Day 24, 6 to go

ELEPHANTS ON PARADE

Don't you love it when you are staying at a hotel or on a cruise and you come back to your room and your towels are decorated into some sort of animal shape? Well, I do! Also my sister-in-law gave my mom a really cute towel shaped elephant that held some lotion. I wanted to try my hand at towel animals. Perhaps it's a little stretch for a new adventure, but it makes me feel very diverse in my abilities. I decided to make an elephant, and the instructions I found called him "Ernie Elephant". He required 2 towels, one bath towel and 1 hand towel. The only towels I could find were different colors, so he was going to be a multil colored elephant a la the psychadelic elephants in Dumbo. It was super simple, but I think he turned out pretty cute. I added some sun glasses for a vacation-y feel. Hmm.. maybe I need to go on a cruise.

Meet Ernie the Elephant

Day 23, 7 to go

GO ON, TAKE A BITE

There's a somewhat famous line in Sleepless in Seattle that Tom Hanks gives as a reason that he loves his wife: "She could peel an apple in one, long, curly, strip" I have always wondered if I could do this. Is there a special trick? Is it really a remarkable task? Well, I have never really tried it before, so here's the new adventure today. Can I, and Meg Ryan, peel an apple in one long curly strip? The challenge was accepted.

The contendor:

A delicious, beautiful, and shiny, gala apple.

The task:

Me, peeling the apple in one strip.

Success???

You betcha! This is the peel - one long, curly strip!!!

It was a really yummy delicious apple too. Bonus!

Day 22 8 to go

COUNTRY ROAD

Tonight was my family/friend giltter toe party. We have a party about every 6 weeks. I literally live for these nights! Good chit chat, food, glamourous toes, and fantastic company. Tonight's party was hosted by my cousin who just moved in to a new house in Farmington. It's a bit of a drive from Santaquin, so I knew I wouldn't have a ton of time for a new adventure. I picked up my friend Tifani in Salt Lake on the way, and we had a fantistic ladies night. On the way home, we decided to go home on the good ol' Legacy Highway.

I have never driven on the Legacy highway before, so we were in for a beautiful, country, nighttime drive. Well, we kind of thought we were.

We did have a pretty nice sunset as we drove. Not too many cars at all, and it was a nice quiet adventure. However, we began to notice that the city was getting a little farther away - we were going to the west side! We quickly exited and made our way to I-15 to get to Salt Lake. Now heading east, we were then faced with this:

Kind of hard to tell, but we were stopped at a train track. We watched the train moving very slowly. Very slowly... Then it stopped.... more waiting.... then the train started to move BACKWARDS. Very slowly... It stopped again... then started moving forward again. This happened about 2-3 more times. I have never seen a train do that before - so somewhat of a new adventure. Finally, the train kept moving and didn't stop. Yeah! I finally got Tifani home and I continued on my way. All in all, a lovely drive that I will take in the future only when necessary.

Day 21, 9 to go

DESSERT ANYONE??

Is there anything better than cooking a yummy, chocolately, creamy, yet easy dessert? I say NO!!! One of my favorites is an eclair cake. Graham cracker crust, pudding/cool whip filling, and chocolate frosting. Are you salivating yet??? Well, tomorrow is our glitter toe party and I needed a treat to take along. Last year at school, someone on the PTO always brought in this yummy dessert for parent teacher conferences and I have been craving it for a while. I haven't ever made it and thought: perfect opportunity! My sister sent me the recipe and I stopped at the store and came home, cleaned the kitchen and whipped up some chocolately heaven.

Here's the recipe if you don't know it:

2 pkgs. of Graham crackers

(2) 3 oz pkgs. of instant vanilla pudding

3 1/2 cups of milk

8 oz. of cool whip

Line 9x13 pan with graham crackers. Mix milk with pudding. Fold in cool whip. Put half of pudding mix on crackers. Do another layer of crackers. Put the rest of pudding mix on crackers and top with another layer of crackers.

FROSTING:

4 TBSP of unsweetened cocal

4 TBSP Butter

4 TBSP of milk

Melt all together. Stir in 2 C of powdered sugar. Frost. Cover and refrigerate.

and PRESTO:

Mmmmm... Too bad I have to wait until tomorrow night to have any.

Day 20, 10 to go

TEA TIME

Having a very sketchy voice after yesterdays concert, I needed a bit of homeopathic help... HERBAL TEA. I have never tried it and have always wanted to give it a whirl. Is it good? Does it really help? I bought a pack of assorted teas including lemon, orange spice, and pomegranate. I have heard that lemon is the best to help with sore throats and such - so lemon it is.

Well, it was not very good. Not a ton of flavor- so it was a bit watery. I added a little honey to make it a bit sweeter. So, it was ok but not great.

With the taste question being answered, did it help my voice? You betcha! It was amazing how quickly it helped. Not a trace of a scratchy voice at all. That' s good to know. Maybe orange spice will be a little more tasty.

Day 19, 11 to go

CONCERT!!!!

A lot of my previous blogs have had to do with my upcoming Neon Trees/3o Seconds to Mars concert. It's finally here (and sadly, over). It was an awesome, spectaular, rockin', crazy, and unforgettable night. Before the concert I knew this would be a great opportunity to be adventurous. I had two goals: be in the mosh pit and try to get on stage. 30 Seconds to Mars always calls about 30 people on stage for the last song of their concert. Anyway, I knew I would be blogging about at least one of those two scenarios. Well, I didn't make it on stage, but Tifani and I were in a proper mosh pit. Can you call a mosh pit proper??? Well, here's the story of the night. Concert was supposed to start at 5, and doors opening at 4. It was general admission so I wanted to get there early so we could get up close. We did. We were there at about 3:30 and not too many people in front of us. YEAH!!! Well, at about 4:15 we hear that things have been changed. The doors will now open at 6 and the concert starts at 7. No wonder there weren't a lot of people there yet! We were 3 hours early!!! We waited it out in true groupie fashion for the rest of our crew to arrive. Once they started letting us in, I got a call from my friend that they were there. I said - run! There are letting us in and I don't think we can save your spot - there were now security people about. Plus, there were only letting the first 1500 people on the floor. Tifani and I got in and walked past a window and saw Tyler and Jared hanging out by the tour buses just talking - we screamed like little girls and snapped a pic with our phone.






Once Tif and I were on the floor - pretty much front and center , the first band, New Politics, came out. I have never heard any of their stuff before. They were ok, but the mosh pit was INSANE!! Don't know what I was thinking wearing flip flops, bare toes and mosh pit is a BAD combination. Pushing, crowding, jumping, screaming, more pushing, no breathing room AT ALL, and all with complete strangers. They played about 4 songs and Tif and I were done with moshing. I know she only put up with it for me. You rock Tifani! So, I experienced it and it was a little too scary for me. So, we moved back to a safer location but still within view.

Neon Trees were so fun and amazing as usual - glad I got to hang with my other friend Andrea as well. Andrea, you are now a member of the family!! Then it was time for 30 Seconds to Mars. They have so much energy and it was contagious throughout the whole crowd. Jared (lead singer) stopped about 2 songs in just to say what a great crowd we were and how much he appreciated that he didn't have to warm us up - we were already rockin! He also said that "on record" we were possibly the best crowd they have ever played in the US and were coming back very soon. YEAH!!!! He took a pic of the crowd to post on twitter:



KINGS + QUEENS OF UVU
(that's what he wrote on the post) I'm probably in there somewhere!!!


Here's a crazy pic of crazy Jared crowd surfing.



It's not the best quality- my phone doesn't take good pics when it's dark - but you can see him STANDING up on the crowd. Awesome!

Well, that's a novel about my adventurous night. My voice is not doing so well today. But I guess that's a sign of a fun night! Can't wait until next spring when they come back.

Day 18, 12 to go

NAILS

Today was kind of a long Friday at work. The school had a carnival that started at 5:00. I worked on stuff in my classroom until 6, made an appearance at the carnival (it was really fun!!), left school about 6:30, ran some errands on the way home, watched some TIVO'd Thursday night premiers with my roommies and went to bed. WHOOPS! No new adventure of the day! Crap, what to do?? Well, fortunately I had stopped and got some awesome nail polish on the way home because I saw a parent volunteer at school that had silvery metallic nails and I wanted some! I had painted my nails during tv night with roommies, and presto! Awesome, silvery metallic nails was a first for me. It may be a bit of a cop out, but I have never had my nails this color and it won't be the last time. I am in love!!! I think it's a bit rock and roll for my concert tomorrow night, what do you think???

Day 17, 13 to go

OF ALL THE MOVIES IN THE WORLD, I HAVEN'T SEEN THIS?

For those of you who know me, I am pretty synonymous with movies. In fact, I am writing this blog while watching a movie in the background... I would have been more than happy to have a 30 day movie blog, but this is for new adventures. Though, I do love movies, I haven't seen a lot of classic or really old movies. One of which is Casablanca.





Today, it was all about the classics. I ordered this classic, Oscar winning movie from Netflix and today it arrived. Just got through watching it and I really enjoyed it! It seemed shorter than I expected. I really had no idea what the story was about before watching it. All I knew was that it is set during WWII and there are Nazi's... I was glad to learn right away that Casablanca was a refugee town for Europeans trying to flee to America. No idea. Wow, and I call myself a movie lover??? Anyway, if you haven't seen it, I highly recommend! Very well acted and written. Humphrey Bogart and Ingid Bergman = dreamy!!

PS - I also just realized pretty recently that Casablanca means white house... Anyone know why it's called that???

Day 16, 14 to go

THIRTY POMEGRANATES

Going to a good rock concert makes me feel like somewhat of a rebellious teenager. It's one of my favorite things and I have one of my favorites coming up: 30 Seconds to Mars. I saw them in May for the first time not having heard any of the songs before and fell in love! My friend Tifani and I decided we wanted to make some T-shirts in support. We made shirts for another concert over the summer, but this time we got some iron transfer paper - something I have wanted to do for a long time. To explain the meaning of our shirts, mine says Pomegranate. At the last concert, the lead singer had a bright pink mohawk which he claimed was "pomegranate". Tifani's has the word "seconds" written 30 times in different fonts a la 30 Seconds to Mars. The iron on process was pretty simple, once we figured out how to get a mirror image of our words. It was a lot of fun - and now the world of homemade t-shirts is at my fingertips!!!!

Yes, we have the ironing board on the washer, we needed to be able to put lots of pressure on the iron transfer paper.

I love how couture Tif's pose is, Miss J would be proud. Also, don't I look SOOOOO rock and roll? Ech, I'll have to work on that before the concert.

Day 15, 15 to go

MEMORIAL DAY
Today, we have reached the halfway point and I am feeling about 75% better than yesterday so I thought I should do something a little special. Something that I wanted to do during this experience was to visit my Grandma Slack's grave. Since it is only about 2 minutes from my house, I thought it would be something nice to do. My grandma died in 1994 and my family and I have been to her grave every Memorial Day since, but I wanted to go on my own. This was my mom's mom. She lived in Provo and I remember going to visit her so often. Sunday dinners, 4th of July, eating at Riverside Country Club, etc. etc. I have so many memories. This is picture of her as a young girl.

Elizabeth Sutton Slack

Over the weekend, I was talking with my mom and sister and they brought up having a Grandma Slack day - eating food she might have made, going a place we might have gone with her etc. And I mentioned to my mom that I had on my list to put flowers on her grave (NOT fake ones - my grandma always said that she would haunt anyone who put fake flowers on her grave). My mom told me that I should get some fall leaves because she loved to go see the fall leaves. So, today on my way home, I made a little detour up the canyon to find some leaves.

I love how the sun is shining through the trees!!

One exciting part of the drive up the canyon: having to slam on my brakes to avoid a pigeon running across the road. Not having hit any roadkill, I finally found some red, gold, yellow, leaves and a sunflower (just because they were everwhere!) I drove to the cemetary and fashioned a little fall bouquet to leave on her grave.

It was a really special and fun afternoon. I will always remember my grandma and I feel lucky that I live so close that those memories are around me almost every day!

Day 14, 16 to go

Madame Librarian

Still not feeling 100% - gotta love a nasty cold. If there hadn't been so much going on at school today, I would have stayed home. But, alas, my students came first. one word: Dayquill. It's amazing. I think it works wonders. At least for about 4 hours. I took some this morning, but haven't taken any more. I thought I was doing better - but at about 5:30, the drugs were definitely wearing off- Hello Mr. Sniffles. Needless to say, I had to, once again, do something pretty simple today. I have been reading Super Fudge to my class and we just finished it today. Bingo - I needed a new book to read aloud. I wanted to get a new book that I haven't read to my class before - I've read some books several times. My older sister came to mind on my way home today. A long time ago, we started a book club to read Newberry Books and she is the only one still keeping it up. Respect to the sister!! She told me of one book that she listened to on tape with her kids - The 21 Balloons. I think I remember a teacher reading it to me in school. It's about a man who is on an adventure in a hot air balloon and crashes an a mysterious island where the people living there have kind of a unique civilization... hmm... Lost, much???? I haven't really read an adventurous story like this to my students before so I took to the Newberry shelf at the library. Don't worry, I have been to the library before and I have read Newberry books before.
The new factor of today lies in the fact that I got a book I haven't read in 20 years to read aloud to my students. I also checked out another book that I remember that I loved: The Summer of the Monkies. Another teacher at my school has been reading it to her class and I have been wanting to get that one too. I'm excited to expose my students to some new books that they may not ever have read otherwise.

Day 13, 17 to go

So Let it Be Read

Today, I had planned to go on a Sunday drive and picnic with my fabulous roommates, but last night, I started coming down with a pretty nasty cold, so I have been in bed all day. Since I didn't feel well enough to go to church, I decided to do some good old fashioned Sunday School. I read an entire book from the Old Testament. I looked at the table of contents to choose a book, and Hosea it was. I have a very hard time reading the Old Testament. I find it difficult to understand and it's often worded pretty harshly and dark. Hosea was no exception. What I mainly got out of the 10-or-so page book was that Israel had forgotten the Lord and Hosea was calling them to repentance. The way it was worded was pretty blunt - comparing Israel to a harlot and to quote Hosea "I hated them for the wickedness of their doings... I will love them no more..." I don't know about you, but I love the feeling of comfort and peace I get from reading the scriptures, and sometimes I don't find that in the wording of the Old Testament. There was a little comfort at the end of the rebuke that is Hosea, however. "I will ransom them from the power of the grave; I will redeem them from death".
On that note, remember the Lord and follow his counsel, listen to the prophets and he will remember and bless you.

Day 12, 18 to go

Maybe she's born with it

Today's adventure was a fun one! I have always kind of felt my eyelashes are a little lacking in the full and thick department. So, to pump up the volume, I bought some fake eyelashes. I have absolutely never used them before and was a little concerned about them looking natural, and staying on. Insert Yours, Mine, and Ours catastrophe here.


Remember the lashes coming off in the middle of a date?


Anyway, I was ecstatic to find a fake eyelash kit - complete with lashes, tweezers, adhesive, and remover for 8 bucks. I decided to use the seperate lashes rather than the one strip of lashes. I thought it would look more natural. It was a little difficult to get the lashes in the right place and to avoid excess gobs of glue. So, gathered my wits and got to work.




Before - have to do it with a clean face. Hence, no make up. Don't look too closely.




Applique




One down

All done and ready for a fun flirty lash day. I was feeling a little "easy, breezy, covergirl".

The best thing about it was no one really thought they were fake or noticed anything until I said I had fake lashes. Like the golden rule of make-up, the trick is to make it look like you aren't wearing any. Maybe the same holds true for fake eyelashes. Apparantly they are supposed to last a couple of weeks, so we'll see. But I love them! I may try to find some eyelash growth stuff - it really makes a huge difference. Great new experience for the day!!!

Day 11, 19 to go

Me.com

Here we are, in the teens of our countdown. How's it going so far? So far it's been a very fun and enjoyable experience. Sometimes it's a little tough to find time and to try to make it interesting, but consistency has been my key! This week especially has been full of fantastic new adventures. That being said, today was somewhat of a different story. After a very long, crazy, and somewhat chaotic day at work, to be honest the last thing on my mind was getting up the energy to come up with a new adventure of the day. I had some ideas, but all of my ideas were a little too much for me to take. So, today here's what I came up with:

I googled my name. I realized that I have never done it before and wanted to check out my virtual self. I found a few other Adrienne Grays in the world. A myspace profile, an obscure singer/songwriter, a twitter page, and then my own facebook profile link! I was the fourth name to come up. Kind of crazy and makes me feel that the world might be a bit small.

Day 10, 20 to go

Paper Cranes



At the end of the last school year, one of the 4th grade teachers taught all of the 3rd and 4th graders origami. Since then I have wanted to learn to make a paper crane. I am sure I have done origami in school, but I don't remember anything I might have made at all. So, I decided it counted as something new for me. I had a pretty good supply of colored paper in my classroom and brought a few home to test it out. Here are a few pics.


Before




In the works...






Flying away!






It was so fun, I made more!!!!


It was pretty easy - thanks to a how-to video on you-tube. A good time. I highly recommend the art of origami!!

Day 9, 21 to go

WHOOPS!!!

So, I spent some time getting my blog ready, and somehow posted it on a different blog. Don't ask me how I did that.... So, rather than re-type... here's the link!

www.bucketlistbookclub.blogspot.com/2010/09/day-9-21-to-go.html

Day 8, 22 to go

Eat Your Vegetables

Today, I decided to be somewhat resourceful and healthy! Those of you who know me may die of shock. Yesterday, I put cucumber slices on my eyes and was left with almost a whole cucumber. No vegetables for me, so rather than waste a perfectly good vegetable I decided to use it for something new today. I tried a cucumber!!! I never eat vegetables, so I decided early on that it should be on my list. My roommate tasted it first to let me know if it was a good cucumber. She didn't want me traumatized for life if the first cucumber I tried was a nasty one. She gave me the OK and here's the photo story:

First bite...


Thinking it over...



Eh, it was OK....


Well, here's the verdict. It didn't have much taste, I thought, I didn't hate or love that. But I didn't like the mushy texture of the seedy middle against the more crunchy outside. I would have liked to try it with some ranch, but we didn't have any here. Next time. I think I could almost enjoy a good cucumber with a little ranch.
I did eat a few bites to give it a fairer try. It was ok, but I didn't love it or want more. I was really hoping that I would like it so I could find a good vegetable to enjoy. Oh well. I tried!

Day 7, 23 to go

Cool as a Cucumber

Today was kind of an indulgence. I have always wanted to put cucumbers on my eyes. Supposedly this has many benefits. I decided to see what the hype was about before I tried it. It is believed the cucumbers can help reduce puffiness, bags, and dark circles under the eyes. The technique: Put slices on your eyes for 10-15 minutes. Simple? Couldn't be more so. Effective??? That's another story. From what I read, the cucumber has nothing to do with it. It is just the cold. You could basically get the same effects from a cold washcloth. Hmm... I was a little disappointed to hear that, I won't lie. However, I still wanted to try it out for myself. To add to the experience, I decided to do this with complete silence. Normally, I would have to have music or some kind of background noise. Since I had basically found that there really were not a lot of benefits from the cucumber, I wanted this to be mostly about relaxation.

It was a little difficult to get a picture, and I know it is not the most attractive look - but here's the proof:





Needless to say, it was cold!! It did feel good and refreshing. I can't wait to try this on a hot summer day to cool down and relax. An added bonus, the scent of the cucmbers was relaxing. I did feel a bit like I was in a spa. When I took off the cucumbers, my eyes felt nice and tight. Don't know if there are any lasting benefits. Maybe I'll need to do this more regularly. Conclusion: cool cucmbers are good for the eyes and the soul.

Day 6, 24 to go

"Do the Watermelon Crawl"


Today, a necessity became my new thing! My sister asked me to bring a cut up watermelon to my nieces' birthday party. Strange as it may seem, I have never bought and cut up a watermelon on my own. I have helped cut one up, but this was all me! I really wanted to stop at a road side fruit stand on Saturday to purchase one, but every one I drove by was not selling watermelons. This was a shame because I wanted to have that as my new experience for that day. Anyway, off to Winco for other groceries in addition to a large watermelon. It was really big!! I didn't get a before picture of it, but I could have fed about 30 people with it!!!


So, my roommate had an awesome knife and I got to work.








Thanks to watching/helping my mom, I have learned the best way to cut a watermelon. It's easy!!! Success!! This is what it looked like when I was done:


Told you I could feed 30 people!! There was SOOO much watermelon.

Now, picking out a good watermelon is always iffy. I've always been told to thump it, and listen to see if it sounds hollow. If it sounds hollow, it should be good. Well, I don't know about you, but every watermelon sounds hollow to me. Another setback is that I don't even like watermelon. How to know if it was good? Enter my awesome roommate, Heidi. She tried a bite and, again, success! Not mushy and very sweet!!! Yeah! Then it was time to pack it up and head out to party. Look at me, I'm such a homemaker!!

Day 5, 25 to go

I Wanna be a Rock Star


My brother and sister-in-law frequently pack along Rockstars to drink whenever we go on vacation. Particularly a lemonade flavored, low calorie variety. They always say it is really delicious, and it has piqued my curiousity. So, today's new thing was to drink a Rockstar. On my way from Provo to Salt Lake to enjoy an evening with a friend, I stopped at a gas station and picked one up.

Don't Drink and Drive!!


It was really good! Tasted like a pretty sweet Country Time Lemonade. I was now waiting to see if I would get a "buzz" or worse. No shaky, anxious feelings though. Probably because I am sl used to caffeine due to my Diet Code addiction... I did feel pretty good, however, a good amount of energy and no sluggishness at all.




Caffeine + B-vitamins = a natural high.

After I downed the entire thing, I had two concerns: That I would be wired and unable to sleep or that I would have a bad crash after it wore off. To my surprise, neither effect. Now my worry is that I have found a new addiction to get me through the day... Gotta get my vitamins somehow!!!

Day 4: 26 to go

Berets, Snaps, and Poetry

Today, I decided to get my beret, notebook, annd pencil, and do some writing. I have never in my life written a poem unless it was some sort of school assignment, so I thought I would try my hand at poetry. I felt somewhat bohemian as I sat down in my chair in the quiet to just write some poetry. I didn't have any ideas of what to write about and no inspiration whatsoever. I was worried it would take me ALL night, but I had a thought and I just began to write. Before I share my finished product with you, I want to preface it by saying 2 things:
1. This poem in NO WAY whatsoever has anything to do with my real life. I honestly don't know how this idea came to me, but not from any experience in my own life.
2. I am not a writer. I wrote this fairly quickly, and as I said, I haven't ever written a poem just for me before, so it's somewhat scary to put it out there for the world to read.

Having said that, here goes:

WORDS

The words from your mouth race through the space between.
The death of a friendship I'd never foreseen.

The words from your mouth bring tears to my eyes.
So cruel, so hateful, so full of lies

The words from your mouth are knives in my back.
From so true a friend comes a vicious attack.

No more words from your mouth and as you turn away,
I see the knives in your back, from my words of yesterday.


Again, I don't know where this idea came from. I was just kind of intrigued by the idea that so many times we are unaware of how the things we say or do may hurt others. We are quick to blame and anger to those we love, but how many times are we at fault? Are we as quick to forgive as our loved ones may be? Are we impatient with others while they are patient with us? Anyway, It was actually quite fun to sit and write just for fun and expand on a random thought that came to me. All in all, a much better turn out than I expected when I decided I would write a poem.


***It's been a few days since I wrote the poem, but I realized where the idea came from. If you watched So You Think You Can Dance last season, you may remember a dance choreographed by Travis that Kent and Neal danced to. It was about two friends. One of them betrayed the other. In that dance, if I remember, one friend did betray the other and walked away. I was thinking about this piece and thought, what if the other friend was also at fault and was unaware? What if the betrayal was provoked? Anyway, that's what inspired my poem!

Day 3, 27 to go: Money, Money, Money

I have heard that money is one of the dirtiest, germiest, and all around disgusting things around. Have you ever wondered what happens to your money after you spend it???

So, today I did something super simple, but something I thought was kind of cool and wanted to do for a while. I entered all of the bills in my wallet on wheresgeorge.com (don't worry, there weren't that many!!!)
If you aren't familiar with this website, here's how it works. You enter in the serial number of your bill or bills, and then after you spend it, if someone else enters the bill online as well, you can track it to see where your money ends up. None of the bills in my wallet had been entered yet, but if someone else enters it, maybe I can see why money is so dirty!!!

Day 2: 28 to go. MUCHOS GRACIAS

So, today's new adventure is more educational than excitement, but new nonetheless.

I really enjoy learning other languages. I took four years of French in high school, between a few members of my family speaking Spanish and my students learning Spanish, plus sign time at school, I feel I have had somewhat of a well rounded exposure to foreign languages. I thought it would be fun to learn how to say thank you in 10 new languages. I already know French, Spanish, German, Japanese (thanks to Mr. Roboto) Hawaiian, American Sign Language, and Italian so here's a few more added to my list: I also added them phoneticaly in case you want to know how to say them yourself:

Arabic: shukran (shoe-krahn)
Finnish: kiitos (kee-toas)
Norweigian: takk (tahk)
Russian : (can't type it because it's different characters and my comp. won't let me copy and paste) but you say it: spah-see-boh
Swahili: asante (ah-sahn-teh)
Tagalog: salamat po (sah-lah-maht poh)
Polish: dziekuje (dsyen-koo-yeh
Swedish: tack (tahkk)
Hebrew: toda (toh-dah)

and my favorite:
Afrikaans: dankie (dahn-kee)

I hope you learned something new. I did today!

Day 1

I told you to stay tuned for my plan to not get totally sucked into the teacher void. Well, here is day 1! For the next 30 days, I am going to do something new each day and document my adventure here for all to read... I will try and blog the same day as I do my new thing, but let's be honest, some days I may not be at computer or have the time to both experience something new and write about it. I promise, however, that there will be 30 entries. Exciting, informative, creative, etc. I make no promises.

So, day 1, 29 to go. STAND IN THE GREAT SALT LAKE. A stinky beginning.

My family went to the Great Salt for pictures. I have never really been there before so I was excited! I think I have been to Saltair but never close to the actual water. I have smelled the smell before. Grossey!!! So, as I got out of the car, I was expecting a nasal assualt of epic proportions. It actually wasn't that bad. Don't get me wrong, it was nasty, but not unbearable. We were all dressed in light blue, white, and khaki and we strolled onto the beach. PS, if you are ever on the beach at the Great Salt Lake, don't think about what the sand actually is. Two words: shrimp and waste. I was even more happy when I was asked to kneel in it for the photo. Oh well, it was fun and I think that they turned out great. After the photo shoot on the beach, I waded into the salt/brine shrimp/water solution for the first time ever. Here are a few facts about big salty:

The largest natural lake west of the Mississippi.
75 miles long, 35 miles wide
Estimated brine fly population: 100 billion
3 major rivers deposit into the Great Salt Lake: Bear River, Jordan River, and Weber River. The extreme saltiness is due to the fact that there is no outlet besides evaporation.
The salinity of the lake varies from 5-27%. On average, oceans are 3.3%. The dead sea is 33%

A picture of me enjoying our local phenomenon is forthcoming. And I promise that future entries won't be quite so lengthy. I do have ideas for new things to do, but I would welcome other suggestions. Enjoy!

Here's the pic of me in the lake. It was taken on my sister's camera and I just got it from her:

First two weeks

So, I have survived the first two weeks of school - and so have my students!

Here are a few highlights and lowlights

Amazing, on-top-of-it new principal. I really think he will do some amazing things for our school. Also, he wears a tie every day and the kids love it! They need to know what tie Dr. Morris is wearing today. It's great to know that the kids are liking him so much already.

Today I was reading a story to the class about a boy who said that he had a "dumb third grade teacher" I stopped and said that I hope none of my students will ever say that. One boy, who is particularly hyper and active just said "No way! You're the nicest teacher!" It was so sincere and adorable coming from him! Also, another girl has already showered me with pictures (most of them depict me with a ponytail and no hair on the sides of my head) and "I love you, Miss Gray" letters. I really think I have such a great class this year and hope they continue to work as hard and well as they have been so far. I'm feeling good about third grade this year.

Sign time. We have a deaf student in third grade who has a full time interpreter and she teaches us sign language twice a week for 1/2 an hour. I wasn't sure we could make it work at the beginning of the year and I am so glad we did. It's awesome! The kids love it and the teacher is great. We have learned the pledge of allegiance and how to "sing" happy birthday and lots of other words. Plus, it's some prep time for me. Win win win.

Completing the first of FOUR conferences this year. Tonight at 7:00 I walked out of the classroom after 3 hours of conferences plus teaching for seven hours. Long day = exhaustion. (it will be beditme soon). The best part was that it was still daylight when I left. That is unusual for conferences. I'm accustomed to walking out in pitch black and driving home in a blizzard in January. Ugh. Can't think about that now. Right now, I am the furthest away I will ever be from conferences. Good thoughts.... good thoughts... good thoughts...


LOWLIGHTS

Waking up at 6:00 every morning. Definitely the top of the low list. Not a morning person and will never get used to teacher morning hours.

Long days. Working from basically 7:30 to 6 at night -a little work at home after managing, teaching, chasing, etc. 17 kids all day. TIRING!!!! Especially after almost 3 months of summer relaxing and just chillin'. Quite a rude awakening.


No more late, warm, summer nights with shaved ice. Yummy. See you next summer.

Not as much time to hang with my friends. I miss seeing them so often and being able to take off with them at a moment's notice. See you next summer.

I have a plan of attack to not get sucked in to the teacher void. Check back within the next couple of weeks to see my documentation of this plan!!!!