Rededication

With the uptake in friends using Instagram to update me on their lives, and myself using the same means to learn about others, I have all but forgotten about this blog. However, in the last month or so I have decided that my life is better without looking a few times a day at social media sites. I have decided to get back into blogging. I think with the future I have ahead of me, this will be a great tool for me to keep a journal, and to have a place to upload photos etc. to mostly just myself. I am hoping that one day I can print off the blog and call it my journal. 

This is for you Whitney...

I've always been horrible at journaling, and with a baby on the way, I am re-considering the important things. I want this little guy to be able to know what went on in the daily/weekly/monthly etc. life of his parents. So, I rededicate myself today, to be better about journaling, and spend less time using Facebook and Instagram. 

Since my last post, a few large things have happened: 

This is the photo we used to announce what we were having to our family and friends.

We are expecting a baby boy on January 6th, 2015. We found out about this blessing on April 27th, 2014 and learned the baby was a boy on July 30th, 2014. We are so excited to meet him and learn from him. We have a crib and some clothes, and I have the daily evidence that he is growing inside me! I am growing and he is too! I can feel him kicking… I started feeling it about 2 weeks ago. My friends who are also pregnant right now were saying that they could feel their baby, and I kept thinking, why can't I?? Well… when I finally stopped to think about all the movements and changes in my body, I realized it was him that felt like the butterflies and flopping about in there. 4 more months left and then he will be here! 

I taught for a whole school year as a Physical Education Specialist in Granite School district (from 2013-2014). Basically this means that I was an Elementary teacher at two different schools… the home school as they called it was Calvin Smith (in Taylorsville) and the other school was William Penn (in East Mill Creek). I would travel back and forth every other day from school to school and teach students ages kindergarten --> 6th grade for 6 or 7 forty-five minute class periods every day. The big catch with all this was that it I taught two class at a time all by myself, so I had an average of 55 students per period. It was so hard!!! I had hardly any idea about what I was doing at the beginning of the job since I had finished a year of teaching secondary Health and had never taught in an elementary school… let alone taught P.E. I learned how to do it, and figured it all out with lots of support from Mitch and my fellow teachers in the district. Most of the time when I would tell people about the job, they would say "isn't that illegal? that doesn't seem fair to you or the students". Well… I agree, but I was blessed to find a full time teaching job after graduation. This job taught me a lot about being patient and loving with all sorts of personalities. I taught almost 1,200 kids last year! The amazing part to me was that I learned about a lot of the kids' lives, and got to know their names and personalities, even though I had so many. I am grateful to have had the experience, and grateful to not have to do that again. 

This is an example of how big they were. One of my fav. classes, 3rd graders, at William Penn. 

This school year I got a job at Centerville Jr. High school as a part-time PE teacher. I wanted to go part time so I could have more time for the baby when he comes. I knew I didn't want to stop teaching all together, so we will see how it goes this year with working and being a new mother. So far (it's only been two weeks) it has been a great choice. My colleagues are really kind and easy to work with, and the students at Centerville are really well behaved. I haven't had to solve problems constantly, or do a lot of lesson planning. I am grateful that I was offered this position, and am back working with middle school kids again. I also get to team teach, so I have a lot of help every day from an experienced teacher. It's been basically ideal. 

Mitch graduated on April 25th, 2014 and was hired as a 'computer scientist' at the Hill Air Force Base. He mostly does statistical analysis on how productive and things different programs are at the base, and he does some computer programming also. They absolutely love him out there, and think he is an incredible employee and person, which is true!!! 

We moved to Fruit Heights from our cute awesome little apartment in Pleasant Grove. We knew we needed a place with a second room for our little one, so we live in a place called Orchard Farms in a 2 bedroom apartment. I am grateful for the change and what I need to learn, but so far, we haven't really made friends around here, and don't love the prices and things. Hopefully next June we can move into a house! 

My parents came home from their mission to San Diego on June 28th. It is SOOOO great to have them back. We love them so much, and are so proud of them. 3 years was a long time to have them gone, but I am so glad they can be around for our little guy's birth and to help me out with all the changes. 

I can't really think of anything else that was big enough to remember from the last year ha! I will try my best to keep a weekly update so I can have a better history left behind for our posterity.

Us at the Tulip Festival in April. We love going to see the beautiful flowers every year.