And the Verdict Is...

I have been battling where to do my student teaching. The options are pretty much endless and having an endless amount of options overwhelms me a little bit. Since last spring semester, I have been trying to figure out where to go. I considered staying in the valley, I have considered leaving the state, I just didn't know what to do. Starting school was really hard because I felt like it was forcing me to make a decision and I wasn't ready to do that. After much careful consideration, I have decided where I am going to do my student teaching! From January until the end of February, I am going to student teach in Logan. I don't have my specific placement yet, but I am going to stay in the valley-this I know. From the end of February until the end of April, I am going to be doing my student teaching in...NEW ZEALAND!

During the summer, I noticed a poster advertising a study abroad program for student teaching in New Zealand. I thought about it, attended the informational meeting, thought about it some more and made a decision. The program begins 27 February and ends the 22 April. They are going to place us with families to live with and schools to teach in. We fly into Aukland and we'll spend a day there and then head off to Hamilton. With the exception of the first weekend and few excursions, I will be spending my time in Hamilton-that's on the North Island, just south of Aukland. I am very excited for this opportunity!

Home Sweet Home

Welcome to my new house! Let me show you around...

To the right side of the house and up the stairs is the entrance to my residence

If you look closely at the front door, you can see one of my favorite features of the house: an actual mail slot! We don't get to use it because the postal workers want everyone to have a mail box for safety reasons. Lame, but oh well. We love the slot!



As you enter the door, you head straight up the stairs. The doorway that leads to the hall has the awesome curtains. They block out some light, but if it is sound you're looking to block-you're outta luck. If you turn left at the top of the stairs...

...you enter the living/family room as well as the little office I created for myself. I found the desk for seven bucks at a yard sale. I felt good about the purchase.

If you turn right at the top of the stairs...



...you enter the dining room.



This is the window in the wall that I was talking about yesterday. We have had multiple people try to climb through and so far only one has been successful. You can watch the video on CoCo's blog.



Through the dining room, you enter our tiny kitchen. There's lots of storage space but hardly any counter space.



Another one of my favorite features of this house is the blinds. They roll up and down (like maps in classrooms at school). It's fun to me because I think it is such an old fashioned thing. The windows go up and down via a string and a pulley. It's pretty rockin' sweet. (Sorry about the towel, I had just gotten out of the shower)



Straight through the doorway, in the hall is the hall closet which is pretty full of stuff.



We all have a lot of stuff.



If you walk straight through the doorway at the top of the stairs, you enter the hallway. If you turn left in the hallway you enter...



...my bedroom.



The limited closet space is ridiculous. My clothes are jam packed. I tried to get rid of some clothes, but I wasn't very successful. I have to keep some clothes on my book shelf and my work clothes belong under my bed.



If you turn right down the hallway, you'll find...



...the bathroom.



My favorite feature in the bathroom is the doorknob. I think the lock is old fashioned and fancy. I love old/seemingly old things.



If you walk through the hallway and look at the ceiling, you'll see the entrance to the attic. This is where our bird friends live. We hear them peck and scratch at the door. Sometimes we hear them chirping. There have been a couple of times when I have been in the bathroom and I can hear them pecking at the fan. For a while, these noises would scare us because we couldn't figure out what was causing these noises. Then we saw a bird fly into a hole outside of our house and we put two and two together. Baker and CoCo decided to play with the attic entrance one Saturday. Check out CoCo's blog for the full story.



If you turn right down the hallway and venture to the end of the hall, you will enter...



CoCo's and Doomer's bedroom.

And that's my home. This is where I live now. We don't have our own washer or dryer. We don't have a dish washer. We don't have a canal running through our backyard. But we do have awesome green carpet and hard wood floors. We do have lots of built in shelf space. We do have plenty of room to park our cars. We do have lots of good times. Dorothy was right, there's no place like home.

I Know, I Know...

It has been a while since I last blogged. Over a month to be exact. I haven't had my own Internet connection until last Friday (we were borrowing from a kind soul who's connection wasn't password protected) but I've had access, so I can't use the excuse that I was Internetless. I am halfway through my fourth week of school and it really hasn't been all that busy, so I can't use the excuse that I've been busy with school. What it comes down to is this: I just haven't felt like blogging. So here's the latest...

My House:
I am really enjoying my new house. I miss all of the space in my house from last school year and I miss all of the "extras" (dishwasher, washing machine, dryer, etc.) from my summer house, but I'm likin' my new place, too. We have birds that reside in our attic and a little window through the wall that we have used multiple time for entertainment purposes. I'll have a more detailed blog on that one later.

Roommates:
I am living with CoCo and Doomer again and there's a new addition this year. Her name is Lindsey, but we call her Baker. She and Doomer work together at Kohl's and Baker needed a place to live. One thing led to another and BAM! we have a new roommate. It's kind of nice to have an even four instead of an odd three.

School:
I am taking twelve credits this semester (the fewest amount of credits I have taken in all of my college career) and I am really likin' the time on my hands. I don't really love any of my classes, but they're bearable and they all get me closer to graduation. This is my last semester of actual classes and studying and tests. I student teach next semester so instead of taking the tests and studying for them, I will be writing them and administering them. Awesome, eh?

Social Life (I have no love life, that's why this blurb is titled "social life"):
Hanging out. That's what we do, much to Elder Oaks' dismay. I have been to Island Park with the Mow Crew, I went to Peach Days with my roommates, I attended the Senior Kick-Off Party last week and I got my picture in the school paper. We still play football on Tuesday evenings and the Mow Crew tries to get together for dinner once a week. No progression here, much to MY dismay...

Work:
I am still working for Logan City. I put in a few hours on Monday and Friday mornings, a few hours on Tuesday and Thursday afternoons, a few more hours a two or three nights a week when I lock bathrooms, and a few more hours when I open bathrooms on Saturday mornings. Still loving my job and wondering if that's what I should do with the rest of my life instead...I teach piano two days a week and I just acquired two more students today. I now have a grand total of five students and although some days are terribly frustrating, I enjoy the experience.

Spare Time:
I have been going to the driving range once a week to hit a half bucket of balls. I have actually invested in my own bag of tees so I will no longer need to be a "tee bum" and scrounge the ground in hopes of finding tees that haven't been broken by other golfers. Where did I get the clubs, you may wonder? They're the old, used ones that have been passed down from Dad, Justin, and Clark. They aren't quality clubs, but they meet the needs for my limited experience. Tomorrow I am going to attend a meeting that will hopefully schedule me to be a volunteer tutor of math and reading to some elementary students throughout the valley. I read a book here and there, do a few crossword puzzles, and chat with the roommies.

There you have it my friends; the exciting life of the Lone Loganer!

Move Along

Another summer is practically gone. Some of my fellow workers finish work tomorrow. College classes resume one week from Monday. Tomorrow is the day that I move out of my house. This summer has gone by in a flash and I don't think I am quite ready for it to be over. It's amazing how time never seems to wait for me...

I have been packing since Monday. I figured if I did a little bit every day then I wouldn't stress myself out on Thursday night. What a good idea that was! I have everything packed that could possibly be packed and I am feeling great.

I own a few things that are too big or awkward to fit in a box.

I also own lots of things that can be boxed. I have neatly packed everything I own and surprisingly enough I was able to get all of it into SIXTEEN boxes. I feel good about that number especially because some of the boxes are pretty small.

I don't have to be out of my current house until 6 p.m. tomorrow evening, which is really convenient. I can get up and do some cleaning, move everything out when my parents arrive, and finish cleaning in the afternoon. I took tomorrow off of work in order to make all of this possible.

The downside to all of this is that my new house won't be ready for me until next Wednesday. So what do I do with all of my stuff? My new landlord has been kind enough to allow me to store my belongings in an apartment, which he owns, that is nearby. I have way too many things. I would never be able to fit all of my stuff in my car even if Dad and Grandpa Clark teamed up to pack it. So the situation isn't what I would call convenient; however, I do appreciate my landlord's generosity in providing a place for my material possessions.

After all of the moving happens, I am headed to Island Park for a weekend getaway with some co-workers. Upon my return I will be staying with Jessie and Lacee at their apartment because I will be homeless from 6 p.m. tomorrow evening until Wednesday when I start moving into my new house.

I am pretty sure this will be the last move I make here in Logan, Utah. I can't say that packing and moving boxes is my favorite thing on Earth. I can say that I hate the cleaning process that comes with the moving even more than the actual packing and moving. Alas, the end of the summer is here and moving is inevitable. One more year. One more set of roommates. One more house. One more move. It is time once again to move along.

Table v. Flag

Last Thursday, I headed to Village Inn after a disappointing game of bowling (I scored 89. Seriously, who does that?). As we sat around the table waiting for our food to arrive, David and James decided to play a little Table Football. Instead of flicking the sticky paper from the wrapped silverware, they decided to slide objects from the table. The point of the game was to score by getting the object to hang over the edge without falling off. Once the object was hanging off, the person that scored got to flick the item through the "goal posts" to score an extra point.

They started with a sugar packet and slowly worked their way up to bigger things. Next came a packet of jam --> a salt shaker --> a spoon --> the jam caddy --> a full glass of water --> the salt/pepper/sugar caddy --> a milk shake --> a plate of food. Extra points didn't exist after the packets of jam for most of the items were unflickable; but don't fret, they still tried. David slaughtered James with a score of 60 (or more) to 13.

After church on Sunday, Colette and I finished my Cafe Rio salad from the previous evening. Once we had finished eating, we sat around talking and decided to play a little football with the empty tin. I scored so many times that we eventually stopped keeping score.

We tried flicking the tin for extra points but a simple finger flick just wouldn't suffice. We decided to try using all of our fingers to score extra points. Sometimes it worked, but most of the time it didn't.

Colette going for the extra point

After a few falls off the table and some overzealous flicks, our tin got a little dented...

Tonight we played Flag Football. Last summer, Doug invested some money into some blue and orange fabric. He cut all of it into strips and donated it to the cause of Tuesday Night Flag Football. We have tried to make this game a weekly tradition but with vacations and busy schedules it hasn't always happened. However, we enjoy the times that we do get to play and I am sad to see the summer coming to a close. We start at 8:00 and play until we can't see the ball anymore. We create different teams every week. We don't keep score and we always encourage the opposing team. It's clean competition-some of the best kind. Tonight Doug mentioned that it was the best two dollar investment he's ever made and I must agree. Thanks Doug for making that investment, for it has been well worth it.

The kick-off

The return



The down

Closing Statement: Although I prefer Flag Football for the movement and the higher level of competition, it really doesn't matter which one you play. You end up having fun no matter what.

Friends + Fair + Funnel = Fun

After the Cardboard Regatta, I spent some time watching the Olympics with some friends and then we (David, Mike, Seth, Anthony, Colette, Jani, and I) headed to the Cache County Fair. The best part is that it was free! I didn't know free fairs existed. We wandered around and looked at various things. First, we saw this HUGE tractor. I have never seen a tractor this big and I was so amazed I just had to take a picture.

We then headed to the animal pavilions. If you knew me, you would know that the animals are my favorite part of any fair because of...you ready for this?...the SMELL! I love the smell of farm animals. I took a picture by this pig because of his ears. They looked like they had been chewed on. WEIRD!

After making the animal rounds, we walked around the carnival. The rides were too expensive for us college students so we headed towards the food. We talked about sharing a couple funnel cakes but again, they were too much money for us college students. David and Anthony came up with the wonderful idea of making our own funnel cakes. So we headed home. On the way back to the vehicle, I provided transportation for Colette, Anthony, and Jani.

While Anthony, Seth, Colette, Jani, and myself shopped at Wal-Mart for funnels, David and Mike found a recipe for funnel cakes (Thanks, Alton Brown!).

First we mixed the batter



Then you pour the batter into a funnel, allowing the batter to drip into the hot oil



You let the batter cook on one side



Then you flip it over



After it cooks, you end up with a beautifully fried creation!



But if you cook it too long, it's not so beautiful

We used powdered sugar or cinnamon/sugar to top the cakes. If you want to get really fancy, you can use whipped cream and fruit topping-which is absolutely delicious but remember, we are cheap! David manned the hot oil and I topped every one's cakes with their desired topping. Since Saturday night was the first time some of these people had tried Funnel Cakes, I insisted that everyone allow me to document their first bite...

Anthony's First Bite (powdered sugar)

Mike's First Bite (Cinnamon/Sugar)



Seth's First Bite (1/2 Cinnamon/Sugar 1/2 Powdered Sugar)



Jani's and Amelia's First Bites (also 1/2 and 1/2)



Brad's First Bite (1/3 Cinnamon/Sugar and 2/3 Powdered Sugar-he was very particular)



David's First Bite (Powdered Sugar)



My First Bite (Powdered Sugar)



I must say that the following sequence was my favorite part of the evening:

1. Approximately 1/3 of Colette's Funnel Cake



2. Ready to stuff



3. The Actual Stuff



4. The Full Cheeks



5. The Half-Masticated Cake rolling around in her wide open trap (you get the quote?)

By the end of the night, I was exhausted so I lay my head in Colette's lap. She decided to style my hair for me. Not too bad, right?

WRONG



She styled a crooked French Braid (because I was laying down) and missed a chunk of hair. To remedy the mistake, she curled it around and stuck it with a bobby pin. Attractive, eh?

It was an eventful evening with lots of grease and lots of sugar. I don't see a problem with this although some people would beg to differ. Really what it comes down to is this: Triple F (friends, fair, funnel) equals FUN!