Christmas Party and Volleyball

And....the holidays have officially begun.  My mom had her big Christmas party this weekend, with all the food, people, and decorations that I remember from every year she has had this party.  It was so much fun, and I loved having the chance to catch up with so many people!  I haven't seen some of my friends in Houston in a long time, so it was great to get to see them again!

I had the Christmas party on my calendar for months, so it was a definite part of my plans for this weekend.  The only problem was, after I was assigned my volleyball team, I learned that I had a volleyball tournament scheduled for this weekend too!  So, Travis and I left Austin on Saturday morning, drove to Houston, helped set up for the party, ate lots of food, and then drove back to Austin again on Saturday night.  I had to show up for the tournament at 7:15am in Austin.  Needless to say, it was a long night!  Travis drove me back from Houston, and I stayed awake as long as I could, but ended up sleeping in the car for about an hour.  Neither of us remember much about the drive, but we made it safely home at about 1:45am.

Then, at 6am, my alarm went off, and I got ready to coach in my first volleyball tournament of the season.  I showed up to the gym at 7:15am for the scheduled coach's meeting, which ended up not happening until 7:45am.  Boo.  My team showed up, stretched, and got ready to play our first game at nine.  We played two games in a row, had a quick break, kept the score for the next game, and then played again.  For our first tournament, we did pretty well.  I figured out the positions I want the girls to play and the rotations I will probably use for the rest of the season.  We only won one game, but I saw some great playing going on!  The rest of the season should be pretty good.  Luckily, our next tournament isn't until the middle of January, so we will have several practices before then to work on our skills as a team.

Travis came to watch our last game of the morning and then we went out for lunch before he headed back to San Antonio.  I went home and crashed on the couch.  I ended up sleeping for about five hours!  So, I haven't finished grading my tests from Friday (two out of three classes are finished), I don't know what I am teaching tomorrow, I don't have a gift for my secret Santa, and I didn't get anything done that I wanted to get done this afternoon, but I did have a really nice nap. :o)  Luckily, this is the last week before Christmas break, so I don't have TOO much going on, but it will be busy.  Progress reports are due Tuesday and several kids are in trouble because of the test they just took.  Grades aren't what I thought they would be, which just means I will get to talk to parents all week about those grades.  *sigh*

BUT....good news!  In five days, I will be on vacation for two weeks!  And this vacation includes a trip to Houston, my grandparent's house, Travis' brother's house, and NEW YORK!  So, I will make it through these next five days so I can enjoy the holidays!

Only five days to go...

Back to work...

After a wonderful and fabulous Thanksgiving break, it was SO hard to go back to work!!  I spent a whole week doing nothing but shopping, eating, and relaxing, and for the first time, I was finished with almost all of my Christmas shopping before Christmas!!  I ate lots of turkey, spent lots of time with the family and Travis, and refused to do any school work.  (Well, I did have to finish grading quizzes, but I did that before I left town and it didn't take me more than 45 minutes, so I don't count that as working over vacation!)  So, needless to say, going back to work on Monday was no fun!  I had all my lesson plans made, and the topic we are doing for the next few weeks is really easy, so I don't really have much work to do right now.  The kids are still a little woozy from break and seem to have forgotten how to behave in a classroom, so today I laid out the rules again and had to be mean (no talking (period, at all, zip, zero, nada), raise hands for everything, etc).  It wasn't fun, but it sure has made things easier for me!  It's amazing what we can get done when they are quiet and are forced to listen to my lovely voice.  I am trying to remember that they are only 13 and really don't think about things from a grown-up point of view.  Hopefully we can all make it through the next two and a half weeks without going crazy!

Overall, though, I don't have much to do right now.  I have everything planned and copied for the next three weeks; all the tests and quizzes are written (thanks to my department).  All I really have to do is show up every day, make sure my kids learn something, and keep a smile on my face.  One of my free periods has been taken away due to the computation blitz we are doing for the kids who can't do things like add, subtract, multiply and divide.  So basically, for 12 days, they are going to sit with me and do problem after problem...after problem...over and over and over again.  (Yes, it is as boring as it sounds.)  And, I am working the basketball games after school on Mondays, which involves flipping two switches (one for the time, one for the possession clock) and adding points on the scoreboard.  Oh, yes, and also a LOT of laughing at the attempts of 7th graders to play basketball.  (This makes me remember my own, young sports experiences and I want to give a shout out here to everyone who was ever forced to watch me play sports...I hope you had a good laugh and I love you even more for having the patience to show up time and time again...)  Here are some pictures to spark those hilarious memories...

Softball memories from 6th grade (I think)...

Volleyball...check out the "cool" uniforms...hand-me downs from the high school!

Showing off our beautiful, giant, purple mouthguards the basketball players were forced to wear!  And again, check out the "awesome" uniforms...

So, since I don't have to focus on anything for school, I have had time to do other fun things like decorating my house for Christmas!!!  I spent a couple of hours on Monday night moving the furniture around and putting up my decorations.  It was so fun to pull out my three huge boxes of decorations and open up all the stuff I packed away last year!  I didn't even remember all the new stuff I bought at the end of the season last year, so it felt like Christmas opening it all up again!  It's not a lot of stuff, but it sure is cute!  Here are a couple of pictures...

And, my club volleyball practices have started, and yesterday I was assigned to my team.  I am coaching the 14 Pink (pink??  PINK?? really?!?) this year, so it will be a lot different than the 12s team I am used to coaching.  The kids are older and more experienced so the games should be a lot more fun, and I am looking forward to that!  I was not excited about the color pink, but it is what the girls wanted, so here I am.  My club director even bought me pink tennis shoes and threatened to buy me a pink backpack too.  Yikes.  Anyways, our first tournament is coming up on December 14th in Austin.  Not a lot of time to practice before then, but we should be okay.  The girls are pretty good players already, so it will just be a matter of getting them to play as a team.  I am looking forward to a fun season!

So, now the countdown to Christmas break has begun...12 more school days until we are off for two weeks!

TCU vs. Air Force

Travis and Eric, his best friend from the Academy, came to visit this weekend.  We hung out in Austin on Friday night with Katie and took Eric downtown for his first Austin experience.  (He is from Georgia and hasn't been to Texas before, until he moved to San Antonio for his instructor training.  He is in the same class as Travis, and will be stationed in Oklahoma after he is done with the training.)  We had a blast!  The next day, we drove to Fort Worth for the TCU vs. Air Force game.  We met up with a couple of my friends from college and had a great time hanging out with them!

JJ, Sperry, Jen, and the giant wool gloves I had to borrow because my hands were freezing!

The boys were in their Air Force blues and stood out well among all the purple!

Their team struggled, and TCU won 44-10.  Air Force did score one touchdown in the third quarter, and Travis and Eric went crazy!  It was pretty funny; they were screaming and cheering right in the middle of the quiet TCU student section.

Travis and his friend Eric

During halftime, my friends and I took a walk up to the highest part of the stadium to watch the halftime show.  Then, as we were walking back at the beginning of third quarter, we passed the guy who was holding the falcon (Air Force's mascot!!).  We got to pet the bird - it was pretty cool.  It was wearing a helmet (that made it look like a giant mosquito) so it wouldn't get scared in the crowd of people.

After dinner, we met up with some of my other friends for dinner and then we went to one of the sports bars in town to watch the Texas Tech vs. Oklahoma game.  We left at halftime when the score was 42-7 (or something like that) and went to my friend Jen's house to watch the rest.  We played with her dogs and watched the rest of Oklahoma's massacre of Tech.   Exhausted, we all found places to sleep, and then we had to leave early the next morning to get the boys back to San Antonio on time.  (They had a meeting.)

And now, I am enjoying my entire week off from work.  Today and tomorrow, I am Christmas shopping and running errands.  Then, heading to Houston to spend some time with my family and Travis' mom!  It should be fun.

Happy Thanksgiving week everyone!

Weekend Update!

This past weekend was so much fun!  With all the craziness going on at school this year, I am really taking the time to enjoy the weekends and do something besides work.  So, this past weekend, Travis came down to Austin to visit.  I graded tests on Friday until he got here, and then we went to the store to buy dinner.  We made two different pizzas, one supreme pizza and one barbeque chicken pizza with homemade barbeque sauce on it.  They were delicious, and they were a lot of fun to cook.  Then, we watched the most recent James Bond movie, Casino Royale, with Daniel Craig as Bond.  His fabulous blue eyes were quite a distraction, but the movie was great.  Then, on Saturday, we went to see the new James Bond movie, Quantum of Solace.  Again, majorly distracted by the blue eyes, but I thought it was a good movie.  Then, we walked around the mall until I found a shirt to wear for our excursion that night.  (The weather turned COLD and I realized I had no warm clothes to wear!!)

I found a sweater and we went home to change and head to Gruene, Texas, a little city in between San Antonio and Austin.  We met up with a couple of Travis' friends at a restaurant in Gruene for dinner, and then we stood in line outside of Gruene Hall to get in for the Stoney LaRue concert.  It was freezing, but the line went pretty fast and we were able to get in before the show sold out.  We stayed until the concert was over around 1:30am and then Travis and I drove back to Austin.  The concert was a blast and it was fun to hang out with the guys from the base in San Antonio.   A couple of the guys had driven all the way from Del Rio, so it was fun to see them and hang out with them for the night.

On Sunday, we sat around and watched some football until about 1:30pm when Katie called and was ready to go to lunch.  The three of us went to the Cheesecake Factory and had a great lunch together.  Then, Travis had to head back to San Antonio, so Katie and I hung around and chatted for about half an hour after he left.

Then I went home and finished grading the tests and entering the grades (which took a total of 15 minutes).  It was a very relaxing weekend!  And this week is a pretty light week, since it is the week before Thanksgiving, so I am pretty excited.  I am spending tomorrow (Tuesday) out of the classroom for some training, so the week is going to feel pretty short.  On Thursday and Friday, though, I have to work the basketball tournament that is being held at our school.  Then, Travis and his friends (who all went to the Air Force Academy for college) are coming on Friday night to hang out in Austin, and then we are driving up to Fort Worth to go to the TCU vs. Air Force football game on Saturday.  It should be really fun!!  We are staying with a couple of my friends from college, and I am really excited to see them!

And, as a little side note, since the weather has finally gotten colder, Mr. Ed has become more snuggly and loveable!  He is currently curled up in my lap, sleeping and snoring like a baby!

Only four more days until Thanksgiving break!

Final School Volleyball Update

We played our last game of the season on Thursday against our rival school.  The games were pretty good, and I was impressed at the playing I saw on the court.  My B team won their game in three, grueling games; my A team lost.  Overall, my A team finished 3rd in the district, with a record of 5-3.  My B team ended up tying with two other schools for first place in the district with a record of 7-1.  I am so excited!  We now get to have a banner in the gym for the volleyball team.  It is my first banner to win, and the first volleyball banner for my school.   Whoo hoo!  Go team!

And volleyball is officially over.  Basketball tryouts start on Monday!

Travis' birthday!

Monday was Travis' birthday, so I took Tuesday off from work so we could actually do something fun and stay up late!  (My school night bedtime is usually around 9pm...a hard thing to do when you want to go out to dinner and celebrate!)  So, when I got home from work on Monday, we took our time getting ready and went out to dinner downtown at Fogo de Chao.  If you have never been there, it is a must for any special occasion!!  There aren't any menus; once you are seated, you can start at the salad bar (which is always fancy and amazing).  Then, once you are ready for more, you flip over a little green disk on your table, and waiters carrying huge skewers of all different types of meat will start coming by your table.  They will carve off a piece of whatever you want and put it on your plate.  When you have enough, you flip the disk over to the red side, and the waiters stop coming.  After you eat what you have and want more, flip the disk again, and the waiters will come by and ask which meats you want delivered.  It is a great way to eat dinner!  We had a great time.  Then we came home and watched Ironman, and I *gasp* stayed up until midnight on a school night! :o)

After a glorious and wonderful sleep in (so fabulous not to have to go to work!!), we went for lunch and to spend some of the birthday money he got from his mom.  Then, we washed his truck, as it was almost orangish brown (instead of the red it usually is!).  The drive from Del Rio to San Antonio is laden with butterflies and dirt flying in the air, and after a couple of drives, it was time for a wash!

And, because Travis had most of his belongings with him in his truck, we took his golf clubs and went to a driving range.  It was my second time to play golf, and I didn't do too badly.  Luckily I was with someone who knew how to correct the mistakes I was making, and I actually had a few good swings.  When it came time for a little competition, though, I couldn't hit anything, and Travis won our distance contest!

Then we stopped by the 8th grade football game, just for some laughs.  Both teams ended up winning, which was pretty exciting.  I also got to see some of my club volleyball girls that I coached two years ago.  They were there watching the other school play, and we are playing against them tomorrow in volleyball!  I got some great big hugs and we chatted for a while.

Then Travis and I packed up his truck again, and he got on the road for San Antonio.  He's living on the base there until he can find a house to rent with his friends!  The fact that he could wait to leave Austin until 7:30pm was pretty cool, since now, for the next several months, we have only an hour and a half drive between us!!

So, a fun birthday and a nice day off in the middle of the week.  Going back to work, of course, was pretty difficult today, but luckily it was a half day for the students, so the day went by pretty quickly.  After the kids left, I spent the rest of the day with the math teachers, planning and writing tests and quizzes.  Fuuuun.  (Actually, it was good to get a lot of stuff done.  I planned up to the week after Christmas!!)

And, tomorrow is my last volleyball game of the season!  I am pretty excited.  I love volleyball, and I love my team, but practicing every day and having games every week for 9 weeks is starting to wear a little thin.  So, last game tomorrow, no practice Friday, turn in uniforms on Monday and Tuesday, work the basketball tryouts for Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday, and THEN I am officially in offseason.  Then, except for working the clock at the games on Mondays, I won't have anything to do for athletics until track season starts in February.  Whoo!

Two crazy hectic weeks until Thanksgiving!  A whole week off!  Yay!

Frogs, Flowers, and Fun!

Last weekend, I went to Fort Worth for TCU homecoming, which was a blast!!  I met up with some old friends and had a great time catching up with them.   I went by the Sigma Kappa house just to say hi and ended up meeting my great-gran little, who is now the president of the sorority!  I was excited to hear that my family was doing so well!  (When I started in Sigma Kappa, my family consisted of me and my big...and that was it!)  I also spent some time walking around campus and seeing all the new renovations that have been made.  The most outstanding was the fact that they changed the huge parking lot in front of the student center into a grassy area that is now surrounded by all new dorms and a brand new student center!  It is absolutely amazing.  Then, at the game, the Frogs played against Wyoming and won the game 54-7.  Overall, it was a great weekend!

This is a picture of the new grassy area in front of the fountain that used to be a parking lot.  All the buildings all around it are brand new, and all of them are dorms!!!  My old freshman dorm that used to be prominent in this area is now hidden behind all the new stuff.

My friend Sperry and I with SuperFrog in front of the frog fountain!

 

The new statue and extension to the Education building

So, this week has been long and crazy, but many good things have happened this week and last weekend!  On Tuesday, Travis sent me the most beautiful roses just to let me know he was thinking about me while he was in Washington!  He made it through his training and will be heading back on Saturday to get ready to go to San Antonio for his next training.  He'll be living in a rental house in San Antonio until the end of March and doing his instructor training.  It will be nice having him so close for so long!!!  Then, he's going back to Del Rio for the next three year to be an instructor pilot.

Tonight, my volleyball teams played against Henry, the team that my coaching friend from Eclipse coaches.  It was a huge competition, and we played some of the best games that we have played all season!  I was excited to see them play so well, but disappointed at some of the mistakes they were making (missed serves, free balls hitting the ground, etc.).  Both teams lost both the games that they played.  So my A team has a record of 5-2 and my B team has a record of 6-1.  We have one more big game next week, and then the season is over.  I'm a little excited to have a little more time in my life!

And, on a final note, I have been asked to coach one of the 14s teams this year for club volleyball, so I am pretty excited about that.  It will be the same as coaching the 12s, travel and tournament-wise, except the girls will be older and a little more coordinated!  Practice and games will start at the end of November.

3 weeks until Thanksgiving!!!

School....

School is consuming my life at the moment.  Despite the great weekend I had last weekend, last week was CRAZY.  Yes, it was a four day week for the students, but I still had to work for five days.  And, the weather turned colder AND we had a full moon...and I never really believed it would have any effect on anything, but, boy, was I proven wrong!  The kids were so squirrelly and out of control all week, and it was all I could do to keep them in their seats!  A couple of times during class we had to take a minute break to let them all (literally) run around the room and get their energy out.  It was bizarre.  I don't think we learned too much last week....  Teacher morale in the 8th grade math department is a little low due to the fact that the parents are calling all the shots and we are forced to concede.  I really wish we could just start the year over, knowing everything that was going to happen, and do things differently, but that's not going to happen, so we continue having parent conferences over...and over....and over.........

Anyways, three more volleyball games to go, and then the season is over.  After basketball tryouts in four weeks, I will officially be in off-season and maybe I will have some time to breathe at school.  Right now, I can totally understand how the kids feel - we are so busy!!!

Travis is out in Washington state right now, hanging around for the week until he starts his resistance training on Friday.  Keep him in your thoughts and prayers because it is going to be a tough week for him!  He won't be coming back to Texas until November 1, and then he officially moves to San Antonio on November 4.  He'll be living there for four months while he does his pilot instructor training, and then he will be heading back to Del Rio at the end of March to start teaching all the young, new pilots how to fly!

Some fun things to look forward to after this crazy week...  On Friday night, my volleyball team and I are going to the UT vs. BYU volleyball game.  Then on Saturday, I am going to the TCU vs. Wyoming homecoming game in Fort Worth!  It's the first time in four years that I haven't had a volleyball tournament on the same weekend as homecoming, so I am pretty excited!  They have lots of fun events going on that day, so it should be fun to catch up with some old friends and see all the great things they have been doing on campus.

Anyways, papers to grade, parents to please, answer keys to make.....back to work!

8 weeks down, 28 to go.....and only 5 more weeks until our next break!

No work and all play on the weekends makes me happy!

What a wonderful weekend!  My mental health day on Friday was totally worth the stress and anxiety on Thursday!  I cleaned the house, did laundry, and then followed through on my desire to do NO work this weekend by going to Del Rio and leaving my books and agenda at home.  It was fabulous.

Friday night, Travis and I went to another class' drop (the ceremony where the pilots who are about to graduate find out what planes they will be flying next).  It was really interesting because this was the first drop where they were handing out assignments for the UAVs, which are the unmanned planes which the pilots fly by remote control in Las Vegas.  Not the dream job for anyone who wants to fly planes, so of course everyone was there to see who would get them!  They ended up handing out two assignments.  Then we hung around afterwards to watch an old, famous Air Force pilot play the guitar and sing some fabulous songs about pilots!  I caught up with a couple of guys from Travis' class who are still on base, and then I got to meet all of his new commanders and instructors that he is going to be working with next year.

Saturday, the Red River rivalry was in full force, and the Texas/OU game proved to be very exciting and intense.  My favorite part was the 96 yard touchdown run that one of the UT guys ran...awesome.  UT ended up winning 35-25 (I believe that was the score...).  Then Travis and I went to a movie for three bucks each at the theater downtown. (We spent more on popcorn and a drink than we did on the movie tickets!!)  We saw Body of Lies with Leonardo DiCaprio and Russell Crowe.  It was pretty good.  Then we drove around the lake and had dinner at this little bait shop by the water.  It was definitely like walking into a small town restaurant; every person (about 20 people total) said hello as we walked in.  We ordered food from the chef who was standing in the kitchen and started cooking right when we ordered, and the waitress hung around and talked with us for a while.  It was great.  45 minutes away from the base, but worth the trip.

Apparently, the best food on base is to be found at the bowling alley, so that is where we went Sunday afternoon for lunch and ended up playing three games.  Travis beat me pretty badly in the first and third games.  I think he let me win the second game, just to be nice, but I only won by about ten points.   (He beat me in the other two games by at least 60 points each time.)  It's not like I was bowling in gutter the whole time; I was actually doing pretty well and about average for my bowling abilities.  He just kept bowling strikes and spares and I just couldn't catch up!  Then we took a drive around town so he could show me some of the houses he is thinking about buying when he gets back from training in San Antonio.  Then, on main street, we found this tiny little "soda shop" that served ice cream and shakes.  So we had some dessert, and then we walked around the store looking at all the trinkets they had for sale.

So, needless to say, mental health has been restored!  This week should be much better than the last couple of weeks, as my stress level is much lower now and I have had a chance to relax and enjoy some non-school related activities.  (Not to mention the fact that I had a great vacation from all my kids and still don't have to see them until Tuesday!)

7 weeks down, 29 to go!

Today was a long day...

I got to school this morning at 7:45 am and left this evening around 10:15pm.  It was quite a day, full of children asking the same questions over and over and fun classroom activities.  I enjoyed having lunch with my volleyball team today (an activity we do every Thursday before a game), and I felt like my classes went well.  (I am finally teaching fun things in Algebra!)  Then, we had our volleyball games, which went okay.   The B team won, the A team lost in a pretty sadly played game.  Guess that just means I have to pump it up next week in practice...lots of hustle and serving!  I stayed after the games (which ended at 7pm) to watch the choir concert (which started at 7:05pm), and then I went down to my room to work.  I cleaned, organized, filed, graded, cleaned some more, wrote sub plans, copied quizzes, filled out paperwork, sent emails, and planned for tomorrow all in three hours.  Now, at 10:45pm, I am finally back at home, ready to go to bed and sleep.  I am taking my first "mental health day" off tomorrow, and I am ready to enjoy it!  Time for some cleaning, some laundry, some grocery shopping, and a little time with Travis, and I should be set.  And the students have a holiday on Monday, so I am going to enjoy my four day vacation from my kids!

Ah...the thoughts of how little I had to do this summer are taunting me...  :o)

A relaxing weekend

We had a volleyball game on Thursday against Tippit MS, and although it went down in the books as a win, we certainly did not play our best.  There were some bad plays, bad calls, and general unenthusiastic playing from my kids.  I think the biggest factor, though, was the fact that it was our first home game and the BOYS were there to watch!!!  My puberty-stricken, boy-crazy, hormone-filled 8th grade girls just could not handle it.  They were giggly and distracted the whole time...  We had a conversation on Friday during practice about it, which was pretty funny.  I believe at one point someone said, (and I quote) "But Ms. Kinley, don't you have a boyfriend?"  I said yes, and reminded them that when he came to watch the tournament, I didn't stand there and giggle at him the whole time.  I coached when I needed to and paid attention to him in between games!  That made them think a little bit....   :-)

And, some sad news...I just found out that several of my players are failing their classes, which means they are out for three weeks.  This is a huge bummer.  I have been stressing all week and not sleeping because I have been so worried about them passing their tests this week and hopefully getting up to passing their classes. Luckily, the three girls that I have are passing for the six weeks, so I don't have to worry about them anymore.  But the others are in trouble, and I have already set up a plan to get them passing by the next three weeks so they can play with us again!

By the time Saturday rolled around, this sleep-deprived, stressed-to-the-max teacher just couldn't handle it anymore.  I went to Starbucks Saturday morning and stayed there all day, drinking coffee, reading, and grading tests.  It was the most relaxing day ever.  I am completely sunburned, but it was worth it.  I finished grading for the weekend, and I started (and finished) the 500 page book I needed to read for my book club.  It was a good, relaxing, peaceful day.  And now it's Sunday and I have errands to run and other things to do, but I now have the time to do it!  And, I have decided to take this coming Friday off for a "mental health day" and spend some time just focusing on me and relaxing a little more.  This first six weeks of school has been more work than I expected it to be!  But I made it, and things will be better soon.  Most of my students are passing now (all but four), and the next six weeks is starting tomorrow.  

Six weeks down, 30 more to go!

Tournament Update

My A team played some awesome games this weekend, but just couldn't pull out enough wins in the pool play to move on to the bracket play.  My B team ended up winning second place in their tournament!  It was pretty exciting, but we didn't end up leaving the school until 5:00pm.  Long day!

So the craziness of September is pretty much over now.  Life should calm down a bit, and I won't have any more tournaments.  We will just be playing games on Thursdays for the next month!  We're hoping to do well this season, so it should be a lot of fun!

Volleyball update

We played against Benold MS tonight, a school in Georgetown, an hour away by bus.  We got there just in time for all the kids to run to the bathroom and then start their warmup.  My B team game was pretty....boring.  The other team couldn't really do much, and my team looked awesome!  Lots of plays, bumps, sets, hits, and great passing.  I was really proud of them!  They won their game.  My A team game was a lot more exciting, only because the other team could play against us.   The first game was a nail bitter and finally ended with a score of 27-25!!!  Then my kids won the second game without too much trouble.  There were some amazing plays in that game as well!

I am really excited to see the progress they are making.  It's neat how the things we do in practice are transferring into the games.  More than once, I have had some of the kids say things like, "oh, we did this in practice," and "we learned how to do this!"  They are seeing how it pays off to practice the things we are practicing (like tipping on the net and hitting down the line) because we are winning points in games!

Big tournament coming up this weekend, Friday and Saturday.  We are going to be playing two of the best schools in the district, which is pretty exciting!  I can't wait to see the girls play more this weekend.  More updates on the games later....

Volleyball tournament and the weekend

My A and B volleyball teams both had tournaments this weekend, and both of my teams did a GREAT job!!  My B team ended up coming in first place for their tournament, and the A team came in second place!  We got gold and silver medals, and the kids were all so excited.  They worked so hard and did so many amazing things.  They are really coming along in their understanding of volleyball, and the rest of the season is going to be a lot of fun.  I can't wait to see where they are by the end of the season...I still have a couple of months with them, as our last game is not until November 6th.  We have our next tournament next weekend, so it will be an exciting week of practice getting prepared for it.

Travis was here this weekend to watch the amazing-ness of 8th grade volleyball, and ended up spending 10 hours in the gym as the games went on and on.  I was coaching pretty much the whole time, going back and forth between my A team and B team games, so he was just hanging out in the stands listening to his i-pod.    

The tournament finally ended around 5:15pm and we had to rush home, shower, change, and quickly leave again in order to make it on time to my birthday dinner reservations at the Melting Pot at 6pm!  We ended up being a little late, but my friends had already shown up to reserve the table, so it all worked out alright.  We had a blast, eating lots of fondue, and hanging out with my friends and sister.  I got a couple of early birthday presents from Sarah, and Travis gave me a new digital camera, since my other one had literally bitten the dust, and a wok pot that I really wanted!

Today (Sunday), Travis and I spent the afternoon looking around animal shelters.  I thought we would be allowed to take the dogs out and play with them at the Town Lake animal shelter, but you have to be a registered volunteer and go through an orientation before they let you do that.  I may volunteer to do that later (ie January or February...summer...) when things aren't so busy for me.  Anyways, we spent about an hour and a half walking around the shelter downtown, checking out the cute puppies and dogs that were there.  Travis found a bull dog, and I think if it was on the adoption list, he may have taken it home that instant.  He was incredibly excited about seeing the fat, drooling dog that was bouncing around in his cage!  There were lots of pitbull mixes there, that were adorable, and a Welsh Corgie and a Jack Russell terrier.  So cute!  We also checked out the cats that were there and had a chance to pet and play with a lot of them too.  I saw lots of orange tabbys, which I loved!!!  Then, we went to another shelter on the other side of downtown, but most of the shelter was filled with dogs and cats being held for the evacuees who are still in Austin from hurricane Ike.  They only had about ten dogs there for adoption and all the rest were waiting for their owners to pick them up and take them back to Galveston.

Then on the way home, we stopped by the new townhouses that are being built two miles down the road from my current house.  When I was looking for a place, these townhouses were still just a dream, and had not been built yet.  They have about 20 of the 101 houses built now, and they were AMAZING.  There were two models that we could go in and look around, and....wow.  The houses are built on a hill overlooking the preserve and the hill country, and the view from the huge windows was amazing.  I would live there in a heartbeat if I could.  The floorplan of the first place we saw was pretty cool, and the spacious rooms and vaulted ceilings were really quite impressive.  We also went to check out the pool, and it was pretty amazing as well.  It was a lot of fun shopping around for things we weren't really going to buy, but were interested in seeing!  

Longest fire drill EVER!

Today at school, we had a fire drill that lasted for TWO HOURS.  The drill started at 10:35 am, but the alarm was somehow broken, and the buzzers did not stop.  We (the teachers and students) were literally standing out on the lawn of the school for an hour and fifteen minutes after we evacuated the building, waiting and wondering what was going on.  We saw the fire trucks arrive and the seven firemen go running into the building.  There was no fire; this was only a drill, so we were all very confused.  Finally, they moved us to the stadium so we could sit in the bleachers instead of the grass.  We sat there for another 45 minutes while the alarms were STILL going off.  We finally got to go in for lunch because the alarms were turned off in the cafeteria.  Finally, around 12:45 pm, class was able to resume as normal.  

Too bad I was giving a math test today.  Too bad that I passed out the wrong test to my first period Algebra class (they got the 8th grade one instead...).  Too bad that progress reports are due tomorrow.  Oh well.  It all worked out in the end!  The test is now scheduled for tomorrow! And the kids will just have to deal with the grades they have right now. *sigh* What a day.

Three weeks of school have flown by!

I can't believe that three weeks of school have already flown by!  So much has happened in the past three weeks, and it feels like we have been in class FOREVER!  I have moved up to 8th grade to teach Algebra, and so far, it has been....interesting.  I have 76 students, spread out in three hour and a half periods per day.  51 of those students are in my two Algebra classes, and the other 25 are in my 8th grade-level class.  I love my students, and once they learn that, yes, they really have to show their work algebraically, we are going to get along great.

I am also coaching the 8th grade A and B volleyball teams, which definitely keeps me busy!  I have 20 girls playing on the team and 1 great manager who has been a wonderful help to me at the games.  I also have the most wonderful team mom who has already showered the team with food and presents.  We had our first game on Thursday, and it was so awesome.  The kids played REALLY well, and I was so impressed with how far they have come since I first coached them last year in 7th grade.   I am so excited for the potential we have for this season!  Both the A and B teams won their games this week, but we quickly learned that our competition this year is going to be pretty tough.  One of the B team games went all the way to 30-28 in a nail-biting, heart-pumping game!  The A team games were amazing too, and I was so proud of my kids!  The games I am looking forward to the most are the ones at the end of the season in November, when I get to coach against one of my favorite coaching friends.  Last year, my B team beat hers, and her A team beat mine.  That game will be quite a showdown this year!  (That game is happening on October 30th, for anyone who wants to experience middle school volleyball at its finest! AND...I have the home court advantage this year.  Whoo!)

I can't believe that it is my fourth year of teaching.  I was told at some point that it would get easier, and in many ways it has, but there is still so much paperwork and politics involved that sometimes it can be overwhelming.  The teaching part is easy; it's the dealing with the parents and the system that is hard!  It seems like everyone always wants to tell me how I should be doing my job and to tell me they could do my job better than I am doing it.  Besides all of that, though, I still love what I do.  The kids make me smile everyday despite all their whining and craziness, and I love coaching volleyball and being a part of the success of the team.  The kids are full of smiles and happiness which I enjoy being a part of every day.

So, luckily, I am all caught up with work at school and have no papers to grade this weekend, so I will be spending the weekend cleaning my house and volunteering to help shelter evacuees in the gym at our school.  (Only if they actually show up....they may not make it out this far north!)  Hopefully it will rain a lot so I can have an excuse to snuggle up with a good book in my clean house and spend some time relaxing!