:00

A week and a half is left in the 2008-2009 school year. It's hard to believe that the school year is almost over. Time flies. Thursday night was the spring concert. The 8th grade band played a couple numbers, it wasn't the best they've ever played but it wasn't bad. The high school choir sang 4 pieces and it's probably the best they've sounded even though rehearsing right before the concert was felt like I'd given them all new music. It was a little rough. Then when it was time for the high school band to perform, the trumpet player couldn't find her music. She was sure she'd left it on the stand but I remember seeing her leave with it. Then she checked her locker but it wasn't there. So there were phone calls made to get her music from home. I had about 15-20 minutes to fill while we attempted to locate music. It felt like the longest time in my life. I told about music fest and handed out awards. We, as a group, stood up and sang An Austrian went Yodeling and Baby Shark for the audience. It got the band relaxed and the audience loved it. It was fantastic. When we finally got the missing music problem settled and the band played, it was probably the best they've ever sounded on the pieces. Sadly my video camera ran out of battery right before the band played. We are going to record Monday so that we have an archive of how well they sounded. It's a great group.
Last week I had gone out the road and explored some. I went to a dock that I'd never been to before and wandered around there. I have some great pictures of jelly fish and star fish that I'll have to post, but it will probably have to wait until I have faster internet.
Thursday I went out the road again to that same dock, the tide was going out so I got to pick up a starfish. Megan, one of the people with me who also happens to be in the 8th grade band, put a starfish on her hand to see if it would stick to her. Instead the starfish tried to bite her. It was really funny. Then we (Kathy, Megan, and I) went to Sand dollar beach. It's a hike to get down there and it's all boardwalks. You don't really realize that you are going down hill until you have to walk back uphill. The beach was awesome. I took my shoes off and walked around in the sand, watching for jellyfish because that can't be a pleasant thing to step on. We looked at all the different sea life. I didn't know that sand dollars were kinda purple when they were alive. I also didn't know there were so many different colored sea anemones. I also have a lot of pictures. There were larger starfish, sea stars, several kinds of crab, among everything else. We explored the beach, it was definitely the highlight. I also never realized all the different colored starfish there were. This is probably because I've only ever seen a live starfish at an aquarium. The beach was worth the hike. When I come back at the end of the summer, it'll be one of the places I'll have to go again.
I'm going to go enjoy my Saturday. I have to get ready to go to someones house. I'm watching 3 of her kids this weekend. It should be fun.

I survived

2009-04-30T05:59:00.003-08:00

Music Fest was very awesome. We spent about 29 hours, or so, on the ferry getting up to Sitka. Some of the scenery was amazing. I just continue to enjoy the area I live in. We arrived in on Wednesday evening. We went straight from the ferry to a meeting in the auditorium, which was followed by a directors meeting. I sent my kids, with my chaperone, to the hotel while I went to my meeting. It's a good thing too, we didn't finish our meeting till almost 11PM. It was a long meeting. I checked into the hotel and went to bed, I woke up at about 5:30AM. There are times, I hate being a morning person. We left the hotel a little late, so we didn't get to the event right at 8AM, not that that was a big deal. I went to go do a few director things, like turning in scores for our adjudication that night, and left my students to watch solo and ensembles with the chaperone. One student snuck out and proceeded to talk on her cell phone for 20 minutes in the bathroom, only to get caught by another director. Needless to say, her phone got taken away for the rest of the trip. Let me tell you how popular I was. Thursday afternoon we had our dress rehearsal on the stage in the auditorium. It was pretty awful. It sounded more like I had handed my students brand new music than music that we had been working on. After getting through that, we had a rehearsal, at the students' request. That went a lot better. That evening was our performance on the stage, it went very well. There were still plenty of times where parts weren't really together, but I'm still very happy with their performance. All I have to say was, that stage was a bit intimidating. Friday was another long day of solos and ensembles, clinics, and performances. We left a little early because my students were falling asleep in the auditorium. On our way out we ran into Tasha, who was upset so we talked and my students and I sang An Austrian went Yodeling and Baby Shark for her. It was hilarious. We got her to smile. Saturday was similar to the days before except my chaperone left to go visit with some of his family and I was left with one sick child sitting in the van (and throwing up near it) and the rest of my students in the auditorium. I spent the entire time running back and forth checking on them. I also left at one point to go get my sick student Pepto and sprite. After the last performance, there was another director's meeting, I left a little early because I had to get everyone down to the ferry. In that time my chaperone reappeared. We drove down to the ferry and loaded. Then everyone got ready for bed. I think we were all pretty exhausted. That was a 24 hour ferry ride. We overnighted in Ketchikan at a pretty nice hotel, which there was a miscommunication and they didn't move all of our room reservations to the correct day, they had only moved mine. So then we kinda scrambled to find rooms for everyone, but it all worked out. I went out and got breakfast in the morning only to come back to the hotel, miss a step, and hurt my ankle. This is not the ankle I sprained back in February, it's the other one. I'm happy to say that my ankle isn't broken, but it sure hurts. I went to the clinic, they said it wasn't broken, but didn't give me much more information than that.
I figured it out, we spent a total of 56 hours, or so, on the ferry, had two 14 hour days, one 13 hour day (which was followed by getting on the ferry), and slept on floors for two nights. It was a long, exhausting trip, but it was great. The rest of the year is pretty much all down hill from here. We have about 3 week left and a week after that I fly home. It should be fun.

Another week has come and gone

2009-04-21T05:41:00.004-08:00

It's been another week and I don't know where it's gone. Time flies. I'd say when you're having fun, but some of that is debatable. I've spent a lot of time out walking. It's been great. Last Tuesday I even went walking twice, so I probably walked about 7 or 8 miles. I usually walk between 3 and 4 miles when I go walking. I've enjoyed my time outside. Wednesday I made Buttermilk Spice Cake with cream cheese frosting. It was pretty good. It was my first adventure making a spice cake. It was a big hit at school. Friday I took the day off and in the afternoon went to town. I was singing Saturday at a church thing, which was fun. It was also nice to attend a full church service on Sunday. While I was in town, I stopped by the music store to pick up some kazoos for my high school band. It's my solution to practicing on the ferry. They were pretty excited when I handed them kazoos yesterday in band. They have come such a long way on this music. We had an extra rehearsal last night in preparation to leaving today. The high school band is meeting in my classroom this morning to load the van and get on a ferry. We go to from here to Ketchikan, then have a couple of hours before we get on the ferry that is taking us to Sitka. We'll be on that ferry for 29 hours. I'm pretty sure we'll be picking up most of the other schools on the way. It'll be crazy on the ferry. We'll get into Sitka tomorrow evening. It should be fun.
For any one wondering, 38 days till I'm back in Illinois. I promise I'm not counting down.

Pancakes, Easter, and Mondays

2009-04-13T20:58:00.003-08:00

I survived standardized testing with only minor scarring. Friday was an early release day. Woohoo!!! I fell asleep on my couch after school. I can't say that I did anything too exciting, but the weather was great so I went walking again. I've been walking most days. I even wore shorts this week. I think I wore shorts on Thursday. I don't totally remember. Friday night I went out walking with some friends dogs. I got pulled around town for the first 20 minutes, after that, they settle down. It was awesome. Saturday I worked on cleaning out my mud room. I have everything out of there that doesn't need to be there. Of course that I haven't finished putting it all away, so it's sitting in my living room. Saturday night I made 14 batches of pancake mix, just the dry ingredients. Then I went to church where we were having a get together that involved eating breakfast for dinner. Hence the pancake mix. I made pancakes and waffles. I still have some mix left over. It was pretty fun.
Easter was a beautiful sunny day. I went out walking in the early evening. I didn't do anything really special that day. I did however make banana bread. It turned out really well, but most things I bake turn out well. Later that evening Nicole dropped off some leftovers at my house from Easter dinner. I gave her a loaf of banana bread. I think that's a fair trade.
I took banana bread into work today. I got the missing ingredients to make buttermilk spice cake. It sounds pretty good. I'll probably make that tomorrow among doing other things. I went walking twice today, both times for about an hour. Not too much else exciting is going on. The music for Music Fest is coming along well. I got a few more things put away this afternoon and some laundry done. Now I just need to do one more load of laundry and a batch of dishes and I should be good to go before Music Fest. I should probably also find a home for some of this stuff taking over my living room. Oh well. I always did need projects to do.

Standardized Testing...Ugh

2009-04-09T11:31:00.003-08:00

That alone should be self explanatory. I'm sitting here on day 3 of standardized testing, bored out of my mind. I've been proctoring testing in the special education area. So I've sat and watched 3 students take tests for 3 days. Today, thankfully, is the last day that I have to proctor. It doesn't make sense to me that a teacher who teaches k-12 should proctor test and have a sub for 3 days. It's three days of rehearsal time that is lost. It is also 3 days where they have to pay me and a sub for me. I could be doing productive things in my classroom versus sitting here. There is admittedly time when many of my elementary classes are testing, since grades 3-10 are testing, but I could be working in my classroom. Heaven knows there are plenty of things for me to do there. I can't exactly haul my stuff up to the testing site in order to work on it. Then I have a sub for the whole day because the students are given all day to finish the testing if they need it. Well the first day one student needed about 15 minutes past lunch, yesterday they were all done an hour before lunch but had to stay with me, and today I think they'll all be done before lunch too. That means all afternoon I have nothing I'm supposed to be doing. Tuesday I went home early because there was nothing for me to do. Yesterday I wrote the itinerary for Music Fest and then wandered around with nothing to do. I don't know what I'm going to do today. I might just go home again. The weather is nice and I don't have any work to do that doesn't involve being in my classroom. It would be very awkward for me to show up to my classroom with the sub there. It's not exactly like I could just go in my office and work either. I shouldn't complain but it just seems kinda backwards, but welcome to the education system. I don't know if anything ever really makes sense.
Yesterday the weather was awesome so I went walking and went to the beach. Today the weather is fantastic again. It's sunny and warmish. I guess you could consider 45 degrees warm. This is Alaska after all and it's only April. Sadly though the weather prediction for about the next week is rain, rain, and more rain. At least we've gotten two really nice days.
Just about a week left until I leave for music fest with my band. (All 9 of them). They are coming along well on the music. Next week will be a big push to run through the pieces and fine tune some things. We have one piece that we haven't run completely through yet and I'm a little nervous, but I'm sure it'll be fine. I have a good group of musicians. We're performing Dona Nobis Pacem, Thundercrest, and Symphonic Overture for Music Fest. I don't know that I've ever performed the first two, but Symphonic Overture I played at my community college. It's completely possible for us to do it. I'm taking it a little under tempo because 152 beats per minute is a little fast, we're taking it at about 130-140 bpm at the opening. It works. It sounds pretty good. We'll see how it goes. We'll go out there and do our best. That's all I can expect.

I can't believe it's April

2009-04-05T06:16:00.002-08:00

Where has the year gone? I really can't believe it's April already. April Fools day started with a great prank by Mother Nature. I woke up to snow. So much for spring. The weather after that hasn't been too bad. We had a couple of days of sunshine. I went walking.
Nothing really exciting has happened this week. The pieces that the high school band are working on are coming along well. We have two weeks till we leave for music fest, we've still got a lot of work to do. I lose three days of rehearsal this week because of testing. I also have to proctor testing. I'm not thrilled. They are hiring a sub for me for three days so I can proctor testing. It makes little sense since there are teachers whose students will be testing and the school wouldn't have to find an all day sub for, but they aren't proctoring testing. This doesn't make sense. Oh well. There isn't much I can do about it now.
I don't think there is much else going on. Today I'm going to have a baking day. I'm probably going to make cinnamon rolls, pineapple banana upside down cake, and brownies. I have a couple of places to go today that I'm taking food to, thus the baking. I guess I'd better start.

Another week down.

2009-03-30T06:10:00.003-08:00

Why is it that the first week back from a break seems to be the hardest? Perhaps it's because we all want another week of break. Maybe it's the fact that the kids just had a week of break and don't want to be at school either. Whatever it is, this past week was like that. Luckily the week flew by. There were also parent-teacher conferences. I was only at one day of those because I did one day of elementary. I didn't see many people. Monday however, the stereo in my classroom bit the dust. I'm waiting for a third "appliance" to die on me. I already had the fridge and now the stereo. What's next? It makes it rather difficult to have music in a music classroom when there is no way to play the music.
I found out this past week that when all of the other classrooms are getting moved around for the remodel, I won't be. That's a good thing to hear, because it would take a lot of effort to move me. My classroom has soooooooo much stuff. Besides, who wants to deal with the amount of noise that I cause. We did the hokey pokey this week in most of my elementary classes, it was awesome. I've done some more "games" recently. My older classes also played a game called what's my instrument. They have the name of an instrument taped to their back and they can only ask yes or no questions to figure out what it is. They seemed to have a good time. Now if only I were getting them ready for the concert. I have so much to do in a short amount of time.
Three weeks till music fest. Once again there is a lot of work to be done. I think I may need to take a day off to work on things.
Saturday I went to town, as in Ketchikan. I borrowed a friends car so I could run some errands. I needed to go buy a new stereo for my classroom, don't worry I'm getting reimbursed for it. I also really needed to do a good grocery shop. I bought tons of groceries. I still don't have everything put away. I think I'll have enough food for the rest of the year. Ok not really, but close.
Sunday, after getting home from church, I made sauerkraut. I remember making it with my parent several times, but doing it by myself, was far more labor intensive. I know it'll be great when it's done, I just have to be patient and let it do it's thing. Last night I also went to a Singspirational. I got invited by a few of the people I know. It's held about 4 times a year and it's rotated between the 4 bigger churches. It was interesting to say the least. There were a couple times where I started to laugh. I've never been to any kind of "revival" but wow this was really different from what I'm used to seeing at church. It might as well have been a revival. All there was was singing and it was all religious. It was far bizarrer than anything I've ever experienced. I'm having a hard time thinking of words to describe it. They are having another one in May, I think I may stay home from that one. Or I'll be back in Illinois, either way I think it'll be better if I miss it. What a strange experience.
It's never a dull moment here.

Finally

2009-03-22T21:49:00.003-08:00

I have a fridge. I have a fridge. I have a fridge. (Dances around singing). I have a fridge. I have a fridge.

Woohoo after two long weeks I have a functioning fridge. YAY!!!!!!

Did I mention I have a fridge?

Regionals, Spring break, and snow

2009-03-21T10:34:00.004-08:00

Oops, it's been a while since I wrote on my blog. It's due temporary insanity, better known as life here in southeast Alaska.
I made it through Regionals with only minor scarring. I took 4 band students and we had a great time. I haven't played that much in a long time. I rocked out on the tuba, the trumpet and the COW BELL. My students think I'm weird. I wouldn't be surprised if there is a video up on youtube of me singing Hey Baby when the Sitka band played. I don't care. I'm weird and I know it. I had a pretty good time. I'm looking forward to taking my band, all 11 of them, to music fest in about a month. It'll be a blast.
Upon arriving home from regionals, I discovered that I'd run out of heating oil. Oops. I borrowed a space heater from a family from church and made sure I ordered more heating oil Monday. I also discovered that my freezer had stopped working. Isn't that exciting? Monday I called the gas station to order heating oil and my landlord to tell them about the freezer. Meanwhile, the fridge section decided it didn't want to work either. Tuesday, I locked myself out of my house and had to walk up to my landlords to get a spare key, walk home, unlock the door, and walk the spare key back to my landlord. I turned the fridge on the coldest setting, it's almost keeping things cold. My week kinda went on like that. Finally Friday we had our first day of spring break. I went to Ketchikan to look through the music library at the high school. I had a great time hanging out. I spent the night over at the band director's house. She and her husband have a 3 year old who is adorable. It was fun. I was supposed to head up to Wrangell on Sunday but Tasha called me and she had influenza. So we decided it was best if I didn't go up to visit her. Instead Saturday afternoon I went back to the island.
Everyday this week it has snowed. It's currently snowing. I know I live in Alaska but really, it's the first day of spring. And you can ask anyone here, this isn't typical. Yesterday it was nice enough to go do somethings outside. I've spent the week kinda cleaning my house. Kinda. My kitchen is clean, my living room is almost done, and the rest of the house isn't too bad. Yesterday afternoon a couple of friends showed up at my house and said they were there to see if I wanted to go to a party. It was awesome. We had good food, good company, and we played some fun games. We played dominoes, pit, and catch phrase. It was hilarious. I didn't take my phone with me because it's not that important. I missed 6 text messages and about 5 phone calls. Oh well. I also came home to a note from my landlord. I called them because they had checked the fridge and could find anything wrong with it. I explained that everything in my freezer was now freezer burned and my fridge was on the coldest setting and wasn't keeping things cold. Hopefully that's enough to get a new fridge. But with the weather being the way it is right now, I don't see it happening today. I appreciate the layed back attitude of the island but somethings need to have more of a sense of urgency. Oh well. I've lived two weeks now with a fridge on the fritz, what's a couple more days.
I know, I have a weird outlook on things. It's not the end of the world.
So this entire break, I've gone to bed at about my usual time and I've slept in to about 7 o'clock. This is of course after waking up at 5:30AM and rolling over and going back to sleep. My body doesn't know what vacation is anymore. That's sad.
In other news, I have my plane tickets to come home for the summer. Two months of me terrorizing the lower 48. It'll be fun!!!!
Oh and I finally (after 8 months) got my two bookcases together and painted.

Brownies, fry bread, and.....

2009-03-01T19:14:00.003-09:00

My bruises and ankle are healing well. My black eye is almost gone. It's only been two weeks. And what a busy two weeks it's been. To recap.... they handed out contracts, and yes I got one, we had a hazing incident which resulted in 5 suspended kids, two suspended coaches, lots of rumors, clearer traveling policies, and new responsibilities for me and the pep club advisor. What else has happened, oh the town has been in a bit of an uproar too because of it all (not my contract). Now Bristol and I are the teachers in charge of the cheerleaders. More Bristol than me because I'm pretty busy with pep band. And I've heard about it from Bristol ever since.
In other news, I've just about finished filing all the music in my music library. Go me. I need another filing cabinet, that's my current hold up. The second round of tie dye turned out great too. This coming week is Regionals, which is in Ketchikan and I will be gone from Tuesday till Sunday for it.
Other than the above mentioned things, life has been pretty calm. I made homemade brownies yesterday. Very awesome. Today I visited some friends and we had fry bread. Yum.
I guess the biggest news of all is in regards to my contract. Well as I said above, they offered me a contract for next year and....(I know the suspense is killing you).....I signed it. I will be here next year. My band kids are elated.
I plan on being back in the state of Insanity, I mean Illinois for a good chunk of the summer. I should be home all of June and July. This means road trip!!! and the county fair, and a the zoo with my adorable cousins, and I could go on forever. It'll be a fun trip and I even plan on doing some canning.
Well it will be exciting.

a few pics.

2009-02-15T17:49:00.003-09:00

Tie Dye shirts. Aren't they awesome.
My ankle. It's more black and blue now.
I love my black eye, it also looks worse now too.

Never a dull moment...

2009-02-15T14:34:00.003-09:00

Oh where to begin...

We still don't have our regular ferry back. It's been two weeks. Oh well. Today was our last home basketball game. Woohoo!!!!!!!!!! School is going well. Two weekends off till Regionals.
Well Thursday the 5th we tie dyed shirts in band class. Yay pep band shirts. It was fun. I think all the students had fun and the shirts turned out well. We're going to do it again soon. I can't say it's the most educationally sound thing I've ever done, but it's a nice change of pace. They've been the talk of the town. It seems like everyone wants one. I'm not going to complain. Saturday the 7th we did a 50/50 raffle and raised over $600, which half of that we got to keep. We're going to order some music, I think. Oh we also had another inservice day that day too so I was at school from 7:30AM till 10ish PM. Long day
This week was pretty uneventful until Friday. I took a "sick" day on Tuesday. It was nice to have a break. I had ideas of things I was going to get done. I didn't do any of them. Oh well. Friday was exciting though. I was walking back to my classroom from the high school and I hit a patch of loose gravel. I proceeded to sprain my ankle and go plummeting head first to the ground. I landed ever so not gracefully. Luckily no one saw me. I skinned a knee and elbow, scrapped up a hand, and hit my cheek on the ground. I now have a black eye from the impact on my face. I proceeded to get back up and go to my classroom. I didn't fill out the accident report until the end of the day. They made me go to the clinic. All that accomplished was getting me poked and telling me I didn't break anything. No xrays. No real checking to make sure I didn't do anything worse. I didn't have a black eye when I went in there but I certainly do now. It happens. I might have to go back because my principals are worried that it looks so bad. All I have to say is I'm talented.

Absolutely Hilarious...sort of

2009-02-01T12:57:00.005-09:00

From the high school doors. Thanks Nicole

Up closer. Thanks again Nicole

Well it's been another fun week here in the middle of nowhere, or at least an interesting one. Now school hasn't been really exciting expect that Monday I found out that I was getting observed the next day. This wouldn't be too bad except it's my worst class. Luckily they were well behaved. I got a good evaluation. I have another one this coming week, but it'll be the high school band.
Pep band has been pretty good. We're sounding decent and are having a good number of students show up. I even ordered the pep band shirts. I've also applied for some grants. I can hope we get some money.
Friday was an exciting day as shown by the pictures above. Thursday night / early Friday we had high winds with gust over 80 mph. About 1AM while the police were making their rounds, they noticed that the ferry wasn't there. The line had snapped and it was going out to sea. It grounded on a small rocky island in the bay. You could see it from the school. By the time school started, the entire district was buzzing about the ferry. Finally just before high tide they got the ferry off the rocks, with the help of some tug boats. Needless to say we are without the regular ferry for awhile. They towed it into Ketchikan so that it can be repaired. Now we are down to one ferry run a day by the inter island ferry. So if you want to leave you have to spend the night in Ketchikan and take the ferry back the next day. Hopefully they get the ferry fixed soon. It's not like I have any plans for leaving the island anytime too soon. I still have two more weekends of basketball games. It's always an adventure here.

What a weird week...

2009-01-25T08:22:00.002-09:00

When I wrote last, I stated that I had no heat. It was funny because after I had finished that entry I was looking up the weather and it said it was 54 degrees outside. I was a bit skeptical so I went outside, in my pajamas. It was 54 degrees outside. Holy cow. The sun wasn't even up yet. It turned out to be about 57 degrees out for the day. Of course that evening it dropped down into the 30's. It was so odd to have a day that warm just randomly. So that none of you are too jealous, it has stayed in the thirties, maybe low forties, since then. The sun has been coming up earlier too. I think it was up by 9 AM, weather channel says it was up at 8:49 AM.
Going back, I finally got heat on Tuesday. It was the earliest I could get heater oil delivered. The first time I bought heater oil it was $4.78 a gallon, this time it was $3.65 a gallon. I can't believe how expensive it still is. Needless to say, I only got 55 gallons. I, of course, can't predict the weather so I don't know how long that will last. 100 gallons lasted me 3 months and we had some really cold days. Not nearly as cold as other parts of Alaska or the rest of the country, but cold for here.
Work has been about the same. I'm down to 11 students in high school band and 6 in high school choir. I think I'm getting a new student in choir. Elementary is still going relatively well. I need to take a day off to work on writing curriculum. I don't really like writing curriculum. I feel like I'm reinventing the wheel. For some reason my administration doesn't see how it's a problem to not have curriculum. Of course they didn't give me a lot of guidelines for what they want to see out of the program either. My elementary principal called me into his office to tell me he really hopes I come back next year. He feels that I'm a good teacher and that I'm doing a good job. I told I'm sitting on the fence. I also stated that if things didn't change here, there was no way I'd stay. I explained that the district needs to commit to having a music program. That consists of funding it and supporting it. I don't have a budget, a repair budget, curriculum, a lot of working instruments. I did apply for a grant yesterday though. If we get it, it will be for up to $10,000 for instruments. That would get me between 3 and 12 instruments, depending on what instruments we purchased. Speaking of instruments, I started 6th grade band during their general music class. It's a lot to take on but they really want to play. I also have offered to let 5th and 6th graders come in afterschool for band instruments. I've had a good showing. I'm really impressed. It's been a week and we're really comfortable on three notes.
7th and 8th grade band are going about the same. I got two more 8th graders. I now have 9 in my 8th grade band. That group is doing well. 7th grade is still about the same, but I no longer have all the 7th graders on Fridays. I only have half of them, and its the better group.
In other news, I didn't have enough people show up for a pep band this weekend. Oh well. I'm also finally getting paid for pep band. Woohoo. I also have sent out music to a couple of band directors for pep band for regionals. I'm excited because there will be at least two other schools combining with us, there is a possibility of three schools. I think it's fantastic. We're going to be one rocking pep band. I'm really excited.
One last thing, I was sitting at home last night, minding my own business when there was a knock on the door. Now who in the world would be knocking on my door at 9PM. I opened the door to about 8 students. Obviously there isn't a lot to do in this town, I wasn't the first teacher they stopped to bug. When I finally got the door shut, they went around and knocked on my windows, I just ignored them. The eventually went away. Nothing like living in a small town on an island.

I don't wanna go to school.

2009-01-19T05:02:00.003-09:00

Happy Martin Luther King Jr.'s birthday. It's another holiday that all the government buildings are closed here but we don't have the day off of school. I don't actually have a day off until March 13th. I don't have a saturday off for 4 weeks. Woo hoo, 4 more weeks of home basketball games, then two weekends off, and it's regionals. Nothing like being the pep band director.
Speaking of pep band, it's been going better. The first weekend was a little rough but this last weekend went really well. I've neglected to hand out the Star Spangled Banner (really I just forgot and it's on my list of things to do this week) so I've sang it the last two weekends. My best performance was probably last Friday. I got so antsy waiting for the veterans to march down the court, that when I started it, it was kinda high. Not too high that I couldn't sing it, but it was higher than I had intended to sing it. It left a lot of people in awe. Several people came up and talked to me after the game about it. I didn't know that being able to sing the National Anthem here would almost make you a celebrity. It has also begun to bring all the single guys out of the woodwork. I wish they'd go back. Just between Friday and Saturday, I've been hit on and asked out more than twice. I've been stopped on the street for people to talk to me. Maybe I'll just stay in my house and hide there forever.
Wait....hiding in my house won't work. Not just because I have to work, but also because half of my house isn't currently heated. I got home Saturday from the basketball game to find that I was running out of heating oil, which meant the heater in my living room wasn't happy. At least the heat in my bedroom works, because that's electric. Calling the gas station is on my list of things to do today. Hopefully I can get a ride out there to pay for it so that they'll come today and put heater oil in the tank. All things considered, a hundred gallons has lasted me since the middle of October and we did have quite a cold spell.
This weekend, the weather has been great. It's been sunny and about 45 degrees. So yesterday I went for a walk, finally three hours later I got home. It was a great walk. Then I was home about an hour and I walked for another 45 minutes or so. All and all, I probably walked about 4 hours yesterday. Not too bad.
Well I think I'm going to get ready to go to work because sitting in a chilly house really doesn't appeal to me. I think it's 50 degrees in my house.

Tuba

2009-01-03T07:49:00.004-09:00

Before
After

Well I had a pretty bad dent in the school tuba so I took it home over Christmas to have it repaired. Dad and I took it up to Badger State Repair in Elkhorn, WI. They looked at it and said, we can have it for you tomorrow. What!! Wow that's fast. They really good though. That was Monday. Tuesday morning they called and told me that I could pick up the tuba anytime. Holy smokes.

I finally made it

2008-12-26T04:09:00.003-09:00

Woohoo I finally made it to Illinois. I flew to Seattle on Christmas eve then yesterday I flew to Chicago. If it isn't bad enough to fly on Christmas, it's even worse when the flight gets delayed. We were over an hour late but at least we got here. My parents picked me up at the airport then we went to have our family Christmas. This involves my parents, brothers, an aunt and uncle, and their kids. Bill, my little brother, didn't make it their last night. Needless to say he's in the dog house with more than just me. It seemed like we had an endless amount of presents to hand out. Something to the tune of like 3 laundry baskets. Some of those presents were the gifts from me. Everyone got great stuff. I had gotten people wool socks for Christmas, well that was popular enough because my aunt and uncle had also gotten us wool socks. I also got a cow patterned tea pot from them. It's so cool. I got some great stuff from my parents too. I have a new sakantu knife, a 9x13 pan with a lid, a enamel covered cast iron casserole dish, and something else that I can't recall at the moment. I'm a little far from the tree. Woohoo to awesome Christmases. I hope everyone had a wonderful christmas and you have a happy new year.

I'll be home for Christmas....maybe

2008-12-21T15:38:00.004-09:00

I went to the airport this morning hoping to fly home today. After two hours of sitting there listening to them delay the flight twice, they finally canceled it. Bummer. The next available flight isn't until Christmas Eve. Then I have to overnight in Seattle and fly out Christmas morning. So I should get home at 2:30 PM on Christmas day. Total bummer, but at least I should still make it home. I'm not going to hold my breath. I'll believe it when I'm actually standing in Illinois. Oh well till then I guess I just hang out in Alaska. It's only a couple of days, I'll make it. I hope everyone else isn't held up with the weather. Enjoy your holidays and maybe I'll see some of you soon.

Woohoo!!

2008-12-17T19:34:00.002-09:00

I'm done!!! Both concerts are done and they both went really well. Yesterday was the high school/middle school concert. It was great. Tonight was the elementary concert, it was also great. We had a huge turnout. It was awesome. I thinking I'm running out of words to describe how well they went. There were lots of compliments on both concerts. It's nice to be done with them. Now I just have a day and a half of school to get through and then I'll be on my way to Illinois for two weeks. Woohoo.

One more week till break

2008-12-14T06:13:00.003-09:00

The concerts are almost here and I'm still not stressed about it. That is a great feeling. Yesterday some of the young men from church helped set up the risers and sound shell on the stage. I'm glad that's done. The PE classes are going to help set up chairs tomorrow. It's great to have some help. Now I just need to finish writing the programs and decorate the gym. The elementary classes are making decorations and I'm getting them from them tomorrow. Melody is helping me hang them, I may see if a few more people want to help. I'm sure it'll be fun. Now all we need to do is move the piano and percussion equipment up. It's a good feeling to be that close to done.
It's been slightly chilly here the last couple of days. When it's sunny in the winter here it's colder than when it rains. We've had a few nice days of sunshine so naturally it's been cold. I don't mind it, it reminds me of home. Nothing like 28 degrees. Of course with it being cold, my landlord has wanted to make sure that I keep water running so that the pipes don't freeze. It's funny to be sitting here listening to water running. It's been cold enough that I wore a hat and gloves yesterday. I'm still wandering around in a hoodie. It's not cold enough to wear a coat.
Work has had it's ups and downs lately, there is even a rumor that I'm leaving. I didn't start it. There are times when I really don't like my job. I like the kids and my colleagues, it's my job that I don't always like. I know that may not make sense.
Friday night Kathy and Bristol came over for dinner. It was hilarious. We had such a good time. It's hard to beat good food and good friends. We had sauerkraut, potatoes, and sausage. I think it's a northern midwest thing, because Bristol had never had it. Kathy has, but in a slightly different version. I really like the dish. I also really like sauerkraut. It's one of those things that I can just eat straight from the jar. Anyway, back to Friday night. We sat around and shot the breeze. Bristol went on and on and on about her boyfriend. An update is good but she had him on the brain, so I threw an empty pop bottle at her. In my defense she said I could throw something at her. After I threw it she decided I had too good of aim and that I couldn't throw anything else at her. We had a good time just sitting around chatting. I made dessert, Navajo Peach crumble, I also added some blueberries to it. It was really good. We also each had a very large mug of hot chocolate. It was great to hang out. I think we're going to try to do this more often. I think at some point board games will also be involved. I volunteered my house because I have more room.
That night I also brought out a few of my projects for them to see. Namely my knitting, my quilt, and some of the projects I've done. They think I can do everything. This isn't the first time people have thought that and it won't be the last. It amuzes me. Bristol even now wants to make a quilt. I admit I need to work more on mine but I've been just a little busy. It gives me something to do when things settle down a little bit, which will be after the concert.
In one week exactly, I will be boarding a plane bound for Chicago. I will be spending two weeks in the interesting state of Illinois with a couple roadtrips planned. I know I want to go to Milwaukee and I'm going down to Carbondale. It'll be a fun adventure. I look forward to getting in my car and driving. Woohoo. I also look forward to seeing my family. They're so weird. That's why I like them. It'll be fun to see my friends too.
Well the saga continues. We'll see where it takes me.

One week till the concert

2008-12-10T04:29:00.003-09:00

It's one week till the concert and are we ready for it? NO. Am I worried about it? No. It'll all work out. We just keep working on it. It's been an interesting week so far in that regard. It seems like the retention is non-existent with some of the students. We just keep plugging away at it. I'm sure that things will work out fine. Kids are amazing that way.
In other news, I got an interesting phone call last night. Bristol called me and said that Melody had come over to talk to me. It was funny that Melody went to Bristol's place because she didn't know my phone number or where I lived. Melody needed to call me because the community choir is singing Little Drummer Boy and they needed my help. They specifically needed my instrument. (This is exactly what she said to me) Obviously no one remembers that it's called a tuba. So I went up to Duncan Church last night with my tuba and played the bass part. Then I got asked if I could sing the bass part for another song. I know that I speak in my chest voice but why does everyone assume that I sing really low. I can hit most of any bass part so I sang bass for a piece. It's fun being the music teacher....really. I'm still laughing that they called me.

My week back..

2008-12-06T06:42:00.004-09:00

I've been home from Juneau for almost a week. It was a great time, but in ways it's nice to be home. I enjoyed being away and seeing fun people. I can hardly believe that in two weeks I'll be going away again but this time it will be east. I'll be home for Christmas (...you can count on me...). Are you singing that song yet? Haha.
It has been a good week at school even though I think the band sounded worse this week than before I went away. They are steadily getting better. The concert is in a little over a week. The elementary concert is too. It'll be good. The kids are sounding great. I'm not worried.
My seventh grade classes are doing well and have been fairly well behaved. I'm glad that they are doing so well. Now if only eighth grade had been a little less hyper this week, it would've been perfect. I'm used it. Everyone is making good progress for the concert. I'm pretty sure that both concerts will be great.
In other news, there is talk about moving my classroom with the remodel that will be taking place this summer. The district would like to put me within a school building. Right now it looks like they'd be moving me into the middle school. They'd need to sound proof my classroom. Obviously. I don't have a quiet classroom. I prefer not having a quiet classroom, honestly I'd being doing something wrong if it were quiet. It would be nice to be out of my current classroom though. Now if only I could convince the district that we need a second teacher. Oh well.
Other than that I can't think of too much other news.

Turkey Day

2008-11-28T07:53:00.002-09:00

When did thanksgiving turn into just a day to have turkey and pig out? What happened to the holiday itself? I pondered this yesterday after making a 20lb turkey, a huge patch of mashed potatoes, and a large pan of stuffing. The food was good, the company was good, and I even laughed so hard I sprayed water. I don't recommend laughing and drinking at the same time, some one will get wet. Well that was amusing. All in all it was a good time.
It's been a good week and it hasn't gone by too quickly. I'm enjoying my time here. Wednesday was pretty low key. I went and conducted a bit over at JDHS. Then in the afternoon I went back to Thunder Mountain to bug Brian. I played a little bit of euphonium and tuba during band. I even helped with a little bit of teaching. Not trying to toot my own horn (that's a bad pun) I'm surprisingly good at off beats. This may not be surprising to many people because I majored in music, but being a tuba player I don't play a lot of off beats, so I have had to practice them to be good at them. Anyways. After the students left Brian let me play the new bassoon (that came in during class) and a very nice new trombone, that makes 4 brand new instruments in one day. He asked my opinion about some of his instruments. He has some really nice instruments. I even had to explain the difference of compensating and non-compensating instruments. If you don't know what that is, it mostly lies in the world of tubas and euphoniums. If you really want to know, I'll explain it to you sometime. Yes I know I'm a band geek. After going through that we sat around and shot the breeze. It was fun. It's fun giving him grief. He needs it.
I had a pretty quiet evening after that. I went out to the mall and bought a pair of xtratuffs, yaktraks, and some smartwool socks. I still need a new pair of shoes, but I should be able to find them today.
In other big news, I officially finished my little brother's afghan. It's huge, maybe massive would be a better word. I rather like it. My plan is to mail it to my parents' house so that it's one less thing I have to lug around with me. Now I'll have to come up with something new to do in the evenings. Maybe I'll finish the afghan I started for me, it won't be as big as the one for Bill. Who knows.
I think it's best though if I eat some breakfast and maybe make some brownies.

Snow, driving, and playing tuba

2008-11-25T20:30:00.003-09:00

I'm currently in Juneau (in case you've missed that bit of information). I arrived late Sunday because my plane was delayed. When I arrived it was snowing and apparently had been for a while. I like snow. Not too much else exciting happened after arriving in Juneau. However on the flight I sat next to a kinda creepy guy who fell asleep on my shoulder.
Yesterday Laurie and I went and visited Juneau-Douglas high school to see Rich and drop off a tuba. We made lunch plans with Rich for today. We then went to go bug Brian but we couldn't find him so we went grocery shopping instead. It's best to do shopping early when a holiday is coming up. After lunch Laurie and I went to her work where I dropped her off and got to drive her car around. I went to the health food store to find a few things and drove around a little bit. After she got off of work we came back to the house and I made brownies and started on potato soup. The soup was a big hit and so were the brownies.
This morning I played a some tuba for a while and then Laurie and I went to get Rich for lunch. We went to a nice little restaurant. It was pretty good and had a good time hanging out. Then we went to go say hi to Ken, who is the band director at JDHS. I'm going in tomorrow morning and guest conducting a little. After leaving there and before going to Costco, we went and bugged Brian. We found him this time. We sang a long with his choir and after choir he asked if I wanted to play in band. I rarely turn down the opportunity to play tuba so I agreed and played a brand new tuba. We had to take it out of the plastic. It was fun and the kids enjoyed having a tuba, so did Brian. He invited me back for tomorrow, so I'll be there in the afternoon. Then we went to Costco to finish the rest of our shopping. It's been a pretty low key day. After shopping and the other adventures, Laurie and I jammed out (she played the piano and I sang) it was so fun.
We had dinner at a little diner. Pretty good burgers. It's been a pretty quiet evening. It'll be a fun day tomorrow and I need to get planning done on Thanksgiving dinner. I'm incharge of cooking that. It'll be fun.

The beginning of a vacation

2008-11-23T15:43:00.002-09:00

I'm sitting in the airport and waiting to board my flight to Juneau. I will be there for a week. I have been in Ketchikan since yesterday morning. It's been nice to be out of town even though I haven't gotten very far yet. I stayed the night at some people from church's home. It was very nice of them. I continued working on the afghan last night. I'm on the last block of color. There is a light at the end of the tunnel. Woohoo. I came in yesterday because I sang at church today. It went very well.
School continues to go well. We're getting closer to the concert and the kids are definitely stepping it up. It'll be a good concert. My 7th graders are about half driving me crazy but that's to be expected.
My dad emailed me an awesome brownie recipe this week. I've made it twice and shared with some of the teachers. They were a big hit. I'll have to make them while I'm in Juneau.
I'm looking forward to my trip and cooking for a group of people. It'll be fun and I'll try to keep everyone posted.

Yay for Playing Tests

2008-11-17T18:40:00.003-09:00

I'm sure that my high school students would not share my sentiment about being happy about playing tests. Oh well. They had their first one today. For the most part, they went rather well. I found decent rubric which made grading easier, sort of. I now just need to update grades in the system because mid-quarter is this week. How exciting, not.
Preparations for the Christmas concert are going well. My kindergarten class is the farthest along. That's very awesome for them. Here's hoping that I can light a fire under the rest of them.
Today we recorded the piano tracks for the song so that they can practice them. It is so nice to have an awesome piano player. She volunteered to play. It's very awesome. I'm so lucky to have an accompanist. I need to think of something nice to get her to say thank you.
Not much else is going on so I think I'll go back to knitting.

It's what day?

2008-11-16T17:20:00.004-09:00

I haven't figured out where this year has gone, but it's going by very fast. I remember Monday and Friday but the rest of this week is a bit of a blur. I'm not sure exactly where it went. I'm not complaining. I'm kinda hoping this week flies by because I'm going to Juneau next week, for the whole week. Yay vacation, sort of. I'm excited. I'm excited about cooking for people. I like cooking for groups.
Not too much happened this week besides playing for veteran's day. Also on Friday there was a community wide talent show. I got volunteered to play tuba in it. Not really asked, just volunteered. Thursday. Woohoo, one day's notice. I played the chicken dance. It was hilarious.
I'm slowly but surely finishing the afghan I'm knitting for my little brother. I think I have about two feet to go. It's pretty awesome. I hope he appreciates it.
I have about a month till the Christmas concerts. Elementary is on one day and secondary is on another. That'll be a fun time. I'm sure.

Veteran's Day

2008-11-11T18:58:00.003-09:00

Happy Veteran's Day. It was a good day to reflect on the people who fought for this country. Today the high school band was privileged to play for one of the ceremonies. I included the 8th grade band because they are more than capable and they fill out some of the instrumentation. We played the National Anthem and America the Beautiful. This of course brought up a few problems like there was no flute part, so I had to write it, or we don't have America the Beautiful in our music library so I had to arrange it. I found a good choral arrangement and then adapted it to the band. I got that to them yesterday so that we could rehearse it and then play it today.
This morning during band rehearsal, my eighth graders showed up. It was great to hear the whole group together. They are quite a good sounding band. It was awesome to have that many students. It was only 7 more students but it all counts.
We got a lot of compliments and everyone really enjoyed having the band play today. I think they thanked us like 12 times. It definitely meant a lot to the community to have us there.
Of course the program was supposed to start at Noon but we didn't start till about 12:20. We were finally done at about 12:50. This meant that all of my students were late to lunch (by 20 minutes, 30 when you figure we had to get back to the band room and put everything away). So of course they were all late to their next classes and I had 10 minutes to eat lunch. Woohoo.
Otherwise it's been a good day and so far a good week. Hopefully I'm not speaking too soon.
I'm going to go back to my knitting now, I'm about three feet from being done with the afghan for my little brother. The fun never ends.

Where has the week gone?

2008-11-09T16:29:00.003-09:00

I have no idea how it's Sunday again. This past week went by very quickly. I don't know how it did but I'm not totally complaining. It wasn't too out of the ordinary either. We buckled down on Christmas music with the elementary students. The concert is in 5 weeks, or there abouts. I think it's really about 5 1/2 weeks. There is still a lot to do. Oh well.
On the upside, my new bass drum came in. It's pretty. I like it. I had to give the percussion instrument talk again to my band. I also had to give the cell phone lecture again. Otherwise the kids are great. Wednesday and Thursday I didn't have afternoon classes because of drug prevention presentations. This meant no 7th or 8th grade. Friday there were a lot of them gone on a sports trip. I had 10 of the 7th graders and only one 8th grader. It wasn't too bad.
In two weeks I'll be on my way to Juneau for a week. I'm excited to see the people I know up there. I also get to cook for more people than just myself. Not that cooking for myself isn't a good thing but I sometimes have leftovers for a while. I love to cook. I made potato soup this week and I ate it for two days for dinner and one day for lunch. I don't have many recipes that don't produce leftovers.
Friday night I went over to another teacher's home. She had 5 fellow teachers over, including myself, and it was fun. She made taco's and we all had a good time. For dessert we had dump cake. It was quite tasty. Now that I'm talking about food, it makes me hungry. I'll fix something after I get done writing here.
I'm still adjusting to the time thing here. I'm just convinced that I have no idea what time it is anywhere else in the world and that it's ok. I'll figure it out when I need to, of course by then the time will have switched back everywhere else and then I'll be back to where I started. Such is life.
Tuesday the band will be playing for Veteran's Day. I have to see if I can find an arrangement of either America the Beautiful or some other patriotic song so that we can play that along with the National Anthem. I should probably take care of that while I'm thinking about it.
I'm off to make dinner and find music.

What's going on?

2008-11-02T08:13:00.002-09:00

Daylight's savings time has arrived and unlike the rest of the state we don't observe it. So don't ask me what time it is. My watch says one thing and my cell phone says something else and I can't figure out how to change my cell phone. Of course when I go to Ketchikan it'll be an hour different than it is here. It will be fun to figure out the ferry schedule. Also now church is at 11 AM here instead of 10AM because we have it piped in from Ketchikan. I'm sure I get used to it but it'll take a while.
So I got back into town on Thursday. The ferry was about 15 minutes late getting in. Stephanie, my AD, felt bad that she forgot to pick me up. I just started to walk, I got about half a mile, and someone picked me up. This happens quite often here. I got home, checked my mail, and stopped by the high school. I went back home and took a nap so that I was a little less dead for parent-teacher conferences. Just in case any of you reading this haven't talked to me in the last several days, I lost my voice while I was in Haines (and it has steadily been coming back) but trying to talk to anyone has been a bit of an adventure. I went up to the high school during conferences because people usually don't make the trek down to the music building. I talked to several parents and my A.D. (who felt really bad for forgetting to pick me up from the ferry). Then I talked to the english teacher down at the middle school (Kathy) about my week away. Home was my next stop and I went straight to bed.
Friday was an interesting day, mostly because I came back to a room that had been messed up. Trashed might be too harsh of a word for it, but it certainly felt that way. I was also informed that the sub didn't really follow any of my sub plans. Joy! I also got notes back from one of the subs disagreeing with the sub plans and then stating what they did instead. Come to find out, that my 7th grade class was also shown a rated R movie. This was not what was listed to do on the sub plans. What in the world is going on here. My elementary students were awesome on Friday though, especially with it being Halloween.
Friday night and Saturday late afternoon, I was a referee at the last regular season volleyball games. I happened to be 1st referee, which means I got to stand up on the stand next to the net. Friday went fairly well but Saturday was a different story. It was sort of a nightmare. When did a game become more than just a game? Why was the line judge calling balls out when they were really in? Why were so many people arguing with me? Why did the line judge call a tip, at the net, when she is at the end of the court and I was at the net? (There was no tip). Well add this to the list of things my AD feels sorry about to me (which once again I told her not to worry about). She came over last night after I got home from playing at a funeral to apologize. I told her not to worry about it. She insisted on taking me out for ice cream. We talked, got ice cream, and I told her not to worry about it. It's not the end of the world. She really has so many things put on her (and she's a really great person and deals with it all so well) that I don't worry about it.
Did I also mention that Saturday and today I've slept in till like 8AM (I never sleep in that late)? I also copied some new pep band music yesterday. The week ahead holds lots of Christmas music. It is now time to buckle down and work on the Christmas program. I should also figure out what I'm going to cook today.
I'm off to church and then I need to do some cleaning around my house. Laundry and dishes would be good things to get done.

Sleep in a bed

2008-10-30T06:09:00.004-08:00

I'm sitting in the airport waiting to board the plane. It's just after 6 AM and the flight leaves at 7AM. I slept in a bed last night, it was the first time I had since I left last Thursday morning. Thursday I spent the night on the ferry, Friday through Wednesday I slept on the floor in a classroom in Haines high school, and last night I was in a very comfortable bed at the Best Western in Juneau. Finally a good night's sleep.
We finally got out of Haines yesterday at about 3:15 PM. (5 hours late). We got into Juneau last night a little after 6 PM. The people who had taken a small boat up to catch the ferry in Skagway beat us back and they left much earlier than we did. There were weather issues in Juneau however that delayed us. It was a long day of travel. It will be nice to be home. I'm looking forward to sleeping in my own bed and actually cooking in my kitchen. Of course I could be stuck in Juneau and I don't know that it would bother me, I know enough people here. I also fit in pretty well with the people I know here.
Laurie, the accompaniest for the Juneau high school choir, picked my student and me up last night so we could go to Walmart. We then went to Bullwinkle's Pizza. Yay Pizza. She suggested coming up for Thanksgiving. I just might. She is also an advicate for me finding a job up in Juneau.
It's almost time to board the plane.

Sitting and waiting

2008-10-29T13:30:00.000-08:00

Well it's currently 1:30 PM and if the schedule hadn't changed I'd currently be in Juneau. Instead I'm currently sitting at Haines High School. The ferry was supposed to leave at about 9AM, because of weather it was delayed. Then it was delayed again so it was going to be in at 10AM. The next delay took us to the boat arriving at 1PM. Then it was going to be in at 2PM. The first boat broke down so they needed to get that one and then send out another one. About 12:45 they announced that the boat would be here at 3PM. That would put us back in Juneau about 5:30-6PM. I'm hoping that is the last delay. I don't mind the delay, but it's getting old. I'd like to check into my nice hotel in Juneau, go to Walmart, and get some good sleep. We might order some pizza when we get to Juneau. I feel bad for all of the people that will miss their flights and need them rescheduled. Luckily I was already overnighting in Juneau so it doesn't make a big difference for me. Oy. This just makes for a longer day than it already was. There are currently about 100 kids, directors, and chaperones sitting around waiting. I really do hope it's the last delay.

Needless to say this has been an interesting trip.

I'm sitting in a hallway next to Tasha, the director from Wrangell, and we are both typing on our blogs. She's my twin (sort of).

I had an interesting conversation with two of the Juneau directors, one was Brian and the other was Richard. Both very nice people and at times they try to be the mother hen. Someday I'll get to be an adult and not a baby chick. I appreciate their concern though. We went out to breakfast this morning. They kinda want to get me up to work in Juneau with them. We'll see how my job in Metlakatla goes. I'm not giving up on that one. I think I can make it my own, it'll just take some work.

Just an hour until we start getting shuttled over to the dock. Maybe we'll actually get out. By the way did I mention we have a foot of snow on the ground. Yay!!!

Snow

2008-10-29T00:04:00.000-08:00

Well the Honors Fest concert was great. I think everyone had a good time. It's snowed all day and it's still snowing. There's got to be about a foot of snow outside. It's fantastic. I love snow. I'm not sure that everyone shares that opinion with me.
We had a directors' meeting after the concert. It was good to talk to the directors. I mostly just sat and listened because yesterday I lost my voice. I'm not sure where it went and maybe someday I'll find it. (Sorry bad joke). There are times you can beat subjects into the ground and tonight we did just that. It happens. I did chat with a couple of directors after the meeting with my frustrations. I talked with them since they were driving my student and me back to the school. They wouldn't let me walk, they're convinced I'm sick. I'm not sick, I'm sleep deprived and have no voice. I've kept fairly quiet not just because of the lack of voice but with being semi sleep deprived, I have the tendency to not be the most pleasant person. I loose all tact and I'm plenty opinionated when I'm not any of the above. It's been an interesting couple days, to say the least. At the very least it was a great experience for my student and she had a good time.
We'll see how much snow we have when it gets time to leave.

Last Day of Honors Fest

2008-10-28T07:03:00.000-08:00

Well today is the last full day here in Haines. Tonight is the concert for Honors Fest. Yesterday was a day full of rehearsals for the students. The directors had a meeting at one point but that was about it for us. Sunday morning it was snowing (like I had said in the previous post). We got between 6-8", it was great. Then later that evening it began to rain. It rained a little bit yesterday morning so needless to say the rain was fairly gone. It turned out however to be a beautiful day. I even walked back and forth between the school and the concert hall a couple times. The final time I was walking back to the school, I remembered that there are bears here and that maybe I should walk closer to the lights versus closer to the woods. Oops. I forget about bears because there are none in Metlakatla. There are also no bears, that at least I know of, is Illinois so I don't generally think about walking places and running into bears. I didn't run into any bears. Just for the record, we went out looking for bears on Saturday and didn't see any, which means I've only ever seen bears in zoos. However on Saturday we did go out to the eagle preserve. That was cool. I'm pretty sure I mentioned this already but it doesn't hurt telling everyone again.
I spent some time yesterday wandering around with the Wrangell band director. She and I are both first year teachers and are very similar. Our mentor says that we're twins, and it's kinda true. Yesterday I started to loose my voice and I think it's about gone. I have to admit I haven't gotten great sleep since being here. I think that's what I get for sleeping on the floor for several days. Did I mention that we are the only school that is sleeping in the high school? So needless to say I'm the only director not staying at the hotel, but school policy is school policy. I'm not particularly worried about it. Tomorrow night we will be in Juneau at a hotel, so only one more night on the floor. I think I'll survive. It's been a rough couple of days mostly because I'm sore and tired from sleeping on the floor. It's also been long days. On the upside, my student is having a great time and I'm very happy for that. Maybe this will motivate more students to try out for next year. It wouldn't hurt. I think my students would enjoy it.
I must be off to eat breakfast and finish getting ready for the day. It's another day of rehearsals and today will be extra long with the concert and then a dance for the kids later. Nothing like getting finished at 11PM so that you get on a ferry by 8AM the next day. The concert should be really good. I'm looking forward to hearing it.

Sleeping bags, snow, and seven AM

2008-10-26T07:12:00.000-08:00

Good Morning!!! For most people waking up for the second day (or any amount of days) in a row in a sleeping bag on the floor of a high school, in a town you've never been to, would be almost unheard of. Here in southeast Alaska, it seems to be fairly common. I'm currently in Haines, which is probably about 300 miles away from Metlakatla. I'm here with one of my students. She was the only student I had make Honor Band. For the next few days we will be here. We left Metlakatla on Thursday. We spent 25 hours on a ferry before arriving in Haines Friday. So Thursday we slept on the ferry, I slept in a chair that reclined a bit and my student slept on the floor. If you haven't been on a ferry, this is a very common practice. Then Friday night till this coming Tuesday night, we're sleeping at the high school. On sporting trips teams almost always stay at the schools, but for things like this it depends on school policy. Our school policy is to stay at the school, so that's where we are.
When we got in Friday, it was snowing slightly. I love snow. The scenery was picturesque. Tall mountains capped with snow with a small town sitting just in front of them along with tall snow capped mountains across the inlet. Yesterday we woke up to a dusting of snow on the ground, probably about half an inch. It was so beautiful. It made the scenery look exactly like what you see in a book as the scenery in Alaska. I have some great pictures that as soon as I can get them off my camera, I will get them up here.
Yesterday the group from Ketchikan, which has been here as long as we have (they were on the same ferry Thursday), and my student and I went and did some exploring. We drove north towards the Canadian border to go to the eagle preserve. Nature wasn't being very cooperative, the only only way to get a good look at the eagles was from the distance viewer. Very often they are closer to the boardwalk we were on, but not yesterday. The drive out there was gorgeous. The road was next to the river that wound through the beautiful snow-capped mountains. It made it even better having everything dusted with snow from the snow fall the night before. After that we had some down time at the school and then decided to go the opposite way and go the a river that usually has a lot of bears. We drove all the way out to the lake which the river runs from and no bears. We looked around and saw a few eagles, but no bears. Once again nature wasn't being very cooperative. I've never seen a bear outside a zoo and I don't want to get close to one, I'd just like to observe one from a bit of a distance in their natural habitat. Three times I've been out trying to find bears in three different places and haven't seen one.
Today will start rehearsals for Honors Festival. There is a band and a choir. The rest of the groups should get here about 12:30. Wrangell got in yesterday so now we're waiting on Sitka, Petersburg, Juneau, Hoonah, Craig, and Klawok. We'll have about a hunderd students here for Honors Fest. We will all be here until Wednesday morning, weather permitting. They have rehearsals today, tomorrow, and Tuesday, with a concert Tuesday evening. The music should be really good.
After leaving here on Wednesday, most everyone is travelling back to their towns that day. We are overnighting in Juneau and catching a morning flight to Ketchikan, weather permitting. It was either overnight in Juneau or in Ketchikan because the ferry back to Metlakatla doesn't run on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. My activities director opted to have us stay in Juneau at the same hotel I was in for the directors meeting last month. Another adventure. It'll be fun.
I better get ready for the day, it's nearly 8AM and the A.D. here is coming at 9 to make breakfast for some of the kids that will be helping move equipment over to where rehearsals and the concert will be held.
The sun is coming up and there is more snow. I can't tell if it is currently snowing but I'll find out soon.