Friday, March 20, 2009

So Much Excitement!

So many amazing things are happening in my life right now! I am feeling very blessed. But more on my big news later... gotta build up that anticipation!

First order of business, Royal Idol, ILS' yearly talent show, was last Thursday. After a great deal of brainstorming and failed but brilliant ideas, Mellie and I pulled of a great performance. We did a "music video" (basically re-creating the video or lip syncing to a song) to a song called "That's Not My Name." We basically did a play on the fact that all the Ms. Garcias are constantly getting another's papers. There is a video that exists, but it hasn't been sent to me yet, so pics will have to do for now.

This is at the beginning, shuffling our papers...

And for our grand finale, Ms. Garcia senior and Mr. Garcia (a school-wide celebrity) came out and shuffled papers with us. It was super fun and entertaining, which was the whole point.

Last year's winner of Royal Idol was a freshmen singer (she was one of mine, too!) and this year's winners were also freshmen. I totally called that they were going to win the day they auditioned, and I was pleased to see that I was right. They were freshmen dancers who krupmed (I think that's the official type of dance). It sounds violent, but it was actually really cool.

In other news, last weekend I got to be on the main stage at church playing Esther in the Bible story. Super fun, as always.

Last night were parent/teacher conferences. A couple of parents that I wanted to see came, but the rest were all the parents who always come even when their kids are doing well, like my parents always did. I'm happy to do it, and I think it's necessary, but I just wish the parents of the kids who need it would show up. But then again, if the parent's gave a crap, maybe their kid wouldn't be failing/a pain in my butt/a waste of space/annoying/"special. *sigh* It can be pretty frustrating, especially after 13 consecutive hours at work.

Speaking of, even though we have today off, I'll be at school tomorrow for the SALTT Dance-a-Thon. Last year, if you recall, my team and I won. This year team Austin Powers is planning to do the same. Now if I could only find a bald cap...

Enough of that stuff, on to my exciting news. First, I'll be heading to Costa Rica for spring break! I booked a Caravan tour leaving on April 9th and returning the 18th. Everything is taken care of on the tour: all food, accomidations, even transfers to and from the airport. I'm really excited and can't wait!

Second is more travel news. I was accepted into a Gildher-Lehrman Institute summer seminar at OXFORD!! Yes, THE Oxford! I'm finally going to England! The best part? I'm paying very little--they give each participant a $500 stipend, and cover all food, lodging, and books once I'm there. I can NOT believe it! I'm still a little bit in shock...

It's all happening.

I am SO blessed!

Much love.

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Saturday, March 07, 2009

Geraldine Spice's Debut

Last night at church we had a women's event called Flavour. The pastor's wife, Lisa Young, comes from Texas (my church is based there and we're just one of the six or so campuses) and speaks to the women of the church. Well, I was asked to host the event. I basically had to be a talk-show host and interview these different people for a fashing segment and a "going green" segment.

My character ended up being this eclectic mix of, like, Helen Madden (from SNL), a HSN host, and a bi-polar cheerleader. It was a hot mess, let me tell you, but Geraldine Spice was fun to play and I had a great time. Everyone said I was hilarious, so that was awesome. It was a little nerve-wracking to perform in front of the head pastor and his wife and family, but they enjoyed it so that felt great. Nothing like showing off a little bit. ;) Lisa actually told me someone asked her if I was hired for the event! And she was like, "Nope, the talent just showed up." Love it!

I love that I get to act at church--if it's not at FC Kids, it's at this event or something else. It's so much fun to be on stage, I can't get enough! It's so awesome that I have an outlet for that.

After the event, I went out to the Kendall Ale House with a couple of women from the event. I had a delicious burger and a beer and loved my life.

I'm currently at school proctoring the placement exam. I do NOT love my life. But speaking of school and stage, next week is Royal Idol (the school talent show) and Melanie and I are going to do a "music video." Hopefully, if we can get it worked out, it'll be awesome. We're doing this song called "That's Not My Name" and we're going to, of course, play on the fact that we're both Garcias. Hopefully it'll work out and be awesome. Last year I danced with Fredy and the kids loved it so I have to top that this year. No pressure or anything...

Later today I'll probably head to Boca to rondevous with Annie. Don't know what we'll do, but chillin' with her for a bit will be a nice change.

Oh! Forgot to mention! On Thursday there was a GV alum event in Ft. Lauderdale. I made the treck up there to attend. I met President Haas and his wife, both of whom are very nice, and some other alum as well. President Hass answered some questions and let me say, I am so proud that I went to and graduated from Grand Valley. It is an amazing place. It's the greenest school in Michigan, the second hardest school to get into in Michigan, and the grads are doing amazing things in Michigan, the US, and the world. I could NOT be prouder. GO LAKERS!!

Finally, I started a quote collection on-line. If you want to check it out (it's a work in progress) click here: alilovesquotes. I figured it was better than random pieces of paper everywhere.

Alrighty... I have grading to do that I am avoiding like the plague. Time to get to it!

Much love.

Tuesday, March 03, 2009

St. Augustine and Everything After

I know, I know. Epic fail on my part. When I actually DO have something interesting to say, I sit on it for weeks. Whatever.

I went to St. Augustine mid February, from the 15th to the 17th. We had that Monday AND Tuesday off of school and I wasn't about to sit around Miami being lame, so I decided to take a road trip. It was one of those, "If you build it they will come" sort of situations, because two of my co-workers (and friends) heard about my plan and decided to come with me. It was awesome to have them along, and it sure made the five hour drive each way much more tolerable.

Our hotel was awesome; it allowed pets, was super cheap, and was within walking distance of almost everything we wanted to see. Win!

So the first thing we went to was the Fountain of Youth. Turns out, it's really just a natural sulfur spring, but Ponce de Leon (all four feet and eleven inches of him) believed it was magic water. So anyway, here's Betty and I at the gate.

Next we went to the La Leche thingy. It was pretty, and peaceful. It's a shrine to Mary and the site of the first mission in the U.S. It was right across from our hotel.

After that, we headed down St. George street to explore down there. That is the old section of town, I guess. So here's Betty, me, and Tanya at the city gates. We had to take this picture a few times because people were, um, special.

And here we are at the oldest wooden school house in the U.S. Let's just say they put bad kids in "the dungeon" and I was inspired...

After a lovely walk and some lunch, we headed to a fortress/fort thingy, El Castillo. We found this lovely gentleman at the top. I'm feelin' his outfit!

I took the perfect people with me because Betty teaches history and Tanya teaches religion. I figure all the bases were covered. :) We had a great time and I'm so happy I got out and saw something new! St. Augustine was a great place for a cheap, interesting, long weekend. Win! Of course, there are more pictures. You can view the album on Facebook by clicking here. This album also has a more comprehensive narrative of the trip.

Let's see... what else have I been up to? Oh, the following weekend we had ETC #58, so I spent Friday night to Sunday afternoon at school. This ETC (Encounter Towards Christ) was quite different from the last one. There were more participants and it was a much more social ETC, as in there were several cliques of kids that came. It was still beautiful, though. I forget that some of these kids are going through some stuff, like some seriously tough stuff, and yet they still manage to try and be kids. I'll admit--I've had a relatively easy life. I haven't had to deal with that much heavy stuff--my parents are still married, I have a decent if not good relationship with them, I have great friends, I'm fairly successful and happy, no one that close to me has died or even been seriously ill... I'm doing okay. And high school was STILL hard for me. But some of these kids... Man, they're amazing. Seriously.

That's why I'm so committed to doing ETC. I get to see the kids in a whole new light, I get to feel with them and support them, but most importantly I get to remember that they're just kids trying to do life and there's a beauty in some of them that just doesn't exist in my classroom, but exists in them. As always, it was an emotional weekend for everyone, but overall a great weekend, too.

Don't get me wrong, though, it wasn't all intense God-loving. I worked on the palanca team and we basically gave eachother fake tattoos all weekend so we could be "hard core." It was kind of hilarious. For example, here's my neck tattoo. Rachel (one of the kids) said that it was me in a past life, which I thought was hilarious. Neck tattoos are hard core.

As are giant phoenix tattoos on your calf. Yeah, I could make it fly.

We were all pretty much covered by the end of the weekend. It was hilarious.

Last weekend, our boy's basketball team played in the regional final game. It was in town (last year it was in, like, Ft. Lauderdale or something) and we were supposed to get completely pulverized. We didn't. The Royals played an amazing game, and were ahead for most of the third quarter. Sadly a series of unfortunate events occured and we ended up losing by about 10 points (pretty good, considering we were supposed to get demolished). The kids took it pretty hard but they couldn't have done anything more.

Some teachers got together and threw the team a special pep rally on Monday. My job was to get a little sign made for each kid. It had their name and what they'd accomplished: District Champions, Regional Finalists, Florida's Elite Eight, and each kid's name. Of course, when I'm standing at the kiosk in the mall, who do I hear but one of the kids? I've taught him for two years so I know his voice better than my own (he talk a lot and I see him EVERY day). He's at the mall, with two of his team mates, drowning his sorrows with retail therapy. I was just like, "You need to go away right now. Go away." I'm sure he knew something was up, but he didn't come to school the next day so he missed the surprise anyway. To tell you the truth, I was kind of sad he didn't show, especially since a) he was a team captain b) three or four different people were on his case all day to come to school and c) he would have appreciated it. Anyway, it was great and the guys were happy.

Nothing else really new. Rico isn't staying with us anymore which is both sad and a relief. The two boys were starting to get along...

I took this after we'd taken them to a local high school to run around on the baseball fields. They were tuckered out!

Life's been pretty busy lately, which is great. I'm grading papers during the week and busy most weekends. I'm glad to have it that way becasue sitting around being bored is over-rated. However, I'd be nice to have some time to, y'know, clean my house and do laundry. But who needs clean clothes, right?

Much love.

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