Long Lost Blogger

I'm back. I can't say how much I'll be here, but I'll try to be around more often. I miss this.

There are many reasons why I haven't updated this ole' blog: I took a two week vacation from life, I got out of the regular routine, I have overloaded my teacher plate, I have overloaded my church calling plate, I have overloaded my intake of MASH, I have been having too much fun...pick the one you think fits best.

I have to share a little gem. There is a certain student who constantly tests my ability to demonstrate 'tough love.' This student, I'll call her Harriett, has been enabled her entire life, but I refuse to continue in this pattern, it's only hurting her. Because she has been enabled she has also become extremely manipulative and often tries to argue with me about assignments. It has been an interesting ride so far. Well, yesterday we were having one of our classic arguments and this Harriett's friend was an innocent bystander. After a couple of minutes her friend began to agree with me, and started telling Harriett to give in. Harriett, 'enabled one', got frustrated and walked out of the office-this is how our encounters usually end.

I have great hearing, and could later hear Harriett and her friend talking in a nearby cubicle. The friend was still trying to help Harriett get over herself and just do her homework. They were discussing me and my ways when Harriett's friend said, "I like Miss Bushman, she makes me want to work harder."

I don't share this to toot my own horn, I share it because I was drowning in all of the 'extra' stuff that comes along with teaching, and this helped me resurface and begin swimming again. It made me remember why I wanted to become a teacher.

Holiday stories and pictures to come...

Winter Wonderland?

Last week I got a sun burn and this week I'm getting wind burn. It finally decided to be winter here in Carson City. Everyone was excited about the 'snow' that fell on Saturday morning. I wasn't aware that it had snowed, it just looked like frost to me. It has been 'snowing' a little every day, the grass was even covered yesterday! I'm glad that there is finally some white stuff on the ground to justify how cold it gets here at night.

Last night I was on my way to the church for Family Home Evening when I had to park my car and walk the last hill up to the church. I was behind this guy in a VW van from the eighties and he had this guy who was in a wheel chair in his van-kind of important to make it up the hill. I think I could have made it if it weren't for his van sliding all over the place. The city didn't really plow any of the streets, but instead went around and laid down sand and salt. I miss my subaru Reggie. I don't feel quite as invincible without her this winter.

I am excited however, to go to Utah on Friday and bask in a little of the real winter there!

Thanksgiving Success, and other Updates

Thanks to my Aunt Connie for a wonderful Thanksgiving away from home. It felt completely natural because I was with family.

Aunt Connie and I got to make a Lemon Meringue Pie. Honestly, the Sweet Potato Pie (a tribute to my brother Bryce) was much easier, but it was fun to learn a new skill. It took me a couple of tries to get the crust right. We had a good time. I got to see the Twilight movie with my Aunt Suzette and cousins Alyssa, Melanie and Randee. That was fun. Half had read the book and the other half hadn't. I started enjoying the film about ten minutes into it when I decided that I had to take it at face value and stop comparing it to the books.

A couple of friends and I got to attend a D-League NBA basketball game. Reno just got the Bighorns. It was held in a high school sized gym, and didn't really have much of an NBA feel to it, but we had a good time.

The week following Thanksgiving I turned 28. I know, I'm getting up there. Thanks for all of the warm birthday wishes. Thanks mom for the fun package. It was funny, a couple of my students knew it was my birthday and they made me a cute card. I had a hard time not laughing when one of my students seriously offered to pay for a stripper to help me celebrate!

Life at school has been busy. I attended a field trip with the Digital Photography class on Monday, and I've been behind ever since. We went to Tahoe and took some pics. Here are some of my favorites.

Another activity taking up my time is the talent show that Mr. Papke and I are putting on two weeks after we get back from break. Because of the nature of our school, we are going to record the auditions for those students who are not comfortable standing in front of large audiences. I'm excited to see who turns up for the auditions because many of my students are extremely talented in a variety of areas.

Picture Day is HERE!!!

A few years ago my adorable nieces found out that my dad has had his picture taken for school ever since he began working as a school teacher. They each took one of his pictures and put them in various places throughout their house. My siblings soon followed suit, and now I believe that everyone has or has had a school picture of my dad on their fridge. (We usually take the ones that are a bit older, when he wasn't as grey.)

Today I got my first round of school pictures. I didn't really know that our school did individual teacher pictures, I thought I only had to get my picture taken for the yearbook. I had a good chuckle when I got to school today and there were a bunch of my little smiles staring up at me from my desk. While raising her figurative glass of grape juice, Kelsey says, "Here's to the first of many school pictures."

Sweet Irony

One time for Thanksgiving my family went up to our cabin and spent the holiday with my dad's brother Jeff and his family. We were not used to spending a Thanksgiving dinner away from my maternal grandmother's house, we always spent every Thanksgiving there. We always knew exactly what to expect because we had been going there forever; the adults sat in the formal dining room and the kids sat at their own 'kid table' in the kitchen. We were all okay with sitting at the kid table because it was tons of fun. My aunts all seemed to have a specialty dish for Thanksgiving and they would usually bring the same thing every year.

This year at the cabin was different. There was no kids table, and there was no set tradition to follow. My mom and my Aunt Heidi had both brought their 'half' of the feast. Aunt Heidi brought something that none of my siblings or I had ever even heard of; candied yams. About mid-way through the meal Heidi noticed that none of us took any of the yams, so she picked them up, walked around the room and plopped some on to each of our plates. Being defiant kids, I don't think that any of us even touched those yams, they all ended up in the trash. Heidi noticed this detail and was disappointed because she said that this was 'grandma's candied yam recipe'.

Ever since that day I have never had to deal with any form candied yams, until last night. For Enrichment last night one of my couselor's wanted to have a gratitude dinner. We all thought it was a great idea. She organized the dinner nicely by writing down all of the items she usually had for Thanksgiving and then assigning each sister to bring a certain dish. I bet you can guess what I was assigned to bring. I got home from school and made this huge dish of candied yams (it actually looked almost identical to the picture above, that's even what my counter top looks like). I felt bad because I had no idea exactly what they were supposed to taste like. Lucky for me my mom and sister provided me with a great recipe that turned out just fine. I tried candied yams last night for the first time. Sorry I didn't eat them sooner Heidi, they're not half bad.

Next week's culinary challenge: my Aunt Connie wants me to make a sweet potato pie and a lemon meringue pie. Sounds like a good challenge right? At least I've had both of these pies before!

Mental Note

Being the environmental enthusiast that I am, in life I attempt to follow the addage to 'reduce, reuse and recycle'. I am no nut, just an enthusiast, so I simply try to make my environmental footprint as small as possible. Some of the things I try to do are as simple as separating and recycling my trash, buying in bulk, conserving energy by keeping my thermostat low (this also helps conserve my money), turn off lights when I leave a room, walk or bike as often as possible, use non-aerosol products, etc.

Having accumulated many of these 'habits' over the years, I mostly do them without ever thinking. The other day I was using the restroom at work and the CFO came in as I was washing my hands. She is a woman in her mid-fifties who is fairly quiet and conservative. We said hello to one another and then I went to a meeting. Just a minute or so before the meeting started this woman came up to me with a huge smile on her face. She asked me if I knew what I had just done. Not knowing what she was referring to, I said that I didn't know what I had just done. She then proceeded to tell me that when I left the bathroom I turned off the light. She screamed my name but I didn't hear her. She had to sit there and repeat to herself that she could do this, she could do this.

Lucky for me that she was smiling when I reacted to this story. I just laughed and laughed. I also apologized, but I laughed a lot too. She also thought it was funny; I'm glad she has a good sense of humor.

Don't worry, this will not deter me from being the environmental enthusiast that I am. I will still turn off lights when I leave a room, I'll just have to be more mindful of who else is in the room.

Feelin' It

I may be a little biased, but the neighborhood where I grew up was the best! At least once a week all of the kids would get together and play some sport. Usually we played soccer, but we also played basketball, football, baseball and volleyball. Sometimes we even got together more than once a week. I loved growing up in this neighborhood because we were such a tight-knit group.

I didn't realize what a great thing I had until I moved away and found out that not everyone did that when they were growing up. Fortunately, I have been able to 'convert' people to get together and play sports wherever I have lived. Carson City is no exception.

Yesterday we rounded up a bunch of people from the branch and played soccer for three hours! I was in heaven! (Today I'm in a different place because of things I pulled and muscles I haven't used in a while.) It was such a blast that we plan on doing it again soon-as long as the weather holds.