Damn it feels good to be a .....

Teacher.   

It is hard to imagine that it has been 9 months since I was in the classroom, and well over a year since I was teaching full time.  Honestly, the school where I was teaching in Atlanta was such a joke, I felt more like a group home resident advisor than a teacher, I don’t know if those months even count as legit teaching.  What is most surprising is how seamlessly I left it all behind, when for some three and a half years it was all consuming.  My days, nights, and weekends were spent in the classroom, planning for the classroom, on the field, in the pool, attending sporting events and plays and student government retreats, chaperoning Prom and homecoming and every other freaky student dance, chatting with students and parents at the movie theatre, restaurant, grocery store, and once, at the bar (who can say awkward!).  I rarely saw my boyfriend (now husband), and even less frequently saw friends.  And I loved it.  And I was pretty good at it.  And I LOVED it.

Somehow though, I haven’t really even missed it too much.  I think that marriage has been such a fulfilling adventure, along with cross country and then international moves, that I just didn’t really focus on the fact that I had left a huge part of my life behind me.  When I left the “school” in Atlanta, I really thought I was done with teaching, that the passion and enjoyment was gone.  I even started looking into other carreer options.

Including as a personal chef...I don't think that ones going to pan out so well. 

Last week though, I started teaching in two of our partnership schools.  Partnership schools are schools that are outside the villages we are housed in.  They have need for financial support, as well as some leadership amongst the teachers.  We do not have a contract holding the teachers accountable with them like we do in La Hoya and Bombita, and we don’t provide materials to the same extent as in our home schools, but we do send two local women to teach art, and I teach English to the fourth graders.  We also invite the teachers and directors to our workshops and trainings, and try to impart new teaching and classroom management strategies whenever possible.  This also helps the COPA schools because the two partnership school only go to fourth grade, and then as fifth graders the students come to school in La Hoya. We typically have to create a separate fifth grade class just for the students coming in from the partnership schools because they are at such a low level in all content areas.

ANYWAY...I didn’t even really think about being excited or emotional about being in the classroom again, but as soon as I walked in the door it was like a part of me long lost had been found again.  I know it sounds cheesy.  You don’t know how many times I deleted and re-typed that statement.   I’ve accepted the cheese now though.  Maybe some of you don’t get it, and that’s fine.  I really love teaching, even though these are fourth graders and I really don’t like that whole upper elementary age group much, it doesn’t seem to matter.  I really really like to teach!  I am supposed to teach the first English lesson of the week to each fourth grade class, and then our local volunteers teach the second class, but I don’t know if I can keep myself out!  I just feel so much more accomplished at the end of the day when I have been teaching.  I even get excited to make my lesson plans and prepare for the classes.  I don’t know how I ever thought I could be happy in an administrator’s position, which is basically what the rest of my job is.  I also don’t know if I could be happy as a stay at home mom, which I have always wanted to be, and Patrick and I have been planning on.  I’m guessing that as soon as I see that little face I won’t want to be anywhere but with her.  For now though, I am so glad to be back in the classroom, and I hope I don’t ever forget how much I love it (again).

I think I will do this at the end of each blog now...The things I am loving right now.  It helps me stay positive.

1.  Being back in the classroom (obvi)

2. This little guy who has been keeping me company as I wrote this blog.

3.  My baby girl practicing her dance moves when I lay down at night. It gives me a chance to focus on her and really connect.

4.Did I say cold showers last time?  Yesterday I took four cold showers, each one better than the last.

5. My newest kitchen creation, which started off as a meatloaf scramble (which was originally slated to be ground beef and sautéed onions and peppers for a curry dish), and turned in to the most delicious Philly steak and cheese I have ever had in the Dominican Republic.

6.   Patrick squeezing my rib cage, occasionally popping the ribs back where they need to be, because this baby is ridin high!

This picture doesn't even do my pain justice.  She is ALL up IN my rib cage!

7.  I don’t have to wear makeup or do my hair.  I guess I never HAD to, and often times I didn’t, but there is just zero pressure here.  Plus my sort of curly hair actually likes humidity, so if its not up in a pony tail, its lookin’ good anyway!

8. Target.  I just ordered a bunch of (adorable!) summery clothes for our girl at half off because they are bringing out their fall and winter clothes, which we will never need because it is summer here all year round. 

9. The bakery across the street from my doctor’s office.  Yeah for Carbs!

10. The facemask my mom brought when she came down…my pores are visibly smaller! 

Iz a Guuuurllll!

A week ago today Patrick, my mom and I went to the clinic to have our gender sonogram done!  Patrick and I went in together first, and the technician started doing his thing, checking various parts of the anatomy to make sure the baby is growing correctly.  Eventually Ih ad to ask " soooooo?  what are you seeing?"  He told me that the baby's legs were crossed, and we might not be able to find out.  Then I hear him whisper in English (with a French accent interestingly enough) "I think its a girl..."  then he sat up real straight and and says "she moved! Its a girl!"  (it sounded like "she mow! Iz a guuuuurl!" an accent I will never for get)  I let out a little "WOOP!" and Patrick may or may not have momentarily blacked out.  My mom was called in then, and we got to see the baby's little  lady parts just to be sure.  And we saw her little face and she had a tiny little hand all snuggled up there next to it like she was waving at us.
The next 30 minutes is sort of a blur. We were really surprised because even though I had not so secretly been hoping for a girl, we both really thought it would be a boy.  I don't know why, but even when my mom saw me she felt pretty strongly it would be a boy too.  I had been picturing baby boy clothes, baby boy nursery, growing up boy activities, and baby boy names, and was getting pretty excited about all that boyish goodness.  So when he said girl, my entire picture of this baby morphed, in slow motion, through now rose tinted glasses.  Patrick says he went through a similar process, and sometimes the look on his face tells me he is still processing the information.

So anyway, we are thrilled to be having a girl, and here are few more things I have been thrilled about this week:

1-Our ultrasound cost only 600 pesos, which is only $15.79.  That's one heck of a deal.

2-Tums are delicious.  Good thing, because I have been having some MAD heartburn!

3-4th graders LOVE to learn English and talk about dogs.  It makes one aspect of my job very easy and enjoyable.

4-My husband does dishes after I cook, and chases mice out of the oven in the middle of the night.

5- My mom came, bearing bags and bags of instant oatmeal.  Now I start my day off right!

6-I have a maid that cleans my house and does the laundry once a week, for less than 30 bucks a MONTH!

7-The haitian kids across the street are my personal welcoming comittee everytime I come home from work. They seriously wait at the fence to see me coming and start waving and calling "Hola, hola!" as soon as they catch a glimpse.

8-Our evening walk is down a plaintain farm's farm road, lined with palm trees and mango trees, and avacado trees.  Often with a glorious sunset.

9-I like my job.

10-I learn a new Spanish word almost every day.  Today the word was fin, like a fish's fin.  En Espanol, Aleta.