Highs and Lows

It's been a while since I've posted.  By a while, I mean it's been months.   As in, since Thanksgiving.  So much has happened, so much is changing - it's easier to look back and just remember things as isolated events, even though many of them have happened simultaneously, and to not even necessarily think of them in chronological order - in other words, things have really been a blur, a series of highs and lows and blahs in between...

Highs -

Brent and I went on quite a trip for Christmas Break this year.  We left the day after school let out to go to St. Petersburg, Florida, to spend Christmas with his dad and his wife.  The weather was beautiful - in the mid 70's and sunny every single day - and we enjoyed walking on the beach and going sailing... and then on Christmas Day we flew into a blizzard to see Brent's mom and grandmother in Buffalo, New York.  Talk about a climate change!

Meeting Brent's grandmother has been a much anticipated moment - this sweet woman is 93 years old and she is so full of life and love and laughs.  I am so glad that I finally got to meet her and get to know her.

We were also so glad to spend time with Brent's mom again.  We haven't seen her as often as we'd like ever since she moved to New York.  She's doing well, but we're not-so-secretly hoping that she'll move back to Texas near us again one day.  We also got to see his Aunt Christie and his cousins Lynn and Larry.

Another high is that we went to Toronto, Canada for our one year anniversary.  We stayed in a beautiful hotel right in the center of downtown, shopped for Christmas ornaments in the underground path and the St. Lawrence Market, had dinner at the nicest restaurant I've ever eaten at, and went ice skating under the Christmas lights at Nathan Phillips Square.

And right before we left New York to come back to Texas, we braved the weather once again to see Niagara Falls from the Canadian side... the falls froze over a few days later.  It was 9 degrees while we where there.  That was my first time to ever experience single digit weather - how do people live in the negative digits?!

It really was a trip of a life time - we were so glad that we were able to spend the holidays with so many of Brent's family members.  Needless to say when we got home we were absolutely exhausted... we really needed another vacation to recover from our vacation... and that's when I got the bad news.


Lows-

Coming back to school after break I found out that our eighth grade science teacher had quit - the solution would be to dissolve a fifth grade class make our classes larger but down to only three homerooms so that I would be able to teach 8th grade science... then we were able to find a long-term sub... but then we lost our 6th grade reading teacher.  Since then I've been assigned to teach a 6th grade reading and language arts class along with my science classes.  It has been a tremendous teaching load with two STAAR subjects not even within the same core.

Then more bad news... KIPP and Galveston decided to break their contract due to financial reasons for next year, meaning my school will no longer be a KIPP school and I would need to reapply to work for either KIPP in Houston, through Galveston ISD, or look for another job.  I've been working hard to put together my resume and do some soul searching about what will be best for me and Brent.  In the end, I've decided that I'm going to apply to as many school districts as I can and hope that I have options to choose from.   It's been very emotional because I love the island, but it can be a very difficult place to work as a teacher.  I love KIPP - I believe in its mission and I am proud to be a part of it - but the hours are extremely long and I do not want to add much commute time to and from a Houston school.  Even if we lived half way, it would still be a half hour commute with no traffic... and school lets out a rush hour.


Mixed Emotions-

We have been so blessed to have a close-knit community of friends through church and school.  Our friends are beginning to graduate and relocate for their new jobs.  It's a joy to celebrate with them, but it's also becoming very difficult for me to say good bye.  All three summers that we've lived here, I've had a close friend move away.

Brent is getting closer and closer to graduation.  It seems like we're finally starting to see the light at the end of the tunnel--this is his last semester that he'll be a full-time student.  He'll graduate in May 2015, so he has two more semesters as a part-time student with hopefully a paid internship.  This summer he'll be going on commercial cruise - he'll leave in mid-May and be back around mid-August.  We have no idea if we'll be able to talk at any point during those 90 days.  I know that this is what we need to do to get us where we need to be - but the idea of a summer without my husband and without my close friends really weighs on me.

STAAR testing is getting closer and closer every day too.  I am still teaching to the best of my ability day in and day out, even though I feel like many of my co-workers have thrown in the towel.  I love everything that I teach from here on out - it's life science!  We just benchmarked my students with the released STAAR from last year though, and the results weren't exactly pretty.  I haven't taught a third of my content, which was 19 out of 44 questions on my test, but I'm still on track with my scope-and-sequence and am trying not to panic and just focus on what I need to do to help them be as successful as possible.  It's wearing me out though -- at minimum I work 11 hours a day, plus several hours on the weekends.  I should be working right now.


Hopes on the horizon -

This summer I'll be staying with my parents to save a little money and to not be alone while Brent is away.  I'll be working as the children's ministry summer assistant at Friendswood United Methodist Church with Lee Ann, my long-time friend and boss when I was in high school and college.  I couldn't have landed a better summer job, and I can't wait to see all of my friends that I made when I worked there as the Associate Director of Student Ministry.

I'm hoping that I'll be able to find a teaching position soon.  Ideally I'd love to find a position teaching elementary school or middle school in Friendswood, Clear Creek, or Dickinson--and I'd love to find one sooner rather than later.

And I can't wait to meet my nephew Jonah in June and celebrate one of my best friend's weddings in July.  Get in shape.  Walk the dog.   Lay by the pool.  Read.  Breathe.  Go two days without crying.  Actually sleep the recommended number of hours a night.  Not work every night at home.



All of these things are so overwhelming.  Everything is changing so fast and still seems to be gaining momentum.  I think I'm getting motion sickness.  One day, one hour, one moment at a time.  I know that God stands beside us through all of this, that He is with us every step of the way.  I feel like I am having to trust Him more than ever with all the uncertainties.