So This is what being a Red Sox Fan Feels Like.

We lost. It was heartbreaking and frustrating because not only are we out of tournament play, we also broke our 37 game no-loss streak at home. It took 23 months to get that far.
I realized this is what being a Red Sox fan must feel like. I still love my RSL, though, and Lu and I are talking about buying some season tickets for the remainder of this year. We had a fantastic time, despite the disappointing results.
In completely non-related news, I recently discovered this band. I think they wail. You should check the out, and then go vote for them in Rolling Stone's cover competition. Go Provo!

CONCACAF Championship!

So I am not really a huge sports fan (pro or otherwise), but there is one team that I support with a great deal of love and devotion: Real Salt Lake.

I got really in to the whole RSL thing a few years ago when Luis's best friend Arturo landed some free tickets through work and invited us to join him at the game. We went, and I had really low expectations. I'd seen the Rio Tinto stadium from the freeway before and I knew about the whole debate in building it, but when I got there I was shocked at how beautiful and clean it was. Good first impression. 
I was also amazed at how empty it was, and then astounded to hear that despite low attendance at their games, RSL has a 37 game winning streak at home. I guess it was in the 20's at that point, but still- 20 something games with no losses at home, even without huge fan support or media attention? Take THAT LA Galaxy and superstar David Beckham!
Since then, I've been to a few more games, and each time attendance has improved (albeit slightly) and the games have gotten more exciting. Tonight I will be attending the CONCACAF Championship game with Luis. If you don't know what CONCACAF is or why the game is such a big deal, check this out. I think our chances are pretty good, all things considered. It's exciting to have a home team that has not let success go to their heads. I enjoy watching MLS vs. for example NBA because even though RSL is at the top of the league the players are not media darlings and most people don't even know who Kyle Beckerman is. The sport is still pretty untainted.
Tonight's sold out game could be a big turning point for the club and for MLS in general, however. I'm ecstatic that I get to be there to watch.
So, in conclusion...
Go my favorite sports team! Go!

No House

Well, we got word that the sale isn't going to go through. The whole modular home thing did us in at the end. I was super upset at first but I feel much better about it now. Luis and I had a long talk and decided that maybe the reason why nothing seems to ever work out is because we're not supposed to be moving at this point in our lives, so we've decided to put the whole house dilemma on hold for a while. We have a date in mind, but nothing's set in stone yet so it's not worth mentioning.
In related news, we also decided that there are a few more things that we need to change in our lives, one of which will have a big impact for me. I'll be changing to part-time teaching next year if my new principal will allow it. We both think that if I'm not stretched so thin at work our whole family will benefit.
So that's that.
Tomorrow is Easter, which is a time for new beginnings, so maybe this is just what we need.

Spring Break = Spring Fever

So I have a confession to make: I'm going crazy.
Like out of my mind crazy.
All I can think about is this house business, because I have nothing else to occupy my mind. It's completely taken over the little bit of mental capacity that I had left going in to March.
Now that other major preoccupations such as the UALPA Exam and state end-of-level testing are no longer crowding it out of my brain, I've got nothing else to think about. The fact that I'm not going anywhere for Summer Vacation this year for the first time in 4 years isn't helping much, either. I have nothing to plan except hypothetical house stuff, so there you go. I have a one track mind.
That's probably why I haven't been blogging very much lately. That's also why I didn't do much over Spring Break, either. My life is so uneventful right now that there's not much to talk about.
I had planned to go to the Tulip Festival, but it didn't open until Friday and by then I had no time left because a few projects I have been putting off forever really needed to be completed (Megan's Diaper bag *cough* *cough*). Instead, I spent Spring Break sitting around surfing houzz.com for bathroom tile/fixture combinations I like, and ruthlessly stalking the Utah MLS online database. Ruthlessly, I tell you. I have a whole blog post that I have yet to publish that is dedicated to my hypothetical future house. I won't post it until I find out about financing because the extent of my boredom induced obsessing is borderline embarrassing.
Be that at it may, I did do a few non-house-related things this past week, so here they are:

Megan's Diaper Bag

The Boy's Easter Egg Hunt

Spring Flowers

I didn't really *do* anything besides take the photos, but they sure are pretty, aren't they?

The End!

Onward and Upward...

So I mentioned about a week and a half ago that hubs and I put an offer on a house. After a great deal of negotiation we got news today that they accepted our most recent counter offer.
Of course there's still the challenges of getting financing for a modular home. There's probably a 40-50% chance that we won't find anyone willing to finance us because of the whole "modular" thing, but hey... At this point what have we got to lose? There's nothing else on the market that we're interested in currently and at worst we'll end up losing a few hundred bucks in an inspection. At best, we could find someone willing to finance us and we could close in a month or less. Nothing wrong with trying, right?
So for those of you curious, here's the link to our most recent attempt at moving on up. It's not much to look at, so below is an artists rendition of what I would eventually like to do with the place... because I'm a huge dork and enjoy messing around with photoshop.

This is by no means the most impressive house we've looked at, but it's one where I would be comfortable raising a family. Nice enough that we can feel like we're getting something out the deal, but not so nice that we have to change who we are to fit in. Plus, there are some major bonuses to buying this home, including but not limited to; proximity to awesome stuff like museums, trails and sporting events, a 600 sq foot workshop which I can convert into a fully functioning studio space, and a 2 bed/1 bath legal attached apartment (the renting of which will pretty much eliminate our mortgage payment). 

We should hear back for sure about financing soon, then on to the appraisal and inspection. Hopefully we can take care of those by the end of the week or early next week, so wish us luck!

Happy 80th!

Check out this link in the local paper about my school:

 The students formed a big 80 out on our back field- I'm standing somewhere in the bottom left part of the "0"

A photo of the faculty and staff (both past and present) on our front steps. I'm not it it because I looked like a troll yesterday. 

Dixon is celebrating her 80th birthday this year. I'm so glad I work here. My past five years as a Dixon teacher have been hands down the best, hardest, happiest, most frustrating, most satisfying, and most rewarding years of my life. The work I do here has enriched my life in ways I didn't understand could possibly happen when I first accepted employment. I will always be glad I decided to take this job, and I am tremendously proud of the faculty and staff that I work with, the community I live and work in, and this grand, beautiful, old school.

Just Shoot Me Now

This week I am administering the UALPA test. UALPA stands for "Utah Academic Language Proficiency Assessment." It is the test designed and implemented by the State of Utah to assess ESL students' English language abilities in 4 different areas: speaking, reading, writing, and listening. It is my worst nightmare.
Reasons why I hate this test:
1. I am the only teacher who has to worry about it, but if I blow it off I lose my license.
2. The test involves about 12% of the students in our school, yet all the other teachers have no idea that it exists so whenever I bring it up I get a lot of stink eye from other people.
3. Administering the test is a logistical freak show. I have to coordinate 100 different student schedules, 3 different teacher schedules, and 2 different para educator schedules. This spans 2 months, because the speaking portion of the test must be administered one-on-one. Yes. ONE-ON-ONE! Can you imagine pulling 100 different students from their classes to give them a one-on-one test? It's crazy! Not to mention the reading, writing, and listening portions of the test which are nearly as difficult to coordinate.
4. This test is SUPER high-stakes, because the students cannot be exited from ESL until they pass it.
5. I have to spend three days reading out loud to 6 different periods of students while making sure everyone has a pencil, their test booklet, and the correct answer document. During this fun-filled extravaganza I also get to deal with rude, belligerent students who resent the fact that they have to take a test, sit quietly, and be at school in the first place (since, let's face it, the majority of the students I teach were born in the US but repeatedly fail this test because they are just AWFUL students... Awful I tell you).
Today I spoke, non-stop from 9:30-2:50. I broke up 3 fights. I threatened at least a dozen students with home visits since they would NOT sit down, shut up, or stop whining about having to take it. I drank 3 liters of water and nearly a liter of Diet Coke to keep my body physically functioning.
I did *not* wear comfortable enough shoes, nor did I sleep enough last night.
I have to do this all again tomorrow, and the next day, and the next day.
Good heavens this job is difficult sometimes.

*** on a more positive note, next week is Spring Break, which I will have fully earned after this week of non-stop torture.

The Waiting Game

So we're still waiting to hear back on our offer for the Cherry Lane house. I'm super stressed because this house, more than any of the other ones we've seen, felt like a home. I can't describe it, but I'm sure you get what I'm talking about. The catch is that it's modular home, which is kind of like a mobile home, but not really like it at all.
Modular homes are built in a factory like a mobile home. They are comprised from separate units which are constructed, then shipped to the home's location and assembled together on the spot, much like legos. They are often much stronger than regular stick built homes b/c the building process occurs out of the elements, b/c they have stronger framing in order to withstand transportation, and b/c they must comply to a more rigorous inspection process.
This house is still in great shape. The problem is that it's modular. You see, when you have to apply for a loan you have to get the house appraised. In order to get the house appraised the appraiser has to find "comps" to justify your sales price. There are not a lot of modular homes out there, hence the comps are pretty impossible to come by. Add on top of that that modular homes have an "expiration date" after which the manufacturer will no longer guarantee their work. This house is technically "expired." Now if you're talking mobile homes, you have to be a little selective, but modular homes once assembled are virtually indistinguishable from regular stick-built homes and don't really fall apart with age as might be suggested. But that doesn't matter to most lenders. They have to play by the rules these days and don't make a lot of exceptions.
So we're waiting still.
Waiting to see if our offer even gets accepted by the sellers. Waiting to see if we can get financing. Waiting to see if we can make this work.
I'm so tired of waiting. You'd think that 15 months would be long enough. I guess not.

Of course aside from general stress-induced mania, the *real* problem with all this waiting is that my overactive imagination runs away with me and I start to mentally decorate the place. Why just today I decorated the den. It looks somewhat like a combination of these two rooms, only with more books. Lots more books.

Sigh. Waiting is so lame sometimes.