Merry Christmas! Being the second day of Christmas, I hope you are enjoying your two turtle doves and a new partridge in a pear tree :) I guess partridges have a short life, I'm not sure what anyone would do with 12 partridges....at least they'd all have their own home. Ok, this is so not the point of my blog, I got distracted. :) I've been sitting at my parent's kitchen table since we came home from mass/ grocery store this morning. I ate lunch with mom and we listened to some great music together. Then I decided to get some work done ( I KNOW, DON'T BE SHOCKED). But last semester the college Algebra class required some extra work on my part, so I'm getting a head start on the Dual Credit Trigonometry class for next semester. I even bought a new spiral notebook. :) Then I got distracted by my mom and my sleepiness. I posted on my facebook a few days ago that I was looking to start acting at the local little theatre. I however am rethinking this. A few weeks ago, I noticed that Amarillo College is offering a "Traditional Archery II" class on Tuesday nights. It's taught by the same person that taught me back in the day at Camp K, and it's an advanced class for people "looking to further their skills with the traditional bow and arrow." Its dates are January through March. So I think I'm going to use a portion of my Christmas money, which includes extra money for house-sitting and baby-sitting, to take this class on Tuesday nights. I've wanted to take it FOR A LONG TIME. Plus, the play that I was looking to audition for only has like 3 male parts and 3 female parts, and while I think I'm fantastic :), there's a lot of other really great people out there. Of course, this also means I may have to wait until next season to audition cause the other play this season is a musical. While I enjoy music, I generally enjoy music in my car or house when no one is watching. I don't think anyone wants to hear me sing or watch me dance on stage, hahaha. Which is okay again, cause I have quite a few things to do with school this spring semester; PSIA is happening SUPER FAST after the break, which if you're in Amarillo or the surrounding area and would like to judge at our campus competition, it's Saturday Jan. 22nd, and I do not feel ready for it at all. Plus, my new year's resolution is to go to Confession/Reconcilliation at least twice a month, I'm going to aim for every week, but I'm a busy person :/ Oh, and don't worry, I will be continuing my blog :) I know you're ALL SUPER PSYCHED ABOUT THAT :) I'm going to end the blog asking about your Christmas, it can't always be about me. Share your stories in the comments section so we can all get to know each other a little better :) How is your holiday season? What is your favorite part of the holiday season? Did you get what you wanted for Christmas? What are your plans for New Years? The last question is a selfish one, I don't have plans yet ;)
Merry Christmas!
Can you guess what languages these are without using google?
I'll post the answer in the comment section sometime this week. :)
Warning! IF YOU ARE UNDER THE AGE OF LIKE 13, YOU MAY NOT WANT TO READ IT. IN FACT, I DON'T WANT YOU TO READ IT. SO STOP NOW AND GO WRITE A LETTER TO SANTA...
As promised here is my Christmas blog, I honestly wasn't expecting it to come so soon either, but I was inspired. Any of you writers out there can testify that when the inspiration comes, you must let it flow. So let me just give you some background info, in case you don't actually know me, or don't know me as well as you should. I LOVE CHRISTMAS MUSIC. When I was a kid, I remember listening to a Christmas tape of my mom's in like August! I still listen to the same music I did when I was 7 and I know every single word. I love our family's CHRISTMAS TRADITIONS! First the Nativity Scene: we usually set it up near the Christmas tree, with the Baby Jesus hiding of course until after Christmas Eve Mass. The wise men are also separated from the rest of the scene and they get moved closer each day until the Epiphany. We always going to mass on Christmas Eve, whether the Children's liturgy or the Midnight Mass, my personal favorite is the Midnight service. Usually either before or after mass, we open our "Christmas Eve Gift," which coincidentally is also how your greet people on Christmas eve. Nine times out of ten the Christmas Eve Gift is cutesy matching pajamas. For the past 18 years or so, I, along with my brother, will watch "Muppet's Christmas Carol" on Christmas Eve. For as long as I can remember, I have never been able to sleep on Christmas Eve. I have ALWAYS BEEN the first one up on Christmas day. In fact, Harry Connick, Jr. sings a song "I'm Gonna Be The First One" that he wrote just for me. :) FYI: WE from now includes Cassi and I as children and Bobby and I for the last 13 years. :) So WE get up and go through our stockings that we strategically placed the night before so that Santa could fill them up with all kinds of goodies. I would like to say this is my favorite, but the WHOLE HOLIDAY is my favorite! So "WE" go through our stocking bit by bit, usually with one or two big-ish presents sitting outside of our stocking. WE of course are super quiet during this time, cause mom and dad are still asleep, seeing as how it's like 5 am. Around 6:30- 7, we finally get brave enough (hungry enough/excited enough, take your pick) to go wake up mom and dad, usually showing them one of the gifts that Santa got for us. Next all of us, go through our stockings, children dumping it all out now that we don't have to be quiet. Then, the parade or something gets turned on the TV, WE play with something new that we just got, while mom and dad start to cook us pancakes (occasionally waffles) for breakfast. After breakfast, we pass out all of the presents to the members of the immediate family. Once all presents are passed out, the opening bananza begins. You can usually tell when you're opening something good cause mom will stop and watch and have her camera ready to take a picture, this is true even to this day. Then the rest of the family comes out, which is normally Bernetta, perhaps Genece, nowadays Cassi, Josh and the kids. And the present process happens again. I'm sure very similar things happen, or happened at your house, but I'm not sure if I would be ok with something just similar. haha. Which brings me to my point... (I know that was a lot of background info, but I think this next part is going to good so stay with me)
So, I was about Bobby's age when Bobby came around and I'm fairly certain if he hadn't come around, I would have had this brainblock then, but as I said getting up early and seeing the Santa gifts is one of my favorite things to do at Christmas, in fact there were a couple of years where I was more excited than bobby, so I took a Tylenol PM before bed so I could actually SLEEP on Christmas morning. So Bobby has overtaken my joy for Santa and christmas and until this year, at least as far as we know, still believed in Santa. Most people may mock him for such a thing, I however applaud him. I also think it comes from having me as a big sister and from watching "The Santa Clause" too many times as a kid. So this year he found out, which means no more Santa. I shamefully admit that I was saddened by the discovery of this fact. I started wondering what I had to look forward to on Christmas Day. Coupled with the fact that I don't really make a lot of money and wasn't really sure that my gifts wouldn't just be a dissappointment, I just completely lost the Christmas Spirit. I stopped listening to Christmas Music, I didn't go shopping at all, I just wasn't interested. It was my students, actually I think that changed my mood. Our school newspaper had an editorial about Christmas by one of the students. She said something close to the following: Christmas isn't about buying gifts or getting up at 4 am. Christmas is about showing love, we buy gifts to see our loved ones reaction knowing that we put effort into it. God showed us his love by giving us his son, so we show love to one another with our gifts.
I think this is where it gets tricky, cause our love is not measured by the amount of money we spend on each other. Rather, our love is shown by the time we spend with our loved ones.
One day, I hope to carry on the traditions with my own family, of course combining with those of my husband's. I'm also plan to challenge myself, as I challenge you, the reader, now, to add other acts of love to your Christmas traditions: serving those less fortunate, helping salvation army, the Angel Tree, or be creative and find some other act of love or kindness. So that when the "magic" of Christmas fades away, the meaning is there as a reminder of the "Reason for the Season."
Merry Christmas! Happy New Year! Here is My Christmas Gift to you all :)
Monday, December 13, 2010
Hello family and friends and random blog readers. I'm not sure how many people actually just read this that I don't shove it down their throats...lol. Anywho...I'm still on Michael Buble euphoria and so I'm going to start this blog with a list. Here are the concerts I have attended in somewhat of an order...we'll see how well my memory is:
New Kids on the Block- Lubbock, TX
Tim McGraw, Black Hawk Down, Little Texas
Wade Hayes (and some other people)
The Beach Boys
Clay Walker
there was another random high school concert...
K-Ci & Jo-jo
Breaking Benjamin & Three Doors Down
Blake Shelton
Montgomery Gentry, Kenny Chesney
Willie Nelson & Pat Green
Big & Rich
WT's 2007 Homecoming concert (I don't remember who it was)
Blue Man Group
Nickelback, Puddle of Mudd and Finger Eleven
Miranda Lambert
Toadies
Jack Ingram
Honeybrowne
Justin Cooper (i think that's right....)
New Kids on the Block- Reunion Tour in Dallas
Michael Buble- Oklahoma City, OK
I feel like that's it, but I also feel like I'm missing someone...
So Michael Buble was on my bucket list and so now to complete my concert bucket list I just need to see Jason Mraz and Harry Connick Jr. Oh, and a show on Vegas! Well that's my blog for now. I have more to blog but I am getting sleepy right now so. I'll have to blog again after the vacation has started, which is just 20 school hours away :) be jealous...very jealous :)
I hope this blog finds you all safe and healthy. You're probably all recovering from the return back to work. like myself. So how was my holiday, you ask. FANTASTIC, actually!! I think it was one of the BEST of all times. There were a total of 29 people at our house at any given time, that includes, Aunts, Uncles, cousins, second cousins, first cousins once removed, nieces, nephews, and Bernetta, our "adopted Grandmother", who also happens to be my dad's Godmother. As most of you probably heard, I was really excited for this family gathering and I was not disappointed. So the festivities really began on Wednesday, I didn't make it out to mom and dad's as soon as I would have liked, but I didn't get my stuff done early enough. So some of the highlights of the holiday weekend would be Pictionary game that lasted until 3 AM, Scattegories, "Gluten-Free Baking", my dad losing the Scrabble game, laughing to the point of tears, the Pace Family Video, Cowgirl Birthday Party, Trampoline Jumping, Boys and the Four Wheelers, the Hula-Hoop competition, Bingo, the Estimation Jar, and Thanksgiving in the New millennium- aka everyone playing on their iPhones/iPads/iPods. Of course, the Aggies won the football game against UT, the Cowboys lost to the Saints, two more highlights of the weekend. I didn't go shopping on Black Friday nor did I end up in the paper, also highlights. My cousin Kim got us all addicted to new apps on the iPhone, "We Doodle" which was free and is basically pictionary, and "Train Conductor" which was .99 but is so addicting. I've mastered the day shift, and I think I just mastered the night shift this evening. All the little second cousins are bonding which is super cute. There are four little girls that are pals: Renee, 8, Aubrey, 8, Sarah, 6, and Rylee, 4. The boys are a little more spread out: Josh, 11, Andrew, 10, Jakob, 6, and Cedric, 4. My brother is becoming a typical teenager, unfortunately. He's almost 14 and spent just about the ENTIRE weekend playing video games. On Saturday morning, he looked awful, so now I'm anxious for him to outgrow that phase. My pictures are all on facebook and shutterfly so you should check them all out. Unfortunately the weekend wasn't ALL fun and games. My mom's aunt Betty (my grandpa's sister) passed away on Thanksgiving Day and her uncle Jay ( Nanny's brother) passed away on Sunday morning. Betty I didn't know very well cause they used to live in Fritch but moved to Oklahoma when I was a kid. Uncle Jay though I did know quite well. Jay lived a sort of gypsy life in that he moved around alot. He also was a very good storyteller. He always used accents and his stories always had lots of details. My mom was able to drive to Oklahoma today for Betty's funeral though and I'm glad she got to see some of her family. I love you MOM! Well, I would like to end the blog on a brighter note though. As of publication time, I had 8 paying travelers on my trip to Italy & Greece which means that my trip is now paid for and I'm only 4 away from the next free chaperon place. And on another happy note, our school's raffle was a very successful fundraiser. We sold over 2000 tickets! Oh and my principal told me today that people are noticing how much the school's been in the news lately! We were in the paper 3 times just last week alone!! Someone told Father that "someone must be doing their job right" ahhh, that's ME! Well, I think my new laptop is about to die so I better wrap it up and get this thing on the World Wide Web! Eight more regular school days until Semester Tests start! By the way I have half-days that whole last week of exams!! Isn't that neat? Have a GREAT WEEK! Thanks for reading. Until next time~
Notable November to you all! I have a couple of neat things to blog about. First, my roommates and I just hosted our first gathering in celebration of Halloween and Teresa's birthday. Not going to lie, it was pretty great. My costume was alot of fun, for me at least. Haha. I was Antoine Dodson and if you don't know who that is you should go look him up on YouTube. I won apples to apples and it was the first time I had ever played. They say that the cards you get are supposed to describe you and my five cards were Easy, Cool, Tough, Sensual and Stunning. I'm not really sure I have an opinion on that.... If any of my friends are reading this though, THANKS so much for coming!!! Also thanks to Neon, without whom I would have never had such a great costume.
Red Ribbon Week was last week and while I was completely stressed most of the week, I really think that it was a great week! I got to go around to each homeroom and show an anti drug video that focused on pain killers and I had some really good discussions. I had never really thought that my ex-friendships (just one really) would come out to be helpful, at least in this manner. It was kind of sad talking about someone that used to be my best friend. I have started to just accept the fact that she just isn't the same person that was my friend, not really sure she ever will be..
I told you all last week that I'm going on the trip to Italy & Greece with some students from school. We started telling the students about it, set up a meeting. So, one of the 10th graders asked the other sponsor if this was an "academic trip" and of course he answered yes. The student seemed dissappointed but he explained that this was not a trip for him to find an Italian girlfriend. Well, we were saying this in front of my principal, who looked at him and said "Isn't that why you're going?" HAHA, anyway. She then went on to say that Italian women and men are very emotional and dramatic. My response to that was the inspiration to the title, I don't do emotions. Then someone was saying that you wouldn't be able to understand them anyway, which made me think that he could be throwing a fit and I would just be staring at him saying "oh, how cute." Well, I better wrap this up. Only 16 more school days until Thanksgiving BREAK!! Yeah!!
So, I guess I'm running a little short on creativity, cause "Rocktober" was the best that I could come up with tonight. I decided to blog "midbook" because there's something about this book that I REALLY, REALLY LIKE and it's better to blog while, well, I should just start my blog now.
So, I'm curently reading "The Lost Hero" by Rick Riordan and I've really enjoyed it so far. As I'm reading, I find myself thinking of all the reasons that I like reading. One reason I enjoy reading so much is because I find it very similar to solving a puzzle, which I guess it is. I like predicting what's going to happen and changing the prediction as I continue reading. I like BEING RIGHT! I mean, who doesn't right? Same reason I like Math. For example, I've been tutoring someone fo Trig and tonight there was one problem that had me stumped so I came home and drew one picture, and when that didn't work I drew another picture. I just kept adjusting my picture until it made sense and was something you could work with and I finally got it. I'm not sure where one gets the desire to figure things out like that. I'm not sure if it's from childhood, genetics, school. I don't know, but however you get bitten by the bug, I've been bitten. It seems as though being a teacher has sparked my interest in learning.
Something else being a teacher has sparked, my interest in travel. I never realized before how connected it was to learning but it really is. Which brings me to another announcement that isn't new to those of you that already read it on facebook. I will be traveling with a group of students from Holy Cross to Italy & Greece duing Spring Break of 2012. I'm REALLY excited about this!! Í'm planning it with another of the younger teachers from Holy Cross and I've talked to a couple of the students about it and they seem really stoked about it. So let this be my first plea for help fundraising. We will be doing LOTS of fundraisers cause we have so long until the trip. I'm hoping to do some really fun, creative fundraisers, instead of the same old boring ones.
Another thing I've decided to try and take on is a Girl Scout Troop. My wonderful niece Aubrey has been involved every year until now and she says she doesn't want to do it anymore. When I asked her if she would join if I were her leader she said yes. At the time, I was just kind of saying it. Then I was asked to lead a troop last weekend at Camp Kiwanis through an overnight. Even though I didn't know any of the girls, I had such a FANTASTIC TIME, so noooww, I'm looking into becoming a real leader for Aubrey, with my wonderful sister as the Assistant Troop leader of course. :) My roommate says I'm crazy, and I'm sure she's right, but WHATEVER. I'm only young once, right? I mean, some day, I'll have a family and what not and won't have the time to do ALL OF THIS STUFF. Well, maybe I'll find a way, haha. Anyway.
It's late. I have a workshop with my Senior High Student council tomorrow and next week is Red Ribbon Week, so needless to say, I'm ready for October to be over. Plus, NOVEMBER MEANS THANKSGIVING. Pace Family, I have an email in my "Draft" Box that I will send out immediately after finishing this. So, it should have already made it to your inbox. :) Have a great rest of the week!
Until next time!
I can't believe that almost all of September has gone by and I haven't blogged. I think part of is cause I've BEEN RIDICULOUSLY BUSY! I quickly want to say that I've finished another book, "The Lucky One" by Nicholas Sparks, not the most depressing book he's ever written..you should check it out. I don't guess I've told you everything that I've gotten myself into this school year. I know I told you at the end of last year that I would be taking a Public Relations Coordinator at my school, as a way to make extra money. I found out when I got back from my trip that I'm also the Student Council Sponsor, which I'm really excited about. Then at the first staff meeting they asked for volunteers for PSIA coordinator, which is basically Private School UIL for 1st-8th grades. Again, I'm REALLY excited about that. I LOVED taking my Advance Science class to that competition at Tech last year! It was GREAT! So I'm excited to get to do that some more!! Then a few weeks ago, I volunteered (sort of ) to take over the 6th grade homeroom! The teacher who had them, also had them for like 3 other classes in the morning which is too much for ANYONE! Which if anyone from Jones is reading this, you probably know how STINKING EXCITED I AM ABOUT HAVING A HOMEROOM!! My 4th grade homeroom a few years ago, was my homeroom soul mate!! They LOVED COMPETING and I'm fairly certain we won (or at least tied) every competition that year!! So I'm hoping to work my magic and bring this sixth grade class to life! They're a little immature and have been a challenge, but I've had worse :) Oh and I'm currently planning something else, that if you have a facebook you've read about my super secret project :) I'm a little hesitant to announce it just yet since it's not completely official but hopefully in a matter of weeks it will be OFFICIAL! Plus, since I'm not working another job, well at least not one somewhere else, I have been able to participate in the Young Adult activities at St. Thomas which has been a lot of FUN! I've also made it to several volleyball games, middle school and high school. Oh- I'm also teaching (facilitating) a Dual Credit College Algebra, which has been a challenge. I've enjoyed having the seniors in class, but I have to spent time the night before going over what I'm supposed to teach them....I'm hoping it's one of those things I get to do again, so I can do it better....Oh, I also attended my last wedding of the past year. From October 2009-October 2010, I attended SEVEN, yes 7, weddings. Apparently this is something that happens to everyone at some point in their life, and at least I had a really awesome black dress that I was able to wear and uniquely accessorize for each occasion! Well, I've got a trip this weekend. I'm going to Irving for a PSIA workshop on Saturday until 2, then I'm heading South for AUSTIN! It's Betsy's Birthday!! So I'm really excited about that!!!!! So I guess I better start putting things together so I can leave after school on Friday! So until then....
Thanks for reading.
