My Life's Work... even on Spring Break! :)

Seven o'clock in the morning the sun starts to pour into my windows, the scent of coffee brewing wafts into my bedroom, the words from my Bible move from the paper into my soul, annnnnnd, cue two dirty dogs pouncing and trampling their little paws all over me.  I don't know how Brewer manages to get himself to the degree of dirtiness that he does, but he comes in with this panting smile on his face as though he doesn't know his long legs are cloaked with dirt.  Yet, I can't help but love him.  Even when he steals my slippers.
(Colbie wants her picture in here, too).  

 

This week my mom was able to witness our new home and go behind the scenes of a third grade teacher at work!  (She was overwhelmed with all the excitement of my job... but really, it is pretty hectic).  Being able to reflect on my teaching and my students' growth through out the year is vital, and for me, it tends to happen on my drive home from school.  Unfortunately (or fortunately) I am not able to write/type these reflections down as I am driving, leaving all these epiphanies lost and gone forever.  How can I possibly recall all the events, big or small, that have happened this school year for memory without them becoming mixed together with others?  My thoughts are all jumbled up, and all I know is that I have not failed to learn even more than I did last year.  All I can do now, is move forward & focus on the last quarter of this year, and get myself ready for the next year!  
Currently, my third graders are just now on Spring Break for two weeks and when they come back, all this year's preparations and hard work will fall into place as they will take the AIMs testing.  How could they not do amazing?  Through all the practices tests, they've made growth.  Through all the test prep packets (all color-coded with matching labels), they've seen and done every skill they "need to know".  I care so much about how my students do, and they know it!  However, I am sooo looking forward to using their learning from this year and using higher level thinking activities to reinforce it all.  I am most excited for my High Fluency readers to do Reader's Theater with a focus on character traits/feelings, differences between genres, and the importance & influence of setting on a plot. 
I am so thankful to GOD for letting me be a part of these children's lives and that he gave me this passion, despite the crude people out there who don't understand the life of a teacher! 
I could completely let other people's words and beliefs destroy my love of my profession, but I have something they don't.  I have a foundation built on rock - it doesn't shift when people give negative critiques to what I do, or when people who haven't gone to college work in a business and look down on teachers... (if you can read this, thank a teacher.. you wouldn't have that job you're working at if you never had a teacher... I wonder... do they think they would have just learned the things they know just by being "brilliant" by nature?) 
I am so fulfilled by my life's work and trust that God is using me to speak to my students the words they need to hear so they grow up with strong morals & righteous thinking.  I believe my students will not be selfish, but self-less.. and in doing so, they will gain their hearts' desires.  God gives to those who humble themselves and who are not self-seeking. He gives to those who give.  <3

To Have, To Hold... I Do!

Thank GOODNESS I was warned by various movies & unmentionable situations that after the BIG DAY, it's just back to life we go...  I am glad I got that heads up because we were able to prepare ourselves & just let God take over.  

Although I admit again and again that I was and always will be a bit of a "daydreamer", I hardly ever dreamed of my wedding day.  My mind chose not to for many reasons.  One was because as a little girl I just generally did not know what to expect & could not have imagined such a love, other than the ones of Disney princesses and their princes.  The second, I always believed in my heart that it should be something that deserved the wait for my soul mate - that we would plan it together and that it would be made as a perfect fit for US.  Many people would say, the guy doesn't do any of the work & it's the bride's day.  Fortunately, God knew I wanted an involved man, because that's what He gave me!  Chris and I were able to plan what we wanted and believed was important for OUR big day.  We had all kinds of friends and family who graciously catered to our every need and, with the Grace of God, our day was as perfect as I EVER could have dreamed.  It truly was a fairy tale day and I was the princess with my prince charming, all that stuff that was really just a little too mushy to dream up as a little kid! 


2010 was a dream in itself for me as Chris and I started dating in January after only knowing each other one month.  A month prior to that I had the most amazing encounter with God and was told to make a list of all the MOST detailed characteristics I wanted in my soul mate, even the location of our meeting (outside & NOT drunk!), so I would immediately know.  One week after doing that, I was outside... (of a bar).. neither of us drinking... and there we met. And although I still don't believe in "love at first site", I do believe in "knowing at first site".. knowing that God is and always will be faithful.  I didn't want to creep the guy out, so of course I didn't tell him just yet... I waited a couple weeks.. and I prayed that if we were meant to be together, it wouldn't scare him off.  The power of prayer is INCREDIBLE, because a year later and we're living our happily ever after.  Our day was beautiful, even after little mishaps which I will not share other than having beer spilled on my face and down my dress that in the past would have left me screaming had I not grown up.  Our life together was and now even more so will be beautiful and joyful.  I said it only after an hour of being married while sitting in our limo, "Marriage really is the best thing ever! I LOVE being married!".  It is a blessing, as is any covenant with God. 

I Allison, take you Chris, to be my husband, my constant friend, my faithful partner, and my one true love.  I will cherish our union and love you more each day than I did the day before, to give and to receive, to speak and to listen, to inspire and to respond. I give you my hand, my heart, and my love, from this day forward in the presence of God, for as long as we both shall live; a commitment made in love, kept in faith, and eternally made new.

1 John 4:9-12

This is how God showed his love among us: He sent his one and only Son into the world that we might live through him. This is love: not that we loved God, but that he loved us and sent his Son as an atoning sacrifice for our sins. Dear friends, since God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has ever seen God; but if we love one another, God lives in us and his love is made complete in us.

Ecclesiastes 4:9-12

Two are better than one, because they have a good return for their work: If one falls down, his friend can help him up. But pity the man who falls and has no one to help him up!

Also, if two lie down together, they will keep warm. But how can one keep warm alone?

Though one may be overpowered, two can defend themselves. A cord of three strands is not quickly broken.

A Teacher's Vacation

Cheers to summer 2010 - raise your icy cold flavored sparkling water to that! (I know a lot of you are drinking something else perhaps a little more potent, but this is what I've been drinking lately thanks to my mama).  It feels somewhat like it normally feels when I come home to Wisconsin to stay with my parents at the lake.  We're talking gourmet meals made by none other than my fantastic mom (I TRY to help but usually I'm just in awe of her chef-like abilities), time off with no crazy, chaotic schedule (but still a to-do/to-read list, those I like), and making arrangements to hang out with old friends (by old I mean they've been by my side for years and they're never gonna officially go away, no matter where our lives lead us!).  

However... this summer/time off is different than any other because I am no longer job searching when I get a free second from part time jobs and I am most definitely not working on homework for college courses.  

No, I am a teacher (ugh, I LOVE saying that!) and instead, I am spending the next 7 weeks relaxing, not a thing on my mind, and absolutely nothing to do! ... Please don't take me seriously there.... For real.  If you are a teacher, you probably know just what I'm talking about, but if not, let me just say that to most teachers, teaching is not just a profession. It is more like something I like to call, hmm how shall I put it.. ah yes, my LIFE.  That might be a bit extreme, but really, I think and talk about it way more than almost anything else.  Just because it's summer vacation and I'm at my summer lake home doesn't mean I haven't been working on all the fun, meaningful learning that's going to take place in my classroom next year.  This includes, but not limited to: looking up good-teacher-resources online, buying good-teacher-resources/books, and reading these good-teacher-resources so that I can start lesson planning for the new school year in August.  (trust me, I know- NERD ALERT - no wonder Chris likes me..?).  But the sickest thing about it may just be how excited I get about all of these teacher-reads.  

This doesn't necessarily even mean that I'm saving time for the new school year, because I'm sure I'll find a way to stay equally as consumed with my "work"... I might even still get frustrated with certain things that happen through out the course of my day when they don't go quite as planned (you just can't even escape that).  Especially when there's an unexpected new student, a missing sub for the teacher next door, the copy machine conveniently decides to stop working the second you really need something to hand out to your kids, tons & tons of standards that have to be taught within a certain deadline, or there's a case of the missing whatever that everyone's all caught up in.  And that's okay, that's what makes the job interesting and even more exciting.  (Again, if you're not a teacher, you are probably even wondering why you're reading this because I must be loca in the cabeza.. actually, I'm surprised you even made it this far!)

Anyway.  I just wanted to say, that even though I am excited (some may say obsessed, but that's a little much now), I am so enjoying this time with my family - they are so understanding and supportive of this love of mine, and so are my friends... or at least these people are nice enough to pretend like they are.  I think a big "Thanks guys :)" is needed! 

My lake home is the perfect little get away with my parents and pups, and anyone else who we deem awesome enough to visit us.  

When the time comes to head back to Arizona, I will be just as excited (especially because I miss my AZ family and crew.. heck, I always miss SOMEBODY somewhere!!)... but for now, this summer vacation ... piles of books and all... is simply refreshing (especiallyy my mom's cooking).

My Apple Seeds

Only a handful of days left until my first year of teaching draws to an end, and I really do think Madame Esme has it right when she says:

"It's an almost psychotic feeling, believing that part of their lives belongs to me. Everything they become, I also become. And everything about me, they helped to create."

At the beginning of the year when my sixth graders first walked in, I saw them as precious "apples"... and on my door I put their names on apples surrounding a big apple that says "the apples of my eye".  I explained this idiom to them when we first met as we talked about how exciting the year would be and how much they would learn and grow.  I wanted them to know they were MY apples and didn't want them to be scared, this was their classroom, too.  

This door display has stayed up all year long.. yet, as the year went on, my apples began to get bruised spots on them as  I started to get frustrated with their drama and behavior issues. I would close the door behind us while going to lunch and remember, they were still the apples of my eye.  

Even after I got saved to Jesus Christ, I couldn't help but have no idea what to do with these now "rotten" acting students of mine.  My apples were rotting and I was gauging my eyes out!!  Teaching sixth grade is a lot harder than it even sounds... not only are you teaching more complex/challenging content, but the DRAMA that gets in the way of this is just as much.  And even still, I would close the door behind them on our way to lunch (wanting to go back inside and lock the door behind me!) and remember: these precious kids are still the apples of my eye. My first class. As my roommate had said, "they can be brats, but they're MY brats!"

I have to say that if I didn't live my life for Jesus, going in to work that became more and more challenging with the mind set that I was serving him, I don't know if I could have made it.  My rotten little apples were testing me, and there were times in my mind where I wanted to call home and BEG to go back.  ("Isn't there any way I could just live at home and go back to being bored out of my mind with a part time job?"... I had too much pride... and faith, to do that).

That brings us to today.  This last quarter I have realized that these kids need me and I have been their teacher, even if only to teach them how to ask each other NICELY for someone to give them their pencil back... and things like that!  I know that some of my apples have a lot of crazy things going on back home and the last thing they need is a chaotic classroom where the teacher doesn't have any control.  They needed structure and discipline, and they've gotten a whole basket full and more this last half of the year.  Now, my apples are being polished and shiny new again.  They are learning that they need discipline in their lives, and I've learned that I have to be the one to give it to them.  We have all learned that being disciplined doesn't mean getting in trouble... it means knowing what to do and how to act even when someone's not watching/telling you.  I needed to learn this for my students, and now we are a much happier bunch... (can you tell that we have been studying idioms/figurative language..?)

Today, with my reading students, we read a poem called "Seeds".  I didn't realize how absolutely perfect this poem was for my students (I had just discovered it in a pile left behind by the previous teacher in my classroom!).  We read it and it talked about how the child "ate" the words that his parent spoke, and became those words (by speaking them and living by them).  At the end it says "For better or worse, the apple doesn't fall far from the tree".  We talked about how this meant the child is like their parent, because even when they grow up and "fall off the tree" you can still tell where they came from.  ... this is where it gets sweet.  My kids have accidentally been calling me "mom" a lot lately, and one of them said that as they go off to middle school next year, anyone would be able to tell they were my students because of the words I gave them.

My first very own students ARE and always will be the apples of my eye.  (even though I cannot, as many have requested, follow them to seventh grade!) When we went outside after class, I told them they had to stay near their apple tree (aka, me!).  Some of my closest apples came running right up to me and held on tight, some of the free-spirited apples took out a ball and ran around me... and I couldn't help but wonder as one of my apples (one that reminds me of me as a kid) walked beside me to the cross walk: will people really be able to tell my students apart from the rest?  But I guess it doesn't matter as long as they always remember what tree they come from! 

Receive the Joy

"If there's nothing worth dying for, there's nothing worth living for." 


For some, they might say their friends or family are reason enough to live, for others it would be their possessions they've worked so hard for, and for others it might just be that as long as they've had fun, they'd die happy. The thing is that "happiness" is solely an emotion.  Emotions change based on circumstances, at any moment in the day.  Most importantly, emotions are not eternal.  
If you asked me a few months ago, I would have said that once I got a teaching job, I'd be eternally happy - and now I have proof that it just isn't so.  It doesn't work like that.  I got my teaching job, and I was left unfulfilled.  I worked and I felt like a grown up, tried to have fun on the side.  At times I was happy, others I was stressed, other times just dead exhausted, or angry, or sad.   
Now some people might say that I've changed ever since I started going to Generations Church.  They're right, but my church isn't what changed me.  I had an encounter with Jesus and HE is who changed me.  I see things through different eyes - I've realized that I can't see things as the world does.  I can go to church, but this isn't what makes the difference in my life, being committed to God is.  I've made a huge leap and am learning how to surrender myself 100%.  
I can honestly say now that I still do experience emotions just like any other person, but I have something even better than happiness.  I have joy.  Joy is eternal.  Joy can go through all crisis.  When a typically stressful, overwhelming, scary, or saddening situation occurs during my day, I have to deal with my feelings, but it's not the roller coaster I used to ride on.  Despite anything that happens to me throughout my day, I have a comfort in me... I have true joy.  God's blessed me, and not because I'm even remotely perfect, but because he knows that I've put all my trust and faith in him.  That he could change anything around in my life, and it wouldn't matter because I have an abundance of him in my life.


The truth is that God doesn't ask us for anything.  He doesn't want or need anything from us.  All he wants is for us to be faithful.  This doesn't make us weak.  Faith isn't just something that works for a certain kind of person.  Having faith in God is for everyone... "what is life without the Life Giver?" Receive your true joy :) 


*Thank you Esmerelda for receiving this message in Colombia and bringing it back for me!

It's a Heart Issue

I used to be one of those people who wished for all kinds of things.  Things I believed would make me happy, if only I could just have it, my life would be made.  If I got it, I would just wish for something else.  Sometimes I'd get it, and I'd wish I never would have wished for that to happen in the first place.  That's where faith comes in.   I learned that wishing gets me no where... it often got me in trouble. 


Faith truly is "a heart issue".  Where is your heart at?  Some people worry and think that will get them somewhere when really it only stresses them out and frustrates them.  Other people become addicted to substances or idolize things or people because they believe it fills them up with what they need in order to be happy, or maybe just to numb their feelings.  When someone doesn't just know about God, but they know Him, they know Him on a personal level, and they don't make faith/church/God a compartment of their life, but they make it apart of their whole life, everything they do, they are giving up all their burdens.  They no longer have to carry that with them and they can live a life with true abundance.   God doesn't want to see us depressed, that's not something someone should ever have to accept as a part of their life!  He doesn't want to see us hurt and overwhelmed - why should anyone have to live a life like that??  When something wrong happens, I was told, that alarms should be going off in our heads - but "instead of being fearful, we should act practical, be wise, have a faithful heart because Jesus already died at the cross for us - he paid for all of these sins, for us!  Bring all of those hurts and worries to the cross, be done with it" and live in peace.  


I've realized that by having a heart wide open, God is able to get in and pour in what he wants to bless me with.  I am faithful for what I've been given, and I want to use it so I can be trusted with more blessings.  People will often be worried about worldly things, bad things that might happen to them or people they love, but it is completely "impossible to fail when you are dependent on the cross."


"Man is the sum of his thoughts." A mind renewed by true faith "does not permit thoughts of poverty, scarcity, ruin, frustration, or failure."  Rather, "the thoughts of the diligent surely lean toward abundance."


Where is your heart at?  Does your heart wish only to be left with worry and frustration?  Or is your heart dependent on the cross "so that you may live life, and live it more abundantly"?


"People who don't pray think they don't need God.  They think they can do it all on their own.  Wishing will never be a substitute for prayer.  In prayer it is better to have a heart without words, than words without a heart.   Humble yourself and pray."  -Pastor Rich Wittmer 


[thank you to all the pastors and leaders at Generations Church for helping me see these revelations and for all the time you devote to spreading the word of God every day.  And most importantly, thank you God for living in my heart.]

Falling into 2010!

Well. It IS 2010! Welcome Mr. New Year. Thank you, as always, for a fresh start. :)


This year has a lot to live up to, considering I had a long list of resolutions last year and accomplished them ALL (except one.. i love downloading music too much to stick with that one, plus I got talked out of it). 
I lived up to my resolutions, and did some extraordinary things in 2009:

• Volunteered at the Children's Museum, resulting in a part time job
• Taught all kinds of kids at Sylvan Learning Center
• Deemed Valentines Day as "Love the People in my Life Day/Hearts are a cool shape day"
• Had my first Tropical Escape Birthday Party.. not to mention, I turned 23 and loved it!
• Got a gym membership & a short term personal trainer 
• Learned how to wake board (about time, huh?)
• Went to Country Fest for the first time... & loved it, minus getting kicked
• Got a full time teaching position in Arizona
• Got one of my best friends a full time teaching position in AZ.. and got her to move in with meee :)
• Bought & fell in love with my first new car... Ella the Elantra 
• Survived the first half of the year with a bunch of 6th graders
• Self-appointed myself as the Cheer Coach
• Went floating down the Colorado River... in the day AND in the night
• Traveled the whole five minutes to Mexico
• Cooked all kinds of new things with my roomie - including oven - explosive Ziti
• Drove to California for the first time by myself, in the dark, with no GPS 
• Dressed up as a Ghost Buster for Halloween
• Discovered an amazing church & had an Encounter!! <3
• Made a covenant with God to have a devotional life
• Learned how to truly forgive & be at peace with myself
• Built a fort with my roomie in our living room.. even created fort building gear
• Had Thanksgiving in Hollywood!
• Went to my first Christmas Party OUTSIDE without being freezing cold
• Made it home to my friends and family in WI without turning into an icicle!
• Prayed & witnessed so many miracles! 

No pressure 2010... you are the year of surprise and more miracles - I won't worry about it :)