Where are we?

It is so good to be back in the classroom with my kids! They are so fun, encouraging & inspiring. They almost made me forget about the billions of paperwork I had to do these holidays... almost. hmm.

Today I gave them a pre-test to see what they already 'know' about space before we start our unit next week. I love seeing how they see things. Here are some of my favourite responses:

"Mars - in Earth there is a chocolate called Mars Bar."

"The sun gives us heart. Black clouds give us rain. Satilight give us power. The moon shines at night."

"Stars are yellow. Stars are a star shape. Stars can be more than others. They are bright. They float."

"We can live on earth, the moon & other planets. But we would die because there's no air."

"When a cloud goes over the moon it is called a eclips."

And my favourite....
"The sun is probably the hottest place on earth. You wouldent be able to touch or even get close enough to the sun to be even two metres away from it. Cause you would melt, that's how hot it it."

Ok, so I obviously did have some time to play these holidays.

Hello Internet world,
Here I am.
Today was the last day of holidays! It's back to work tomorrow! Eeek! Where did that time go?
So because I haven't blogged in ages, here is a wrap up of the last 2 and a half weeks!

So straight after the last day of school Lou and I headed to Sydney for The Script.

 

They even sang my song (If You See Kay...) AAAAAAAND they even had pretty pink lights! How did they know it was my favourite colour? (yes this is a reeeeeaallly dodgy photo. But just look at the prettiness!)

After the concert it took us over 40 minutes to get out of the carpark. This is my panic-face...how will we survive here on the 5th floor when I've already exhausted our water supply? On the up side we did have a substantial amount of Easter eggs thanks to my cute kidlies!

The next day was off to Steamfest to celebrate my dad's and the foster kid's birthdays. Basically there are alot of steam trains and other train/steam related things. it was pretty fun.
This is me on the Steam train. It took ages to get all of the cinders out of my hair.

My dad was like a little kid in a lolly shop. Oh look a steam tractor!
How perfect was the weather!

A few days later I spent the day with two of my most amazing friends. We went pampering, had a yummy lunch and wandered around the beautiful Japanese Gardens and Art Gallery.

Then it was off to Adelaide!
I stayed not far from this chocolate factory. The tours were full so I got to take myself on a tour. It was really cool seeing the (is it politically incorrect to call them oompa loompas?) at work, making yummy treats... but at the same time I'm am super glad my work doesn't have a viewing platform and hoards of people walking by all day. Oh and there was taste testing too. mmmmm!

Adelaide is really pretty and Autumny.

And they co-ordinate their vespas with their chairs.

I loved these cute arch ways and alleys.

So many vespas. If I lived in Adelaide I would get a vespa.

I sat in this park for ages...

...but then I got distracted by the prettiness and got lost on my way back to the lodge... I walked off the map & even ended up walking in a triangle... dumb sense of direction!

The reason I was in Adelaide was for this wedding. It was sooooo beautiful! The ceremony was in a massive pear orchard. There were tractor rides in the in-between bit and then the reception was in the packing shed.
Ryan had even written a beautiful song to sing to his bride. maw! so beautiful!

It was a great few days in South Australia & I got to catch up with some great friends who I haven't seen in ages!

Back home again and some lovely friends and I went to see some fantastic bands! Shawn McDonald, Article One and New World Son came all the way from the US and Canada. Such a great night!

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Week two was mostly school work...
With a visit to my grandparents, babysitting, two picnics, a movie night and a sleepover thrown in.

Easter started early with the Sunrise service by the lake. I think it's one of my favourite traditions, even though it's early and cold.

Anzac day. It was weird not going to the parade this year. But we did each Anzac biscuits... does that count?

Katrina & I went bowling with Leah, Jase and cute Morgan. Katrina and I even wore matching socks by accident. How cute are we!

Tomorrow is back to work. I've done... not nearly enough work (even though I feel like that's all I've done). But I am looking forward to hanging out with my kidlies again! We have a fun term ahead!

The post that's not really here.

So I'm not meant to be blogging (self-imposed ban, because I have seven million things to do these holidays... and they are all taking way longer than I thought. And even though I want to share about The Script and Steamfest and Adelaide and the wedding and hanging with friends and babies and Shawn McDonald, Article One, New World Son and visiting my Grandma and knitting a zebra and Space, I can't let myself because I need to get my work done. I've even written up a schedule (which (brackets inside brackets inside brackets) I am quickly falling behind on)...blogging shall recommence next Tuesday). So consider this post 'not really here' (said with weird spooky voice and spirit fingers which trick you into not even noticing I am breaking my own blogging ban). I just need to share something and there's no people at my house. Even the cat isn't home...(actually I wonder where that cat is...)

So tonight, as I was eating dinner and watching Parenthood, I was reading through the 'home port' section on facebook (my facebook is in pirate) & I noticed a few friends had commented sympathy type messages on a mutual friend's wall. Of course I checked out the wall and found many many similar "praying for you guys" kind of messages & scrolled down to find a link to a news report that reported that said friend's (ok friend as in ... I haven't really seen this girl in 5 or so years, she used to come to my church and home group and we did some uni stuff together and both got jobs at schools that met up once a year...then she got married, had kid (maybe kids?), became a pastor and moved to tasmania... we're facebook friends, but not tight) husband went missing on a bushwalk on Tuesday. Apparently he was an experienced bushwalker and had all the right equipment, but something went wrong.

While I was reading this, the comments on her facebook wall started to change... no longer were they messages of hope of finding the husband, but they turned into messages of "I'm so sorry to hear..." A spot of googling told me that her husband's body was found this afternoon.My heart broke. I have never met this man and as I said, I'm not particularly close to the wife. But as I contemplated how her life has changed since Tuesday morning when she said "see you tonight" to her husband as he set off on another hike, I cried. Life is so fragile! I bet that earlier this week her concerns were based around Easter church services... now, aged 31 she is a widow. The man she thought she would grow old with is no longer here.

I know this is not the end of her story, God's plan for her life is not finished. I know her husband is celebrating Easter with Jesus.
There is hope.
But it is still horrible...

The other thing that really struck me about this is how quickly the world knew about his death. Instantly her 512 facebook friends can share in her grief. There is no time for her to mourn with those closest to her, everyone knows. Technology has changed things so much. Condolences are not shared privately, but written publicly for all to see. I don't know what I think about that... it's so cool that the community can gather round someone like that so quickly, but at the same time... where is her time to process it for herself? (not that she is necessarily on facebook right now...maybe i'm overthinking this...I just know that I've be burned once before by premature facebooking...)

Anyway that's my thinking this evening, thank you for letting me share with you... not that I did... you didn't see anything. I'll be back on Tuesday, hopefully.

Now to get back to writing my text types unit.

Holidays!

Term 1 has come to an end! This term has been crazy busy! It's good to have a break... but before you tell me how good teachers have it to get 12 weeks of 'holidays' a year let me tell you what I need to get done these holidays: program term 2's Maths, HSIE, Science, Text Types, Shared Reading, Handwriting, PDH, PE & Creative Arts units (at least 3 days worth of work); edit & publish our school's new phonics dvd (at the rate it has been going tonight this may take the next 17 weeks...grrr so many crashes); finish registering and evaluating term one's programs (about a day's work); catch up on last term's marking, read the expected Professional Development readings (1 day); find resources for next term's units (at least a day) & whatever fun things my boss emails us in preparation for inspection. eeek! Two weeks is not long enough! haha

Don't worry there will be plenty of fun had! So many friends to catch up with! I'm heading to Adelaide later in the week! And I have already seen The Script (they even sang my song! With pink lights! It was lovely!) on Friday night. And we took our dad to Steamfest (think steam trains, steam tractors, model exhibitions etc) on Saturday. Anyway, I need to get back to fighting with Adobe Premiere... I will put up photos a different day. Happy Holidays!

But why?

Today was Mission Day at school. It was such a fun day! Mission Day is basically a day where kids rotate around classrooms and learn about different countries & the needs that exist there (you can find out more on my class' blog tomorrow... some of my Year 3 girls are half way through writing a persuasion to convince you that Mission Day is the best day... You should probably read it). The kids all come dressed up in clothes from another country. Most of my Year 3 girls came as Hawaiians & my Year 4 boys came as 'American Gangsters' haha! Next door five Year 4 boys came as Ned Kelly... um kinda missed the point (he was an Australian Bushranger...) . Obviously a bit of costuming peer pressure happening in Year 3 & 4.


In my classroom we did Japan... so I got to wear a kimono and thongs to school today! I had 4 different classes come and visit my country. I told them some general facts, we prayed for the country, we learnt some basic greetings (I still remembered some from my 7 years of Japanese at school), we did some dancing to this catchy song (random youtube find)

we played Jankenpon (scissors, paper, rock) & made origami dragon heads...



One of my favourite moments of the day was when I was making the dragon heads with Year 4. I was showing them how to fold the paper with the colour on the inside & one boy called out "but why!?"
I loved that question & the way he asked it!
He couldn't see the bigger picture. He wasn't doubting that I knew what I was doing, but he couldn't see how folding all the colour inside was going to work out in the end. While the rest of the class followed the direction without batting an eyelid it made him slightly uncomfortable. Was this really going to make the toy I had promised they would have in the end?

It was such a cool reminder to me - so often I ask God that same question "but why!?" I'm sure God laughs, he knows the big picture.  That life doesn't always have to make sense, there are uncomfortable & weird bits. But he sees the end of the story too! He knows that the colour needs to start on the inside.

I love that I learn from my kids.

My other 2 favourite moments of the day:
- A kindy girl dressed in a Hawaiian skirt and lei told everyone she was from Turkey... when another teacher told her she was dressed in Hawaiian clothes she said "well I'm a bird and I can sleep over in Turkey if I want to" Um... I love kindy logic.
- When I had Year 2 today and we played a game where I would call out a number in Japanese & they had to get themselves into groups of that number (this worked real well with the other 3 classes I had), the kids didn't like seeing anyone left out so each time they would beg me "but can't we just have a group of six (or three, or five)! It's not fair that she doesn't have a group!" so cute.

Nothing Ventured...

There's a few things up in the air for me at the moment.
Big adventurous things.
Trying not to get excited ahead of myself...
Eeek!
I'll fill you in when/if I know more.


In other news:
- Tonight I survived 12 parent/teacher interviews tonight. One parent came with a whole sheet of questions and concerns, our 10 minute session lasted around half an hour.
- There are only 3 days left of term 1.
- Tomorrow is Mission Day. We all get dressed up as people from different countries & travel around the world (aka the classrooms)learning about the countries, the culture, the needs etc (all in 50 minutes!). We're also having a cake stall to raise money for our sister school in the Philippines... we have developed the motto "More than 5, you won't survive" after last year's overindulgence. haha
- Next week I'm going to Adelaide. fun times!

The Flatmate with the Aversion to Doors

Last night I got home after dark and went to open my front door but my key wouldn't fit in. It was dark, so I fumbled around a bit and realised the keyhole was full... with the tip of my flatmate's key. hmm. She hasn't come home yet, so I haven's had the chance to ask her how she managed to leave half of her key behind. hhaha I am looking forward to that conversation.

The thing is, though, in the 5 weeks she has lived here this is not her first door incident. In this short space of time she has managed to lock herself out... 3 times, lock the bathroom from the outside twice (I am still not sure how she does this) and left the front-door wide open for a whole afternoon.

Despite her aversion to doors she is a great flatmate, who loves to clean for fun (this does not make sense in my head). But just to be on the safe-side I got three new keys cut today :)

Those Moments

Today I feel so not sick! Oh it's such a good feeling! Haha, I was only sick for 2 days, but I felt ridiculously horrible. I don't ever want to be properly sick, I'm so grateful for good immunity.

School was fun today. My kids presented their projects on Japan. I was actually quite impressed with what most of them came up with... of course there was one boy who seemed completely oblivious to the fact that we have been working on projects for the last 3 weeks & a few who if I typed their speech into google I'm sure I would find it... hmm more teaching on research skills next term it seems. But I was so impressed with the creativity in their presentations, one boy even dressed up as a professer with a blue wig, he was such a crack up. At the end of the day he came and told me (still in character) that my children had done some great research and he had learnt a lot by listening to their presentations. oh they are fun kids!

This afternoon two beautiful friends and I had a coffee catch up after school. Great food, crazy conversations and a lovely way to end the week!
Then we sat by the lake and Lou played some of the new songs she's been writing. Oh she's so talented. Sweet, soul-sharing music on the jetty by the lake as the sun sets... it was one of those moments that made my heart so full. I seriously live in one of the most beautiful places & have such amazing friends. Oh I sometimes wish I had more adjectives...hmm maybe some pictures instead?