Philippines!

I am off to the Philippines! I will be leaving today, the 24th and coming back on January 2nd. I am going with 5 other SM's. I will try and keep you all posted as to our fun adventures but if I cannot get to a computer I will definitely write about it when I return. Please pray four our safe travels and good fun.

Merry Christmas to all!!

Much Love until next time...:-D

Just a glimpse of God's work

So I had a pretty amazing experience today. Let me preface by saying a few weekends ago Ale, Haslel, and I (my roommates) decided to make a list of 20 things we want to do before we leave Palau and it really got me thinking about my true goals for this whole experience. Anyways, I decided to see what goals my students really have for their lives, so I gave them an in class activity and the directions were to write 20 things they want to do before they die. I was expecting most of them to just think of little things that 3rd graders think of and copy from my ideas but I was totally touched, surprised, and filled with laughter to read their answers when they turned them in. I would like to share a few with you...

Genesis- one of my tough kids--
1. Go skydiving
2. go snowboarding
3. Learn more things
4. Learn to Respect people
5. Go to College

Vi-my sweet girl--
1. Meet Hannah Montana
2. Be a Princess
3. See snow
4. Decorate a Christmas Tree
5. To have my own piano

Taldil-my amazing Pianist--
1. Learn how to make a piano
2. Be a Hannah Montana Staff
3. Go to the Taj Mahal
4. I want to be with Jesus
5. Play with Snow

Ilang- My little drama queen-- (this one brought tears to my eyes)
1. Climb a skyscraper
2. Live in black and white
3. Live in 1884 (HA!)
4. Be a spy
5. See Ms. Ashley in heaven

Reklai- My cute little story teller--
1. Visit Ms. Ashley in Tennessee
2. Get a very cool car
3. Get a girlfriend (HA!)
4. be a wrestler
5. act very cool

None of those were ideas that I had given them! I am so impressed at God's work within these children. It was soo amazing to see just a glimpse of the great work God is truly doing in their hearts each day. I'm so inspired. I love them more and more each day.

Hope this touched you as much as it did me.

Much love and prayers to you...until next time...:-D

New Pictures

Just wanted to announce that new pictures are posted on my Picasa web album which you can acces by clicking on the Pictures link. I added new pictures to the diving, Fun in Palau, scenery, and my students albums.

ENJOY! I KNOW I AM!

LOVE! :-D

December Diving

I went diving on Sunday!! It was soooooo much fun!! We have this great deal going with a local dive shop named Day Dream. We get 3 dives for $40 whenever and wherever we want to go. They love us! We have so much fun with the dive master and the other staff divers. Our dive master's name is Soachi (So-I) and our driver's name is Boxy but when he first introduced himself to us we thought he said Foxxy so now we call him Foxxy B. HA! Then our other staff diver is named Spiece. We have inside jokes and sayings for all of them. They always want to go on our dives because they say we are so much more fun. We like to laugh and have fun....what can I say. :-D

Anyways, on this particular trip we went on 3 dives. Our divespots were German Channel, Blue Corner, and Helmet Ship (a shipwreck dive!). At German Channel we saw 2 mantarays and at both German Channel and Blue Corner we saw TURTLES!!! I was soooo excited!! The shipwreck dive was so cool. The ship sunk in 1944 during WWII. It's called Helmet Ship because a bunch of helmets were left and you can find them scattered through the ship. There were also old beer bottles left behind, guns, bombs, and barrels of something. We were able to go through the whole ship and stood on the bow of the boat like in Titanic. The bow was the lowest point sitting at about 75-80 feet down. It was a blast. There are pictures posted!

In the end, I'm more than happy that I went diving and I can't wait to go again. By far the turtles were the highlight of my trip and it's funny because now every time I see the other divers they always tease me about how excited I was. I'm sure you can imagine my excitement. :-D

Hope this finds everyone well...until next time. Much Love!

Thanksgiving....resort style!

Ok, so apparently I'm really bad at writing on this thing because clearly I haven't written in over 3 weeks. Moving on...THANKSGIVING!!! My all time favorite holiday! Honestly I had been dreading Thanksgiving for the sole reason of I would be away from my family and clearly this is the holiday that everyone gets together, eats turkey, and watches the Lions game. EVERY YEAR. Without fail. I was pretty upset that I would miss it but thankfully God knew just what I needed to take my mind off of being away from my loved ones. After all was said and done I had 3 full Thanksgiving meals, all wonderfully prepared by people of the community (not all on the same day btw) and a much better attitude about the Thanksgiving holiday. :-D

Well, it started out with my adoptive Palaun mother (all of the SM's have adoptive parents and they do things for us and make us feel at home etc.) Her name is Sarah and we hadn't really done much of anything together for the past few months with the excpetion of saying hello at church. Well this past weekend, she set me and Ale (a fellow SM, my roommate, and my Palauan cousin because her adoptive mom is my adoptive moms sister) up at a local resort that she works at for the weekend. The resorts name is Palau Pacific Resort (PPR). We had heard a lot about it but hadn't ever been there. Well since my mother works there she gets rooms and stuff for free so she sent us there and we got to stay in a room with a t.v. and eat and swim and do all kinds of stuff....FOR FREE!! It was so amazing! It was like being in the states...only on a much nicer beach! We had T.V. in our room and we certainly utlized that via the disney channel and ESPN and all of the other priveleges.

One funny story was I went to the bathroom in our room and it had butt rinsers and dryers! Of course I had to try it out. Weird experience I'm not gonna lie. AND!! Our shower had hot water!! In our apartment we don't get hot showers...ever. You best believe I took multiple showers within that less than 24 hour period. It was amazing.

Point of the story is...I'm really thankful that my Palauan mother was so gracious as to set us up at the resort because not only did it make me feel loved but it also made me feel as though I really wasn't that far away from home after all.

In the end, I had an amazing Thanksgiving, and though I missed the Lions playing and my precious family, I know there will be other times and that God has good plans for me.

Hope this finds everyone well.

Mucho Amor until next time :-D

Redeeming Love

I am finally over my cold!! I was so bummed on Sunday when I couldn't go diving due to my head cold. Every diver knows that going diving when sick is like a death sentence...so I stayed home and graded. I got a lot done...as far as diving....maybe next time which will hopefully be next weekend.

This week was a really great week. I finally came to the realization that God needs to be the ultimate center of everything in my life. I have found that no matter how many times people may tell me to make him the center of my life and how much I try to tell myself that He needs to be...I just needed to figure it out on my own. And this week, I'm not sure how, but I did! I already feel much better about a lot of the situations in my life such as with my students, their parents, roommates, my family, and being away from home. God has sent peace to my heart and as I write this I have tears in my eyes for the joy and surrender that I am experiencing. I always get so irritated with people telling me how to "find God" and how to give up control...and though I will probably still get irritated when people tell me how it is, I now FEEL His peace. This peace God has given me is just overwhelming and though it will not be easy to maintain this feeling, I have true faith, for the first time in my life, that God will carry me through and that He is in COMPLETE and TOTAL control. What a great feeling!

All of these feelings made my week so much better and caused me to have great fun with my kids. Yesterday was International Day and as a school function we had a food fair type thing with all of the students countries represented. Anyways, my class went to the fair at our specified time and we had a blast! We tried all kinds of food and played with origami and what not from all these other countries. The countries represented were the Phillipines, Palau, Sri Lanka, Japan, Korea, and Indonesia. It was so cool to see my kids dressed up in their native wear and to have them run to me, grad my hand, and take me to a booth saying "Teacher teacher come try this food...it's so good, we eat it all the time at home." What a great time we had! I tried all kinds of random foods, some really tasty, some not so much, but the bonding between me and my students was priceless.

In the end all that's left for me to say is I am so grateful for the peace, relaxation, and fun spiritedness that God has bestowed upon me this week. Thank you for letting me share all of this with you and I pray that you will find your way in your spiritual walk with the help of God's REDEEMING LOVE.

Much love to all until next time....:-D

2 weeks in a nutshell

So it's been WAY too long since I've written and for that I truly apologize. I will try to recap the last couple weeks but for the short version... I've been yelled at by a crazy parent TWICE, fallen out of my hammock (huge bruise to prove it), watched some great basketball, totally rearranged my classroom, and had a surprise day off of school.

Now for the long version...

2 weekends ago (the weekend of parent teacher conferences)was a long weekend. It was the most amazing long weekend because my housemates and I were able to do some real exploring of the town we live in and we found some pretty interesting stores. There are a lot of souvenir shops and a lot of knock off brands of Chanel, Dior and other such expensive brands. There are also a lot of creepy, nasty, unhealthy looking dogs and let's just say I stay far away from them. Since it was around Halloween time there were a lot of costumes out...we had a lot of fun trying them on and taking pictures. The workers were just laughing and probably thinking "those crazy Americans." Oh well, it was fun. :-D Pictures are posted as well. On that long weekend we also went to the championship game of the National Filipino basketball league here in Palau. We had a few friends on the Surangel team so we went and cheered them on. THEY WON!! Good times.

This past weekend was nice and relaxing...to enjoy that relaxation I decided to go outside and lay in my hammock and read a nice book. We set up 3 of our hammocks out on our porch and sometimes we sleep in them and sometimes we just relax out there. Anyways, on this particular night, I went out to read and got in my hammock...sadly I did not realize that the rope on one side was thinning out from being outside so long and from so many people laying in it. Needless to say it snapped and I landed on my bum...huge bruise...hurt a lot...pictures on the link. Enough said.

I also took the opportunity of a new month to redecorate my classroom and to rearrange the students desks. It feels so refreshing to have new decorations and what not. It's all decorated with fun Thanksgiving type stuff. I love Thanksgiving...my favorite holiday.

Last but not least...today (Monday) at about noon the school office got a phone call from the president of Palau's office saying that the president was declaring tomorrow (Tuesday) a national holiday due to the elections so we should cancel school for the day. HAHA! Unfortunately, by the time we as the teachers got the news school was already let out for the day. So we each had to call the parents in our class to let them know of the free day tomorrow. So...SURPIRSE! NO SCHOOL TOMORROW!!

Well that's all for now. Next time I will stay on my toes and not wait 2 weeks to write again.

love to all...until next time :-D

Parent Teacher Conferences

So parent teacher conferences were today...and boy do I have stories.

The way PTC's work here is that the school assigns a time for the parent to come in for 15 minutes and that is the time we have to discuss how the child is doing and what not. Well my first appointment was at 8:00 with Taldil's parents. Now I knew that her dad was the chief of Koror (The state we live in) but her mom is the one that always comes in to drop her off and pick her up and what not so I just figured she would be the one to come for the conferences. Anyways, long story short...THE CHIEF shows up at my door 2 hours after his appointment with a big long story as to why he's so late and that his daughter didn't tell him anything about the appointment until it was too late and on and on. First of all...THE CHIEF JUST WALKED INTO MY CLASSROOM...do I bow, shake his hand, look him in the eye, what do I do? Anyways, after 15 minutes of him telling me stories about his life and me laughing and us not discussing his daughters grades at all, he gave me 2 contact numbers, said call whenever you need anything, stood up, shook my hand, mentioned his name again (which I think was to solidify any doubts that I may have had that he is indeed the chief) and left. Glad he's a nice guy.

Most of my other appointments for the day went very well. One mom had me cracking up because right when she walked in she said "my son hates to study and all he wants to do is watch television and he's just so emotional all the time and I truly apologize." Cute lady.

Genesis'(my problem child) dad came in and before even looking at the grades said "you know, my son has an attitude problem and I don't mind if when he gets out of line if you just spank him." HAHA! All I could do was chuckle. It still makes me laugh as I am writing this. He then gave me 4 numbers to reach him at. 4!

All was well up until one mother came in. It was like a tornado came in behind her because all she could do was complain about the school and the teachers and how I assign homework. She kept telling me to Tell Nelson (the principal) about this this and this and I just kept thinking you go tell him yourself! She was not happy to put it nicely. She saw her son's grades and said "I will not accept these B's until I know that my child is getting the best education possible and that his teachers are trying their hardest." Side note..YOUR CHILD HAS A'S AND B+'S!! THAT IS NOT BAD!! she continued by saying "I would like to have a copy of your lesson plans to verify what he is learning and so that I know what my child is learning. I will be coming in to observe your teaching skills next week." WHAT?! She also had a lot of beef about the math grade and I told her that I don't teach math, that teacher is in the library if you would like to talk with her. To which she said "I'm sick of hearing you all tell me that you don't teach a certain subject. This is a conference. His teachers should all be here at once so I can talk to them." She just kept going on and on like that. Totally outrageous stuff. I didn't really say anything because I didn't feel like I had anything nice to say and my mom and dad always taught me that if I can't say anything nice then don't say anything at all. :-D

After discussing this whole ordeal with Nelson I found out that this is not the first time she has done something like this and that last year was even worse, especially with the math teacher who is the same person as last year. That makes me feel a bit better. :-D

So in the end, I have met the chief, laughed hysterically with parents, been chewed out by a crazy mother, and I'm still alive to tell about it! Monday is coming quickly though so I pray that all will continue to be well. My spirits will not be crushed!

Until next time...love to all! :-D

Pen Pals Unite!

Earlier this year I decided to incorporate pen pals into my daily lessons for my class because I feel it is important to be in contact with people from different cultures and from different parts of the world. I worked it out with the 3rd and 4th grade teacher at OAKS, the school I worked at in Tennessee, as well as with the school I attended as a young girl in Worthington, Ohio. So... each student has 2 pen pals, one in Tennessee and one in Ohio.

So this week we (my class and I) received our first package from our pen pals in Tennessee! I cannot tell you the joy I felt seeing my students read their letters and see the pictures of their new friends in Tennessee. They were so eager to write back telling of all their favorite things and to send pictures of themselves. One of my trouble makers, Rois, came to my desk and was so excited to read me her letter from her new friend named Emily. After she read Emily's letter to me she said to me "Teacher, Emily doesn't like homework and neither do I!...Emily's favorite color is purple and so is mine!" I have never seen her respond to things with such excitement. She was truly shocked that someone so far away was so much like her. She quickly wrote a letter back to Emily and was so happy to turn it in and have it sent. This coming from the girl that NEVER turns anything in! My heart truly filled with awe and joy.

One little boy in TN sent pictures of his electric guitar and his pet gerbils and his Wii. Ozzie, my student, was the recipient and he was so excited to get extra pictures. He came and asked me, "Teacher, what is this animal" because he had never seen a gerbil before and "teacher I have a Wii too. I wonder what his favorite game is?" To which I said why don't you ask him in your letter. He was so excited about the whole thing that the first thing he wanted to do was take his letter and pictures home and show his dad. I told him as long as he brought it back so we could hang it on the wall that it was ok. He came back the next day still talking about it!

I found it pretty funny that when I was proofreading their letters, almost all of them wrote, "I can't wait till you come to Palau so i can take you to the rock islands...see you soon." I just had to chuckle. TOO CUTE!

I truly believe that pen pals is such a great idea and a great way to make new friends. I'm pretty sure this has been the most joyful experience I have had with them thus far. I was just so honored to be a part of their excitement.

Happy Sabbath...Hope this finds everyone well....much love....until next time...:-D

Not just another ordinary day

So today was a pretty good day. Nothing too out of the ordinary happened, however ordinary seems to be a relative term these days because I have to be ready for anything it seems like. I wasn't so thrilled about waking up this morning but once I got to school my students just brightened up my day so much. It wasn't necessarily particular things they did but just being together seemed to be fun. Teaching them was really fun today because they actually seemed interested and we laughed and had a great time teaching and learning together. Tomorrow we are watching Finding Nemo for science class because we are studying amphibians, reptiles, fish, etc. I am also looking into getting a class goldfish so we can further our interest in fish and also because it would be pretty much amazing to have a class fish. I'm going tomorrow to see if I can find one at the store. If not I will just have to truck myself down to the ocean and go fish for one myself. :-D

I must say that what totally transformed my day from just another "ordinary" day to an amazing day was when I went to the office and found that I had a package and a card from my mom. I quickly opened the card and found that not just she, but all of my Worthington, OH friends and family had signed the card too! I was truly, no joke, brought to tears just standing there in the office. It feels so nice to be thought of. So for that...all of you who wrote in that card, I truly from the bottom of my pea-pickin heart thank you. :-D

Tonight, the plans are to play a rousing game of volleyball and to continue the never-ending process of grading.

Hope this finds everyone well. Until next time....:-D

He's got manners!

I got a new student yesterday!! His name is Kyle and he's Filipino and his English cracks me up! I am now proud to report that I have an even 16 students in my class now. When he first walked in to the classroom I asked him his name and he gave me like 4 names then his last name. Then I asked well which one do you want me to call you? And he said Kyle...so Kyle it is!

It's kind of funny because the other kids automatically deem him as not as smart as them because he's new but man did Kyle blow their minds. He answered questions faster than they did and read better than some of them. The other students are quite impressed. Today he raised his hand to answer a question and stood up answered it (kinda like a soldier)...correctly I might add...then sat down and the other kids were in shock asking themselves why is he standing up. Their faces were priceless. THIS KIDS GOT MANNERS! Hopefully the other's will take note. I just had to laugh. The make me laugh so much everyday. Man I just love my students! :-D

Until next time...PEACE

A week of good times!

Since I haven't written in awhile let me take this time to fill you in on the past few days. So much happens in a day!

First let me start by saying today is Independence Day for Palau (October 1) which means NO SCHOOL!! It's so nice to have a day off in the middle of the week and relax. There are a lot of festivities and boat races and what not at the bridge that we will be going to later on today. Good times!

Last weekend a group of 10 of us went with Nelson (our principal) to one of the outer islands called Pelelui. It was so much fun!! It took 2 1/2 hours to get there by boat. (The boat wasn't going very fast) While there we saw beautiful sunsets, all kinds of WWII ruins, went caving where the Japanese stayed and made bombs during WWII, went swimming at a watering hole, went to the highest point on the island, and went body boarding, not to mention I collected some pretty amazing shells. :-D Pictures are coming soon!

Last week I was also bitten up by really tiny microscopic mosquitos. At first everyone thought they were sand fleas but it turned out they weren't. Anyways, they were all over my calves. I had at least 30 bites on each leg, no joke. They all started itching at the same time and I wanted to rip my legs off they itched so bad! Luckily, Ms. Betty, the same lady that fixed up my jellyfish sting had just the right NATURAL remedy and knew just what tree to get medicine from and fixed me up good. I am proud to say that though it still LOOKS like I have leprocy on my legs and it's not very attractive, they do not itch anymore which is fine with me!

On other news...the past couple weeks have been amazing with my kids. I rearranged their desks into groups and it is going so well. They love the competition. One boy actually said to me that school is starting to be so much fun. YAY! Yesterday we went on a small field trip to the health fair down the street and got free t-shirts, water bottles, and first aid kits. They had a blast! Oh and one more thing...my class loves to brake dance! I have great video and pictures of them brake dancing. We have so much fun.

Well that is all for now. Until next time! Love and blessings to all. :-D

Lice Anyone?

Thank goodness it's Sabbath. This week was such a trying and frustrating week. It's been everything from at least one of my kids going to the office each day to finding out that 7 of the 15 kids in my class have lice! Let's talk about the lice ordeal first...

So one of my kids came to me saying her head was really itchy and after her mom (the librarian) inspected and found lice, I decided to do an inspection of my whole class and found that 7 of them had it...BAD! Royally freaked out is what I was. I don't handle bugs or anything crawly or any animals really very well so I was not ok with any of this. After going to the office to see what I should do next, whether to call their parents or write a note home, I found out that it is a normal thing for people to have lice around here! WHAT!! Nobody warned me about this! Anyways, the whole office staff just laughs at me now and jokes arounds about lice whenever they see me because apparently it was very humorous for them to see me freaking out like this. Clearly, after that day I went and bought some lice shampoo and treated my hair even though my roommate Ale checked my head thoroughly. Mercy. All I have to say is I have a lot of hair and I WILL NOT be getting lice this year if I have anything to say about it. YUCK!

Anyways, as far as the rest of my week is concerned I'm just glad it's over and I have a chance to start over this next week. I must admit it's very frustrating to hear from my children every day that Ms. Brittany (their teacher from last year) was so much more fun and they don't like me and I'm no fun etc. I finally made it very clear to them that I am not Ms. Brittany and though I may be much more strict than her, I can still have fun with them but they have to be willing. They haven't said anything since then so hopefully that worked.

All that's left to say is I'm super glad it's Sabbath and that I have time to relax and recuperate. Please pray that next week will be much better and that patience will come easily for me and the children.

Till next time... :-D

Sometimes you just gotta laugh

So today has been quite the day let me tell ya. My day started out rough in that the 2 trouble makers in my class named Genesis (boy) and Rois (girl) both decided that today would be a great day to reek havoc on me. Now keep in mind they are not accomplices on any missions to cause me stress...they totally work alone which makes it even more difficult to handle. Needless to say, both of them ended up in the office today (second day in a row and it's only Tuesday). Of course every time they return to class from the office they are sweet little angels, but I just don't understand why it has to come to that point.

Anyways, after school I totally got the urge to bake, mostly because it's a great stress reliever and I really just love to cook and bake. Since we just got paid yesterday, me and my 3 housemates walked to the grocery store, Surangel's, which is only a couple blocks up the road from our apartment. When we were done shopping rainy season graced us with it's presence...not just a sprinkle but a down pour. Seeing as how we were all in our school uniforms and they needed to be washed anyways...and we just wanted to play in the rain...we did as the Palauan's do and just went on our way in the pouring down rain. Good times really.

On the way back to our apartment (in the rain) I lost my left flip flop in the very deep river of water that was racing down the side of the road. Meanwhile, my housemate Haslel's right flip flop broke...so together we could make a pair! That's not all....haha....my other housemate Katie slipped and fell flat on her bum on the slippery sidewalk. Luckily nothing happened to my other housemate Ale. Hilarious trip is what that was! What a sight we must have been!

Anyways, we finally made it home and I am proud to report that I am happily baking 2 chocolate chip pumpkin cheesecakes (I know right...interesting combo but sounds yummy to me). Since I had extra pumkin from the cheesecake, we decided to make pumpkin pie as well, but of course the recipe is enough for 2 pies. So right now I am baking 4 pies!! Great therapy baking is....I digress...Today has been full of up's and down's but God sure does now how to make me laugh when I'm down. I'm so thankful for that.

I sure do hope this finds all my loved ones doing well and in good spirits. Keep your heads up and know that you are not alone and God is always there to make you laugh when you need it the most. Much love and blessings till next time. :-D

Oh How I love Palau!

Oh how I love Palau. Life here is so simple. I love not having to worry about getting anywhere at a fast pace or committing to things I don't want to do. I love the freedom that I have to be a follower of God and to show others the passion I have for serving Him. I love that I am humbled more and more each day through the students that I teach, the experiences I have, and through the other SM's that have quickly become my new family. I love the challenges that I face because that helps me know that I am learning how to have patience and strength in a higher power than myself. I love teaching my third graders. They bring a smile to my face everyday. Even when I am tired and having a bad day they recognize this and try everything in their power to make me feel better. I love the scenery and the beauty of the 300+ Palauan islands. They are so gorgeous and I often feel as though I am living in a postcard. I love that I am growing more and more each day in the direction of Salvation. I love my Lord and Savior for putting me in this place and for showing me that there is more to life than busyness and pleasing people. I am here to serve, and that is just what I'll do. :-D