Published!

So, I have this amazing best friend that I look up to in many ways.  Not long ago, she had her graduate research project published and that made her even more cool (if that's even possible).  She was even mentioned in several articles for her findings on fathers. Here's one of them. I knew that I could never be in the same league as her and all those who have had their works published.  Apparently, I was wrong.

Introducing: 

a book written by me!  

It may be full of spelling and grammatical errors.

It may be dull at times.

It may even contain images that I don't exactly have the rights to.

But, it's mine.

If you are just dying to read it's contents,

you can find them at this blog.

Yes, this one.

It's a blog book. 

My *talented pet, Gil, made the back cover!

He couldn't be more proud! 

Thanks Mamacita and Papas Fritas for the amazing Christmas gift!

You're the my favorite parents!

*You may be thinking, "Your fish is talented? I highly doubt that."

Well, he is. He is talented at getting food (he takes after me).

He saw me walk into the kitchen one night and started splashing water like crazy.  He was giving me a signal that I had been neglectful and forgot his dinner.

Smart fish. 

Another Good Idea, Bad Idea

It's time for another "Good Idea, Bad Idea."

Good Idea: Sending a secret email to all of your roommate's friends about her birthday surprise.

Bad Idea: Including your roommate as a recipient in the email. *

*Note: If this does happen to you, be sure that you have a sneaky friend that can break into said roommate's email account and delay any traces of it before she sees it.


Good Idea: Wearing nylons to church on a cold day.

Bad Idea: Choosing the pair of nylons that causes you to stop and think, "Huh. I wonder why these are tucked to the side as if I was trying to hide them from myself."**

**Below is a carefully crafted image to help you picture what might happen. The green arrow is pointing to wear nylons would normally go up to.  The orange line is where they really will be after about forty minutes of church.

Missing Eyes

After receiving his graded test today, one of my students came up to me with a big grin on his face.

Student: Miss J, this is so funny.  You forgot to put eyes on this smiley face.
Me: That's not a smiley face.  It's a "C." That's your grade.

The Joys of Grading

Of all the assignments I get to grade, essays are the ones I put off for as long as possible.  When I actually get around to grading them, I find it to be quite enjoyable (just like practicing the piano). Here are just a few gems from the essays I graded this evening (the night before progress reports are to be sent home):

"I went over to my friend's house and we jumped on his trampaling." 

"I ate a handburger. It was delicious."

"We went to ride the rollercoaster but I wasn't tall in of."

"I woch Sbooby Doo with dad."

Mix Tape

Mr. Sandman was my bff last night.  He brought me some crazy vivid dreams.  It really is quite unfortunate for the rest of you that you weren't there and also that I was unable to write them down before spelling rules and the Judicial Branch and the order of operations and my fly being down for 1.5 hours started to fog up my memory.

So, here's what's left:

I walked up to my bedroom door to discover that someone had decorated the whole thing with red butcher paper and coded messages.  I followed a series of clues that lead me to my collection of cassette tapes.  I had to find a specific tape called "Mix Tape" and a certain song.  The song that was originally there had been dubbed over my whoever sent me on this chase.  Through the song, I learned that this person wanted to take me to a Valentine's dance.

Later on in my dreaming, I went over to my parents' house.   I was there for about an hour and when I left, I couldn't find my car anywhere.  I concluded that someone had stolen it.  I decided that the best way to get my car back was to walk around the neighborhood until I saw my car (because when people steal cars, they stay within walking distance).  There was not a single car parked in the entire neighborhood.  Why not? Well, it's because all the youth from my parents' church were having a sleepover in the neighborhood streets.  There were teenagers lined up for several blocks in sleeping bags on the asphalt.  I never found my car.



The first part makes more sense if you know these 2 things about my life:

1) I have this super cool sister who knows how to throw a shindig.  It was her birthday a few weeks ago and she had a super sweet 90s party.  Among all the radness, one of my favorite things was the super fly invitation I received that was patterned after a Walkman with a cassette tape inside.

2) I drove back from a quick trip to Vegas last night.  I was there with my amazing coworkers for a literacy conference.  I learned a lot and I had such a great time with them.  During the car ride home, we talked about almost everything-including how we had asked boys out to dances in high school.

I've got nothing to explain the 2nd part of my dream.

Sunday Morning Dreams

My church time changed to 2:00 pm today.  As feared, I slept in way longer than I should have.  Fortunately though, I got some good dreams out of that extra sleep time.

Dream 1:

It was my birthday, so I invited all of the third graders to my party (who would do that?).  One of their parents agreed to host it at her house.  I had a lot to do that day and was way behind schedule.  I stopped at the mall to fulfill another obligation first.  I soon realized that I had no idea where the party was located.  The mother hosting my party called and asked how much longer she should hold the kids there.  I never made it to the party.

Dream 2:

I went to New York City with my fam.  The hotel lobby TVs warned us that another big storm was coming.  I thought to myself, "Why did we think it would be okay to come here right after Hurricane Sandy?"  A hotel employee gave us a copy of their emergency evacuation plan. The atmosphere was starting to get a little tense.  I continued to check the TV monitors and then a credit card commercial came on.  At the bottom of their credit card, there was a quote.  It read, "This storm will not be as bad as Sandy. -Dieter F. Uchtdorf" 

That's when I knew we'd be okay.  I had been walking around with a toothbrush in my mouth.  I went to return it to the medicine cabinet and discovered that my toothbrush was already in it's place. I was using someone else's toothbrush. Hope they don't find out! 

Dream 3:

I lived in a very nice home and had invited my students over (perhaps I felt bad for missing my own birthday party earlier).  Everything went well and then their parents came to pick them up.  I went in the backyard to get them and discovered that they had all jumped in our lake. How was I going to explain this to their parents? How did they even get in there? I tried asking my husband (yes, I had a husband) what had happened, but everything was a bit chaotic and I never got an answer.  

Past Halloween Awards

The award for most frustrating costume goes to...

The Scarecrow from Wizard of Oz

Even though I went trick or treating with my sister 

and everyone could easily tell that she was Dorothy,

nobody could figure out who I was.

(Don't blame yourself mom, you did a great job at sewing all that hay into my overalls)

Least disguising disguise...

Witch

I was so sure that nobody would recognize me with my green face paint,

pointed nose, and frizzy hair.

I was wrong.

Most repeated costume...

Hippy

One of the best decisions my mom ever could have made was

to save her bell bottoms from the 70s.

Best Costume...

Siamese Twin from the 80s

I will always hold dear in my heart the year that 

Irene and I scrambled around Provo to sew two eighties outfits together.

Nothing could top the ghetto blaster we took turns carrying on our shoulders.

Also, I loved that my "twin" was almost a foot shorter than me.

So bummed that I don't have photographic evidence of this one.

This will have to suffice:

Best Choice Made On Halloween Night...

Foregoing trick-or-treating

so that I wouldn't miss

this film on TV:

(Yes, we owned a VCR)

Worst Halloween Choice

If you get invited to a party the weekend before Halloween and it says: "Costumes optional,"
what that really means is: "Don't wear a costume and you'll be tagged in an embarrassing picture on facebook, so all your 'friends' can give you grief for not dressing up." Next year, I better plan ahead better.

I've been...

...so excited that fall is here/coming.

I've made pumpkin waffles twice already. 

And I don't plan on stopping there. 

...hoping that my doc fixed up my spine for good.

A simple outpatient procedure over fall break 

may have changed my whole life for the better. 

...addicted to Rush Hour.

These plastic trucks and cars are starting to upset me

more than actual rush hour does. 

...reading this book.

So good. Don't let the creepy cover art deter you. 

...consuming Higley Hot Dogs.

Our family's form of currency.

...staring at this cute face. Not mine, the baby's. 

Unfortunately, the mustache pacifier is MIA. 

Now you're all caught up on what I've been doing.

Hopefully I'll have some good dreams to share soon.

As of late, they've been less than compelling.

Letters of Recommendation

Here are a few reasons why my students would recommend me as a teacher:

1. She is a nice teacher and she teaches me stuff very good.
2. She'll never leave you behind!
3. She loves teaching! (and owls.)
4. She never raises her voice.
5. When I rais my hand she coms to me right away.
6. She rocks!

and my favorite response is...

6. She rights fast.

and the best dad award goes to...

Hey Dad!

I wanted to say thank you 

for the AMAZING Dutch oven apple cobbler!

You're the best!

Love,

Boppy

P.S. It was totally worth poking a toothpick in there 20 times.

I wasn't smart enough to take a picture of my dad's cobbler.

This is the closest I could get.

It doesn't really even compare.

Helicopters and Heat

Recently, my middle-of-the-night activity mostly includes me waking up and thinking that it's morning. It's rather confusing and getting kind of old.  Last night, though, I slept all the way until morning!  Awesome! Plus, Mr. Sandman brought me a dream! Double awesome! So many exclamation points!!

I logged into facebook (or faceboard, as my mom would say) and opened a message.  I've received dream texts and dream emails, but this was my first dream fb message. 

The lengthy message was from some kid that I knew in high school.  He told me about how I had totally missed out on seeing a helicopter landing. It was so cool.  I really should have been there.  Why didn't I go?  Everyone there loved it.   

While reading, I thought, "I wasn't invited to the event where this took place, so how could I have been there?" and "I've already seen a helicopter land.  It was pretty neat, but it got dirt all over the place."

Basically, I wasn't very enthusiastic about the message. However, there was one line in there about how I was as "hot as magma." That's 1300 °F to 2400 °F, people.  I was hoping to provide a super cool hot picture of magma for you, but since magma is below the Earth's surface, there only seem to be pictures of lava, which is not as hot and would be a false representation. 

Ashamed

That's the best word to describe how I've been feeling as I've been typing up the journal I used when I was 14-15 years old. Here are the top 3 reasons why I'm ashamed:

1. I wrote the word "tommorrow" incorrectly about a million times.

2. I complained A LOT

3. This entry:

"Later on we went to a church dance.  I had a pretty good time.  Hardly anyone I know was there but we made the most of what we had.  ______ asked me to dance w/ him.  What a surprise.  He’s asked me at every dance.  I wouldn’t mind it so much if he didn’t scare me.  There is this other guy that is stalking me.  He goes to summer school.  I hope I don’t see him there.  He asked me to dance with him at the last dance too.  Why can’t any hot guys ever stalk me?"



P.S. I did end up seeing that guy at summer school ALL the time. Only a few years later, I decided that both of the young men mentioned weren't so bad after all.

Practical

I am a pretty practical person.  So, I was pleased to see the practicality of one of my students today.

My class was solving a math problem that went something like this:

Jane bought 9 pieces of candy.  Each piece of candy costs 10 cents.  How much did Jane spend?

This student wrote 90 cents at first, but then changed it to one dollar.  

Why?

Sales tax.

Talk about students who are prepared for the real world. 

Take that Common Core Standards!

And now for some intriguing inventions I came across while searching for impractical things:

via

via

via

There are 2 types of people in this world...

...those who like Neil Diamond. And those who don't.

This weekend, I discovered that I'm a part of the latter group.

I also discovered that hosting a "What About Bob?" party can be a lot of fun.

As the guests arrived, a Neil Diamond CD from the library was playing.

I had to turn the volume down really low so as not to go insane.

 My new pet, Gil, was excited to see his namesake on the screen,

 so we started the movie.  

I love "What About Bob" more and more every time I see it.

There is almost always something new to find humor in.

One of my very wise guests pointed out that

Dr. Marvin's children are named after Sigmund Freud and his daughter Anna.

Bob loves that Fay's corn is hand-shucked.

After the movie ended, we had a corn shucking contest.

It was intense.

 And the winner of the Salt Substitute is...

Jen with 10.5 seconds!

Unfortunately, Dr. Marvin didn't show up for a book signing,

but we did enjoy reading the cover of Baby Steps.

If you ever need "a vacation from your problems,"

let me know and I'll gladly watch Bob with you too. 

My Special Present

As I went outside to greet my amazing, little students the other morning, one girl told me that she had a special present for me. 

Once we were inside, she opened her hand to reveal...

a breath saver!

How did she know that I was really hoping for an unwrapped mint that

had been held by 8-year-old hands?

Owl of the Week

To introduce how we do student of the week in my classroom, I was the first "Owl of the Week."  On Friday, we always write letters to that person.  Here are a few highlights from the letters I received:

"I hope you are haveing a grate time whith Hedwig...So how whod you feel if I got you a real live owl.  It would be cool.  No-Yes

"I like how some times you get out of your mind!"

"You are so nice to us in class. I hope you stay alive for ever."

"owls are nauternal (nocturnal) that means they hunt at night. I like nauternal animals they can catch pray wile they are sleeping they don't even know."

So there you have it.  They don't want me to die and nocturnal animals can catch prey while they are sleeping.  Who knew?

Single

In my dream last night, I was called up to the front office of the school to redo some paperwork that I had filled out incorrectly the first time.  One of the questions was about my marital status.   After marking "Single," the principal's secretary started hounding me.  She told me that I better stop slacking and start dating more often.  It was rather comical when I woke up.  I told her about my dream this morning and she promised to never bug me about my dating life. I'm glad that people are nicer to me in person than they are while I'm sleeping.

I feel like a lot of my recent posts have centered on the fact that I am man-less and childless.  I promise that I am really not as concerned/obsessed with these two facts as it may appear.

Map of my Heart

Ever wondered what my heart looks like? 

Well, I've mapped it out for you:  

I created this as an example for my students at school. 

I was going to add color, but I got lazy.

They're going to refer back to their own heart maps when they are stuck on what to write about.

As you may have noticed, the top left corner of my heart is currently vacant.

If you have any suggestions of any kind, I'd love to fill it.  Especially if your suggestion involves a man. :)

Baby Hungry

Ever since my sweet little nephew arrived, I have been thinking about babies a lot.  I had a dream that I was adopting a baby earlier this week.  The problem is that every day I wake up, I am still having a hard time knowing what's real and what isn't.  It's happened before with several other supposed middle-of-the- night deliveries (including rabbits), but now it's a baby. My thoughts as I'm getting up have included, "I really need to clean my room or the adoption agency won't think I'm a suitable mom" and "Today is baby day!"  I really hope that my half-conscious self will start realizing that there won't be any newborns delivered to my house at 3:00 or 5:00a.m.  It's hard to go back to sleep after such a rush of emotions.

One Thing

via

I had no idea as I was reading The Book of Mormon this week, just how much it was preparing me for what was to come.  So many things went wrong at work today, but I was still able to find great joy in one thing. I would like to share that one thing with you:

After talking about how unwise it is to hide papers from your parents, one girl went on and on about how you should never feed your homework to your babysister.  

When she finished explaining this important concept, she ended with,

 "And by the way, that was a story about me.  I fed my homework to my sister once."

Another girl chimed in, "Well, her sister definitely has lots of learning in her head."

I was cracking up. 

And here is the line from Alma 56:9 that gave me the strength I needed today:

 "But behold, here is one thing in which we may have great joy."  

Dream Within A Dream?

I was so excited that I remembered my dream the other day.  

I jotted down a few notes so that I could blog about it later on.

Since that day, I have not seen those "notes."

My only explanation:

I wrote my notes down in another dream :(

Under Attack

Of all the insects that could be in my house,

 I am glad that we only have a cricket problem.  

Crickets used to not bother me at all.

But now that I see them all the time, I'm starting to loathe them.

Meet my current best friend:

The Bug Wrangler

It's designed for little kids to catch bugs 

and has a built in magnifying glass to observe them.

I just use it so that I don't have to squish the bugs. 

 Here's one of tonight's catches.

I'm so regretting not taking a picture when I had 6 crickets trapped at once.

Growing into my Name

Did your mom say everyone else's name in the family before getting to yours? 

Whenever my mom tries to say my name, she almost always says my sister's first.

Only she doesn't say her whole name-she catches herself before getting to the second syllable.

So, it comes out like this:

"And Bethany"

but it sounds like this:

"Aunt Bethany"

For years, I have tried to explain to her that I'm not an aunt.

But now I am

(and I couldn't be happier)!!!

No more of this only being a vicarious aunt for my friends' kids and their nieces/nephews.

Back to School...

I love my new class.  

It's only been three days, but they are hard workers and have A LOT of character. 

One boy in my class is already having a hard time with the people at his table.  I was impressed that he took matters into his own hands on the second day of school.  He propped this paper up on his desk to let his peers know how serious he is about getting his work done.  

*name has been changed

The "Locked" Diary

 One of my summer goals was to finish transcribing 
the three diaries I used from ages 7-13.  I finished today! 
The finally diary I did had a lock on it. 

I bet you're dying to know how to open this highly sophisticated lock.

Just turn it to the letter "I" and voila! It opens!

To celebrate the completion of this task (with a week left to spare-booya!),

I'll share some of my top favorite lines from this particular diary.

7-30-94
Yesterday was Stephanie’s birthday party... Everyone got a Cabotell mine is pink, purple, and turqouise.  Stephanie got 3 cabodles and one had a ruby and a diamond ring in it.

...

I have a major crush on Nick.  He’s the cutest boy I have ever seen.  He’s 11.  He wears black and turqoise high tops.

...

When I grow up I am going to get married in the temple and I want a suburban and 4 kids.  that makes 6 people in my family.  

8-2-94

We’re listening to Power 92 . It’s I saw the sign.

Saturday 10-1-94

My Aunt Barb is having a baby boy in December. I’m so exited to have another cousin.  His name might be Colton.  I will always listen to my parents.  

Sunday 10-2-94

I don’t like Nick anymore.  I don’t know why I did. I never even knew him.  There is a boy in my class named Shane.  I think he’s really cute.  

Now, to move on to the rest of my journals...

This might take a while. 

Back to School

I had my first back to school dream this week. Only this time, it wasn't the students that made it frightening.  An old friend of mine showed up right before the first day was to begin and explained the sticky situation she had gotten herself in with one several past relationships.  She asked me to watch her daughter while she took care of some things and for some reason, I agreed to do so.  Watching the little girl proved to be trickier than anticipated.  By the end of the day, I didn't even know what I had taught students.   They probably all went home to complain about what a lame teacher they had.  

Glass House

I dreamed about staying in a house made completely out of glass. You couldn't get any privacy anywhere.  This made the process of taking a shower especially awkward for me.  It's not like the house was out in some secluded area either; there were tons of people outside looking in.  It was pretty much a nightmare for someone who isn't even comfortable in her own bedroom without clothes on.

Julie Andrews has the Solution

In this dream, I moved into a large house with my friends and a bunch of Emo kids.  I was up on a ladder, using an electric drill to help my friend hang up President Hinckley's Six Be's.  I did a terrible job at using the drill and ended up losing my balance and hanging from a board in an unfinished part of the house. If I fell, I would have gone all the way from the attic to the ground floor.  Since I was very clever and strong in this dream, I made it to safety. Phew.

The Emos had set up easels everywhere since they were really into painting.  They were also really into drinking, so Coors beer could be found all over the place. I needed to step outside for a moment. As I was exiting the house, it turned into this strange mall where nannies would watch all the children on one level and parents could do whatever they wanted on another.  The children were so heartbroken that they couldn't see their parents.

Once I got outside and away from the craziness, I sang "The Hills are Alive" while walking down a crowded street.  It made everything better.

Mafia and Motorboats

Remember how I found that note yesterday? Well in my dream last night, there was a series of numbers written at the bottom.  It came to my attention that these numbers meant something very important to the mafia.  I immediately regretted blogging about the note and did everything I could to keep the mafia from getting it from me. I blame this intense dream on the the mafia movie that I watched last night.

I had second dream where I was hanging out at a cabin with my friends.  A few of them were going somewhere, so I decided to go along for the ride.  We got to our destination in a motorboat.  As I was climbing out, I realized that I was barefoot.  My friend soon said, "Look what I found for you!" and then he handed me a pair of really nice sandals that were exactly my size.  Awesome.  We walked into a store and it dawned on me that I didn't have a suitable shirt on.  I was barely covered.  We looked in the store for one (even though I had no money with me), but they only had children's clothing.  My friends kept reassuring me that nobody would notice what I was wearing not wearing.  I still don't believe them.  In part, I'm going to attribute this dream to an episode of Phineas and Ferb that we watched last night to lighten our spirits after the mafia movie crushed them down.

Nice try, kids.

I'm not really sure why, but every year I don't reveal my age to my students until the end of the year.

And I make them do a complicated problem to figure it out.

This year, only one student was able to do the math, but he told everyone else.

Enough with the background info.

I went to my classroom today to drop off/pick up some things.

Since the A/C was off and I was sweaty already,

I decided to unstack the desks and move them around a bit.

This piece of paper fell out of one of the desks:

(reads "Miss J is 28 year old")

I can't believe that someone tried to give away my secret to my next class.

But, I am impressed in their clever method of sharing my secret age.

Not clever enough for this teacher, though.