read this!

if you read my dad's blog, then you know that in the week before my aunt came, my mom did some serious cleaning. she came across some school papers of ours that they had kept. my all-time favorite is an apology letter that ryan wrote to his teacher when he was in the 3rd grade. my dad gives the background information, so i won't repeat it. click here to read it. hope you enjoy!

no excuses anymore

i know, i know. school has been out for a week now and i still haven't updated my blog.

sorry.

in my defense, my aunt came from california a week and a half ago for joey's graduation and i've had a blast hanging out with her. she's so much fun. today all of us, minus my dad, went to run errands together, and she had us all in stitches while were in the van. she told us that we all belong in the circus, but she contributed to all the craziness. suffice it to say that kelli will no longer volunteer to drive the family around. =)

joey graduated last week, and it was a fun-filled weekend. we had more family come in from out of town, and we had a great time. i think i'll devote a whole post to that later on. i need to get pictures from someone else considering my camera is so slow that i didn't get any good ones.

what else, what else...

oh! i found out "officially" on wednesday that i'm teaching first grade next year. it had been in the works for about two weeks before, but certain things had to happen before they could tell me. apparently that happened this week. i signed my contract, went to my new room, and freaked out.

first grade's kinda a big deal. oh man...

in related news, i had to completely clean out my room since i was moving rooms. this wasn't a really hard job because 1) i have so little stuff since i only taught one semester, 2) i was in a small room to begin with, and 3) i moved into the room right next door (actually some of the other teachers moved my stuff because i was late getting back to the school...they're wonderful). when i walked into my old room, completely void of anything, i got a little emotional. i mean, it was my first room. i had my first class in that room. when i realized that i was getting so emotional, i realized it was time to go home.

so i went home and took a nap-'cause it's summer, baby!!!!!

things i have done on my first day off

• nothing!

WELCOME, SUMMER!

almost there

i have almost finished with third grade.

almost.

we have our awards program tonight, my kids have a recitation, and then i'm done.

i won't see them on monday. i won't tell them one more time not to talk out, to be quiet, to quit yelling at each other. i won't hear "miss hernandez, he won't leave me alone!" "miss hernandez, i forgot my homework!" "miss hernandez, i know i got in trouble, but can't i have grace?"

the one i'll miss the most is "miss hernandez, can i have a hug?"

the "new" chick-fil-a

i had to check out the menu at chick-fil-a...you know, to keep the people informed =)

the biggest difference that it made to me was that the tenders (which i like to have from time to time) are marinated with a different recipe. i still thought it was good. the dr. pepper is not as great because they're using a different machine, but i'm sure it will get better. i'm not complaining. you probably don't want to read about all of the changes, so go check it out!

spurs won!

that's right...spurs kept their championship dream alive with an exciting game in new orleans.

wonderful. downright wonderful.

quick update

since everything i wanted to update happened at least 2 weeks ago, i'll just write a quick one.

• kelli turned 22 on may 7th, so of course we had to celebrate! her birthday fell on a wednesday, so after our intermission service, we went out with the family to eat at red lobster. i love red lobster! then on thursday, after my mom's spring concert, we went out with our friends to eat at carinos. yummy! then on friday, sarah, kelli, courtney, and i went to kim le's for pedicures! the four of us did the same thing for my birthday and it was oodles of fun. we all decided to spring for designs on our cute little toenails, so we all got flowers (not actually my choice, but whatever) and sarah got super cute dragonflies with rhinestones. fancy shmancy. anyway, my parents got kelli a CHI hairdryer, which is fabulous, so i've been enjoying that as well! my pretty hair thanks you for being born, kelli. keep it up!
• just a few days later, on saturday, sarah graduated from asu with her master's in nursing. what a smart gal! i'm so impressed with her dedication to her career. kelli told her this week that she makes it look so easy, and i couldn't agree more. i'm proud of you, sarah!
• joey just finished his run for high school musical. he played the part of ryan evans, sister to drama queen sharpay. i thought he did a wonderful job and i'm so glad that he's actually able to use the talents that God has given him. high school musical actually runs next weekend too, but joey's graduating on saturday, so he can't perform. too bad. i'm not necessarily a fan of high school musical, but i loved watching joey.
• i only have 3 1/2 days of school left! my kids are driving me crazy because they are so ready to get out of school...almost as much as i am.
• my aunt from california is coming this week! i'm excited because obviously, we don't get to see her much. she's coming for joey's graduation and staying for 2 weeks. yay for family!!!!
• saturday in san antonio wasn't bad. i was in shorts because i thought it would be hot, but instead it was cloudy and sprinkly. still, it was better than being incredibly hot all day long. i got me some dippin' dots so i was a happy camper. i will say this: the trip was for a group of 7th and 8th graders, and every time the whole group was together just reminded me that i made the right decision in choosng to be certified ec-4th grade. it made me appreciate my little darlings all the more.
• speaking of my little darlings, we took a field trip to safety city last week. in case you don't know what safety city is, it's something that the city offers to third graders. they have a mini-setup of the city of san angelo so that they kids can learn the right way to ride their bikes on the street. it's such a great field trip. it was so cute to watch, and i had a hard time not laughing at some of them. okay, i laughed a little. one of my accident prone children stuck his hand out to signal that he was turning left, but he couldn't steer with only one hand, so he ended up going straight...right into the fence. when the other kids asked if it was true that he ran into the fence, he said, "NO! i hit the pole, THEN i hit the fence." when i heard that i had to turn around to laugh. after safety city, we went into the fire safety trailer to learn about fire safety from the fire marshal. i had been talking to him about the field trip a few weeks before the actual trip, but the week before we were playing phone tag. when we walked in, he asked me, "are you bethany?" when i told him that i was, he said, "i'm brent-the one you've been playing phone tag with." this same little boy leaned over to me and in total confusion stated, "i thought your name was miss hernandez!" oh boy.
• chick-fil-a has changed their menu! i'm not completely sure of all the changes that were made, but i plan to check it out really soon...like in the next few minutes. gotta go!

n-e-r-v-o-u-s

game 7 of the hornets-spurs series is tonight.

i'm all kinds of nervous.

literally.

guess what i'm doing right now?

i'm looking at online graduate programs for a reading specialist degree.

yeah, that's right, i'm going back to school. fun, fun, fun. the plan has always been to get my master's. when i changed my degree to education, i knew i wanted to be a reading specialist. i'm sure asu's program is just dandy, but i was thinking that an online program would give me more flexibility.

i don't know, though.

guess i should keep looking.....

did you see the ridiculous time of this post?

yes, i'm up. really up. i'm even dressed and look halfway decent. why, you ask?

i'm going to san antonio for a school trip. no, not my school-another school. but here's the scary part: i'm going on this trip as a chaperone.

yes, you read right-a chaperone.

when did i get old enough to be a chaperone?

i feel really old. and being up at 6 o'clock on a saturday morning is not helping.

on a much brighter note: 4 1/2 days of school left! maybe then i can get some serious blogging done!

all i want

all i want more than anything is a night where there is nothing planned.

nothing at all.

all i want is a day where i can get home from school and change immediately into my pajamas.

is that too much to ask?

so...

i know, i know...i need to update. i feel like i have so much to blog about, but alas, it's 10:00 at night i still have to do lesson plans.

yikes.

so, to keep me from forgetting what i want to blog about, here's my bulleted list of soon-to-be posts:

• kelli's birthday
• sarah's graduation
• school
• mother's day
• summer plans...oh, glorious summer

stay tuned!

why i live

about 4 years ago, i started a job that even now holds fond memories. i was one of the work studies in the art & music department at asu. because i worked in the actual office (not in the recording studio or music libraries), i was nicknamed "the office princess."

okay, i gave myself that nickname. BUT the name fit. so there.

it was a really good job. my bosses, jaxine and dr. scott, were wonderful. they were easy to talk to and many times listened to my seemingly many problems. and unfortunately, the time that i worked there might easily qualify as the most drama-ridden times of my life so far. bless their hearts. they put up with a lot from me.

anyway, back to real reason for this post. my primary job was to type up the programs for all of the concerts and recitals during each semester. back then, i could finish a student recital program (which occurred every wednesday) in less than 30 minutes. that included copying and folding them. during the middle of the semester, i averaged 3-4 programs a week. i could do those suckers in my sleep.

when i left that job to work for lennon, guess what i did every monday? that's right, programs. technically, it was a bulletin, but i used the program template from publisher. same thing. i don't mind doing programs. i really don't. i just couldn't seem to get away from them. so you can imagine that when i accepted this teaching job, programs would not be a part of my daily life anymore.

WRONG!

word got out that i did programs for one of my jobs, so guess what i did tonight? the program for the music spring concert.

this is apparently my purpose in life. i might as well embrace it.

and...

totally didn't know today was cinco de mayo until i got to lunch and saw the napkins and sombrero decorations that came with our teacher luncheon. one of the other teachers asked me if i knew why we celebrated cinco de mayo and i had no clue.

what a sad, little, pathetic excuse for a mexican i am.

oh well.

apparently not that tired...

kelli and i figured out what nerds we are tonight at the store.

remember kelli? the girl with nonexistent blog? somebody talk to her...she's not listening to me!

so here's the deal: kelli got her tax refund yesterday and i got paid today, so we set off to buy groceries. it was kind of a big deal because for the first time in a while, we were actually going to split the total cost in half (don't ask-long story). last night we made our little list (yes, we are "list people") and this evening set out for our neighborhood heb. kelli had already told me how much she could spend, so her goal was to spend about $15 less than that and i would match it. the verdict?

we got freakishly close to the goal. i went $2 over, and kelli went $5 over-which was basically $10 less than what she could spend. are you following at all? bottom line: we did much better than we thought we would. or could. AND we're using coupons. i feel so frugal!

the funny part came when kelli's total rang up. when kelli saw that both of us were pretty darn close to what we wanted to spend, she said,"yay! we stayed within our budget!" our bagger laughed at us. poor girl. she must not know what it's like to be on a budget. she has no idea what she's missing.

later after we had put the groceries away, we were watching t.v. when kelli turned to me and said, "i'm still excited about how well we did at the grocery store." i totally agreed with her. it was a big deal for us. i know. we're nerds.

third grade happenings

my little third graders have been busy recently:

• last friday morning before i walked into my room, i noticed that my light was on and someone was in there. i walked in to find one of my students in there. he got to school a little earlier than usual, so he decided to put the chairs down from all of the desks. i was so impressed and made a big deal of it to the class whenever school started.
• not to be outdone, this morning i walked in to find another boy (principal's son-should've known) doing the same thing. he even took it a step further and re-straightened the desks.
• i didn't know this was teacher's appreciation week! i got a cute basket with m&ms and a notepad with stickers. it's way cute. i also got a lotion/body spray set. yay for presents!
• on a side subject, i've been reading the five love languages for singles (no comments, please) and from the reading i have figured out that my primary love language is gifts. not even kidding you. i love to get gifts. no wonder i feel so loved at this moment.
• i totally forgot that the kids had an extra rehearsal todayfor their music program coming up. with an extra 30 minutes of not having class, we still managed to finish all of our work 20 minutes early. i still have no clue how that happened.
• guess what we're studying in health? A BALANCED DIET! and to think that we were talking about the food pyramid while i sipped on my dr. pepper.
• that's all for now. i'm tired.

new addiction

i am way addicted to the soundtrack to wicked. for those of you who don't know, wicked is the story of the wizard of oz told from the wicked witch's point of view. joey got the soundtrack a few weeks ago, and i absolutely love it. the last year that i was in choir, we sang a medley from wicked, and i liked the music, but after listening to the whole cd, i've fallen in love with it.

i know my family is planning on seeing it when the broadway production is in san antonio, but now i'm not sure if i'll last that long. it's awesome! go listen to the cd!

why i miss being in college

this could be my last week of school.

but nooooooooo.

i miss college. a lot. a whole lot.

yikes

it is may 4th and my first post in the month of may.

i'd better get on the ball...