There are no words for this...

So, when visiting Kathy, you just never know what's going to happen!

Family...

The past few weeks have been busy and full of adventures. Here are a few of the highlights...

• House sitting for a fellow teacher
• Del Sol graduation, followed by food and drinks at an Irish pub
• Rick and Holly visiting Vegas for a week
• Eating at favorite restaurants, including Roberto's taco shop, Bahama Breeze and a Japanese place in China town
• Spending all day with a Realtor, looking at and putting in offers on houses
• Kathy coming to Vegas
• Wandering around the strip a few times
• Visiting the Ethel M's chocolate factory and the Cupcakery (Yummy!)
  
• Picking cactus brambles out of my thigh
• Driving to Oceanside using Bill's non-directions
• Staying with Tina's parents in their amazing gorgeous home
• Relaxing in the hot tub each night
• Riding a boat out into the ocean and having the dolphins swim with us
• Bill catching a fish, a small fish
  
• Learning to drive a 4-wheeler through the avocado orchard
• Driving back to Vegas and stopping near the World's Largest Thermometer to get some NoDoz
• A very long nap to recover...

Now for a few weeks of nothing and then off to more adventures!

Worth it...

Over the past few weeks, there have been a few things that have made this school year entirely worth all the hard work I have put in.

• My efforts at pushing the school towards full inclusion have paid off in that more than 4 times the number of Special education students passed the proficiency exams than last year.
• Twice as many sped students graduated this year compared to last year.
• One of my student brought me flowers and a candy lei (filled with life savers) and said thank you for saving my life. I had never been to a sadder meeting, parents/teachers/counselor/student in tears because he wasn't going to graduate - we worked out a deal, and he did an incredible amount of work and is now graduating. He's such a great kid, and I am so glad I was able to help.

I am looking forward to the break, although I will probably still go in and work over the summer. I am mostly looking forward to the break from all the staffing and drama issues! I am now pretty sure I will never go into administration, because I never want to deal with personnel issues again!

Adventures in color...

So, after giving it some thought, I decided to go back to my original hair color. I called Tina to get some advice and was a little nervous after hearing all she had to say. When I first got to the salon, my stylist tried to convince me to go darker, then get highlights; as I really didn't want dark brown hair with pink highlights, I chose to take the longer route to color correction.

Round 1 - bleach, stint under hairdryer (burnt my scalp due to heat, not bleach), and first trip to sink - hair was now orange and red. Round 2 - different bleach, stint under steamer, second trip to sink - hair was now bright orange and yellow (think Carrot top or girl in 5th element). Round 3 - two different hair dyes, more time under hair dryer and third trip to sink - hair was now mostly brown, with some underlying orange-ish strands. Round 4 - more hair dye and bleach for highlights, fourth trip to sink - I didn't see hair at this point, but the stylist seemed quite concerned and had to consult with another stylist regarding the color of the highlights. Round 5 - still at sink, toner applied to hair - hair is now a few shades darker than my natural with highlights. Round 6 - haircut, blow dry, more haircut, flat iron, more hair cut. Total time - 8 hours.
In the end, it's only a little darker than my natural shade and I think after a little time I can get it back to normal. I loved the red and would go back to it in a heartbeat, but it's a lot to maintain and I'm trying to make life simpler.

Marine Science Field Trip

I had the great opportunity to go on the Marine Science Field Trip this year. We started on Wednesday morning and got back Saturday night. On Wednesday we visited Steinbeck Vineyards in CA, and the owners taught the kids a mini-lesson and took them for rides around the vineyard in a 1975 Jeep. That night we camped out at San Simean State Campground, right by the beach. We had a telescope and taught an astronomy lesson that night. We were also visited by some raccoons and what we think was a wild pig of some sort. It made for an interesting night.

The next day we drove out to Monterrey Bay and visited Hopkins Marine Station, a satellite of Standford University. Then we got to spend some time at the tide pools nearby. We also spent a couple hours at the Monterrey Bay Aquarium, which was huge! That night we drove up to Alemeda and spent the night in a nice little hotel.

In the morning, we took the ferry over to San Fransisco. It started raining on us and many of the kids put on huge garbage bags to stay dry. We spent a little time at Pier 39 and then walked down to the ferry terminal for Alcatraz. One ferry ride later, we spent a couple hours touring Alcatraz. It was pretty cool. After taking the ferry back, we let the kids loose on Pier 39 for dinner. Our next stop was Reno, which should have only taken 4 hours. However, we got stuck in some crazy traffic for 1.5 hours, and then it started snowing around Lake Tahoe! Our 4 hour bus ride turned into a 7 hour bus ride!

We stayed the night at Circus, Circus in Reno. In the morning, we took an hour long tour of the University of Nevada, Reno campus. I think all universities are pretty much the same, so nothing too terribly exciting there. After that, we spent another 8 hours on the bus and made it back to Vegas. I can't wait for the next field trip!

Spring Break

I'm not really much of a Spring Breaker, but I sure did enjoy the time off. I did manage to get away for a few days and went down to Arizona to visit Bill and family. We played lots of games and did a little sight seeing. One of the days we went up South Mountain, which has an amazing few of all of Phoenix. The kids were cracking me up, because that morning when they were getting dressed, they both decided that they wanted to wear blue, because I was wearing blue. When they came downstairs, dressed and ready to go, they kept saying they were on "Aunt Sharon's team." I'm not sure we ever split into teams, but I at least got a picture of "team blue!" My favorite part of the visit was getting to see Bill take off in an F-16. It still amazes me that he can actually fly something like that! It's so cool! I also got the chance to make Bill his favorite dessert, strawberry shortcake, but I forgot to take a picture. Anyway, now I'm all ready for school to start back up!

Driving for the Directionally Challenged

Although I can get around most cities just fine, I apperently become directionally challenged when it comes to taking longer trips. I decided to go to Arizona to visit Bill and family for part of my spring break. I've been here once before, and on both trips I've managed to make wrong turns, or miss turns, and add about half an hour to my trip. This last trip I decided to take a different route, so as to avoid all the extra traffic at Hoover Dam. I wound up in California! I had to turn around and backtrack until I found the missed turnoff! I eventually made, so all is good now. Hopefully I will be able to find my home in a few days without too many detours...