Students and thoughts on life

Huh, I just realized that the purpose of this blog WAS to document our new family and the various things which happened. It has slowly transformed to become my rambling thoughts and complaints on life. Oh well, you are the one reading it so I don't know which one of us to feel more sorry for.

I am substitute teaching today. It is so funny to watch the antics of the students. Sometimes I wish that I had my own classroom and could teach the students. This is my current conundrum. I have been applying for jobs, but honestly I am not so sure that I want one. Sure, I have worked for eight years towards this ultimate goal, but there is so much hesitation. I would prefer to teach History, as this is my strongest area. The problem I have run across however, is that I was not prepared by my university to get a job as a history teacher. They never told me that there is another type of endorsement for History teachers, it is known as a Social Studies Composite. In this endorsement a teacher is allowed to teach multiple subjects; for example: History, World History (the two I am authorized to teach), Sociology, Psychology, Geography, Government, etc... It is the Social Studies Composite that all districts are hiring for, as they make the teacher much more marketable and movable. This means that I will most likely not receive a position as a history teacher, something which I kind of expected.

This is why I prepared myself to teach English. I will graduate next week with an endorsement in both History and English. I have currently applied for over a dozen teaching positions, and have only been contacted or interviewed for one. In all honesty, I'm scared. I do not feel prepared to teach English. The state core is SO VAGUE! I have complete freedom as long as the students learn the concepts. I guess this is a plus, but I am used to teaching History and the methodology that follows it.

Take all of these factors in account in the confusion of deciding my future as well as that of my family and I am in a conundrum. IF I am able to find a teaching job I can make a lot more money (I know thats an oxymoron), saving it for the future purchase of a house. The problem is I feel like I am moving forward or on and leaving my husband behind. He is younger than I, and just beginning his collegiate education. He has not learned all of the lessons of focus or determination to finish. To him it seems as if this is all a game. He is in no rush, he is still young. He has so many desires to learn. He loves learning and wants to vary the subjects he studies. The problem is this costs a lot of money and pushes graduation further and further away. This causes all manner of issues (mainly with me, as he is content to continue truck'n along) as I struggle in limbo, without a focus driving daily life.

How is it with you reader? Am I normal in the fact that I tend to have a driving force, be it education or work, which rules my days and most of my thoughts? I would say that now I am finished with school the next obvious step is to start our family, but I do not feel that would be fair for our future children. I want to be able to care for them in a responsible manner.

New Recipies

Just for fun I decided to try something new. I started using a website my husband and the guys he works with use. Its called Allrecipes.com. You can go and find recipes. Imagine that! The other day I decided I was going to make banana bread. You know what terrible feeling when you have to many bananas and they are going bad?! Well here is a little trick. Freeze'm. If you freeze them you can thaw them when you get enough and make bread.

Without remembering to look at my recipe book I looked up a recipe on Allrecipes.com for banana bread. I was very suprised was not just bread but when I found a recipe for Banana Nut Oatmeal Bread. Cool huh. I tried it and it is REALLY REALLY good!!!!! And SO easy to make. I'd better be careful or I might have another 'commandment' on my hands. Ya see, the first time I made bread, I made a recipe that my husband's mom uses. It is this weird wheat germ corn meal thing and it is absolutely divine! Well I tried to make bread for the first time in my life and David promptly told me that it was a commandment.

You see, every time we run out of bread I am to make more. I followed said rule for about two months, and then fell off the band wagon. Maybe it is time to get back on. See I love cooking. I come from a long line of really really good cookers. Yes, cookers is a real word. In this however, I have rarely been able to perform the actual cooking. I have observed and 'helped' many many times and feel like I know how to do it, but when it comes right down to it I get worried that I will mess things up.

So far I have not totally destroyed the things which I cook, although have had a few 'mishaps.' Such as the time that I tried to make spaghetti, forgot about the sauce and ended up making a reduction (that was a first!!!) imagine my surprise when I learned that reductions also condense the amount of water, thereby making the amount of salt in said item very prominent. The next mistake happened with my first foreign food adventure. David tried some, emphasis on SOME and commented that they are much too salty. Oh well, more for me! My meringue cake....well he tried it, and everyone else said they liked it, but no one finished it.

After all of these mistakes I was scared to try again, but apparently my Paella is great. He even ate the leftovers! This is a first!!!! He never eats leftovers. So here we go again. I make banana nut bread (with my secret ingredient) and time will only tell what the reaction will be.

Exhaustion

To see an apropriate cartoon for how I feel click HERE

Okay, I can do this! Been at work since oh....6:30 this morning, and I should get home around 9 or 10 tonight + that to not going to bed at a decent hour and I am totally completely ready to crash. BUT OH WAIT you say...yes that's right, homework is calling my name. So here I am on my break, my small amount of sanity for the day laying my homework out on the desk in front of me. As I open the browser I turn into auto-pilot. First things first, I must have background noise, some might call it white noise. So what shall it be? Pandora? A movie? Oh wait! That's right, there is a brand new oh so waited for Glee episode waiting for me. I can hear it now, calling my name. I log onto the site and wait on the edge of my seat for it to begin playing. As I do this, of course, as usual my concentration is shot. So here I sit twenty minutes later with no homework done. Oh, I did look at the sheet and even pulled up the site, I even typed up the header for my papers.

This seems to be an eternal loop. "It's okay," I tell myself. "Sixteen days!" That's right, I only have sixteen days until my life ends as I know it. Then its official. I will be a grown up. I graduate in sixteen days (not that I'm counting of course). Ever seen that episode of Gilmore Girls where Rory graduates and realizes that she doesn't know what to do next in her life? Well that is exactly how I feel. For now I have a job, one that allows me to see my husband most of the day. I can walk there and I'm friends with most of my coworkers. The only problem is that it is not a full time job. We need insurance, we need a cushion fund. One of these days we will have a family (two years..not that I'm counting on that front either...okay I admit it I am an obsessive counter. Odd as I failed math) and a house (hopefully sooner than later). As it is right now I am working at the college, substitute teaching, and cleaning a business building at night. As stated above life is exhausting. Hopefully in....oh say....seventeen or so days that will all change....or will it?

Easter Morn

Well this was our first. Our first Easter married (not as a couple-that would have been a year ago. One year ago when he so sweetly asked me how I would feel if a certain incident which occur ed in a freezer, were to happen again, but for real this time. Imagine the joy I felt as I quietly responded, "It would make me very happy!") we spent with my family. My grandmother had been diagnosed with Alzheimer's and slips every now and again. As tradition held firm we went to her house for Easter dinner and Easter egg hunt. This was David's first trip to meet the extended family. They were polite and kind, although he was a bit confused when my grandmother told him that we were having corn dogs with our hunt. For some reason he interpreted this as we were hiding the corn dogs instead of candy. I hate to disappoint you readers but he was wrong, the corn dogs were to go with our ham dinner.

This year I was determined to make the day special. I had grand plans of sneaking out with a girlfriend and buying an Easter basket for him. Sadly this was not to be. David went with us on our adventures and I completely forgot until around midnight. As I lay on his lap sleeping (my usual pose when watching movies) I woke to realize my error. I started whining about how horrible I was and how he deserved a good wife. He just laughed and drove me to the store. We promptly went our opposite directions and bought 'surprises' for each other. We even took over separate rooms to set things up. The next morning I realized what a gem of a husband I have. He had created a beautiful 'vase' basket with gorgeous roses, and some extraordinarily yummy chocolate. We spent our day relaxing as we listened to General Conference and ate our baskets of goodies.