Some days, life is great.

So a ton has happened and I just haven't had the time to get on here and write it all down. But the first and most exciting thing is that I got an internship! Jordan School District (just south of Salt Lake) hired me on as in intern for this upcoming school year. The internship will take the place of my student teaching, because having an internship means having your own class for the school year! They haven't yet told me which grade, or in which school I will be teaching, but I was told they would be getting back to me sometime this week. Anyway, very exciting. As soon as I find out more details, I will let y'all know. And just fyi, I'm in the process of putting a photo album up, as well as streaming some home videos that I have from the last couple of years. Should be fun... keep checkin' back!

Second, I finished up with my practicum today, and it was kind of bittersweet. I really like the kids, and have enjoyed getting to know them, but at the same time I will be happy to not be teaching first grade. Way too much cheese for me. Not to mention it's hard to do any sort of even remotely complex games/lessons/activities because they are just too young to catch on. Most of them anyway. I like to plan fun games or interactive lessons but the majority of my ideas have been too complicated for them. Luckily the chances of me ending up in first grade for my internship are pretty slim. But anyway, I have had a lot of fun with the kids during the four weeks that I was at Westridge. Today I brought them all treats, they wrote me notes and I took plenty of pictures. The picture above is me and my class. And for all of those who are curious, Ilana (the one from my stories in the previous post) is the one just to the left of me when looking at the picture (she has a brown shirt on).

Third, I don't know if I mentioned before that I had the opportunity of dancing in the big BYU Luau this year. I thought I'd give it a try especially since it seems to run in my family (my grandma taught hawaiian dance, and my mom was a member of a polynesian troupe for awhile). I had so much fun! It was great to be dancing in front of a crowd again, and to have that dancing outlet. It felt really good. I think I'm going to try and do it again next year, even though I'll be teaching. I danced in the Tahitian number, and the Hawaiian. The picture above is a few of the girls, and the one below is of the whole group, including our instructors.

Also, I got to go to the conference center in Salt Lake for the Sunday morning session of General Conference! I have never been, so I was really excited and it was great actually being there. My roommate Caitlin and I were going to drive up Sunday morning and just wait in the stand-by line to see if we could get in, but my friend Michelle (just to my left in the picture), who is in my cohort for ELED and with whom I am actually living with for spring term (along with Katie, the one just to the left of Michelle) had an extra ticket and invited me! We drove up Saturday night and stayed at the Harmer's (Michelle's grandparents). They fed us banana splits while we waited for Michelle's brother Nathan and his friends to get back, and then the battle ensued over the car bed. We (Michelle, Katie and I) being female and of course more mature and willing to sacrifice, charitably gave in and offered the car bed to the boys (all the while knowing we could have gotten it if we really wanted it :)) We went to the next room and slept in the double bed. And yes, there were three of us in it. But it was still fun, and we slept well! The next morning after deciding to not take showers because, one, the boys were in the bathroom, two, we figured we could get away with it, and three we didn't want to get out of bed, we finally got dressed, ate delicious whole wheat waffles for breakfast with whipped cream and strawberries on top and left for the conference center. Just as a sidenote, did any of y'all know that the author of the "Pickles" cartoon is LDS? Check the comics from Sunday morning... there is a picture of the Salt Lake temple on the wall. Anyway, conference was great, and I always forget how amazing the Tabernacle choir is in person. Wow.

Overall, things are going well. I have been feeling at peace about most things in my life, which is a nice assurance that I'm headed in the right direction. I will be going back to class tomorrow morning bright and early at 7:30 am and will have lots and lots of Practicum assignments due in the next couple of weeks followed closely by finals, and then moving out, but despite the stress, it shouldn't be too bad. I'm discovering that as long as you have your friends around you, nothing can really be that bad :)