August 31: First Day of School...and Family

I survived my first day in first grade. It was... Different.  I didn't think that first grade would be much different than second... They're just a little younger and cuter, right? Woah. A LOT younger, a lot more squirrelly, much more dependent, have much shorter attention spans... And yes, really cute!!!  I can honesty say learning first grade is going to be more work than I anticipated, but I know it will ultimately make me a better teacher. I was VERY comfortable after my 8 years in second grade, and I needed a change and a challenge.  I got one :).  The kids are amazingly sweet and funny ( I have one kiddo that showed me how he speaks dolphin).  I am excited to grow alongside these kids and to see how we all change and mature thorough the year. 

It was really nice to have a good reason to leave school at a decent hour today. If my family wasn't here visiting, I probably would have locked myself in my classroom for the night and stressed about making day 2 perfect. Newsflash: if you are a teacher, day 2 will never be prefect. Not will day 3, or day 4 or day 104. We work with kids. Kids are supposed to be messy. They are supposed to be making mistakes.  MY biggest mistake would be sitting alone somewhere stressing about the tiniest details that are out of my control anyway. So thank you to my family for getting my out of school at a decent hour, for listening to my recap of the day, for giving me good feedback, and for helping me laugh and decompress.  And for taking extremely weird "is this a cover of a band photo shoot" type pictures. 

Where is Arthur, you wonder? Right behind me, pushing me off the deck as I take the picture. That's why it is a little crooked. But doesn't explain why Jesse is doing what she is doing. 

August 30: Get Ready for Family!

My family comes today!!! For two weeks! We have been blabbing on and on about how beautiful the weather has been, showing off our pictures of all the hikes, and adventures we have had, and just overall hyping the crap out of Kodiak. I checked the 10 day forecast today to see what kind of weather we might have for my family: 

Definitely not as sunny as we have been having, but not too bad! They say in Kodaik: if you don't like the weather, wait 5 minutes. So I guess we will see! 

August 29, 2015: signs of fall

After working all day in my classroom (with the help of my amazing sister, Meagan, I finally was able to get over to the brewery tonight and celebrate with another teacher! Then I allowed myself to go to Meg and Kyle's and play games without thinking of work. It was needed! They have been so supportive as I have been getting ready for school. They brought me lunch today and have been feeding me dinner most nights. Best family ever.  On my way home tonight after a game of... I actually don't know what it was called. It was a LOTR card game of some sort, I realized I never took a picture today. So, this is what it looks like on my way home at night now. This is my road. After acclimating to 9 years of city driving, where the street lights make the dead of night look like noon, this crazy dark Alaksan wilderness is scary. Plus, there are bears lurking in my neighborhood. I actually sprint from my car to my front door every night. 

That picture is with my brights on. What happened to the midnight sun?? :) 

August 28: Getting there!

My room is clean and organized and (almost) ready for the 21 six year olds that will be my new class. I ended up staying at school until close to 9:00 tonight too (so no celebration today either... Maybe tomorrow?).  Tomorrow we have a mandatory work day for all teachers, so I will be back again at 8am to plan! 

Much better, right? 

I am getting really excited. And terribly nervous. 

August 27, 2015: clean room checklist

School starts in 4 days! After our teacher in service today I rushed back to school with the goal of completing my 23 item checklist so I could take Friday evening off and celebrate. After 4 and a half hours, I left my room looking like this: 

Checklist not complete. Close though! Guess I will be coming in Friday... But only for a little bit! Then I will celebrate! 

August 26, 2015: Masseuse in the Making

I babysat today for an hour. I asked Arthur what he wanted to do and he insisted he wanted to come to my house. There is NOTHING kid friendly to do here! No toys, no comfy couch to sit on to watch movies, no kids books. Nothing. 

Except a flashlight. And a headlamp. And that's what we play with every time he comes over. I got sick of it after 30 mins so I got out my roller stick and taught him how to give me a back massage. He was interested for about 60 seconds before he went back into the cubby and grabbed my flashlight again. 

August 25, 2015: Good Reads

I didn't take an intentional blog picture for today. So... You get to see the picture I took to remind myself of some of my favorite books for the first day of school. This is picture one of three. They really are great reads, if you are ever interested in something quick :)