Wedding Blog!

If you're still reading this blog, you deserve a medal. I've been horrible at keeping up with my blogging here... Instead, I've been blogging on a word document when I have downtime during teaching. I'll be sure to copy and paste some of those entries here eventually. As it turns out, Blogger isn't blocked at the school where I'm interning right now! YAY! But, I'm not sure blog entries are looked fondly upon by the tech department. BOO. Oh well...

Anyway, I've been working on a wedding blog! This is exciting to me for two reasons: a) I can have an audience (no matter now small) to listen to me talk about wedding stuff, and b) I'm desperately trying to be a blogger for Weddingbee and having my own wedding blog is the first step!

So, check out what I've been working on. To keep with the same style as this blog, I've named it Married in the Middle of Nowhere (there's a link on the top of the right column).  I've got the first few posts ready, but they won't be published until sometime next week. Let me know what you think! I love talking wedding :)

I'm on BREAK!

Well, it's been a whirlwind month (ok - 23 days - but who's counting?), but I've got SO MUCH accomplished! Our Big Day will be on:

Dress? Check! (Day 6)
Reception Venue? Check! (Day 13)
Caterer? Check! (Day 13)
Photographer? Check! (Day 16)
Bridesmaid Dresses? Pretty much decided on... about Day 2

Now that I'm on break from school and my other school I've got much more time on my hands! I plan on sharing allll of my fun finds and ideas and inspirations with you! But first, I have to warn Josh that he's not allowed to read my blog anymore for fear that he may stumble upon pictures of my dress (which I will be posting in the near future).

Side Note: I'm thinking about switching over to Wordpress... any advice/comments/preferences? I've heard that it's a lot more user friendly, and I've got a little html coding knowledge tucked away, so I'm thinking it might be more my style. Plus, I'm anticipating uploading a lot of pictures soon, and I've heard their photo uploading software is SO much better than Blogger... Let me know what you think!

 7 Months and 30 days to go! (EEEK!)

A new look for my blog... and my hand :)

 Please excuse my looks... I had been crying happy tears :)

I'm planning on changing over to a more wedding-centric blog, and I'm planning on posting MUCH MUCH more (I know I've said it before, but I have so much to post about now!). 

What a perfect Thanksgiving weekend, reminding me of everything I have to be thankful for!

Rock Stars

My mentor teacher's classroom revolves around the idea of "Rocking Out." Her rules are all about rock shows and how it applies to the classroom, and she has a Rock Star Wall of Fame which is littered with awesome things our students have done. I'd like to incorporate this into my blog in some way... and I'm drawing some inspiration from a teacher-friend who did something similar last year. She would blog daily about good things that happened to her throughout the school day. I love this idea as a way to reflect and also to share some of the amazing things my students are doing! (Now, I doubt this will happen daily, but hopefully I can post more frequently about the good things that are happening in my classroom!)


Star 1: Friday, I taught my first original lesson from start to finish and it went well. Seriously, I was on an adrenaline high when I got done. With the exception of one kid who nodded off a few times, those kids were engaged with my lesson and participated more than I expected. I even got participation out of students I didn't expect! What an awesome feeling...

Star 2: Friday, one of my students came up with a sweet idea for a writing project, and she was genuinely excited about it. I loved seeing her so inspired to write!
Star 3: One of my Emotionally Impaired students opened up to me Friday. Not only was she participating like crazy during my lesson, she also came up to me after class and told me about her exciting weekend plans. She's never spoken to me before, other than to grumble a greeting to me at the door, so this was a big step!





What was your Rock Star Moment of the Day?

And it begins...

I'm finishing up my 3rd week at my Teacher Assisting placement. Woah! How did that happen? Time flies.... and my blog suffers, unfortunately.


Can I just talk for 3 seconds about how much I freaking love school right now? Seriously. It's completely wearing me out (I'm recovering from a nasty cold; damn kids and their germs), I've got no free time, I wake up at 5 am, but I'm not being one drop sarcastic when I say that I love it. I absolutely adore what I'm doing and I've got no doubts that I made the right decision about leaving that horrid, horrid world of banking. (Sorry... I just threw up in my mouth a little at the thought of going back. ughhhhh scary!) Did you hear the part about getting up at 5am? Yeah. I never would have done that for my other job. I would have slept in as late as I could and rolled into work looking like hell with a scowl on my face. Now, I'm up, eating decent breakfasts, straightening my hair, and picking out cute clothes. It's happiness. It's changing my life. Looooove it.
So, what's so fab about it? Well, let me explain:

• Even though some of them are downright asshole-ish, most of my students are great kids. They're funny, motivated, honest (which can be humbling at times), and so far, they've been really nice to me. Let's hope I'm singing the same tune after I present my very first original lesson plan tomorrow. (It's about sentence combining using conjunctions and punctuation. Don't act like you're not jealous that you can't experience it... It's going to be mind-blowing. Ok, yeah that might be a little sarcasm creeping in there..)
• The staff at my school is freaking hilarious. Never have I ever heard so many F-Bombs dropped at lunchtime, during some of the most inappropriate conversations a teacher's lounge has ever seen. And I had some pretty intense lunchtimes at the bank... The other teachers have been so welcoming and friendly. They're such fun people!
• I absolutely love when kids ask me if they can go to the bathroom, go to their locker, etc, because they realize that I have the same authority in the class as the teacher. It's kind of a power trip... haha kidding. kind of. 
• Tomorrow is homecoming, and I'm chaperoning the dance. I'm helping out with advising Student Council this year and it's been so much fun so far. For Spirit Week, they did a limbo contest at lunch Wednesday. I was in charge of recruiting people to come out to the lobby and participate. And guess what? There were a TON of kids there, either participating or watching. More kids than they had the previous day, and more than they had today. I'd like to think it was because I personally went to each table and called students out by name and told them they needed to participate. I could be totally off, but this is my blog so we're going to go with that...

So, even though I'm bogged down with homework and no longer have time for my precious little bloggy, I'm a very happy teacher... Hopefully I'll have more time to share about what the coming year brings, but don't hold your breath!!

Goin' to the Chapel... But first, we party!

Note: I thought I published this last week, but apparently it just saved. Bummer... Anyways, the wedding was Saturday and it was beautiful! I'll share pictures of that later. For now, enjoy bachelorette party pics!

My bestest friend Erin is getting married tomorrow! We've known each other since we were three years old. Last month, we had a bachelorette party at Station Square in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, complete with vodka, a limo, and a mechanical bull. What more could a bunch of girls ask for!?

The beautiful bride before the partay started!

Jenna and I, two of the bridesmaids!

Me with the Matron Maid of Honor (this amazing chef) and another bridesmaid. (we were a few drinks in. no judgment)

The bride riding the mechanical bull! She was pretty good, too : )

Stage dancing at Barroom! Tons of fun, and only one fall-off (no, it wasn't me!)

Late night/Early morning lounging on the patio at the last stop. They had a grill on the patio where you can get a meal at the end of the night. Amazing idea!

This was SUCH a fun time and I'm super excited for the wedding this weekend!!

Sidewalk Sales!

While Josh and I were in Holland, there were sidewalk sales going on! Downtown Holland has some amazing little stores, so I was thrilled at the opportunity to buy stuff on sale : )

The first place we went was the Peanut Store, which was a delicious place to start! It has bins of candy throughout the entire store, along with salt-water taffy, roasted nuts, and homemade fudge! We picked up a pound of taffy for Josh's parents because they watched Diesel for us : )

Our next stop was for dinner, and we chose to eat at Butch's. They had an amazing wine selection (one of my favorites from Traverse City!!) and delicious food! Of course, I forgot to take pictures...

We tasted more than just wines while we were in Holland. We also tasted balsamic vinegar and olive oil! Fustini's is a store that doubles as a tasting room for their oils and vinegar. I never knew that there were so many flavors so it was a lot of fun trying and tasting everything... that is, it was a bunch of fun until Josh spilled some vinegar all over the floor! It was pretty funny... but we left quickly after that.

This is just a SMALL sample of all of the amazing stores around Holland. I'm thinking this would be the perfect place to buy Christmas presents ; )