so in the meantime, i’ve been itching to post… they’ve almost been spilling out of me cuz i haven’t been able to post it here. 

instead, i’ve started a new anonymous blog. 

if you would like the link, please email me.  or comment here.  but usually, emailing me is much better. 

cya around!!

i’m actually toying with the idea of deleting this blog.  or moving it to another site.  basically, making it unavailable to the general public.  i haven’t figured out yet how to make it a ‘members only’ blog and i think it might be because i don’t have the most current version of the software, plus it’s been 2 or 3 years since i’ve done anything with the backend of this website! 

at any rate, now that i have a little bit more time on my hands (because the volleyball season ended), i’m going to start trying to figuring it all out again!  which means that as i tinker around in backend, i might accidentally break the code while i try to make a log-in necessary to read it.  or i might end up being successful and figuring out how to move my entire site somewhere else.

at any rate, if you want to be told when this site finally moves, please leave a comment on this post or email me.  if anything, just to let me know you’ve been reading my blog.  i’d love to know who my visitors were!

thanks for visiting!

“what are you thankful for this Thanksgiving break?”

even though it’s not math related, i like to give questions like this because it helps me get to know the students as individuals, it gives me a chance to talk about what’s important in life, and i also get to see their writing ability.  i was really touched today reading some of the students’ answers.

here’s a sample of some of their answers:

• a lot of the students are thankful for their family!
• "For being able to wake up in the morning to go to school and get a good education for my future
• "I’m thankful for my dad coming back from prison because I haven’t seen him for about 4-5 years.  I’m thankful for my dad getting a coaching job.
• "I am thankful for having everything that I have for example a house to live in, food to keep us alive"
• "I am thankful that I have a job and that I will be working during break next week.  With the economic struggle I am very fortunate to have a job."
• "I give thanks because my dad gave up alcohol."

hearing about the students reminds me that being a teacher is more than teaching them math…

i don’t normally watch a lot of movies, but i think when you start watching multiple movies in such a short time period you can’t help but compare and contrast the themes… hahah, do i sound like a nerd yet? at any rate, if i wanted to simplify things, i could say that the films we watched all dealt with one subject matter - purpose in life. 

in family inc, we watched as an american-raised daughter left her dream in the states to apprentice under her dad in china, thereby fulfilling her dad’s dream.  i think it was particular poignant for me to see the daughter of a chinese businessman return to work for a man that she only saw twice a year while he thought he was doing the best for his family - my dad always talks about how he has trouble knowing how to treat his children because his dad was always absent as well.  although i’m 2 generations away from it i could see similarities in the relationships.  of course, this movie also displayed the chinese guilt that is laid down for the children to do their duty to the family - not that big an issue in my life but i can see it affecting my friends…

assembly is a chinese war movie that was a bit intense in it’s warfield depictions, but as it followed one man’s journey beyond the war, he was unwavering in his goal to celebrate the unsung heroes who had fought beside him.

at first i didn’t want to see accuracy of death because i hate things that deal with the supernatural, but in the end this one touched me the most.  the movie uses the grim reaper as a literary tool to discuss if a person’s life has been fulfilled before they can die - and we watch as the grim reaper makes several visits to determine if a person’s life has been fulfilled.  as he suspends the death sentence on someone, he gives her another chance at life, and at the end of the story, we are shown what she has made of her life.  it was bittersweet (as life usually is) to see the parts of her life that changed and to see the one thing that was constant throughout her life.

chocolate is a martial arts film starring a 14 year old!  this was done by the makers of “ong bak”, and so it was extremely neat to watch the young actors make a film like this, knowing that it wasn’t special effects or camera tricks, but all real choreography!  in the movie, she plays an autistic child who uses her gift at martial arts to collect money from her mother’s debtors to pay for her medical expenses.

it was a weekend of sitting (and subtitles!) but i enjoyed being there - and i got a free toyota matrix t-shirt!  it was also fun wearing a festival pass and getting into any movie we wanted, and the gala was nice too.  i found myself standing next to john cho a couple of times, y’know, harold, from harold and kumar =) i know there were more people there too but i don’t know their names and i didn’t take pictures with them… but they were there!

thanks to mr man for bringing me to the sdaff!

i mean, i suppose i can partly blame it on my computer being on but really i’ve run outta mail to read and blogs to catch up on and the like, and i’m just here, lying down, not sleeping, and not really doing anything either!  or maybe it’s just my body rebelling against me… i have not been in top form lately and i’ve been forgetting things - important work things! - and maybe this is part of the same problem.  i have to admit i’ve been feeling a little off lately and i think maybe my mind is trying to figure it all out but currently i don’t even know what i’m thinking about i just know that i’m writing these horrible long run-on sentences instead of sleeping!

i desperately need sleep…

and how do you stop feeling off?  how does one get back into sync?

lake shasta was rather pretty, although the water levels were dropping extremely low, and i enjoyed being out there.  it was neat seeing markers from old bridges that had been covered up when they first put up the dam on the sacramento river.  i also enjoyed the church service we put on for ourselves cuz i haven’t led out in church in a while - and they put the two of us in charge of song service - with my hoarse voice and all!

here i am enjoying wakeboarding after our impromptu house church. 

and then later in the day, i tried again cuz i wanted to learn to jump.  actually, i got a few jumps in the morning but nothing was caught on camera.  later that afternoon i decided to give it a try again and adam took this photo as proof that i actually did jump =)

we had fishing poles hanging off the side of the houseboat all day long and when we came back in the afternoon, grace’s dora the explorer fishing pole had been pulled over the side by some fish… they set it up again and later on that night, another fish took the bait and my man reeled in this huge fish on this tiny fishing pole.  the fish was almost as big as grace herself!  i can’t believe that plastic pole held up!  can you see how huge that fish was?

kurt kept on creating these fantastic gourmet meals all weekend long as well, but i was too busy eating the yummy-ness to take any pictures.  but all in all it was a great trip!  good people, good food, good times =)

the total came up to 161 cookies!  that’s a lot of cookies…

and thank you to The Man for helping me bake them!

if you’ve noticed, all of my birthdays for the past 7 years have been spanish-themed.  this year was no exception, and my friends threw me a quinceanera last night!

for those of you who don’t know, a quinceanera is a latin american “debut” for a 15-year-old.  traditionally, the birthday celebrant wears a white dress, similar to a wedding, and she has an entourage too!  the quinceanera celebrant would be escorted by her ‘chambalan’.  i came dressed in a traditional white dress, and several of my friends wore similar dresses in a variety of colors.  the men got dressed up and there were a ton of sombreros all over the place.  the special guest of honor (other than the quinceanera herself, of course!) was “macho libre” as my chambalan.  and kat, susan, rita, and i did a special dance with our special guest star marlene!  we just had so much fun planning this thing all month long - the goofier, the better =) we totally hammed it up!  you can see in these pictures we took last night:

here’s me in my traditional white dress with rita

and all the ladies dressed up - thank you mom for getting our outfits!

and gavin was so cute dressed up as a mexican hombre

and all the guys got in character too!  check out everyone who came dressed up =)

my chambalan was “macho libre”!

thank you so much marlene for hosting this barbecue/quinceanera at your house!  i had so much fun! 

thank you to everyone who came too!  this was definitely a quinceanera to remember =)

basically, i’m trying to start the year off on the right foot. 

i’m also sitting here reading harry wong’s “the first days of school” trying to get in the right mindset because “there is overwhelming evidence that the first two or three weeks of school are critical in determining how well the students will achieve for the remainder of the year”, and the tone is set during the first 2-3 days of school.

i want to have a good year and i’m doing what i can to be an effective teacher.  here comes the school year!  pray for me!

but the real fun began after church as we drove up to big bear mountains looking for glenn and the rest of the rock climbing group.  FarmBoy drove all over the fire roads looking for the 3n07 road off the 3n16 and we spent more than an hour enjoying the scenery of the back roads.  we never did find them on the mountain, but we did get to meet up with them while they ate dinner in town.  every one of the campgrounds was full and you could see a lot of cars parked on the perimeter of the campgrounds, but instead of joining them, we ended up sleeping on the ‘bridge’ over big bear lake.  yup, that’s right, we just camped out in the bed of the truck on the bridge, surrounded by the lake on both sides!  it was almost a full moon… i thought it was so neat to see the sunrise too, but i guess i’m just a citygirl who hasn’t seen too many sunrises!  FarmBoy couldn’t believe i woke him up to watch a sunrise!

but c’mon… this sunrise was sooooo beautiful!

see the lake on the side of the truck?  there were people fishing there all night....

on sunday morning, we met up with the group again to follow them to the rock climbing site.  we had fun doing that too, but we had to cut our time short to make it to laguna beach cuz we had tickets to the pageant of the masters!  if you’ve never seen ‘living art’ then you’re missing out… it’s so neat to see them make a scene and make it look like a painting using real people!

it was a great weekend - we got to spend time with friends, with family, go to church, enjoy the outdoors, do some activity, and enjoy the arts!  i am so enjoying my time with FarmBoy =)