Living on a Prayer

I am amazed how teachers do it every day. And then they go home and take care of their children and their families. Obviously, I am constantly overwhelmed, but there are days speckled in there when I feel on top of everything, and that things are going smoothly. Anyway, I've been teaching for a month next week, and it just goes by way too fast! I'm going to come back to teaching, but I'm going to update on our weekend adventures first.

Two weekends ago, we went camping for the first time in Seattle. It was a ward camp out, so we didn't have to pack or cook any food. Score. We camped at Cascade Park, which is on the shores of the Stillaguamish River (oh my the names here kill ya). We set up our great red tent, and Ian realized he forgot the sleeping bags. Oops. Good thing we're both used to Utah camping and had packed two fleece blankets and a comforter as well. We ate smores, and watched the bishop cut a watermelon with a machete. We were the only ones without kids there, so we ended up staying up to watch the fire die out, and it was so nice, minus the lack of stars in the sky. It poured overnight, so our tent was soaked on the outside and I regretted not packing my rain boots. Oh well. We ate, and then I conquered archery. Turns out being a camp counselor paid off haha! After lunch, we packed up our wet tent to dry out in our apartment, and headed home.

our tent and the massive evergreen trees

Last weekend, the school had free tickets for teachers to the Washington State Fair, so of course I grabbed one on my way out. Saturday, we headed to Puyallup, found free parking on the street, and explored. There was so much food, and scones (fried rolls) are super popular up here. Also, something called elephant ears. Strange. Anyway, we wandered around all afternoon, saw lots of goats, sheep, and ducks, and hid from the pounding rain by the fireplaces they had for sale. We had a great time, and enjoyed some yummy ribbon fries and a foot long sausage with onions. MMM onions. We also got to play games with some couples in our ward, and it was a blast.

runner ducks look ridiculous

baby pigmy goat!!

hairy highland cows! These things were huge!

Now, back to teaching. Yesterday was Friday, and I always expect my students to not want to learn, but yesterday was not the case. Not only did they get a 4 at Library, but when the interim principal stopped by my classroom (our principal is on maternity leave) while I was teaching writing, and my students turned and talked to their partners perfectly, and offered the best answers I could have imagined. My goodness that never happens. Then, in the afternoon, they were begging to keep practicing rounding costs to the nearest dollar. Whattttt, since when do kids want to keep working and learning? And to top it all off, my high flyer child not only made it through the day without me feeling like a bully, but after school gave me a hug. A hug from the kid who argues and argues with me. What a great end of the week. Although Monday will be a whole new day, Friday was one of those days that made the stress and workload worth it.