Love Day and SUCH a Big Helper!

This past week was pretty typical when one considers our new normal. I’m getting settled in my classroom and slowly getting more used to the workload (and all. the. technology.). This past week held Valentine’s Day, which was fun at school (with the kids getting to exchange Valentines and me getting goodies from staff and students) and at home. Paul surprised me with a little bear, flowers, and chocolate, he got Joseph some candy, and he got Abigail flowers, a little bear, and some chocolate. Abigail’s flowers and the bears were part of a fundraiser at DLI, which he always tries to support. He also made dinner: venison tenderloin (from the deer he split with the guy he went hunting with a little while ago), roasted potatoes, and veggies. It was sooo good! Now for the story about my big helper. There was one day at school that Abigail got her clothes dirty while at recess. She asked to go to the bathroom and decided she would change her clothes (all kinders have a change of clothes in their backpacks). Then, she decided she’d help ME by washing her clothes…in the sink in the bathroom (thank goodness she chose the sink and not the toilet, haha). She said she tried to dry them, but the paper towels didn’t work, so she put them in the plastic bag that was originally holding her clean change of clothes. She did this all in about five minutes and presented her very surprised teacher with a bag full of sopping wet clothes. Her teacher said that she couldn’t even get upset because it was so transparent that Abigail was trying super-hard to solve her own problem. I couldn’t get upset because, well, what would be the point? It was already done, haha. I did tell her that next time she needed to just change and we would work together at home to wash and dry the clothes! She’s exhaustively entertaining.

My pretty Valentine’s flowers!
Goodies from my students. 🙂
One of the other fifth grade teachers gave me this cup filled with chocolate. She knows what we need to get through the day, haha.
Abigail needed to take a picture with her bear. The bear came with a little heart balloon, which she had to share with Grogu (the other balloon is one that she picked out a week or so ago when she went with me to run errands). Six might be one of my favorite ages.
This is Abigail’s art that she made last month (they’ve been on display in the classroom). It’s a snow owl. I think the smile is my favorite. 🙂

Officially Tired but Unofficially Hired

This past week was pretty normal for what is our new normal. The only thing that was crazy was that I was having a real challenge getting the info I needed from TEA (Texas Education Agency) in one condensed message. I finally (with the help of Paul who was able to provide me with what turned out to be the right question) was able to get it out of them that if I just took three tests, I could get my standard certification and that I could apply for a one-year certification which would allow me to be hired while I was taking those three tests. At first I was trying to get the tests waived (since I’m pretty sure the tests I took in California for my Californian credential would have covered my bases for most, if not all of them), but the process to do that was just too difficult. It’s easier just to take the three tests. I spoke to the principal and she told me that yes, she wants to hire me. I know I need to wait for my certification application to be processed before I can be officially hired, but it feels nice to be unofficially-officially hired, haha. I’ll be teaching fifth grade for the rest of this year (which I already knew I would be doing, but now hopefully we’ll be able to get the paperwork done in time for me to get at least a little bit of full-time pay as opposed to sub pay) and hopefully next year I’ll be able to start right away with a standard certification (I’m planning on trying to get my tests all done before the start of the next school year).

My students really like stickers…like REALLY like stickers. So I bought a bunch of stickers to use as positive reinforcements…but I couldn’t help but pick a few to keep. 😉 The patronus (spirit animal) one is actually from one of my students. She knows I really like Harry Potter and she noticed my purse had a bunch of patronuses on it. I walked back to my desk to grab something at some point during the day and noticed that she had put the sticker there for me to have. She had a big book of Harry Potter stickers that she had been sharing with everyone. It was nice to be included. 🙂
These two were playing a game called “Come Here and Go Away” (from the show Bluey). Joseph would basically push Abigail and every time she would get close to him, he would pretend to start a conversation with her and then get upset when she swung away from him and would tell her to come back. Conversely, with the go away bit, he would push her and tell her to go away and then pretend to be mad when she swung back towards him. It’s her favorite game, haha.
Seeing them snugglin’ was so cute!
Joseph’s friend, Adam, invited him to go to the rodeo today. They spent the entire afternoon at the carnival and had a blast!

And those are the only pictures I got this week. I told you I was tired, haha.

Hard Stop

This week was definitely an interesting one. Monday started off normally enough. Monday night, a cold front moved in, bringing really cold temperatures. Because freezing rain was in the forecast (we ended up not getting any), they cancelled school for Tuesday and Paul worked from home. Wednesday’s weather was worse (we actually did get freezing rain then) and they ended up cancelling school AGAIN (Paul worked from home AGAIN). Thursday was a bit rough. My students were cranky and tired (I was cranky and tired) and it was a really frustrating day. I came home and vented to Paul about it. He was an amazing listener. After he listened, he quietly, without needing to be asked, worked to lighten my load. When he found a spare moment, he threw a load of laundry in the washer. He made dinner on several nights, and he even brought me flowers and chocolate after school on Friday (which ended up being better than Thursday because on Friday morning I had a heart-to-heart with my students). Oh, and he took the kids back home with him on Friday so I could finish working. I am so blessed to have such an amazing eternal companion. As far as the progress goes to get certified for teaching in Texas, I have everything uploaded to the TEA website, so I’m just waiting to see if any of my California tests will help waive tests that are required in Texas. Fingers crossed that everything will transition smoothly so that I can get hired…so I can get the pay that matches the work I’m doing, haha.

This is the face of someone who wants to be home on her unscheduled day off but realizes she needs something for school the next day (which is ironic because school ended up getting cancelled that next day…but it was still okay because that meant that I didn’t have to be out in it on the day that was worse).
Paul and I made bread in our Dutch oven (we baked it in the oven)! We were mashing a couple of recipes together, so we definitely need to tweak some things for next time (mainly just shortening the time, taking the lid off partway through the baking so the top doesn’t get burned, putting a layer of parchment down to protect the sides, and taking the bread right out of the Dutch oven so the bottom doesn’t burn, haha). It was really tasty, though!
Paul made smoked chicken and potatoes in the smoker, and then we had fresh bread and broccoli. It was a tasty meal!
This was probably the highlight of my Friday. 🙂
I spent a decent chunk of today lesson planning, but saved a fun craft for after dinner. Now I’ll have a sign to hang on my classroom door. 😁