Playing Hookie!

Yesterday I took a personal day to spend the day with Joel. He's been working strange ED shifts this month and is scheduled to work every weekend. So we decided to pick a day to spend together, and we couldn't have picked a more beautiful day. We slept in a bit and headed up to Winter Park to ski for the afternoon. The temp was warm in the high 40s without a cloud in the sky. This is the first time in two seasons that we've been able to ski together...just the two of us! I'm able to keep up with him on any blue, and I even beat him down one run. Just to make sure I didn't get too full of myself he quickly took me up to a bowl, where I invented my own one-legged windmill ski style. It was quite a sight!

After we got home, Joel dusted off the grill for some buffalo bratwursts, and I finished weeding and cleaning out the flower beds. We are catching up on Lost and started season five. It was such a fun day, and we had a fantastic laugh when my sunburn started to appear. Of course, I have the signature "I skipped work today to go skiing" look, which is a sunburned outline around my ski goggles. This morning I found new ways of using concealer to hide my shame. Even though I took a personal day, and I can spend it however I choose, I just didn't feel right going back to work today showing all the evidence. Thankfully, the concealer worked, but I had a hard time explaining why I was sweating all day long... ;)

Off to China!

This week I received my acceptance letter to teach in a teacher training program (JESIE) in China! I'm still working on the travel plans, but I will most likely arrive in Shanghai on or around July 2 and travel with my group down to Nanjing where we will be teaching for about two weeks. I will be working with three other teachers from Denver, and the rest of the group is from across the US and three providences in Canada.

Since I began teaching in Denver, I've been working on gaining my ELA (English Language Acquisition) certification. Additionally, this semester I'm involved in the National Consortium on Teaching about Asia, where I've received an in-depth look into East Asian art, music, literature, culture and history. It seems like all of my new interests have serendipitously met in this summer experience. Joel and I are excited about this opportunity and are looking for ways to do this type of work together in the future.

More details to come....

A Great Birthday!

On Thursday, Joel surprised me with an incredible birthday present. He rescued me from parent-teacher conferences a few hours early and swept me away to the Pepsi Center where we had courtside seats to the Spurs Nuggets game. He told me to lay out a fancy dress and heels so he could pick me up from school. When he arrived wearing his favorite baggy jeans and maroon fleece, I was a bit confused, but all was explained when I got to the car to find my Spurs jersey instead of my dress. We arrived extra early to get pics and autographs and then set beside the Spurs bench for the entire game. Our seats used to be owned by Daniel Graham, Bronco's tight end, and we sat about ten seats down from Brandon Marshall. This was a once-in-a-lifetime experience, and we'll never forget it!

 

 

Needless to say, my 30th birthday has been the best two month celebration ever! It all started with a girls' weekend to a spa in Arizona with my sis-in-law, Angela. Then on my birthday we had friends over to watch the National Title game, and Joel bought me a fabulous German chocolate cake and iPod. He told me something else was coming, but I had no idea it would courtside seats to my favorite team. This was a fabulous birthday and start to a new year!