Practicum!

Today I began my first day of my second practicum of the year. This semester I am in a first grade classroom in Paris, IL. I'm not really nervous at all this time around, partly because it's my second time, and partly because I'm more comfortable with first grade. My teacher seems really nice, I just don't know if she'll be as helpfull as I'd like. Today she just let me observe and I think I'm just more used to jumping right in. She didn't really tell me my plan for the next four weeks as to what I'd be teaching or anything, so I'm not quit sure what's going on yet. I told her my only requirements are to create a bulletin board, do a case study on a child's reading ability, and then just to teach as much as possible. So, I hope this means a lot!

Funny story of the day:
My first day in the classroom, right? I don't know any of the kids yet. One little boy sat by me on the carpet and slipped a card under my leg as he whispered, "here I want you to have this. It's my favoritest card ever." I didn't even look at it, and I tried to give it back quietly. However, he insisted that I keep it as a "present". Later, I pulled the card out from under my leg to look at it, and I realized it was a picture of basically a naked woman. She had small triangles of fabric covering her breasts, and her hand was the only thing covering her bikini. The woman in the picture was supposed to be representing wrestling in some way... not really sure on that part yet. I couldn't believe that this little first grade boy had a card like this! I would hope that his parents didn't buy it for him! Some parents really make me angry, and this would be the type!

busy busy weekend

I've been feeling so exhausted lately after the weekend is over. I think that some rest some is needed. It just seems like since we've gotten the house it's been go go go, nonstop! This weekend I did get a lot done on my to-do list for the house though! It was Jared's birthday on Saturday so I didn't make him help with anything, haha. I got the kitchen painted, the guest bedroom cleaned out, all his clothes hung up and organized, the guest bed is all set up, and I finally cleaned a little. I dusted and did all the floors before Jared's family came over on Sunday for a little birthday party. It was good to see some of his family that we don't get to see very often. We also went and bought new kitchen countertops this weekend! I was excited to go pick these out. We wanted to get them ordered before Christmas and then Jen told me that Menards was having a sale on them this weekend so we went ahead and got them ordered. I would have been happy with getting the laminate ones, but for 75 more dollars we could upgrade to the high resolution. So, that is what Jared wanted and that's what we got! Im excited about getting them installed. I just have this "thing" about putting food and stuff on the old countertops beacuse they just look so warn and old in some places. So, I'll be happy to have new in the house :) I'll be sure to take before and after pics as well!

I also got the trim started which I'm excited about getting that done because it will make it look complete I think. I bought one of those rolling edgers and it actually worked really well so far! I haven't made much progress because I tried it right before we had to leave and it did seem to work! So, I may try and work on that this coming weekend when I go home. BUT, I get to watch Noah all weekend so I'm not sure that I will really get anything done on the house, but that's okay :) I love that little guy.
Maybe it will be good to take a break for all the workin, paintin, and cleaning. It drains me!
I'm going to need my energy because this week Wednesday I start teachin the little 1st graders in Paris. I'll be doing that for my Practicum which is 4 weeks. So I'll finish right before Thanksgiving break. Then after break we come back to school for 3 weeks and then we're out for Christmas! It's all approaching SOOOOO fast! I better quit typing and thinking about all of what I have to do before Christmas break because I'm just stressing myself out. I'm doing quite well with taking my projects one day at a time, knock on wood...
Welp, thats about it for now. Have a great week everyone!

Carving Pumpkins!

This was the pumpkin I carved. I thought it was pretty cute :) We decided to carve pumpkins tonight and it was really fun! I carved a ring, Megan carved an Owl, Kayla carved a peace sign, and Abby carved a haunted house looking thing. We took some fun pictures as well. It was a nice stress reliever :)

tryin to show off my bling-bling to match my pumpkin, but the flash was too bright

Kayla's peace sign, so cleverly held together by toothpicks

cute pumpkins, cute friends :)

~Last year my pumpkin said NOAH. I can't believe that was before he was even born!

Birthday Week!

I like to celebrate birthdays for more than just one day, so I call it a birthday week, haha. Although this year I wasn't as excited about my birthday as I usually am. I think that means I'm getting old :(  either that or just too busy, one of the two. Well Monday the 18th was my birthday and I turned 22. On Mondays I usually have class until 10 am and then another one from 7-930 pm. Well since it was my birthday I skipped my last class so that I could celebrate a little bit. So, I went out to eat at Cody's for my birthday dinner with my mom and Jared. It was a nice dinner! Then Jared and I went to the movies and saw "The Town". It was a pretty good movie as well. We had a nice date. As far as gifts go, basically everything I got was for the house, which is okay because I don't have the money to go buy all of the stuff we got! And we needed it all!
From dad I got a purse (which was basically the only thing non house oriented) and an end table for our house. From mom I got an end table, and then my birthday dinner. From Jen I got my shower curtain and rod rings, along with a picture frame that spells out FAMILY. From Jared I got a visa debit card so that I could pick out something, because he said he wasn't sure what I'd want to get for the house. So I think I decided either a recliner or new counter tops is what I'll buy with that. From Jared's mom, we got a microwave and trashcan for the both of us. From his Grandma, we also got a joint present, which isn't in yet, but hopefully it will be soon, but it's our TV stand. From my grandma I got money. From Hannah I got a reed diffuser. And then I got our nice silverweart set from Emily and Allison and some box shelves from Aunt Carol. Overall it was a good birthday!
 Jared's birthday is this coming Saturday, and he'll be 21! We aren't sure yet what our plans are. Some of our friends were wanting to go to Champaign that night, but we were thinking of just having some friends over at our house for a bonfire, but if they all go to Champaign, that may be an issue, haha. So, we may go as well. Sunday we are planning on having Jared's family over after church for cake and icecream to celebrate both of our birthdays. So it will be yet again another busy weekend I'm sure!

The birthday kids! :)

Willow Street Home

We did it! We are officially homeowners! Jared and I purchased our first home Friday, October 15th! It was a long, stressfull process, but we did it! We got done with all of the closing stuff around 2:00 on Friday and then the painting began. We went to Wal Mart and bought all of our paint brushes and everything we needed to paint. With the help of friends and family (whom we can't thank enough!) we painted the ceilings in the living room and dining room, and the walls as well. The rest of the rooms can wait, but these were just horrible colors that I couldn't stand looking at!

Before

Before

After

After

This weekend was busy! I was so exhausted last night! Today is atually my birthday, but I told Jared it doesn't really feel like it because we were so busy with the house and stuff I haven't had time to think about my brithday as well! But anyways, I'm excited about our first home and I can't wait to go home and work on stuff little by little as the weekends come and go. I think our first home is suited for us very nicely. We have a few more things we decided we wanted to do to make it look better. We moved up counter tops to the top of our list along with another piece of furniture. We figured the counter tops won't be too expensive and we should buy them while we have extra money right now, same thing with the chair. The living room is pretty small, but we do need more seating than just the one couch we bought. Which by the way, is very comfortable! So we may go to Menards this coming weekend and look at some counter tops! We also want to stain the kitchen table a dark mahogony wood color to match the new end tables and T.V. stand. My parents got me some end tables for my birthday from Clarksons Furniture. They are so nice! I love them! We also can't wait to get our T.V. stand from Granny! Jackie (Jared's mom) got us a new microwave as well! Our birthdays fell at just the right time!



We are so thankful for our relationship together and our lives that we are starting together in our first home. We pray that God blesses our home and our family! Thanks for everyone who came over to share this special time with us this weekend!

Do you ever just have those days?

Today, I thought it was going to be a good day. It's Wednesday, which is almost my favorite day of the week! I only have one class in the morning and the rest of the day I have nothing! However, today was just one of those days. I went to bed last night thinking about my wedding and thinking of what a happy day it will be. Then I started thinking about the emotional parts. I am going to need some major prayer that I don't have an emotional breakdown that day. I know the hardest part for me to deal with on my wedding day, will be thinking about my parents and their marriage. I still can't believe it really happened... I know that divorce takes time for healing, and for me it just seems like it's a constant battle that takes away my joy. Anyways, I'll get through it with the help of God, Jared, friends and my family! So, that is how my day kind of started, and then it got worse, before it eventually got better...
I was feeling so out of the loop on everything going on with our house. I decided to call my loan guy from the bank and just ask him how things were moving along. He told me that he wasn't sure of a closing time yet, or even if we'd for sure get to close on Friday, but he did say we were to bring our closing cost money with us. This was a suprise to me! When I asked how much money it would be, he didn't know. So, I started stressing out and wondering if we would even have enough money to be able to close. He talked to me like I had bought a house 5 times already. It was just really frustrating! So, if you know me, I'm an organizer and a planner. So you can only imagine what is going through my head at this point. I'm soooo upset I can barely talk. So I have to text our realitor to ask him if he knows anything about these closing costs, because as far as we knew, they were being added into our loan, as that is the type of loan we went with. Our realitor told us that the closing costs should have been on our Good Faith Estimate that our bank went over with us. Well, BINGO! There was our first problem, our bank never went over these papers with us! Now you know why I was feeling in the dark. I pulled out the Good Faith Estimate and looked at them. The only thing I saw was settlement costs, which were nearly $7,000. I basically had a major melt down at this point. I didn't know how we were going to be able to afford this house anymore if we had to pay $7000 on Friday when we close!
So, luckily my mom answered her phone when I called her and she was able to calm me down, a lot! She went into the bank and talked to the loan guy for me. I am so thankful she did this, because I feel like he told her a lot of stuff that I didn't even know. Our bank has just not had good communication with us through this whole thing, and to me that is stressfull, especially when I am trying to finish school and focus on that! UHH!
So anyways, I decided to just get calm and say a prayer to God and ask him to comfort and ease us through this whole thing. I thought about this video, and it made me think. Wow, my problems really could be worse. I take for granted the simple things in life. Click this link to watch this video, and then try complaining about your life...

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SjbX6mDnMwM

Big Weekend!

Well, the day is almost here! Only 3 more days until our closing date on our house! I can't wait to get in there and just look at it again! I've only been there twice, and one of the times was just to sign a paper so it was brief! Jared and Cash will be living there permanently starting on saturday. Jared asked a couple of his friends to be his room mate untill May, but none of them had any extra money to put towards the rent. So, it looks like it'll be just Jared and Cash! I know that It will pretty much seem like I live there when I'm home as well. I just wont be sleeping there. I'm going to want to go and make sure it's clean and he's finding stuff to cook/eat and that his laundry is being done. I gotta take care of him! :)

Here are some of the projects that we want to do before May:

Paint the interior of the house
Pull up the carpet in the spare bedrooms
Polish or re-finish the rest of the wood floors that still need it (bedrooms)
Get new cabinet doors for the kitchen
Stain the cabinets and the new doors a dark wood color
Maybe knock out a small wall in the kitchen to open it up to the dining room a little more
Knock out the wall between the living room and the dining room into a half wall with support beams

So far, everything is still looking good for closing this weekend! The bank called me today and they just need 2 more documents signed. We are waiting to hear back from the realitor so we know what time on Friday we're closing. Then our plans for Friday are priming the walls and ceilings (they're burgendy now), possibly starting to paint the living room and dining room, and cleaning the place from top to bottom!

Saturday we are planning on moving stuff in. Jared is supposed to be working on getting some guys together to help bring stuff over. Hopefully we can start that at 8 or 9 a.m. We really don't have a ton, but enough that we can't do it alone!

Wish us luck and say a prayer that everything runs smoothly this weekend! We are so excited!

Cassius (Cash) Conrad

Well, we finally got our puppy! Named after Johnny Cash and Muhammad Ali, our new puppy's name is Cassius Conrad Yager. We'll call him Cash for short. He already knows his owners so well! He follows Jared around everywhere! We love that he is playful and relaxed at the same time. He seems like the perfect puppy thus far! We've had him since Saturday and he's slept through the night both nights so far, and he hasn't had ANY potty accidents! I'm SO SO surprised at that, but definitely not complaining! He is 14 weeks old and weighs 21 pounds. He is going to be a big boy when he gets older.

As you may know, I was really nervous/worried about getting a Rottweiler. But, I feel much much better about it now that we have him and we've heard so many success stories with these dogs. It's the unsuccessful stories that scared me. Cash's previous owner gave Jared and I some really good tips on how to train him to be a friendly, loyal, and protective dog for our family. We were able to see Cash's mom and dad when we picked him up as well. That helped a lot with my nerves because they were really friendly dogs. The family had 7 kids and they were playing with the dogs without any fear. I just know that these dogs have a reputation of being mean. I also am more aware now that the dogs are only mean if they are neglected or brought up without human socialization. So, we plan on introducing Cash to many different people and children to get him used to that. I just know he is going to be a great dog for us!

More house stuff-12 days!

As we get closer and closer to our closing date, I get more and more excited everyday! I can't believe it's less than 2 weeks now! YAY! I have a feeling that I'll be living there on the weekends, just not sleeping there. I know I'm going to want to be there all the time whether it's to clean, decorate, paint, or just hang out with Jared. So, I've decided to make one of the bedrooms, the one closest to the living room, into an office. I'm going to put some filing cabinets in there, a desk, and I think that would be a good place for Jared's gun cabinet as well, unless I can talk him into putting in in the basement with the rest of the man cave-ish stuff.
We are planning on painting on the day we close; so Friday October 15th, if you're free, stop on by and grab a paint brush! I'm SO excited about the colors I picked out. I showed them to Jared and he wasn't too excited, but he could live in it with the pink walls and not care, haha. Jen and I went to Sherwin Williams the other day and got some paint samples. I've decided to go with Lemon Verbena (which is a light green color) for the living room, and then the dining room, which is connecting, will be Aqua-Sphere (which is a light blue color). I still can't decide on the kitchen. I think I may want to either just do a neutral tan color, or continue the blue into the kitchen. I just can't decide. The hallways and spare bedrooms will all be painted Hazelnut Cream, so just a light tan color. Our bedroom is going to be that Hazelnut Cream and Orange Sienna (copper brown orange color). We may wait to pain the bedroom though, because I'm not letting Jared put our new bedding on the bed untill I move in in May. So his bedding will be just a red comforter and brown sheets for awhile. So the orange won't exactly go with that, which is why we may wait.

Other than that, I've been looking at tv stands, end tables, and dishes lately. I really hope I can get these dishes. I've changed my mind 3 times already, but this time I'm stickin to these. I just love the colors and pattern! I really like how the big plates are circle and the small ones are squares! Soooo cute! I added them on a wish list at pfaltzgraff.com

Here is the tv stand we want. We asked for it for our birthdays from Jared's grandma, so I'm excited about getting it for our house! We want to get matching end tables as well. They are just so dang expensive! We may have to wait on those.