I-pad could change your life...

This weekend sick with the flu, two grad school classes, second grade valentines party to plan and complete, grades and comments to start digging into and Sun Valley hockey tournament this weekend. Happy Monday!

But today is Valentines day and big G got me an I-pad. Which could change my life. I will probably be on facebook even more!

Perfection

I lived the best three hours today and I need to write about it. I need to know that they really happened and remember them later.

Today Madden and I went to the craft fair and then walked for an hour in the rain/ snow all over town perfectly happy and having a wonderful time. That's it. That is what I lived and I feel so lucky.

I am so aware of the passing of time and how fast my kids are growing up. I morn it frequently and I am terrified of when they do finally grow up and leave the house that a few hours like today felt like a gift when needed most.

He will be ten next month and there are so many things that he has outgrown, while we were walking on the sidewalk and he was talking about his plans to do somethings I was able to just be there with him and laugh and talk and plan.

We weren't ice-climbing or skiing or climbing a mountain or doing any of those things we normally do we were walking down the street, wet and happy.

The NOW

Fall, I mean WINTER

So an update on the goals. I did ride 80 miles. I rode to Teton Village, through Teton National Park, to Moran. Then I came back on the hwy. Which was not the best, but the ride was beautiful! I went alone because it was kind of impromptu. It worked out great! Not quite 100miles, but close enough.

the 10 pull-ups...who am I kidding?

Student Teaching

I am in my 6th week of student teaching in fourth grade. I am loving this! I love the kids, and I love to teach! This is such a revelation to me! I have NEVER in my life known what I wanted to do. I just usually do whatever it is I am doing. This leads to random and seemingly unconnected life events. Except, luckily God knows this about me and he set me up with a planner husband and he knew I would just follow him around, it works.

WINTER IS HERE

Yesterday it was Fall, tonight it is winter here in the hole. We had this gorgeous, sunny, fall day yesterday and tonight we have two inches of snow accumulating. What can you do? Not ski of any kind yet, not bike anymore, so it looks like I am running this weekend. It could be worse that's for sure.

A Question...

How do you mom's get these amazing blogs written and beautiful with kids yapping in their ear? In the time it has taken me to write this daughter one has repeatedly told me what time she wants to be woken up in the morning to get on the bus for her Cross Country meet, Son has told me EVERY funny line in "Diary of a Wimpy Kid" and in third grade all the parts are funny, all this and the other kid is not even here presently. It is enough to make me scream inside my head. OK I feel better now.

What else?

Winter Goals next time! I don't want to give any of the excitement away, but abs of steal might be on there.

The quote of the day...

"Have you noticed all the homeless people in the world lately? That's why they have the dollar menu at McDonalds now."

I should put this into context. This was said by Addy to Madden in a very-know-it-all voice and with great conviction.

a project for school

For my bachelors degree from Prescott College I had to take a class called a Liberal Arts Seminar class. This class was taught by this wonderful professor at Prescott.

For the class we were required to read the book, A well educated mind by Susan Wise Bauer. I highly recommend this book. It was really wonderful to read about how to read!

We were then asked to answere a question a week in our journals. The final requirement was a project to complete. I chose to interviews my daughters who are 11. Here are there answers.

And here is Adeline;

The questions I asked them are shortended from the ones I answered, but I really liked hearing what my 11 year olds have to say about who they are and were they want to go in life. It is very inspiring.

I will try and post the questions later this week if I think of it.

Amy and I went for a 30 mi rode bike ride today to Teton Village. It is a very flat ride, but we made it harder by dragging the BOB behind with her kids in it. That would have been a great picture if I would have thought of it.

Have a great night!

One goal down!!!

So the goal of riding up the pass is GOLD!!! Amy B. and I rode up the pass today with Lee suporting us in the car. Holy Moly I am so tired!

We rode up Teton Pass to the sumit. I thought I was going to die, but I didn't. Not this time. I can't even really say if it was fun or not yet. I will let you know tomorrow! when I have forgotten.

This is what I am doing today...praying and procrastinating.

This is Garrick and I on top of a climb in Yosemite. He is on the Grand today with some just graduated boys. They are climbing to top in a day. This would fall under the catagory of PRAYING

I read this blog and Bella's blog and I thought of courage. What it takes to do life. How sometimes it is survivial and sometimes it is joy. PRAYING

Cleaning...kitchen, living room.

Painting...whole house, girls new rooms upstairs. Both of these are efforts to pracrastinate.

All I really want to do is go mountain biking. Again procrastinating.

I have five classes left in my bachelors degree. This degree has spanned 12 years, three community colleges, one distance learning program called Prescott college, (Which I highly recommend) three babies, and one great marriage. WHEW! I will officially be a college graduate this winter after I student teach. Holy Shit!

I know this is a bit rambily of a post, but I have been gone a long time.

Summer goals. I should talk about that because then it is out there and I might actually accomplish them. I think I will pretend that LOTS of people care about my summer goals and they will ask me about them in the future and then I will want to have accomplished them. So here they are;

• 20 pull-ups (I can do 2 and1/2)


• ride a century on my road bike (so far the farthest I have ridden is 35mi)


• ride up the Teton pass on my road bike. I am VERY scared to do this. I almost peed my pants when I wrote it down just now.


• make it all the way to the top on this trail on my mountain bike. very hard for me as I am a granny rider

OK there they are. now I have to do them.

Pray for Fatcyclist and his family, Pray fo Bella's baby (Yeah!), pray that I will stop procrastinating and get my *^%&$ school work done.

Peace friends, go out and play for me!
Lucia

Only in Wyoming

I saw this on my run this morning in Teton National Park...too funny!

End of the weekend.

Every week we host a "small" group. We get together with a group of people from all walks of life and talk about the bible and what God is doing in our lives. This last week we ended up talking about our families struggle with "church". Should we go, how much, is it even important. All of these questions we go back and forth on. We like our church that we currantly attend, I mean in all honesty it is a little boring and redundant, but that's not the end of the world and you could argue about whether that should even be a factor in the attending church factor.

So the conversation in our group circled around and around with people on both sides, but no one saying a firm "yes" or "no". Which is nice.

One person in our group who is quiet and thoughtful started talking about his church experience growing up in Pensylvania. He talked about the pastor who was an amazing speaker and about how the building was very historic and had lots of secret tunnels and cool things for little boys to explore. He also talked about the memories of sitting with his mom and dad and getting mints from his grandma.

I thought about what he said in the days that followed and the question arose, "What memories and traditions are we creating for our kids?"

This is such a broad topic, but one worth thinking about. Tradition for tradition sake seams futile and without meaning, so I do want church to be more than memories and good feelings. On the other hand giving our kids the gift of memories is also invaluable in fostering the growth towards whole people.

All these ideas were swirling around in my head competing with the very real fealings of, "just not wanting to go" in me. When I remembered that way back in July I committed to teaching an art lesson second hour at church. This seamed like divine planning!

So, Sunday morning I dragged myself out of bed, got the kids ready and we headed out the door with everyone protesting!

Five minutes into the second hour children's time the kids were asking me if we could come back every Sunday. And trully what I saw was not the Sunday school of my childhood church experience, but real learning about Jesus and the bible and real language being used and some good topics being discussed.

It then occured to me that church might not be so much about me anymore and more about what lessons and memories could be written on my children's hearts to carry them through their lives into their adulthood.

Peace on a rainy Sunday evening,

Lucia

The day after...

I am so thankful today for so many things.

The rainy weather feels refreshing this morning and odd for this time of year, but a good day to draw and knit and snuggle in.

I feel thankful that the day after Halloween is a Saturday, and not a school day because that is just torture! Plain mean!

And mostly I feel thankfulness for my "life" friends that I have collected throughout my life.

I think of them all often and the different moments we have shared and the many things I have learned about how to do life through each of them..

The other day I was thinking about how many times in my life I have moved. I realized the longest I have lived in one place is six years! That is not a long time. We have already lived here for five years and it is finally starting to feel like home.

With all that being said I find myself on the other end of moving where a life friend has moved away from me. And it feels like a giant hole in my heart and life. It is much harder that I expected, even though we will see them a few times a year it is so very lonely here in Jackson right now.

This is also the sad reality of living in such an expensive a transitory place. People come an go a lot. I like some aspects of this because it brings in new a fresh perspectives and energy in such a small town it is like a fresh sea air, but the hard part is it can make you weary of even forming bonds and attachments to anyone and I know that is not healthy.

Book Recommendation-

My friend Melissa recommended a book to me this summer and I bought it then, but didn't have the mental space for it at that time. I picked it up again this week looking for some inspiration and found myself just soaking in this woman's words of wisdom and thought.

The book is Walking on Water : Reflections on Faith and Art by Madeleine L'Engle. It is a really wonderful book of her thoughts on different things and her vocabulary is incredible. I have had to look up a half a dozen words already!

Here are some of her thoughts;

"It is a frightening thing to open oneself to this strange and dark side of the divine; it means letting go of our sane self-control, that control which gives us the illusion of safety. But safety is only an illusion, and letting it go is part of listening to the silence, and to the Spirit."

She talks a lot about being obedient as an artist and the idea that we must practice our art so that the art can speak through us.

"I believe that each work of art, whether it is a work of great genius or something very small, comes to the artist and says, 'Here I am, Enflesh me. Give birth to me.' and the artist either says, 'My soul doth magnify the Lord,' and willingly becomes the bearer of the work, or refuses; but the obedient response is not necessarily a conscious one, and not everyone has the humble, courageous obedience of Mary."

In other news...

I worked all evening on fixing my computer because my USB ports decided not to work anymore and I wanted to upload some new pictures. I got that fixed and then the very next day at the school Halloween carnival I dropped my camera and now that is broken! So new pictures are not to be!

That is all I have for this Fall morning!

Peace and love to my life friends!

Lucia

The Weekend!

The above image is me spinning fire! This is my new hobby and was on my list of things to learn in life! It is called Poi, very fun and G. is so terrified!

It is a beautiful fall day here in the mountains. Unusually warm, golden yellow and red from the Aspen trees. It is a day to inhale deeply.

M and the neighbor boys are playing football in the yard and the girls are rehearsing there dance moves that they and 50 other 3rd, 4th and 5th graders will perform during half-time at the high school football game tonight.

Life feels so full right now.

We were talking a few weeks ago in our small group about how God fills your cup with joy. My friend said she looked up this phrase in the concordance and the actual meaning/ translation was "overflowing". So our God actually wants our cups to be overflowing with joy. I feel like that today. The blessings of sunshine, family, friends, and contentment.

Thank you Becoming for the heartfelt comment that reminds me of the importance of joy, not because of circumstances, but because of Christ's love, what an amazing reminder! You are so insightful and honest!

This weekend our town gathers at the town square to buy pumpkins for a PTA fundraiser. So unusual that the weather is so nice!

Peace in the fall!,

Lucia

I am on a roll!

So now that the guilt is not allowed (thank you Heather for that wonderful reminder!) I feel like this is fun again! An I won't do anything that isn't fun!

Today was Columbus day and we had a teachers inservice. The girls went to a day of dance camp organized by the high school cheerleaders and Madden stayed in my room in the morning and G's room in the afternoon. These days are always a juggle!

The good news is though that my friend taught this inservice and she did such an amazing job that I came home and took a nap because I learned so much! The topic is my favorite and that is teaching reading.

If you can read well, or at all, you can do anything!

I work with students who are struggling at reading. They often hate it, they are often behavior problems, and they are checked out of school the majority of the time. I get them for 45 minutes a day in a small group setting and I am supposed to teach them how to be a good reader, teach them to love to read, and teach them life skills that I think are important for them to be successful in the academic environment. This is one heck of a tough job!

So back to today, the great thing about today is that it was a 100% applicable to by job as a
title 1 reading para and to my upcoming classes! A double hitter! I love those!

I start reading Methods, Language arts methods, and education for the future next week and my mentor is one of my all time favorite Kindergarten teachers in town! She was Madden's teacher and I am so excited to sit down with her and just absorb her enthusiasm and energy. Should be great!

We also had church tonight and our pastor guy was talking about work and the reason we do work. This was a good reminder for me because even though I really love my job and I really like working, I do get the jealousies every now and then. I start thinking about how I wish I was still a stay at home mom and how I really wish I was called to home-school my kids, This is a whole other topic, just believe me when I say I was not called and there is no way around it at this point!

So tonight message was that God created work to not only bless him, but to bless US as well. That we as created people need work and it is good. His reference was Ecclesiastes 3:9-13 that not only is work a blessing from God, but a gift from God.

Tomorrow is a great day to be mindful of doing my work for God and not for men.
Peace,
Lucia

I am back...I think..oooh commitment is SO hard!

After six months of quiet and guilt feelings on this end I decided just to jump back in today and start talking about our life, the crazies, the struggles, and the joys!

So here is an update for the record.

I went back to school! I am finally finishing my bachelors degree from Prescott college. I will have a bachelors in elementary education with an endorsement in art. This gets me a gigantic step closer to my dream of being an elementary or middle school art teacher. Now I just need a job opening, an interview and no other candidates with their MFA's!

A and B are in fifth grade a really seem to have come into their own this year. They decided to be in different classes and they both have amazing teachers. I don't know if it is a combination of factors or if it is part of their growing upness, but they are just becoming their own people, growing in different directions, and still maintaining their wonderful "twinness". It is so fun to see and be a part of!

M.J. is in second grade and just about the sweetest little guy! He is doing so good too! Reading is a bit of a struggle, but we are hitting the "confidence" factor hard!

I am having a really amazing year at my school! I love the other ladies I work with, they are wonderful and I LOVE my kids! It is so fun to be doing something everyday that you really love!

I haven't figured out how to make art a part of my everyday, but that is a goal! I have included my creativity in my school work and that has been extremely rewarding.

G-man is doing OK this year. He started a new engineering program at the High School and I think for him when he is doing something new and writing the curriculum (so he doesn't know exactly what he is doing) he gets overwhelmed and tired and then frustrated. So, I hope things get better for that guy! He is excited about the program, it is very cool! Eventually it will be great for him.

My USB on my brand new computer is defunked, so I have to go talk to Mr. Dell and figure that out, when I can I will post more pictures!

Peace,
Lucia

Well.....

Clearly I SUCK at this!

I have failed the blog test and I think I can live with that.

I might start back up again, I might not. You never know and I make no promises.

Have a great day!

Lucia

Tuesday

Today is Tuesday! I hate to count down, but this is the last Tuesday of my summer! AHHHHH.

My big sister is here for the week with her two little people and it is so fun.

I was thinking about stuff the other day thinking that my life really is flying by. I turned 30 this year, which seems substantial somehow. It also feels like it is about time that I just jumped into life and did what I was made to do.

I am going to take this year and really figure out how to make a living from home and how to do what I love.

My goal for this week...even with my sister here, is to start building my website. I want one that integrates my art and my design business.

New fun coming...stick with me I will work on being more diligent!

here is my new haircut...I shaved it, fun for summer.

Lucia

Good morning friends!

August already! I am not sure where I have been, but it's obvious that I haven't been here!

We have been traveling a lot and I have been working as a mt. bike guide this summer. BUSY

Also we have been working hard on our outside. So fun,

Here is our back deck which is so fun to have! I just feel like it enhances our lives so much to be able to sit out there and enjoy the warm weather. Gar did a beautiful job building it!

Today I am in bed with my foot propped up for most of the morning I am going to attempt to sit still and let my foot heal! On Saturday I ran for six hours and the next day the bottom of my foot started to hurt. It is very painful to walk on it. So today I have nothing really to do and I thought it would be a good day to just chill.

I am training for this marathon in September. It is an amazingly brutal marathon with extremely hard-core people. The fun part is is you are running this marathon with people out there who are running 100 miles and they have been running since the day before!!! It is seriously insane!!!

I think I am done with marathons for a while though. I am tired of training for them.

So the scoop on this blog. Major life changing earth-shattering changes are coming to this corner of the universe. Becoming has given me feed back on what she would like to see in this space so since she is about 50% of my readership I am listening to my audience and incorporating changes.

Enjoy Thursday!

Lucia

Sleep Talking and Apologies

In true ME fashion I have to make cookies this morning and bring them around to my neighbors behind us because well I was sleep yelling last night!

"Get the F*** out of here!" was what I said (because I thought someone was stealing our pine cones!) it seemed perfectly acceptable to me for me to yell this even though our neighbors have small children, I have small children and it was 1:00 in the morning!

Oh man I can't even grantee that I will never do this again! I really could.

Embarrassing!

Have a great Monday!
LUCIA-the sleep talker

Summer!

SUMMER!

Yeah for Summer!

Three cheers for summer!

OK so a few blogs ago I waxed on and on about this amazing run I went on with friends and guess what? There is a grizzly bear hanging around there! Jack, who was running with us, said he smelled it. I did not know grizzies smelled, but there you go!

Pretty crazy. Pretty weird, and I am pretty darn glad I didn't see it! A friend of mine was running up there a few days later and she said she ran right by it and saw it! and this is the same bear that tracked a man for a mile! This is very scary. The trails we were on are VERY popular so it is surprising to hear this!

So yesterday a couple of us went up Philips Canyon Which was really amazing! I didn't get any pictures, but there were amazing views of the valley, amazing views of Driggs and a lot of uphill! Loved it!

In other news art school is calling my heart....the problem is there isn't an art school here, anywhere!

More later!
Lucia

Rainy, Flue Day!

Yep it is a rainy/ snowy day and little M has the flue! Up all night with multiple trips to the toilette to be support, which means I will get sick soon...such is life!

Here is a picture from a few days ago, when it was sunny, of my favorite sign in Jackson. It is really old and makes me smile!

Have a great day, I will not let rain and flue slow me down!