Teacher Appreciation

The week before Spring Break was teacher appreciation. My awesome room mothers did a lot to make sure it was a good week. They decorated my door. It has been a month and I still can't bear to tear it down.

One student brought me flowers. I'm sure it was totally his idea :)

Also, the PTA made these little guys for us. Normally I don't really like stuff like this because I feel bad throwing it away. But, I thought this idea was really clever. It would be a fun and easy craft for kids to do too.

I'm so happy that I have my class this year. They are great kids and teaching has been much more enjoyable this year. I actually like coming to work each day. That said, there are only 22 more days of school!

turn off your tv week

This next week is the national turn off your TV week. The Legacy Center was promoting family physical fitness activities that they will be doing for those families that will be turning off their TV and the more I thought about it, the better the idea seemed. For most of my post-high school life, I haven't had a TV. But this year I've got cable and DVR and I watch a lot more TV than I should.

Some things I plan to accomplish this week are:

*Exercise every day

*Finish reading Animal, Vegetable, Miracle

*Literacy Institute Meeting on Wednesday after school

*Go through my stuff and make a trip to DI

*Study for the GRE

*The Tulip Festival at Thanksgiving Point

*Go to the temple

*Cook real food and take lunch to school each day

*Make my photo album for Mexico (I've been back 2 years, it is definitely time)

*Clean my classroom

If you are interested in participating, look here for more information. I'll let you know how it goes.

Boston Day 8

Not many pictures this day. We went to Harvard in the morning. We walked around the campus then went to the Natural History Museum. The collections at the museum were impressive.

One of the entrances to campus.

We also went to the Isabella Stewart Gardner museum. It was about to close so we only got 30 minutes there. It was not enough time because the museum was amazing.

We had to leave the next morning really early to make our 6:45am flight. Boston was great. Thanks Mom for going with me.

Boston Day 7

It rained all day. We started off at the New England Aquarium. It was fantastic. My favorite thing was the giant sea turtle.

After the aquarium, we took a tour of Paul Revere's house. This is a picture of me walking in the rain. We walked for hours that day.

We had lunch at Cheers.

We walked all over Beacon Hill. It is a beautiful neighborhood. We went on two tours of old houses. It was interesting to see how rich Bostonians lived in the 18th and 19th centuries.

The trees were in bloom.

Boston Day 6

We did the Freedom Trail all day on Day 5 but still didn't finish everything so we started off on Day 6 by going to the South Meeting House and Old State House Museums. We also went to Faneuil Hall. Mom stands in front of the Samuel Adams statue. It hit 90 degrees on Day 5, the very next day it was in the 50s and incredibly windy.

To give our feet a rest, we went on a duck boat tour. We had already explored much of Boston by then so there weren't too many new sights but the tour guide was funny and it was fun to float in the river.
Our last stop of the day was the Boston Science Museum. We only had a couple of hours there before it closed which was disappointing because there was so much to see. Some of my favorite things: the heredity room where I learned that my face is not very symmetrical:(, watching chicks hatch in an incubator, the dinosaur skeletons, the electricity room.

Boston Day 5

This was our day to walk the Freedom Trail. I was really excited because this was one of the main reasons I wanted to go to Boston. The weather was crazy that day. Boston set a new high record that day- 90 degrees. We walked for miles and miles and sweated and I loved every second of it. It was great to finally put all of the events leading to the Revolution together spatially.

This is the grave of John Hancock. The man dressed in colonial clothing was our tour guide. The first half of the tour was included with our Go Boston Card (highly recommended). We had to pay for the second half but it was worth it because he had a lot of interesting stories to tell.

The Granary Burial Grounds are just around the corner from the Boston Common. They estimate that 12,000-15,000 people are buried there. The cemetery is not very big meaning there are bodies piled on top of each other.
This gravestone marks the location of the remains of those killed in the Boston Massacre. I never realized the role that propaganda played in getting the revolution started. I guess propaganda still plays a big role.
Mom aboard the U.S.S. Constitution. The ship was built in the late 1700s and is still commissioned by the US Navy. It fought in several battles during the 1800s and never lost.

Paul Revere statue and the Old North Church.

At Giacomo's Ristorante in the North End of Boston. We ate Italian food there twice and it was incredible both times.
Eating gelato in one of the old streets of Boston. The streets needed to be wide enough for a man and his cow. Therefore, they are pretty narrow.
The Freedom Trail day was great but exhausting. I woke up the next morning with a sunburn.

Boston Day 4

We spent the morning in Salem and the afternoon in Boston. Our first stop was the Peabody Essex Museum. It had a great collection of maritime art. Salem used to be one of the wealthiest cities in America and it owed that to all of the shipping they did from the Orient. We also went to the Witch Museum but didn't get any pictures.

Our next stop was The House of Seven Gables. It was built in 1668. Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote a book based on this house. The tour was really cool. They added in a hidden staircase a few years ago to make the house more like the book and it gave a good visual for places slaves may have gone on the Underground Railroad.

We had nothing planned for Boston the first evening we were there so we walked around Copley Square and Boston Common. Here new reflects old, kind of a cool aesthetic.

Mom was really excited to see the duck statues.

Me too.

The trees were in bloom on the Common so it was absolutely beautiful.

We ate at The Cheesecake Factory that night because it was close to our hotel. The food was good but the portions were HUGE!!!

Boston Day 3

On Monday, we packed in three major cities: Lexington, Concord, and Lowell. It was early April so most of the sites were closed but we did get to see some things. I think the best part of Lexington and Concord was the Minute Man National Park. It is a walk/bike trail that takes you along the path that the British marched on their way to Concord. It was beautiful and peaceful.

Here Mom stands on the Battle Green in Lexington. One guy was shot and he dragged himself home to the house in the top left corner, then died in his wife's arms. Tragic.

Along the Minute Man trail.

A tavern sign. I guess that most signs didn't have words on them since most people were not literate.

The Old North Bridge where it the war officially began.

The river under the bridge was really flooded as evidenced by this sign on the trail to the visitor's center.

We stopped at Lowell too to see the textile mills that are still running as part of a museum. It was a little out of the way but I have studied the Industrial Revolution in America with my kids and I really wanted to get a feel for what factory life might have been life. I can't imagine working here.

Double lobsters?! I felt like a glutton but I had to do it.

Mom jumped on the double lobster bandwagon too. They were so good. It's hard to believe that lobster was looked down upon in colonial America and fed to prisone.

I can't get this picture to delete. Enjoy the double lobsters again.

Boston Day 2

We went to Plimoth Plantation on the most pleasant day, weather-wise, of the entire trip. The sun was shining but it wasn't too hot.

Mom prepares to battle the other tourists for the attention of the 1627 villagers.

This would be the winter home for the Wampanoag. They call it a 2 fire because there are 2 fire holes in the roof. Why can't all things be named so simply?

The summer home uses reeds that help suck the humidity out of the air. Genius.

The view from the trail connecting the two villages.

This picture is the only proof that my mom and I were actually in Massachusetts together at the same time. We sort of failed and the whole getting pictures taken together thing.

In the 1627 village, I had the chance to try my hand at various tasks. Crushing things.

Tending sheep.

Baking bread.

Napping in a bed way too small for me.

Fighting the enemy (in the church).

Sawing wood.

In trying to keep everything authentic, they concealed the drinking fountain and trash cans in barrels. Hilarious.

We had stuffed quahog and succotash for lunch.

Our view from the lunch table.

Our last main stop of the day was the Mayflower II. Mom poses at the ocean.

I am grateful for airplanes.

After our time in Plymouth, we drove to Cape Cod and then drove up to Woburn. The first Red Sox game of the season was that night, so we ran into insane traffic. Mom was pretty white knuckled and narrowly escaped a fender bender. But, we survived.