Hedgetoad Teaching

For the past couple of days, Lala* has had a somewhat juicy sounding cough. She's always been a bit wheezy, but the cough had been moving slowly up the juicy/more frequent scale. Last night, after charming every mother attending the local high school basketball game (my dance team had a performance), we came home to a screaming- I'm-so-uncomfortable -can't-breathe cold and the nasty elevens. After two showers and sitting next to a steaming tea kettle and about a hundred trips around the kitchen in the stroller, she finally relaxed enough to fall asleep. Might I stress my love of my umbrella stroller? I'm pretty sure it's the single most sanity saving device I have. Lala loves to ride around in it, it can double as a rocker, sit in the bathroom while the shower is running and for a kid who dislikes the car, dryer and being held in any position except fully verticle (while I'm standing-no sitting allowed), well, I may have it enshrined. Today we're off to purc...

School is back in session, dance competition/performance schedule is in full swing... and... the week before last an infant was placed with me! Yah! I was a little shocked that it happened so fast. I took a day off to aclimated and get appointments in. I'll be taking another this week... good thing, since we've come down with our first cold and now have 4 days to fight it off. My arm muscles are crying (most people get to go from 5 or 6 pounds and work their way up) - she's a chunk! Everyone at school has been so supportive, offering me things (homemade soup!) and helping me to manage my time and responsibilities. I even had someone thank me for asking her to watch the baby during our half half-time performance. In the meantime, I'm having a lot of conversations about poop, coughs, food types and which diapers are the best. I'm also learning to exist on short naps - last night, one of my dancers said "you look so happy when you have that baby in your arms....

I spent a significant amount of time yesterday looking for performance poetry that was school appropriate - sadly, just when I thought I'd found a really good one, out would fly some word that I can't use in class. It did, however, make the Taylor Mali's "Whatever" a little more meaningful... the whole lack of vocabulary thing. Taylor Mali - Whatever Taylor Mali - What Teachers Make (cleaner - does have lower level swearing) Nayeli Knutson, Priceless employeed poor ( includes the word shit ) Billy Collins - Forgetfullness (Animated Poetry) Billy Collins - Now and Then (Animated Poetry) I don't know if I'll be able to use any of these in class. Novemeber's storm wiped all the categories in our filtering system. In the restoration process, the filtering system software company informed our technology people that NO other schools had as much openness as we do. I immediately pointed out that their pool of information came from their own clients... bu...

The Social Worker emailed me on New Year's Eve to let me know that my homestudy report was completed and had been sent on to the supervisor. That's the final step to getting my license. It's a little hard to describe what I'm feeling about thist... on the one hand, I'm all fluttery and on the other, I'm all "ehh". I emailed back about a timeline and well, there really isn't one. You just have to go with the flow and hope for the best. I am hoping that I'll have a couple month wait so that dance competition season will end before. Eeek... I do have to have a chat with my boss and a conference coming up at the end of the month. The only thing to really pin hopes on was " but it usually doesn’t take too long ". No, I have no idea what that means.