First off, can we just talk about what a terrible procrastinator I am? I have two assignments due at 5pm today and I haven't started them...yet I choose to update my blog right now...I've waited til the absolute last minute to do all my assignments this semester. It's shameful.

Secondly, I'm subbing for the first time in high school tomorrow. I'm scared! But I needed to work tomorrow so I'm just going to suck it up and be a man!

I observed a 3-6 grade resource classroom this morning and I really liked it. I can see myself teaching that. But sometimes I can see myself teaching PPCD too. So I just don't know.

In other news, Joshy is going to get certified to teach. It's official. He wants to teach middle school or high school math, and he jokes that his passion is coaching girls volleyball or cheerleading...at least I hope it's a joke...

What a week!

I figured out that I worked about 58 hours this week! I know some of you (Jessica, Kacy) are thinking "Oh get over yourself, I work at least that much every week." Or at least, you should be thinking that. But this old girl (me) is not used to working that much! I worked Sunday at the church, Tuesday for 12 hours and Wednesday for 12 hours watching Laura, Wednesday night at the church, Thursday all day and Friday all day babysitting, and Friday night at the church. I have to say, I'm rather excited about getting paid.

Funny Moments from the week:

1. Watching Celtic Woman on Youtube with Laura for about an hour.

2. Laura telling me she wishes one day I'd be as beautiful as Serena Williams.

3. When I told Laura we were going to meet Josh for lunch on Wednesday, her giving me a huge hug and saying "You're the best friend in the whole wide world! He is SUCH A HOTTIE!"

4. Parker, 3 year old boy I babysat on Thurs-Fri, singing "I like 'em big. I like 'em chunky" from Madagascar.

5. Austin, 7 years old, telling me I should enter a woman's bodybuilding competition (his mom does them).

6. When I told Austin and Parker that I had a boyfriend, Austin yelling "You've got to be kidding me! I can't believe you have fallen in love with him! Do you kiss each other??"

Not so funny moment from the week:

Laura and I made breakfast one morning..I made eggs and two pieces of toast. I left the room for a second, and came back to find Laura had set up a tv tray for me and gotten me juice and silverware (so nice of her!). I had eaten my eggs and one piece of toast. Laura then asked for a wet paper towel. "Why do you need one?" I asked. She replied, "Because I dropped a piece of toast on my foot earlier and the jelly got my foot all sticky." I threw the remaining piece of toast in the trash. I just sooo pray that I ate the non-foot piece of toast. I gag every time I think about it.

Heard about the job....

So I talked to Laura's mom about working for their family, and she said it sounds great and I just need to turn in my application and do some training hours and then I'll be all set to start working for them! The only thing is, it's not full-time like I was hoping. It's just like 40 hours a MONTH. But it'll still be great experience, and the mom is a special ed teacher who knows tons of people and would be a great resource. Plus, she said she knows other families who may need me to work for them doing the same thing. So I'm excited!

So I'm going to keep subbing...and I changed my availability so that I could start subbing in middle school. We'll see how that goes...

Josh had a job interview in College Station this week. I'm prayinggg that he gets the job. If he does, I will probably live with Josh's parents here and then move down to CS this summer. I thought I had to do my student teaching in the Dallas area, but I called the program and found out I could do it somewhere else! I know it might be hard to get a placement in College Station because of how many A&M students have to do their student teaching in that area...but I feel like it could work out. I know I shouldn't already be thinking about all that, but ya know...I am.

Praying for a job!

So I have been really discouraged lately about not having a steady job, not hearing back about several interviews, and trying to figure out which restaurants I'll apply to next. I don't really want to work at a restaurant, but if that's what I have to do to make some money, then I will do it.

My mom called me last night about a possible job that sounds amazing and perfect for me. Ok, so Josh's best friend Todd's girlfriend, Jenny, has a sister that is 24 and has special needs. Their family, who lives like 20 minutes away in Richardson, is looking for someone to watch her and hang out with her for like 6-10 hours a day. My mom heard about this job because Jenny's aunt is Susan Cutrell from Sulphur Springs.

Anyway, I have to fill out the application and paperwork because they have to hire someone through a company. So I am just praying that this works out because if they hire me, I could start right away and I could do that probably until I have to student teach next fall. And I really think it'd be perfect for me and I'd love doing that way more than being a waitress.

So if you read this, I would really love for you to pray that this works out. I feel like this is already a huge answer to prayer!

Don't wear shorts when it's cold outside.

Helloooooo!

I don't know how to start this off. It's been too long. So let's just dive right in.

I finished my first semester of classes with a 4.0 wooohooo! I love the low expectations of A&M Commerce grad school. It's a beautiful thing. I'm taking three more classes this semester, two of which will be online, so I only have to make the trip to Mesquite every Monday night.

I've applied for a bunch of teacher's aide positions and random restaurant/coffee shop jobs in the last month or so. I have an interview at a school on Monday, and I had an interview with Starbucks last week, where I discovered that my college degree was working against me and they didn't want to invest in me only to be hurt when I leave for a better job. Oh well!

So, here I am again, desperate to do some subbing, but since it's just the first week back to school, I haven't found any work yet! It's just ridiculous how much free time I have on my hands. I've been slumping back into a lifestyle of watching multiple episodes of Family Feud at a time...which you know is never good...but at the same time, it's SoOoOo good. I DO, however, have some standards for myself, which is not watching The Bonnie Hunt show, The Tyra Banks show, or Maury anymore. When I've watched these shows in the past, I've never been happy I watched them afterwards.

I have been doing super awesome about working out, I have to say. Eating well, ehh, not so much. I'm doing better, but I still have a ways to go before I could proudly stand before Jillian Michaels. I've gone to at least one class per day at the gym regularly for at least the last month. One day, I WILL surpass the 50 year old women that teach my class in athleticism and stamina.

So after I went to the gym today, I figured I would go ahead and go straight on to Wal-mart to get a few groceries. I was wearing knee-length shorts, a t-shirt, and a hoodie (Cute, I know!) Well, as we all know, it's effing cold outside these days. But I didn't mind braving the cold just to run into the grocery store and run out to my car. So I'm in the produce aisle of the grocery store, and an older black woman approaches me with a scowl on her face and angrily says to me, "Child, I can not BELIEVE you are out here in this freezing cold weather wearing that. You have got to be out of your mind. What is WRONG with you??" I laughed nervously, because I had no idea how to respond, and she goes "No I'm serious, what is wrong with you??" And then she just stares at me waiting for me to tell her what was wrong with me! Ahhhhh! I was scared of her. If you know me, you KNOW that I have the utmost respect for strong-willed black women, and wish I WAS a strong-willed black woman, and here I was being scolded in Wal-mart by one. Dang it! She said a few other things and I just continued to awkwardly smile and waited for her to finish. The last thing she said was "You've got to be kidding me! Take care of yourself, sugar. You have GOT to take care of yourself..." as she shook her head and walked away. I'm never wearing shorts again!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

I'm baaaack...

Hey friends. I haven't been too inspired to blog lately...but here goes nothing!

My classes are pretty easy. The last couple weeks have been busy with schoolwork, but not hard. I had to do a "Graduate Research Project" for one of my classes. The words Graduate, Research, and Project sound scary, but it only had to be like 3 pages. It was assigned back in September, but I thrive under pressure (not really) so I did it all on the afternoon it was due!

Subbing is going alright. I was going to sub today in a PPCD class (Preschool Program for Children with Disabilities) and I was really excited, because I think that I MIGHT want to teach PPCD when I am ready to be a real teacher. But I got sick yesterday, and it's worse today, so I had to cancel early this morning.

I subbed for ANOTHER first grade class last week, which was stupid of me. My thoughts when I accepted the job were "It can't be as bad as last time", "I need the money", and "Last time taught me what to do differently in a first grade class"...What a little optimist I was. It was horrible. Nothing I did or said seemed to work. They were all over the place. There was a kid in there all day who isn't getting any special ed services but has serious emotional and behavioral problems, he cried about everything he had to do that day. As a sub, it's really hard to know how to handle situations like that when you've known the kids for all of 10 minutes.

One funny thing about that day was when I introduced myself to the class as Ms. Bryant...well, there's also a black teacher at their school named Ms. Bryant. I heard one of the kids ask his friend, completely perplexed, "Wait, so....if she's white....how does THAT work!?!" I wanted to say "Oh my God, you can't just ask people why they're white!"..But I withheld. They probably weren't even born when Mean Girls came out.

In other news, I stupidly went and watched Paranormal Activity the other night. It was very entertaining, I have to say. Had me on the edge of my seat. Sleeping that night was a bit of a problem though. I finally fell asleep at 3am...I wouldn't exactly recommend the movie, considering it is about demonic activity. Don't worry though, it's all scripted and nothing is real! It's not real, Leslie! They're actors! It's a script! You're gonna be ok! ............

What else...I've been trying to go to the gym a lot lately. It's only $12 a month for a membership! I still can't get over that. And it's about 4 times bigger than the SS Athletic Club (crappiest gym ever...60 yr old aerobics instructor Julie was the only thing that redeemed it). Anyways, the women that teach that class take all their cues from Jillian Michaels. They are all like 30-50 year old hott moms, and they make me want to die with their high levels of fitness and extremely toned arms.

That's all for now. Write back soon. Lylas! Stay sweet and cool.

First off, I need to vent about some things. This seems to be a good place to do that. Some people's facebook statuses make me want to set myself on fire. And yet, I still read them all just so I have an excuse to be annoyed, which I know is lame, but whatever! I'm especially tired of the facebook statuses that are all the same, like "The Office wedding tonight!" or "Relaxin' and watching my 'Boys...Tony Romo better not let me down again..." Also I hate it when facebook statuses say things like "I'm so hungry. What should I eat for lunch?" 20 minutes later: "Looks like it's gonna be Chickfila!" 20 minutes later: "I'm stuffed!"

I had a flat tire on my way to work this morning. But a very nice middle-aged man helped me. He just aired it up, so I don't think it had a hole or anything in it. It seems to be fine now...don't you worry your pretty little head over it!

I subbed for a first grade class yesterday. It was quite possibly the worst day ever. The other teachers were really nice and told me that their regular teacher is disorganized and doesn't have much control of them, so my chances of having a good day with them weren't too good in the first place. They really were just BAD kids. Sorry to say it. But I gotta be real. I warned them, I separated them, I left their name for the teacher, I took away some recesses, I had the teacher next door come in and talk to them....literally, nothing I did or said made even a 1% difference in their behavior. They came up to me and tattle-taled on each other every other second, they pushed each other, they cussed at each other, they did obscene gestures at each other, they threw pencils at each other, they mocked me when I spoke, they didn't listen to the morning announcements, they didn't listen to instructions for assignments, most of them didn't DO their assignments...the teacher left cut-and-paste spelling assignments which was a mess, they tried to sneak scissors and tape from the teacher's desk...did I mention that every time ANY of this happened, they would come up to me and tell on each other? It was a nightmare. Did I cry during my break? Yes. Did I cry after school? Yes. Should I have cried? No. They are first graders. But I did...I was just so freaking tired. Oh, and my favorite part was "Ms. Bryant, are you pregnant? Are you gonna have a baby?" "No." "Then why is your stomach so big?"

I know I shouldn't come to the conclusion that all first graders suck and I'll never teach first grade, but that's baaaasically exactly the conclusion that I've come to.

It ended up a good day though, because when I told Josh about my day, he came over with a dozen roses (he's going to kill me for telling you he did that), and when his parents found out, they took us out to dinner, which was so nice. They're basically my new bffs.