February 25, 2013

2.25.13

We have officially been in Denver for 6 months and it is really starting to feel like home. Dan has been busy with his documentary making and film classes. He's even going to Vegas in April to film an amateur poker tournament. (I'm a bit jealous) We got a new addition to our family, Mordecai. He is a four month old kitten and a ball of energy. Chai is fanally getting used to him and they are very playful with each other. I had my third grade concert last month and it went quite well. We did "How to Be a Pirate" and the students were very cute, dressed up as pirates. Next week is the second grade performance of "E-I-E-I Oops" and two weeks later, the kindergarten performance of "The Three Piggy Opera". I am so excited for everyone to see these performances, they might be my favorite so far. I thought that being a first year teacher and having a performance for each grade was going to be impossible, but I am really enjoying putting them together! 

We are so lucky to have found a great group of friends in Denver. Last weekend we went to a "Nerd Prom" downtown and an ASA Alumni Casino Night. We also have a busy spring and summer concert season coming up! We have tickets to see Matt and Kim, Passion Pit, Of Mountains and Men, James Blake, Animal Collective, Dan Deacon, Vampire Weekend, and Avett Brothers. Who knew all of the best concerts were in Denver?? We are also looking forward to having some visitors from the Midwest coming to see us. Megan is coming the last week of March for my spring break, Dan's parents are coming in April, and my parents and brother will be driving out here in June! We hope everyone likes our cats :)

Health wise we have been doing really well. All of the kids at my school were very sick with the flu and thankfully Dan and I were able to avoid it. It might be the 14 vitamins I've been taking every day, either that or I've gotten all of my sicknesses for the year (fingers crossed). I have been doing this weight loss program called "Ideal Protein" and the change in my body has been quite dramatic. I have lost almost 15 pounds so far and I feel incredible. I have also been taking private Pilates classes and my back feels stronger than ever. Hopefully I'll be at my goal by spring break and back to eating normal foods. 

Dan and I are planning our trips for the summer and so far we will be flying to Michigan July 13, travelling to Chicago for Pitchfork the weekend of July 20, and flying back to Denver July 27. Other than the blizzard we had two nights ago, our winter has been very mild and pleasant. We are so lucky to have so much sunshine every day! I don't think we would want another Michigan winter after this wonderful one :) Missing our friends and family but looking forward to all of our exciting adventures ahead of us.

November 22, 2012

11/22/12

Happy Thanksgiving!
This is our first Thanksgiving away from the mitten and our families, so we are trying to distract ourselves so we are not too homesick. I have to say I miss mostly the smell of my moms kitchen when she is cooking the turkey and my favorite mashed potatoes. Dan and I are going to be spending thanksgiving dinner at the technology teachers house this evening. I was surprised at how late their family was eating dinner until I learned that everyone in Colorado spends Thanksgiving day on the ski slopes and then eats a late dinner. Since I'm not allowed to ski yet I felt I would celebrate Thanksgiving like a true Coloradin and work out instead. I am excited to socialize tonight with new people and eat some home cooked food :) Dan and I celebrated our 4 year anniversary last Thursday, Dan brought home the most beautiful gerber daisies and delicious oven baked pizza. This Saturday is Dan's 23rd Birthday which we will be celebrating with dinner and a movie.

School has been going very well for both of us, Dan has finished his first quarter at DU and turned in his take home exams as well as his two 15 page papers. I had my big Veterans Day program on Tuesday which over 800 people attended. It went very well and I am so thankful that it is over with! The parent volunteers at my school are absolutely amazing. They showed up on Monday after school and decorated the gym with red, white, and blue decorations and then on Tuesday they passed out programs and flags to all of the guests. I don't know what I would have done without them. All of the students did a great job singing and the best part was when I had the students all singing together for the last song. The entire audience was in tears, success. I can't wait to get the DVD so I can show my parents.

Dan and I are looking forward to coming home for Christmas break, we are counting down the days... Dan is off from school until January so I'm sure he will be busy watching movies and smothering the cat. I will be enjoying the next four weeks of school and curriculum mapping.

We hope everyone has a great thanksgiving and we are looking forward to seeing everyone soon :)

October 28, 2012

Greetings from Michigan!

It has been one crazy fall semester so far and I am now enjoying my fall break in Michigan. The month of October was filled with snowy days, midterms, projects and presentations, choir rehearsals, staff meetings, and my first school concert. Dan and I found a fantastic bar in downtown Denver that is owned by a Michigan alumni. It is called LoDo's Bar and it shows the Michigan football games every Saturday. Last weekend Dan, Tom and I went downtown and watched the Michigan/Michigan State game. It was a fantastic game and we had the perfect seats on the patio of the bar. Dan and I are starting to learn our way around the downtown area and it is always exciting to find new places to visit. Tom is the master at finding great brewery's and restaurants, we will have to go exploring with him more often. There is a Lodo's bar closer to us in the Tech Center but we were told it will full of Ohio State fans, so I don't think we will be going there.

Dan has been very busy with his graduate classes. We went to a potluck dinner at one of the professor's houses in his program and met a lot of the teachers and students. Dan had two midterms and a project/presentation for his classes and is now preparing for his finals. I cannot believe how fast his "semesters" go on the quarter system. It seems like he just started classes and now he's about to finish them. Not only does he have his finals to prepare for but he has a 15 page literary review paper for each of his classes due right after the final. That sounds very stressful to me so I might have to go find a new place to hang out when he is writing those. Dan's job is going very well and he is enjoying the company as well as the people that work there. He conveniently works two light rail stops north on Colorado and then has class one stop further at DU. The public transportation in Denver has been very, very good to us seeing that we only have one car. Hopefully in the spring, I will be able to ride my bike to work so that neither of us will have to use the car very often.

Dan and I have been working on "budgeting", now that we are both getting paid. We have reduced the amount of going out to eat to once a week, we only fill our gas tank twice a month (and we always use our King Soopers card to save money), and I have limited my shopping BY A LOT. Dan is so proud. We split most of the living costs so we are doing pretty well on surviving with two part-time jobs. Our biggest purchase has been our plane tickets for December coming home. We waited too long and our tickets totaled to $900 for the two of them. Next time we will try to buy our tickets in August. Lesson learned.

School is going very well for me, my students and staff seem to really like me :) I constantly get e-mails from parents about how much their child likes choir or music class and it makes me feel really special. I print all of them and put them in my smile file :) One of the best parts about my school is my team, the specials team. The teachers are absolutely amazing and do so much for me! This past week I was really sick with a sinus infection and I was unable to teach a full day so they covered some of my classes for me. Most of all, they helped me with my first grade concert! Being in charge of 80 first graders is a lot of work so it was fantastic having them there to help organize the students and keep them in line. My first grade concert was excellent and I am so thankful that it is out of the way. My students sang four songs "Whacky Do-Re-Mi", "I Like School", "Rhythm is Math", and "I Want to Know". Throughout the performance I had the students tell the audience what the songs were about and how they related to their other classes. The only problem was that I forgot to introduce myself in the beginning so that was awkward. It got even more awkward at the end though because I was sitting on my feet on the floor, so that I wouldn't block anyone's view, and my feet fell asleep. So when the concert was over, I rushed to get up and get on stage to introduce myself and thank people for coming, and I tripped over my own fast-asleep feet! So embarassing. By the time I got on stage, the audience was already halfway out the door. Lesson learned, always talk BEFORE the concert. Other than that, the concert went really well and I am excited for the Veteran's Day Concert because that is going to be with the whole school.

Friday morning, on his way to work, Dan dropped me off at the Denver Airport and I flew home to Michigan. I was sitting on the plane next to someone who was flying to Detroit to see the Tigers Game. I asked him how he managed to get tickets and he said that his son has paid $1,100 for them! I then made a joke "oh, did your kids go to Cherry Creek Schools?" and he said yes. Damn, if only I made that much money. But last night my Dad and I got to watch the Tigers game from the comfort of our own living room, which was great because it looked freezing at the game! I am looking forward to a week of relaxing, visiting old friends, stopping by GV and the ASA house, and spending quality time with my family. I miss Dan and Chai but it feels so good to be home.

October 8, 2012

10/8/12

Happy WINTER! not. We woke up Thursday morning with four inches of snow on our cars :( it was quite awful since we realized that we had left our scrapper in Michigan. Funny though, there was no snow on the ground, just on the trees and the car. Apparently it snows on and off from October 1st until March in Colorado, weird how no one mentioned that to us before we got here. Dan woke me up Thursday with "Emmy, you have to look outside." I thought I was going to see beautiful fall colored trees or a car accident, anything but snow. Thankfully by the time I arrived at school, all of the snow had melted and the sun was shining. The thing I like most about Colorado weather is that no matter what, the sun is out. Rain or snow, there is still sun. I feel like we go weeks in Michigan with out seeing the sun, hopefully it stays like this all winter.

Dan and I went to a BBQ last weekend for our friend Tom's birthday. It was great getting to meet more people and get out of our apartment. Driving to the different parts of Denver reinsure that Dan and I picked the best possible area to live in. I feel so safe walking around our apartment complex in the evening time and driving around. The parts near the hospital where I go to physical therapy, unfortunately, are not as nice.

Physical Therapy has been going very well, all of the therapists are surprised at all I am able to do and don't understand why my restrictions haven't been lifted yet. (It's because I'm really enjoying having Dan do the house work) No, it's really because I have to wait another two months before I'm healed enough to bend, lift, and twist. Most of my exercises are core strengthening, pool walking, and back muscle massage therapy. Parts of my back, especially surrounding my scar are still numb so I can't feel when people are touching it (lightly), I can feel when any amount of pressure is put on my back. (gentle hugs) The only time this will be a problem is if for some reason my back catches on fire :)

Dan has been busy with his new job working at an at home nursing company. He scans tests and files paperwork which sounds boring but he gets to listen to his headphones while he does it and sometimes play on the internet. I think this mindless work is great for him to keep his mind off all of his graduate studies. Dan has a really big midterm tomorrow and has been studying a lot for that.

On Saturday we ventured to the outlet mall on the other side of Denver. It was huge and had a Gap, Banana Republic, Ann Taylor Loft, Bath and Body Works, and lots of other stores. Unfortunately I didn't feel that the prices were much better than the sale racks at the regular stores so I think I'll stick to the mall close by next time. I'll save more money in gas.

Yesterday, Dan and I ventured out to Boulder for the first time. We did a three mile hike beside a beautiful creek that ran between downtown Boulder and the University of Colorado campus. CU was beautiful and we walked around the football stadium and past several academic buildings. There was even a fine arts and sciences building called the Ketchum building! One of Dan's professors got their PhD from CU and so Dan is thinking about possibly going there once he graduates from DU. Boulder was absolutely gorgeous and had lots of shops and restaurants. It felt a bit like walking around Ann Arbor, lots of hippies.

After our walk and a quick dinner, Dan and I went to see one of our favorite bands, Beach House, at the Boulder Theater. This theater reminded me a lot of the Royal Oak Theater in that it had a nice balcony for the old people and the people with back problems to sit. We had a fantastic view of the show and the acoustics were amazing! Unfortunately it was a Sunday night show and the doors didn't open until 8pm. Beach House didn't' start playing until 10pm and by 10:45 we were exhausted and had to drive the hour long trip home and go to bed. Dan and I were two crabby patties this morning when we had to get up for work. No more Sunday night concerts for us, even though it was well worth seeing Beach House.

This week I am working on getting my Veteran's Day Concert together and preparing for my first grade concert. I cannot believe that I am having a first grade concert in only two weeks, they are definitely NOT READY. I can't tell who's more sick of these songs, me or the students, or perhaps the student's parents. :) 15 Days until I'll be home in Michigan! I cannot wait to see friends, family, and cider-mills! Dan is happily going to spend the week hanging out with Chai, the love of his life.

September 23, 2012

Hello Friends and Family! We can’t believe that we’ve already been here for two months! We are starting to feel like real Coloradans, going on long walks, hiking, attending festivals, and I even registered to vote in the state of Colorado! (This swing state needs me) Dan has started class at The University of Denver, he has two communication classes that meet Tuesday and Thursday evenings from 4-8. I have been trying to learn how to fend for myself for dinner each night (not going so well). Thankfully, after a temporary deli job, Dan now has an office internship at a home healthcare company; it fits perfectly around his school schedule! Now I’ll only have to make dinner two nights a week J.

School is going very well. My students, parents, and staff seem to really love me which was my goal. My mentor had me visit a master music teacher on Tuesday which was fantastic. This teacher not only was amazing, but had great advice for me and said that she would be a resource if I ever needed anything. I feel so lucky to have so many people that I can go to in this district! I am so thankful every day for the job that I have, it is beyond perfect and amazing. On Friday we had a “no contact day” where the teachers had an in-service.  We learned about all of the different classroom features on our iPads and how to incorporate them into lessons. After the seminar, the former-former music teacher, who just had a baby and is moving to Chicago, volunteered her time to come help me learn how to use my SmartBoard. It is so cool and interactive! She had hundreds of lessons for each grade level and I am excited to start using it in my every day lessons. I have my 1^st grade concert coming up in a few weeks and I’m starting to get quite nervous, I hope we can pull it together!

Dan and I finally made it out to the mountains to go hiking last weekend. We went to Red Rocks Park and Amphitheater which is in Morrison, Colorado, about 25 minutes from our apartment. I really hope that we can take our families there when they come visit HINT HINT MOM, DAD, AND DAVID! The park was absolutely beautiful! Dan and I were driving up the mountain and somehow missed the park entrance so we ended up driving quite a ways up the steep slopes. To make it even more difficult there was a bicycle race going on so there were hundreds of bikers going up and down the mountain too. Dan had never driven on a mountain before and I was one nervous passenger. Once we got to the park (and safely back down the mountain) we parked the car and started to explore the amphitheater. The ramp to get into the theater was very steep and I’m shocked that everyone can climb that just to see a concert! Once inside the theater we saw hundreds of people running, jumping, and doing push-ups/sit-ups up the seats of the theater. These people are nuts! I barely made it up the steps in a timely fashion and all these people were running up and down them. Once we got to the top of the steps we saw an insanity yoga class going on. Not just relaxing yoga but really intense yoga! With the altitude, there is no way Dan and I could ever do that.

We toured the amphitheater visitor center which had photos and videos of past performers. Some of the bands/artists that had played there were The Beatles, Bruce Springstein, U2, Bob Dylan, Bob Marley, Dave Mathews… Tons of amazing artists. Our goal is to see a show or two next summer. After we left the amphitheater we went hiking on a 1.5 mile trail around the park. The first part of the trail was all downhill which was very nice. Unfortunately Dan got stung by a bee literally 30 seconds into the hike (it might have been my fault for swatting it) but he was fine and we carried on down the path. By the time we got to the uphill part of the hike I was really feeling the altitude and my back muscles. Dan was a pro at hiking but was kind enough to go snail speed for me. We were not the only foreigners on the trail though as we passed people from Wisconsin and Texas, it made me feel better. I cannot wait to go on more hikes (perhaps some easy ones for a while).

Last night Dan and I went downtown to the Denver Oktoberfest. It was located in the ballpark district and right next to Coors Field. The festival was hosted by Samuel Adams Beer and we bought one giant beer stein to share between the two of us. We chose the Oktoberfest Beer and it was absolutely delicious. They had live bands playing, tons of German food, and hundreds of Denverites having a great time. We met up with one of Dan’s classmates and her friends and practiced our “making new friends” skills. Hopefully we will be able to meet more people soon J

Goals for this week are to finish planning my fall programs, Dan will start his new job, and I will be continuing my physical therapy. Photos of our hike are available on Facebook.

September 4, 2012

Happy First Day of School Michiganders! I still have not figured out what the equivalent of "Michigander" is in Colorado... Today was the end of my much needed four day weekend (holiday weekends are great when you don't work on Tuesdays). Last week was quite eventful, especially now that Dan has started his new job and is no longer at home in the evenings to cook dinner. PLEASE SEND FOOD. Just kidding...

Monday was exciting because my students and I sang at the Colorado Rockies game. This was the first time I had ridden on the Light Rail. It was very clean, fast, and convenient. Unfortunately we had to walk very far to get to the special entrance at the stadium and it was a bit harsh on my back. The game was really fun though and the Rockies ended up beating the Dodgers 10-0 or something like that. Dan and I were even on TV! The first home-run ball landed right above us while we were standing in the isle. It was a bit scary but very exciting. My students and their families really enjoyed themselves so hopefully we will be asked back to sing again.

This week I got to see all of the A group students. The difficult part about week "A" is that I have kindergarten in the morning and in the afternoon. This cuts my lunch break short and I have found kindergarten to be my most difficult class. Even though it is only 30 minutes I still find myself exhausted after each class. All of the students have A LOT to say about whatever is in their tiny brain and I am finding it hard to focus their attention. I have found new ways to play song games that require them to stay in a circle so they cannot drift off and get distracted. I have also noticed that they could sing and play "here comes a bluebird" forever and ever. This is kind of nice to keep under my tool-belt in case I find myself needing to kill time. My easiest grade to teach is 5th grade, I relate better to older students and they (sort-of) understand my humor. I found a children's book about the Star Spangled Banner for 3rd grade which went over very well. I hope to find more children's books for more lessons.

My S.T.A.R Mentor is one of the most fantastic people I have met. She comes once a week to observe me and to give me helpful tips on how to work on my classroom management, classroom organization, and much more. This week we worked on my "tool-box", things to say to grab student's attention. So far they have been great, "Ready, Set?!" "You Bet!" and "Have a seat!!" "So Sweet!". I have also come up with some pop culture ones like "Lady!" "Gaga!" and "Call Me?!" "Maybe!!". The students love this stuff and it is so much better than "clap. clap. clap clap clap". I also needed to work on making sure my classroom rules and consequences were made clear to the students. I have three rules: Respect Yourself, Respect Others, and Respect the Instruments. These are easy to follow and I spent each class period going over what each of those mean in the music classroom. All of the students seem to understand it and my classes have been amazing since. Also I have three consequences: First offense: Warning, Second offense: Call home, Third Offense: Meeting with parents, student, Ms. Pellerito, and principal. (dun dun dunnnnn)

My goals for this week at school are to create a choir packet with all of the songs they will be learning, attendance policy, t-shirt order form, calendar, and contact information. I also need to learn how to make posters (with our cool poster making machine), and clean out my room. There is so much junk in there including outdated text book and tons of costumes from past plays. I am going to need a lot of help doing all this so I'll have to rally some parents and volunteers.

Dan and I went to my first doctor appointment today at the University of Colorado Spine Program. It was set up exactly like the Spine Program at UofM and I really enjoyed my visit. My x-rays looked great (scary, but straight) and I am to start increasing my daily activity. One thing that surprised me was they said that I need to start swimming every day. I didn't know that I was allowed to swim and of course, our apartment complex swimming pool is closed now... Hopefully I will be doing some swimming at physical therapy which starts on Saturday.

Dan seems to really enjoy his new job at the deli. His work outfit is much better too, and he doesn't come home smelling like sour cream and tacos. (yay!) Dan is working every day this week and then has orientation at DU on Friday. It is strange to me that he is just choosing his classes on Friday, the day before school starts! That would stress me out. Clearly, I have long-term planning issues. Chai is also loving her new home and my iPhone may be filled with cat pictures.... We love her :)

Until next week... Mountain Pictures Coming Soon! (I promise, we will go there!)

August 26, 2012

I have officially survived my first week of school as a real teacher. Monday was crazy because I met all 421 of my students and saw each class for 10 minutes. There were a lot of questions like "who are you, what happened to our old music teacher, and what grade are you in?" After school got out on Monday I was completely overwhelmed and exhausted. Thankfully I had the day off on Tuesday to recover and regroup. Wednesday was probably the worst day of the week because I had not prepared enough material to cover an entire 45 minute class for the younger grades. I forgot, from teaching high school all last semester, that the students need to be changing direction every 15 minutes or so, or else they go crazy. I spent a long time on Wednesday evening reflecting and over-planning for the next days lesson. Thursday went much smoother and I left the school feeling energized and excited about the next day. Friday was crazy because they were setting up for the after school picnic/carnival right outside my window and they decided that during my first grade class was a good time to set up the bouncy house (and plug the extension cord to it into my classroom). Clearly these people were not teachers.

Some of the things that I have been teaching are warm-ups, proper classroom behavior, rhythm (macro beat vs. micro beats), the history and lyrics of the star spangled banner, "Here Comes a Bluebird", rhythm machine, and my all-time favorite cheer "I said a Boom Chicka Boom". I always do this cheer at the end of the lesson because it gets the students up and moving and I can do "I said a boom chicka boom" really quietly as I direct them to the door to settle them down. I have also stolen a fantastic lining up song from one of the first grade teachers that I am teaching to each of my classes. It is to the tune of Yankee Doodle and goes "My hands are hanging by my sides, I'm standing straight and tall. My eyes are looking straight ahead, I'm ready for the hall". I find myself singing this every time I leave the classroom and it really helps the students calm down and prepare to walk quietly in the hallway from my class.

Since each grade level has three classes, they are divided up into groups A, B, and C. This past week I saw group B and next week I will see group A so I will not see group B again for 2 weeks. I like this schedule better though than only seeing each class once a week because I felt like I had accomplished more and gotten to know each student better this way. Dan and I attended the after school picnic on Friday which was really great to see all of the students and meet parents. Everyone seems to have very positive things to say and all of the students seem to really like me. I hope it stays this way :)

Dan has been job searching all week and got a job at a local Deli :) I'm sure he's going to enjoy making sandwiches, wraps, and salads for people rather than serving greasy mexican food like he was at Monterray. He also applied to a few jobs on DU's campus so hopefully he will hear back from them soon. It will be rather weird to work all day and then have Dan work during the evenings and weekends. The deli is not open on Sundays so I guess we'll have one day to go on our adventures :) Dan is anxious for classes to start and excited to be challenged in a way he never was in his undergrad. I'm sure I'll be learning about a lot of experimental films and such this year, just as Dan will be learning lots of elementary music songs.

The weather has been consistently hot and sunny and we are hoping for some cooler weather to come our way, especially since our pool is closing after labor day. My fall wardrobe is ready to be worn, especially because my classroom is so cold! Tomorrow my choirs are singing at the Colorado Rockies game so that should be fun! We are taking the light-rail down to the game, singing the national anthem, and then staying for the game. The game is against the LA Dodgers and I don't think the Rockies stand a chance, they are pretty bad. If only they were in the same league as the Tigers...

Until next week...