2007…

Goodbye, 2007, and up yours.  I’m over you.

Hello 2008….

 

i’m pretty much a big deal…

Well, kids, it’s official.  I done got me a job!!!  I found out yesterday that I’m the newest member of the special education department at LSHS.  Too cool!  They interviewed 3 people for the position- 2 were teachers wanting transfers from other buildings in the district- and I’m the one they picked.  I can’t even tell you what I was thinking when the head of human resources called to offer me the job… 3 years, 3 long years of seeking out what was next, what the Lord had in store, where I’d be going.  And now… I’m a teacher!  It’s going to pretty much rock, and I can’t wait!

Soooo, I just thought you might all like to know how great I am…  Feel free to praise me now.  😉

 

check

Beautiful 70 degree day?  Check.

Professor dismissing class at 5:00 pm instead of 7:15 pm?  Check.

Lots of energy to burn?  Check.

Running for the first time of the season?  Check.

Loving every minute of it?  Check.

🙂  I love spring!

 

blogalicious

I fear that I have failed my readers. I, in fact, have not been blogalicious. What is blogalicious, you might ask? Well, blogalicious def, blogalicious def, blogalicious def,  blogalicious, definition- make them readers go loco. They want my treasures, so they get their pleasures from looking at my blog-o…

Whoa.  Something tells me I just took a turn for the horrible.

Allow me to ‘splain my absence.  I have no life.  I wake up way too frickin’ early.  Then I go to school and teach.  Then I leave school to go to school and get taught.  Then I go home.  Then I eat dinner, I make lunch, I wash my face, I go to bed.  Repeat cycle until I want to rip my own arm off so that I’ll have an excuse to be stationary for more than 5 minutes.  Drastic measures?  Yes.  But if spring break weren’t in two weeks, it might be necessary here soon.  I can say with confidence that in the fall semester, I will not be enrolling in 9 hours at UMKC.  I will take my 6 hours, and I will enjoy rediscovering what life is.  Besides, that’d be WAAAAAY too much in combination with my first year of teaching.  That’s right- there’s about a 99.99% chance that I will have full time employment in August.  CRAZY!!!!  I was telling a friend of mine that I’ve now been unsecurely employed longer than I was securely employed.  I’m pretty sure that secure employment for me is going to cause some sort of black hole to rip open in the universe, so be prepared, people.  I don’t think it’s going to cause the earth to explode, but we might experience a world-wide blackout.  Make sure your flashlights have batteries.

Today is my mama’s birthday.  Happy birthday, mama.  She’s really young now.  Today is also my beautiful fantastic cousin Sarah’s birthday.  She’s really old now.  16.  And she’s going to get her license tomorrow.  Scary.   I told her to make sure she goes at least 10 MPH over the speed limit during her test because they really liked that.  I’m hoping she doesn’t take me serious.  Tomorrow is Abbie’s birthday…  she would have been 18.  I still can’t really believe she’s gone.  I remember being at the hospital the day she was born, angry at the baby down the hall who wouldn’t stop screaming because I couldn’t hear my cousin.  Turns out it was her.  I held her when she was like an hour old.  18 years ago.  And now….  something tells me tomorrow will not be an easy day.  Just when you think you’re done with the tears…

I didn’t grade the college prep quizzes I was supposed to this weekend.  And I don’t care.  At all.  When they whine at me tomorrow, I’m going to tell them that they’ll get their quizzes when I’m good and ready to give them back.  And if they’ve got a problem with it, I’m going to send them to the office.  Actually, that’s probably not how it’s going to go at all, but wouldn’t that be cool?  I so have absolute power.

Can anyone tell why I haven’t been blogging lately?…  Hope you enjoyed a completely random conglomoration of thoughts.

 

it’s the most wonderful time of the year

Some may say that Christmas is the best season of all. To those people, I say fie on you.

Welcome to my most favoritist season ever! Today is Ash Wednesday, marking the beginning of Lent. I love the Lenten season. Every year, the Lord does something way cool in my life through this season. There’s something about the denial of self, the acknowledgement of sacrifice, the preparation of what’s to come that’s just… terrible and beautiful all at the same time. There’s something about setting your eyes on the cross and its implications in your life that brings about revelations that can’t and won’t occur otherwise. So, welcome, my friends to the most wonderful time of the year. I pray that you will be able to experience the terrible beauty of this time, and that the Lord will reveal new and amazing things in your life throughout the season of Lent.

 

officially official

I’m officially starting my master’s program on Monday night!!!  Hooray for back to school…  It’s really kind of strange, going back and all, but I’m doing it.  In my undergrad years, I was the kid that was lucky to open a book for one of my classes, let alone actually read it.  (sorry, mom… but you probably already knew the truth)  I got a couple of my books last night during my enrollment-advisement-financial office-back to enrollment-advisement again-bookstore fiasco, and before classes even start, I’ve already read the first chapter in both of them…  and I’m interested in what they’re saying.  I’m not quite sure how to handle this whole “interested in education” thing.  It’s new.  Kind of foreign.  Kind of freaky.  But very welcome at the same time!  I’m sure it makes a huge difference when you know you’re actually going to be using the information that you’re learning, and when you actually want to learn it.  However, I’ve never done master’s classes, so I’m not sure what to expect.  I keep having these visions that on the first day of classes I end up like Elle Woods in “Legally Blonde”- you know, she’s the only unprepared one in the class and the teacher makes a fool of her and kicks her out.  Only I’m not a petite blonde with big boobs and a fancy convertible and a chihuahua who’s fighting some other chick for the rock.  I just want to be a teacher.  And I’m guessing there’s no rock involved.  Sad day.  But there are great benefits, so I’ll settle for that for now!  It’s definitely going to be interesting figuring out how juggle everything this semester- between subbing, photography, and class 3 nights a week, I think I’ll manage to keep myself busy…  (since that’s such a stretch for me)  Back to school, back to homework, back to papers, back to FUN!!!  From now on, you can just call me a Kangaroo!  GO ‘ROOS!  (who choses a kangaroo for a mascot anyway?  apparently umkc does…)

 

dancing queen

Santa brought me a pair of tap shoes for Christmas. 🙂

And to the 8 pounds that I’ve recently lost, welcome back. While I haven’t missed you, having you back isn’t so bad if it involves peanut butter bon-bons and Mema’s peanut butter chocolate sheet cake. But don’t get too comfortable. I’ll be tap dancing you away again soon.

 

this here is a shout out…

Hi Mema.  🙂  love you!

(don’t be jealous if your name isn’t mema.  1- not everyone could aspire to have such a cool title.  it’s reserved for the cream of the crop.  2- it’s not that i don’t love you, too, but i just love my mema a lot.)

 

do i HAVE to work a full week?…

I’ve now officially had 2 long weekends in a row.  Thanksgiving break followed by 2 snow days on the next Thursday and Friday.  Does it get any better than teaching?  Despite having a hard last week for the 3 days that we were here, I was ready to get back to work today.  How sick is this?  On Thursday night, when they were saying all the school closings and I saw our district, I… was… sad.  Huh?  Here’s my question- who’s sad that they don’t have to go to work?  Apparently I am.  Weird.  I never thought I would find something that I love this much.  However, now I’m hoping that by Friday I’m not faced with this I’ve- just- come- off- of- two- short- weeks- and- now- I- hate- teaching- because- I- actually- had- to- work- five- days- in- a- row feeling.  Talk about spoiled…  The students keep asking me what I did with our snow days, and it’s very sad to say that I have absolutely nothing to offer them.  “Well, I cleaned the bathrooms, and I worked out, and I watched some movies and… uh… I… slept?”  Talk about an exciting life.  HOWEVER, I did shoot a wedding with Kelly on Saturday, and I definitely climbed up on top of her car to get a pretty tight shot.  I was pretty proud of myself for several reasons- 1. Have you ever tried to climb on top of an Xterra? in dress shoes? when it’s been snowing and icing for 2 days?  Yeah, I didn’t think so.  But I have.  2. The shot was (hopefully) totally money!  It looked so cool on the camera screen, so hopefully it looks just as cool on the computer screen.  3. I managed to not only get on top of the car, but to also set up my tripod on the car.  Seriously- sometimes it sucks to be this good.  It was pretty good times!  All in all, I’d call it a very successful (and lazy) 4 day weekend.  We’ll just forget that that ridiculous Chief’s game was a part of it…

 

edjumakaysheeon fer mee!

I’m really digging this teaching thing.  I’m going to be really sad when I leave this job, even though my 4th hour makes me want to rip off my ears so I don’t have to hear them sometimes. But, I love it- bad days and all. So, the decision has been made, folks. I’m a goin’ back to school. That’s right. One degree isn’t enough for Jessi. She needs  a master’s to go along with it.  (since her bachelor’s is completely worthless… go psychology).  I’m hopefully starting at UMKC in January, and it’ll take me 3 years to be out with my masters.  Who would have thought?  Me.  With a master’s degree.  The coolest part is, I can start teaching in the fall on a provisional certificate, so if all goes well and the opening is there, I’m going to be a teacher next August!   It’s pretty cool to see how the Lord has been orchestrating all of this, despite my stubborn, selfish heart right now. 2 lead teachers are currently willing to go to bat for me to be on staff here at LSHS, and have had multiple conversations with our principal, who’s made it clear with both of them that he (the principal) wants me on staff here as well.  So cool.  I’m just praying that a position will open, because it would just rock.  It’s nice to feel like I’ve figured out what I want to do and to be on the path to doing it. And it only took me 2 1/2 years to get here…  Better late than never, right?  It’s been fun seeing the “teacher within” come out over the last sememster, too.  You know those teacher sayings that you always used to roll your eyes at?  Yeah, I say them.  And I say them with pride.  Over and over until the students are rolling their eyes at me!  You know that teacher that wouldn’t let you turn in late work even though you had a really good excuse (even though there really is no good excuse)?  Yeah, that’s me now.  I used to be a pushover- “Oh, just turn it in when you get the chance.”  “Sure, I’ll take your assignment that’s 2 months late!”  “No, you won’t be penalized for being lazy.”  Not so much anymore.  Now it’s “Sorry, should have thought about that yesterday when you had class time and last night when you could have gotten it done and in your study hall when you’re supposed to be working on homework.  Bummer.”  HA HA HA HA HA HA!!!!!  You know those shoes that teachers wear?  That’s something I’ll never cross over to.  😉  So, wish me luck, because if there’s anything that a girl working 2 jobs and not doing a very good job maintaining sanity needs, it’s graduate classes.  Wait, what am I thinking?!?!?…