Teaching Thus Far

In two days, I go back to school for my second semester of teaching. Crazy. I can not believe that I have been teaching for 4 months! I told myself that before I go back, I wanted to sit down and reflect on my the past couple of months.

Many of you know that I have wanted to be a teacher all my life- seriously, since I was like 5. I was the nerd that had her own school room (the storage closest in our garage) and I taught to my stuffed Disney characters, pretending like they were my students. I used to get extra worksheets from my 5th grade teacher so I would have work for my class. My big brother would sometimes play along too and would be the principal.

Now that I am almost 23 and have my very own classroom at Horn Lake Middle School and I teach to REAL 7th graders, many people have asked me is it all that I thought it would be?

I can honestly say it is. Don't get me wrong, teaching 7th graders is hard many days. The thing I have been disappointed in the most is the fact that I have not been able to build deep relationships with my students. I always knew that being a teacher meant that I was the teacher and THEY were the students, and that they were going to know that. I have learned with my kids that if I make the SLIGHTEST joke with them, they think we are going to party all class. Finding that balance has been difficult, and I know one day (many teaching years later, I'm sure) I will find the key.

My favorite thing about being a teacher is seeing it (math, life lessons, etc.) CLICK! When I compare some of my students math scores from last year against their scores from the previous 2 nine weeks test, it makes my heart smile because they have grown, some a little and some ALOT! When I see that, I know that it is not me teacher, but Christ in me teaching. I have also enjoyed teaching them a little about who they hang out with. We have a saying around my classroom "Bad company corrupts good morals" Alot of them have little to no idea what that means, but maybe by May!

If you want to see a visual on how much my children do (or do not) like me see pictures below.

During Thanksgiving, the students could buy feathers for their favorite teacher. The teacher with the most feathers got a turkey.

Here is my turkey...

Pretty good, right? Well here is the teacher across the hall from me turkey..

And she wasn't even the one who won!! The teacher who won had like 450 feathers.

Just reminding myself I am not there to be their friend, but their teacher! But hopefully at least some of my students like me.

Also before Thanksgiving, we had a Faculty vs. Faculty basketball game.Yes, I did play in it, and no I am not good at basketball. I did score 4 points for the 7th grade team though! Woop Woop.

7th grade teachers ended up winning the tournament! 

Anyway, I could seriously sit here for hours and tell the good, bad, and ugly about teacding, but aint nobody got time for that.

When Wednesday comes, I will wake up with a smile on my face, thankful for the job that I have!

What my Students are Thankful for

In the spirit of Thanksgiving (like a month and a half ago), I had my students write down 20 things they were thankful for. Some of them were silly, some serious, and some were odd.

Let me share some:

1. A girl was thankful that she was alive because she was a Y2K baby, and the world was supposed to end in Y2K. I laughed so hard.

2. A girl was thankful for gumption. (They just learned what that meant in English)

3. Many were thankful for their teachers (some even saying me by name)

4. One was thankful for the time her dad spent with her.

5. One guy was thankful for his Ipod, TV, xbox, wii, iPhone, and laptop. (Seriously, these kids are 13! Sad, but at least he was thankful for them)

6. Many were thankful for their parents and the love and care they give them.

7. One kid was thankful for Flu Season (??)

8. Many recognized that a house, food on the table, and warmth aren't always a given for some people. Many said they were thankful for those things.

After they told me 20 things they were thankful for, I told them 20 things I was thankful for. They LOVED it!

I hope to cultivate a spirit of thankfulness in my students all year long. We will see how that goes.

It is complete.

It is complete. The 8 pack (as Amber Grace's dad named us) is now all officially married. Cindy Grice took this picture at our wedding and at everyone's wedding we took the same picture in the same order. Cant wait to display these pics around the house!

Andrew and Kenna's Wedding Festivites

So this weekend, we got the last of our friends married. Weird to say that. We are only 22 and 8 of our best friends are already married! I already love that we are all married.

We started wedding festivities last weekend with Kenna's bachelorette party. Big thanks to Holly Wright for getting it all together! We met at her apartment then headed downtown to the Blue Fin and ate sushi and hung out. In the words of Kenna, she "loved it because it was so intimate." Glad she had fun :)

We even got to stay in the lounge area!

I love this picture of Kenna as we opened gifts and had dessert at Holly's apartment.

While we were doing our girl thing, the boys were doing doing their thing. Literally- meat and sports. Andrew attempted the 4 pounder burger at Kooky Canuks- you heard me right. Four pounds of meat.. seven pounds of food altogether. 12,000 calories. Any guesses how far he got into it?

Not even a fourth of the way through... Good thing, because I'm pretty sure he might have died. 

Then the boys went to play basketball... really? Can you say barf?

Anyway...... I digress.

Wedding weekend started Thursday night for us because Landon, Matt, Haley, and I headed down to Jackson to stay with Haley's grandparents, Nonna and Pawpaw. They were so sweet to open up their home and feed us. I felt like I was staying at a hotel.Look...

In case you didn't figure out, I took the day off Friday, which was so exciting for me because it was my first day this year I have taken off.

Friday morning we woke up and headed to Summit/McComb area in South Mississippi.

We had Kenna's bridal luncheon around 11.

Look at the gifts Kenna got us... :)

Friday afternoon we hung out with Kenna a little and then Friday night was rehearsal and rehearsal dinner. It was so cold when we were rehearsing, but the dinner more than made up for it.

Look at the happy couple...

All of our friends rehearsal dinner's during their wedding weekends had reminded me why we have chosen them to be our friends.. and this one was so different. I loved hearing people comment on the character of Andrew and Kenna because all of it was true and such a testament of their individual character and their character as a couple.

 JDub, Amber, Matt, Haley, Landon, and I were graciously offered to stay the weekend at Kenna's family's cabin. It was so good to be all in one place for a weekend and get to hang out with them!

Hate that I didn't get a picture, but one of my favorite times during the weekend was Friday night Andrew and Kenna came to hang out at the cabin with all of us. They took time out of their HECTIC weekend to spend time with us!

Saturday...THE BIG DAY!!

We got to sleep in until 9. We didn't get to the house until around 12. By the way, Andrew and Kenna got married at a family house in Summit. It was the house her parents got married in. They really fixed it up and it was a GREAT place for them to get married!

One of my favorites from the day.

The beautiful bride!!!

Snapped a picture with the groom.

Then snapped a picture with MY groom!!

Drum roll please........

The stunning bride.

We will take a short break and brag on how cute my husband and I look!

And, back to the wedding..

Good lookin wedding party.

Sweet, sweet ceremony

And then there was dancing..

I had so much fun this weekend with all my friends. Now we all get to do married life together!!