Ahoy Matie!

Last Friday, September 19th was national talk like a pirate day. We decided to celebrate at our school by having a contest for who could dress up like the best pirate. Because of my numerous basketball games, I wasn't able to find the time to sew me some wicked pirate pants, but some of the kids at our school sure looked great. I didn't get a chance to take any pictures so sorry, but I did give extra credit to every kid who dresses up. One of my students made a stuffed parrot to prop up on his shoulder. Others had authentic vests, pants, hats, and plastic swords. They won prizes for being the best dressed. It was a lot of fun. Our student council this year is doing a great job getting us excited for every random holiday found in our student planner.
We had a half day, and the other half was meant for teacher inservice. During that time, we created webpages for our students. In 2 hours time, I actually made quite a bit of progress, and it is up for viewing. Unfortunately, I don't have the right program on my school computer to update it or change it. So, it hasn't been touched since last Friday. My principal is working on getting me the software so I can maintain my website and use it as a resource for the students. You can check it out though. Go to: www.pvo.k12.il.us. Click on the junior high building. Scroll down and find my name and click on my webpage. It should come up. Hopefully soon I will have a chance to update it.
So... I thought I would put a plug in about my school year this year. Things are going A LOT better this year. Not only do I already have a lot of planning done already (thanks to all the time I spent doing it last year), I also have a new batch of students. My students this year (7th graders) are a great class. Most of the time, they are respectful and best of all, they actually listen. This is the first year that I know what it is like to teach a lesson without being interrupted all the time. At the beginning of the year, I found that I have to plan more for my lessons, because I always ended with time to spare. It's only because they are better behaved than others. Lately, I can tell that they are getting used to junior high because they have become a little more chatty. However, it's nothing to freak out about - they are a good group of kids, and I don't have to be the police man or whipping task master when they are supposed to be working independantly or in groups. They usually take care of that themselves.
Basketball season is as busy as ever and is going about as well as it could. Our team so far has done better than we predicted, but still not as great as we would like. We are really short on girls and even more so on girls who are athletic and skilled. We have seen a lot of improvment in the girls since the beginning of the season, and hopefully we will continue to do so. So far this season in 7th grade, we have had about the same amount of success we had all season with them last year as 6th graders. We won our first game. Last year, we only won one game. We've lost two since then, but we play again on Tuesday, so we will see if we can get back on a winning streak or not.

Don't ever be afraid to talk like a pirate now and then - it could turn out to be quite fun.

Happy Birthday Brittney!

One week and one day ago was Brittney's birthday. I ordered her present a week before her birthday on-line from Amazon. To my great disappointment, it had still not arrived on her birthday, so I took her to dinner at Biaggi's (a really good Italian restaurant) and told her we could go anywhere she wanted afterwards and buy whatever she wanted. She wanted to go to Wal-mart and buy some shirts she had seen on sale there a few days earlier. When we got home we invited some friends over (Wes and Lesli Peter and Steve and Jessica Gutke, no one with kids because it was past 8:30pm) for ice cream and brownies. Brittney, Lesli, and Jessica are all school teachers, so guess what we talked about. It was fun to have our friends over.

The next day the package finally arrived - nine musicals on DVD - "The sound of music" "The king and I" "Oklahoma" "Carousel" "South Pacific" "State Fair" "Meet me in St. Louis" "The music man" and "Seven Brides for Seven Brothers". Brittney had a basketball game and I had Elders' Quorum visits that night. Before I left I hid the DVDs in various places around the house. When we both got home that night, I sang a song from each of the musicals and had Brittney figure out based on the song where the DVD was hidden. It was so much fun. She got so excited. Instead of seeing her excitement once when she opened the packaged set, I got to see it for each of the DVDs, and Brittney does get excited.

I love Brittney. She is the sunshine of my life. I strive to be the husband that she deserves. She is so talented, currently she is coaching basketball and preparing for a musical Stake Women's Conference and teaching school and being a wonderful wife and being my new running buddy. She has beautiful dark curly hair and a radiant smile. "Somewhere in my...childhood, I must have done something good." She is a few of my favorite things.

Labor Day

On Labor Day, Bruce and I went with some friends down to Clinton Lake to spend the day. It is a small lake about 40 minutes from our house, but they have a nice beach area to play in and the water is warm. We packed a picnic lunch, ate at the beach, and played in the water. It felt unseasonably hot for September and we roasted in the sun. Playing in the water was a lot of fun though. When we first got married, we made it a goal to do something as a family on holidays we had off of school. After 3 years of marriage, we finally did it. Every other holiday it seems like we had something going on that only allowed us to work (experiments, catching up on homework, etc.) so we didn't truly enjoy the actual holidays. We enjoyed labor day so much that we were glad we made that goal in the first place and have vowed to actually follow it. The beach area is actually considered a state park. Our governor is closing some of the state parks in Illinois due to budget cuts. We don't know if this beach area will be affected by it, so we were glad we went while we had the chance.

Arthur Cheese Festival

So I know that a lot of people in our ward have already posted about the infamous Arthur Cheese Festival, but I still must say something about it. The Arthur Cheese Festival takes place every labor day weekend from Friday through Monday. Most of the highlight activities occur from 12:00-5:00 on Saturday, like cheese cutting ceremony, cheese eating contests, and international cheese curling. In all honesty, what dairy farmer wouldn't delight in the idea of a Cheese Festival right? So of course Bruce and I, along with Eggetts, ventured down to Amish Country Arthur and delighted in the magnitude of the 311 pound block of cheddar cheese. Bruce and I got there early in time for the cheese cutting ceremony which consisted of the mayor giving a speech, encouraging us to spend money there so they could continue with the tradition, and the Miss Arthur, Jr. Miss Arthur, and Little Miss Arthur there for moral support. It was short and sweet, and soon the big block of cheese was cut into slices to give to others. They used piano wire to cut the cheese into big blocks. We then ate all the free cheese and crackers we could. We were stuffed to the gills! At a shop near by, they had other types of cheese samples, ranging anywhere from bacon cheese, taco cheese, jalapeno pepper cheese, BBQ cheese, and the best baby Swiss cheese I have ever tasted. We were both in 7th heaven as I adore cheese. Unfortunately we couldn't stay very long due to prior commitments, so we didn't get to stay for the cheese eating contest or the cheese curling competition. Perhaps we will come later next year, since we have experienced the cheese cutting ceremony, and participate in the other cheese activities.



We got our picture taken with an oversized wedge of cheese, and we snapped a shot of a beautiful display of pumpkins and squash. Not to mention the brass band walking around dressed up as clowns. That was a sight to see. It was sure steamy and sunny that day. I should have worn a hat because I definitely got sun burned. After we got home, I had to call my sister and brag about my cheese festival experience. Incidentally, my sister is lactose intolerant and hates cheese, so she wasn't one bit jealous of all the cheese that I ate; in fact, she found it rather disgusting. I believe that every town should have a cheese festival and hand out free cheese! Don't you agree?

Running.....smunning

Since Bruce's irreplaceable running buddy moved to France today, he had to find a replacement. Although I didn't mind running in junior high and was one of the fastest girls in my class, I can't say that I love running very much. I see running as a means to accomplish a goal (a sports related goal). Example: I need to run the bases when I get a hit in softball; I need to run up and down the basketball court in order to be a good player; I need to run in order to set the ball in volleyball; and I need to run up and down the field in ultimate Frisbee in order for anyone to want me on their team. Not to mention the need to run into the end zone for a touchdown. Seeing as how I need to exercise (because blowing the whistle and yelling at the girls to run the play again at practice doesn't constitute true exercise), I decided to get up and go running with Bruce to fulfill his overwhelming running desires. It's been a while since I have run long distances, and I almost made it the full 1 1/2 miles we ran today. I was amazed at Bruce's athletic prowess ability as he raced around the corner (Bruce told me to add this). I can certainly tell he is more rehearsed and in shape than me. Day 1 down. 294 more to go until Bruce's true and experienced running buddy comes back! Then I can once again sleep for 20 more minutes before needing to get ready for work. :) Sorry! No pictures. I don't look too flattering with a red face and nauseous stomach.

Jason, my running buddy

One of my least favorite parts of junior high was running in gym. It seems like I ran the mile in about 12 minutes or more, walking part of the time. That's why I often wonder what Coach Downs and Coach Steele would say if they found out that now I run 3-4 miles 3 times a week and I've run a 5K (3.1 miles) in 27 minutes.
Two years and two months ago we moved to Savoy, IL. Having driven through the night, Brittney's dad and I said when we got here that we were going to take a nap before we unloaded anything from the truck, so we did. Brittney couldn't sleep until the truck was unloaded however, so she and her sister, Katie unloaded it while we slept. While they unloaded it, our new neighbor, Jason Wheeler walked by on his way to a meeting and noticed our truck in the parking lot with a Utah State bumper sticker. Being from Cache Valley, he immediately came over and introduced himself and volunteered to help those sisters unloading all by themselves.
Two days later, he was the one we called to find out where the hospital was so that we could take Brittney there to have her appendix out. (Maybe all the work unloading the truck aggravated it.)
About a month later, he and his wife Kara and daughter Brooklyn invited us over to dinner. During our dinner conversation, I found out that Jason liked to run and I told him I did too, so we decided to go running at 6am the next morning. We started doing it every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday after that. We had to take a break for a year a few months later when my experiment started at the dairy and Jason began working on a house for the solar decathlon, requiring us both to be at work before 6am. We decided we'd rather sleep than get a run in before work. However we picked the running back up last winter and have run until now. One of my favorite memories is of running down the bike path south of Prospect road last January and watching Jason run over the hills of snow in his shorts.
We've had various people join us at different times, the most regular one being Talia, Jason's daughter that was born in November after we moved in. She usually sets the pace, leading out in the jogging stroller. Sometimes after we go running, if we haven't run hard enough or long enough, Jason will feel a "black hole" coming on and tackle me and I have no choice but to wrestle him back.
Next Monday Jason, Kara, Brooklyn and Talia will be moving to France for a few months while Kara teaches English there. Jason and I plan to keep running; it's going to be a lot harder to encourage each other to get out of bed at 6am though.
Jason's brother, Justin ran with us last Monday. He told Jason afterwards that he needs to get a running buddy. I agree, everyone needs a good running buddy.

The First Day of the 21st Grade

If you count every year of school I have had since graduating from the 12th grade as a grade, then this week I started the 21st grade. The classes I am taking include: cell and membrane physiology, the science of animal well-being (emphasis on dairy this semester), stress and immunity, regulation of feed intake, and canoing.
The first day of school I just had cell and membrane physiology. It was good, I made a new friend (Darren) which is what mothers always want for their kids when they go to school. He wants to study with me, which is good. I don't know why he picked me, the class if full of pre-med students, and I am not one of them.
My friend and neighbor, Wes told me he was taking tap dance, bowling and canoing. The canoing class sounded really fun. He told me Monday night that it started Tuesday, so Tuesday morning I looked it up on line and decided to try to register for the class. It let me in, then I realized the class started at 9am and it was currently 8am, so I'd better get moving.
Regulation of feed intake is really interesting. My friend, Matt Thorpe from our ward is also in the class. This week we learned the solution to the energy, water, and obesity problems. Get rid of the clothes washing machines and dryers. If people were working harder washing their clothes, they would burn more calories and we'd save water and energy.
Stress and Immunity and Science of Animal Well-being will also be interesting. In both classes we discussed how people assume they know what the best way to treat animals is, and they completely ignore the research. I'm not sure how many of our readers support the humane society, so I'll be careful what I write, but if any of you are thinking of supporting them, talk to me first, and I'll steer you towards better uses of your money.
I think it will be an interesting semester with lot's of exciting things to learn.

2nd Grade 5th Grade 21st Grade