A Weekend For Celebration

Well, it's official, I finished my first year of teaching! It had it's ups and downs and my students definitely noticed my excitement on the last day ("Mrs. Young, are you really that excited to have us gone? You seem REALLY excited") but mostly I am just proud of myself. With one exception I didn't make any parent hate me and with a couple of exceptions my students end-of-level test scores went up from last year. While those things are important I think the best part of teaching this year were the times when I got to bond with those special little kids. One girl told me on the last day how much it helped her when her parents were being sent to federal prisons for 8-10 years and I just gave her a hug and told her that she was special and smart and could make better choices with her life (that was a sad situation, don't tell anyone I hugged her, I don't want to be sued). Another girl said thank you for helping her though her parents divorce this year. Several of them told me thank you for being a nice teacher, except every once in a while when I could be the wicked witch teacher (yep, it happened). Teaching can be such a rewarding job.

This is where I would post a picture of those cute fourth graders if I was allowed

As great as those kids are, I think the thing that made this year so great for me was my amazing group of coworkers. There were five new teachers at my school this year and I think we helped bring a great energy to mix in with those ole' veterans. I just loved going to work every day to see all of these wonderful ladies.

Kristy, Me, Cassidy, Morgan, and the sweet sign in front of the school that looks like it's been there since the school opened in the 50's.

In other exciting news this weekend, it's mine and Stephen's second anniversary! It seems like we have been married a lot longer than that to me, it's been a busy couple of years. I love being married to such an amazing and supportive husband, it was the best decision I have ever made and the most wonderful two years. 

I decided to start an anniversary tradition. On our one-year anniversary we had the top of our wedding cake that had been waiting in our freezer. Our cake was made by a close friend of my sister and it was delicious, it even tasted good a year later. I emailed her and got the recipe that she used and I think I'll try to make it every year on or around our anniversary. This year was the pilot year. I baked them into cupcakes and took them to our ward BBQ. One lady was crazy about them and over the pulpit today, in her testimony, said they "took her to another place" and I'm pretty sure she meant a good place. I think that is a pretty good review.

They are vanilla cake with raspberry filling and white chocolate ganache frosting. I filled them with raspberry and all, it was a little tricky but worked great in the end. 

For our anniversary/school being over/my being alone 3 nights a week while Stephen travels for work, we are going to Hawaii next week! Stephen has traveled more weeks than not these past 9 months and it has been really awful for me but the points and miles racked up pretty fast. I'm going to find out next week if having him gone so much is worth it. We are spending five days on Kauai and three on Oahu. I am most excited for our 22 mile backpack trip on Kauai to see a part of the island not accessible by vehicle, it's going to look something like this...I hope:

I feel so spoiled but then again, we wouldn't be going if it weren't basically free. I have paid for this trip not in dollars but in having my husband away so much. I hope it makes up for some of that, I think it will.