Category: Slice of Life

Sometimes I overwhelm myself. Actually, it would be more accurate to say that often I overwhelm myself. This time, I am referring to my writing.

A couple months ago, I decided that it was time to take up writing again. Or more accurately, it was time to make writing a routine again. So, I signed up for Time to Write, with TeachWrite, and I started building a routine around writing. So far, so good.

Then, I was reminded in our sessions of many things that I used to do that I love doing. And then I started browsing on the Erin Condren website, probably because of a VIP email, and bought a few journals. I browsed on Amazon too, and bought a few more journals. There was a notebook that I was writing in, plus my planner and my teacher planner. I dug out my sentence-a-day journal and don’t forget the tracker for my nutrition and exercise information. I also decided that I wanted to work on handlettering, so I bought a workbook for that. And pretty soon, I landed squarely in the land of overwhelm.

I now am a little bit lost in that world. It stems from the perfectionsim in me. I think I am seeking out the perfect, most amazing way to be a daily writer.

It needs to be simpler. But I love all my different journals. So I am schlepping a tote bag around my house with me. The morning routine is to write in my planner and then to write morning pages in the notebook. At least that is established.

For everything else, there will be a time and a place for them. I just don’t know when or where yet. I love the idea of each guided journal I have. One of them may have the map out of Overwhelm, but for now I might enjoy being a little lost.

I try not to let anxiety take me over. Today it won. I just have so many thoughts swirling and whirling in my head.

There were movers coming with some hand-me-down furniture, which meant moving some of our stuff out of the way so they could maneuver. I was nervous about it. (But it turned out fine)

Tomorrow my 11-year-old dog has a surgical procedure to remove a malignant growth on her leg. I know it is pointless to worry about things that I cannot control, but this dog is our baby…we have had her since she was two months old. I know I have to be getting ready for it, but I don’t want to face it any time soon. My fingers are crossed that when this growth is sent in, the edges are clean in the biopsy and we are done with it.

Yesterday, our district administration shared their plan for re-opening the school buildings. The plan has staff coming back much sooner than what had previously been published in the timeline for returning. And it brings up so many questions and I am just a big ball of anxious thoughts.

Oh well, I don’t often wallow in these types of thoughts and I won’t continue to do so. Tomorrow is a new day. I may need a good cry or a good run, but I will be okay.

One of the best parts of working from home this year is the opportunities I have had to learn more about what a great teacher my husband is. This has been so heartwarming to witness. Even though it gets frustrating at times for him, I know he is so thankful for the opportunity to be doing this thing that he loves now, but did not see himself doing earlier in life.

You see, my husband grew up in Spain. He did not have a great experience in school. He is a twin and he is very, very, creative. His twin is very book smart. School, taught in the rigid, traditional way of his Catholic school in Spain, did not come easily to my husband. He had many teachers tell his parents how dumb he was and that he wasn’t going to make it very far in life. (I don’t know how many teachers actually said these words, but this is how they were perceived by him, which is what matters in this story) His mother adores him, but believed his teachers and they had epic homework breakdowns and very difficult times when he was young.

So, when it came time for him to choose, at age 12, whether he would go to the college preparation high school or the technical high school, he chose the latter. And, all through his childhood and young adulthood, he believed the story that he was not intelligent and he couldn’t learn. He finished his technical high school and then entered the work force in Spain, with absolutely no plans for higher education.

Then, he met me. I was studying abroad in my last year of college. We met, we dated, we fell in love, we considered where to live, he moved to the USA. At the time, he did not speak English at all.

It was rough. Immigration is no joke and trying to learn a new language while immersed in a completely different culture and moving out of your mother’s house for the first time and trying to figure out the first year of marriage and living together is overwhelmingly hard. But he was determined to learn English and get a job. He worked his butt off that first year.

I was floored by the complete dedication and the hard work that he put in. We put him in English as a Second Language classes at the community college, we switched to speaking English at home, the television always had the captions on and I rarely was able to get through an entire episode of anything without explaining at least two or three idioms or phrases to him. He was able to communicate in English to almost everyone around him in about three months. It was impressive.

Around this same time, we moved to Milwaukee so that I could do an alternative certification program to become a teacher. I had always wanted to be a teacher, but there were some other detours along the way and I did not study education in college. I quickly became obsessed with education and all that I was learning and experiencing as an intern teacher. I remember how my husband used to make fun of me because it was all I talked about.

Over the years of living here, Ramon had a succession of jobs, mostly as administrative assistant. His technical high school education was in this field, so it was the most closely matched for him. He hated it. However, in Spain, the unemployment situation is horrible and has been for a very long time. So, for him, the idea of trying to do anything about not liking your job was, literally, a foreign concept.

I spent years planting the seed of the idea of going back to school. About ten years ago, he finally listened. He went to school and decided to go into education. He worked hard and was certified as a World Languages teacher in Spanish. His decision, at first, was really based on the idea that we would both have summers off and the ability to travel for extended times to visit his family.

That is not the reason he continues to teach. Now, he loves it! I love hearing him joke with his students and chat about video games. I love brainstorming lessons and units with him. I love hearing the passion he has for helping students learn a second language or refine their literacy skills in their first language. He has so much more of a natural talent for this profession than either of us would have realized. I feel privileged to witness this talent every day.

I played with a pantoum today. Thank you Elisa for the inspiration to try this poetic form. I chose a day that brings up a lot of emotions. Trigger warning: I am writing about the day my dad died. I was 14.

I haven’t actually been able to write much about it before. I like the fact that the poetry form helped me approach this subject. This is a draft, but it was a very interesting experiment in figuring out which details to highlight. Here it is:

As of today, we are now a two air-fryer household and I may be slightly insane and am definitely obsessed.

We have owned an air-fryer for a few years now. At first, I thought maybe it was just another trendy kitchen appliance fad (ahem, George Foreman grill).

Then, one night we went over to our friends’ house and they served us a chicken made in their air fryer. It was so juicy and perfect. It impressed us. So, we bought one of our own.

The air-fryer very quickly became our kitchen appliance of choice. We have made so many things in this thing: “fried” eggs, hard boiled eggs, apple fritters, grilled sandwiches, chicken, salmon, shrimp, steak, roasted veggies, potatoes, and all kinds of frozen foods. Chicken tenders are crispy and taste like I just got them out of the fry basket. Frozen vegetables cooked from frozen come out charred and incredible.

Various times over the years, when I wanted to make two separate things in the air-fryer, they had different cook times and temperatures. This is remedied by doing batches in the air-fryer, but it takes longer.

A couple weeks ago, I figured out that a toaster oven/air-fryer would be amazing. I waffled back and forth about it. Did I really NEED another air-fryer? According to a post and lively discussion in the Cosori group on Facebook, that answer is YES. I am not sure I need it, but it sure is pretty on my counter and will, no doubt, be put to very good use.

The other morning, I was doing my hair. I didn’t want to take a ton of time to style it, but I also didn’t want to put my hair up in the usual messy bun. That’s when I gave thanks for the nifty little device that I bought on a whim last year.

One of the things I both hate and love about Facebook is the fact that you are sent targeted ads. On one hand it is entirely and absolutely creepy and scary, on the other hand, I see some really excellent products that I didn’t even know existed. I bought the L’ange LeVite Straightening Brush one day after seeing those ads pop up on my feed almost every day for at least a month. I figured it would be a fun thing to try. Holy cow! It is so nice and easy. I can brush my hair and have it looking like I just had the salon do a blowout in my hair.

After taking the time to stop and be grateful for a minute, I started to think about my hair story.

Childhood Hair

You see, when I was little, my hair was stick straight. I looked at all the people with gorgeous curly hair and was jealous. I hated my straight hair. It’s funny how the tables turn.

At about age 8 or so, I started getting perms. The curls just never exactly became those amazing spirals that I saw on other people.

I remember reading about rag curls in one of my books–I think from the Little House on the Prairie series. I spent a lot of time trying to figure out how to do that. It didn’t work.

Then, at about age 11 or 12, I bought a set of Benders. I remember plugging in that bag and waiting for the foam rods to get hot. Then, I would meticulously wrap up sections of hair. Then, trying to sleep on a head full of these curlers was quite an adventure. I did a whole lot of experimenting with trying to get the perfect set of curls. It didn’t work.

I remember begging my mom to pay for a spiral perm. I think I even had to pay some of my babysitting money to make it happen. Then, I went in with such high hopes and came out with my hair looking permed as usual. No perfect curls in sight, just a super wavy frizz. I was so disappointed.

High School Hair

One time, in my Junior year of high school, I asked my hairdresser what she thought I should do with my hair. I had been contemplating a big change but wasn’t sure what that would be. She confidently suggested that I cut it short. So I did.

My hair stayed short through the rest of high school and a couple years into college. It was annoying though, because I had to really style my hair every day or it looked horrible.

Finally, Some Curls!!

When I grew my hair back out, I had curls! My hair is completely crazily naturally curly now. I love it a lot of the time, but there are also those times when I wonder what I was thinking when I was young and yearning for curls. That’s when I am absolutely grateful for the tools that help me tame these bouncing spirals.

It is crazy how my desires about my hair have gone full circle. Now, instead of trying to find perfect curls, I work to find the perfect straightening tool. I am very content with my hair. It’s part of me. And I love that it is a little rebellious.

Dear Clutter,

Your time has come. Yes, I know I always say that, but I mean it this time. Get ready. This is going to be some serious work, but I will examine every part of you and determine the state of your health. For some parts of you, I will find a more permanent place of residence in an organized closet. For others, I will find a new home in which you will be able to thrive. And yes, I am sorry to say that there will be some parts of you that just need to be thrown away. However, I will try hard to make it less painful.

I know that you have been very comfortable here. Even though we had more time at home after we moved last Spring, you have eluded our priority lists. Yet, we get more and more annoyed with you. We just can’t ignore you anymore. So get ready for some changes. I am coming for you.

With love from your soon-to-be more organized friend,

A few years ago, I stopped blogging. I am not exactly sure why that happened.

Part of my giving up blogging had to do with the idea that I was just not enough. Most of my blog posts are written in one draft and most of my content is not earth shattering. I began to feel like an imposter and let the perfectionist in me determine my path. My inner perfectionist is not very good at advice. I am glad I have silenced her for now.

The three link-up posts I wrote each week really did help me to connect with amazing communities and have a purpose for writing. Two of those communities are still going strong and I am so happy to connect again with the It’s Monday, What Are you Reading? group and this Slice of Life community.

The link-up that had the most profound effect on my mindset and my resilience in hard times was the Celebrate This Week! link up that was hosted by Ruth Ayres. I was quite bummed to find that this is not still an active link-up.

Although I can’t link up to the community, I can still celebrate and share it here. 😃 My celebrations for the week:

1. My husband and I happened upon some live music yesterday when we ventured out. The Oxley’s are a local band and their music was really nice. It had a folksy vibe and just gave such a nice ambience to our date night.
2. We have a good start on plans for how we will collect Chromebooks at the end of the school year. We still don’t know whether we will be going hybrid in April or whether we will end the school year completely virtual. Either way, we came up with some solid preliminary plans.
3. I got to attend a virtual conference this week. My mind is reeling with actionable ideas for ways to continue to develop our program at my school. There was a mix of sessions that really helped me to envision the direction I would like to help our school go next year.
4. I have written a slice for every day in March so far.
5. My surprise box from Erin Condren came today and I have some new stationary to play with
6. My mom is selling her condo and we are able to get some hand-me-down furniture from her that is pretty new and very nice…and a digital piano that I will enjoy starting to play again.
7. The sun was shining almost every day this week and we have had temperatures in the 50s (Fahrenheit). Spring is on its way!

What do you have to celebrate this week? I would love to hear your celebrations in the comments.

This week is the VILS Virtual Conference. I absolutely love learning! Being part of the Verizon Innovative Learning Schools program has been amazing. I love my coaching job and I am so thankful for all of these amazing opportunities to network and connect and learn.

This year has been a year full of learning about instructional technology. I have learned along with all of my teachers. We have learned and mastered Pear Deck, Google Suite, Adobe Spark, Flipgrid, Padlet, and more.

I have had opportunities to learn more about coaching and to learn how to structure my schedule and my days so that my position is valuable and helps to move instruction forward at my new school.

I am so excited that I ended up at this school. They are so welcoming and I have fit right into the culture. In a lot of ways, it was very lucky for me that this year has been virtual so far. Everyone was able to see how my instructional technology coaching position was useful for the school. Many people who may not have been super excited about technology coaching were forced into learning more technology platforms than they would have imagined this year.

I am really loving the learning this week and so excited to continue to implement amazing things at my school in years to come.

I do not understand the tendency that I see for people to begin to worry about that upon which they have no control. The angst that people feel and the extra anxiety in the world seem to have mixed into the perfect storm for drama.

It drives me nuts. In some of the groups I have on Facebook, the same themes come up over and over again. People make their opinions known and try to guess the decisions that another group of people will make. And they agonize over something that they are not going to have control over.

Why?

Why is our tendency to create these drama filled and tense moments? Why can’t we spend our energy creating beautiful things and appreciating the world? I am not talking all gumdrops, lollipops, and unicorns (although I probably would like a page like that). I would love it if people would not start debates or ask questions that are obviously baiting people. They will just end up in a bunch of people giving opinions and making guesses.

This has especially been happening with some teacher groups. We are still virtual and the school board needs to decide about in-person still. The questions that people ask and the ridiculous rehashing of the same thing over and over again drives me crazy. It is what it is, and agonizing about it before you even know there is something to worry about seems like a colossal waste of energy.

Now, excuse me while I go create that page about unicorns, lollipops, and rainbows.