I am Going to...

TO THE TEMPLE!!!!!!

It's a beautiful day to be able to say... you are going to the temple. It's taken me a while to be ready to this mentally. It's never been a matter of being able to go, its always just been a matter of wanting to go. At one time in my life I was all about going, but then it changed, and I was less about going and more about the outside life... the time I could save doing something else. But I have thought this through for a while now, and have made my covenants, and I am ready, and excited.... Wednesday is going to be amazing!

Happy Tax Day!

So in the celebration of Tax Day... I decided to use my PF Chang's gift cards and have a tax day dinner! It was 15% off on this day also, so that was extra fun. And so we gathered many friends together to have a fabulous dinner! It was a lot of fun and we ate a lot of chinese food. So I really enjoyed being able to laugh with friends and see their quirky and really hungry sides.

Here are two prospective Priesthood Holders you probably don't want to date.... Naug and Rotc are showing off what the difference in men and women are in photos. Naug is "Man" and Rotc is... what is supposed to be a "woman". Oh love... apparently its faked.

Black Eyed Peas!

So after returning from my week of Nature, children and drama... I was gifted (blessed) with the opportunity to attend a Black Eyed Peas concert for FREE! They were amazing seats, we got to experience the concert first hand, and it was just mind blowing fun. I really needed fun like this, and I was so blessed to be able to receive these tickets from a friend. Her husband and herself were too tired to be able to attend and so they thought of me first! Aren't I special! No cost, nothing, they just handed them to me! So my first reaction... call someone to attend with me. 5 friends later, I finally settled on Naug. And he agreed and we made the hour long trek to the concert.
Fergie was amazing live, she has real talent.... not really as beautiful as she is in pictures in real life, but she is amazing on stage.
This is how many people were crammed into one place filled with lazers, fog, and yelling. If I haven't lost some sort of hearing, it will be a miracle.
Here is Naug and I, haven't seen him in FOREVER, glad that we got to hang out and catch up.

Into the Woods

Spring Break about killed me... from not only pure over relaxing, but from the whirlwind of having to get back on track after the best 9 days of my life. However... running back to school was not the plan... and instead I went to outdoor school with my beautiful niece and had a blast spending it with sixth graders as they learned about recycling, food waste, and how to save the planet, one meal at a time. So the last week of March was spent in the wilderness with not so small children, who enjoy drama and talking back.

Here the kids in my nature group are learning about composting and helping the environment with worms, air, dirt and waste. Interesting enough.

These are the girls in my cabin... we had a diabetic, a non english speaking, one cheerleader who was embarrassed to be a cheerleader, and gothic emo in the making, my nieces 3 best friends, a overdramatic 12 year old, a pair of twins (which took me two days to figure out), a spritely little one, and a pair of quiet, good, reserved girls. That's the make up of 16 girls, 5 days, and a lot of wilderness.

When twelve year olds dance... this is what happens. They split into groups, they have the one awkward boy who will probably either end up with one of these girls, or being the best shopping buddy ever. It was nice to see my nieces world outside of just the two of us doing things together.

It was weird to be at Walden West, it is the only outdoor school I haven't been a counselor at in the Bay area. This was also the first time I went to outdoor school for a specific person and not just because of the kindness of my heart. I was there for "Spunky"... who 10 years ago could barely string full sentences together, and now... she is going into junior high... sniffle. Something else dawned on me. It has been 10 years since I was a camper. I have been doing the counselor thing for 7 years now.. and its easy to forget that 10 years ago... I was the kid in the boots and pancho, following the Naturalist around with bright eyes. Great memories from this week... I also the flu this week and hiked so much I thought my legs were going to fall off.

Lesson learned: Don't pack for Spring Break and forget that once you return, you are going to be in the freezing raining wilderness where flip flops and sun dresses are not compatible and no Mother Nature caters to your needs.

Reasons Why I Love and Despise Teaching Second Graders

10 Reasons I Despise Teaching Second Graders:

10. They ruin each others homework in an attempt to spite each other

09. They fight over who is older for hours on end.

08. They whine about doing their homework.

07. They whine about not being able to do their homework.

06. They forget that they take the bus and end up missing the first and second bus.

05. They fight over ONE pencil even though there is a box of pencils in front of them.

04. They lie about finishing their homework, WHILE handing in homework for me to look over.

03. They forget their homework in the classroom, in the car, on the bus, in their backpacks, in the garbage.

02. They have the attention span of a fly.

01. They believe listening to directions is optional, even when its repeated 9 times by nine different people.

10 Reasons I Love Teaching Second Graders:

10. Their smiles when they accomplish something.

09. They are always excited when they learn something new.

08. They have the most creative imaginations.

07. They can play non-stop.

06. Their favorite thing to do is draw.

05. They have pretty stylish clothing.

04. They can turn sticks into money and a playground into a five star resort.

03. They are always smiling and wanting to give hugs.

02. They are so excited to see you when you walk into a room.

01. They go home at the end of each day.

We are 10 weeks into the semester and I have to say, sometimes these kids run me thin, but other days, man, these kids make my day.

SPRING BREAK!!!!

Angels we have heard on hi!

Spring Break has kicked in! And I can not believe I survived it until this moment. I was almost for sure I would not survive until the Friday rolled around for Spring Break.

Festivities this week adding up to the moment:

Making 3 runs to drop off people at Spring Break start destinations (ie.. airports and homes).

3 days of exams and studying

1 lunch with the Institute Secretary

20 extra hours of sleep

One and a half hours of clearing out my room to kick of a clean spring break

3 trips to Mariposa Bakery

2 hours of guilt tripping S into Disneylanding it with me

90 minutes of rampant crying and fighting

2 hours of fighting with 7 year olds to focus and do their homework

1 hour of running around playing kickball with rotating short attention spanned children

4 skipped meals

1 St. Paddy day run to In and Out Burger and the Booze Shop

4 cuts on someone's fingers for attempting to open a beer with a key while in a drive thru

1 very pleading text message for someone to buy me a beer bottle opener key chain

And finally a 6 hour drive, ending in a 900 square foot 2 bedroom 2 bathroom marble countertop, jacuzzi bath penthouse across the street from disneyland.

Food Crime!

So in the attempt to survive the disaster that is my exams, work and volunteer schedule, I have attempted ways to make sure I had healthy organic, gluten free meals to eat. Because seriously, cereal was getting old, and so was the yogurt. It dawns on me that its so easy to skip meals, over eat and indulge in the junk of all junk gluten free foods because of time constraints and pure laziness. So taking one from Amy's page, I am whipping up some frozen meals. One flaw! Gluten free does not freeze well. At least the pasta doesn't. Its gross when you thaw it out. Really really gross. I forced myself to eat it, but man was it just gross. I think anything with cheese is kind of gross also. So here are the following items I made recently:

Gluten Free Linman Lasagna

Gluten Free Pasta and Meat Sauce

Gluten Free Amy's Chicken Pot Pie Filling

Gluten Free Biscuits

Gluten Free Brownie Truffle Cheesecake

Everything I made turned out pretty well at first go, but the following items should not be frozen.

Gluten Free Pasta

Gluten free pasta gets really mushy, really fast normally, so when you freeze it with sauce, I feel like it just becomes strained peas after you thaw and reheat. I prefer al dente pasta, which means that I prefer the expensive corn pasta, but rice pasta tastes good if cooked right and ice bathed out of the pot. Still though... frozen sucks.

I am a little iffy on if the Brownie truffle cheesecake turned out well, but thats also because I kind of overcooked the brownie layer. We will see how the biscuits turn out in the next entry on food. I am trying different things here, but for some reason, I have this inkling that gluten free alfredo isn't going to work frozen. Which is cool, I think that is something I can whip up fairly quickly.

So the dilemma this week is, I have to eat another 5-8 meals this week before going back home to my family where I will suffer a different torture, I have 4 single servings of pot pie in the freezer, 2 servings of lasagna in the freezer, 2 servings of salad and have a scheduled lunch on Wednesday. I can substitute 3 of those meals with cereal and yogurt. Should I make anything else to eat this week, or should I just eat my leftovers and get it over with? I am wondering if I will survive eating healthy for the last 3 days of this week or if I will cave and make See's Candy and a box of juice count as a meal. I did however purchase 3 bananas today, so my goal is to eat those. The salad and three bananas are going to be the most vegetable I get in a month I am betting. Geez, I am worse off than a picky 5 year old.