My favorite baby boys

One of the great things about dating Brad was getting to know his friends. Meghann and Marcus Sauer have been such a joy to know and we ALWAYS have a great time when we're together. And they have the cutest little boys! This past Sunday we met Titus James for the first time and had to take a billion pictures of this handsome little boy. I know you'll enjoy the Sauers as much as we do :)

Brad and Baby Titus James. He's a natural. And how cute is Titus James?

Titus James and I.

The whole family! They are such wonderful people and I am incredibly blessed to know them.

Teaching

When you are in college, training to be a teacher that changes the world, there is just so much they don't tell you. It's probably a good thing they don't tell you, because we might not have become teachers. I am technically a teacher, but on a daily basis I'm a number of other things that no one ever prepared me for.


This week I was a....


1) Custodian - Sweet student A thought it funny if he through student B's ring in the trash. Awesome. I dug in the trash and then made Student A put it all back.


2) Security guard- Crowd control is my life. You have no idea what crazy is until you have seen one of the largest high schools in the country switch classes. 4,000 kids walking across the school in 5 minutes. It's quite the sight.


3) Counselor - Sometimes, I learn more than I ever want to know, I can't even begin to share all the things kids say.


4) Doctor - "my head/stomach/piercing/feet/etc hurts." They come to class after eating cinnoman rolls and chocolate milk for breakfast followed by chile cheese fries for lunch and then skittles for their afternoon snack. And then they say they have no idea why they feel sick.

5) Teacher - And some how at the end of the day, I will come back and do it all again, and most of the time I like it. Weird, I know.

Month 5

Happy 5 months to Brad and I!

In honor of our 5 month-aversary, I'd like to list some of my favorite month 5 moments.

- Dancing in the bathroom, while getting ready to go out for my 26th birthday.

- Laying out by the adult only pool in the Bahamas drinking Mud Slides and eating really good pizza.

- Seeing Jason Castro at our hotel in the Bahamas.

- Bringing in the New Years in the Bahamas with champagne and a billion fireworks displays.

- Drinking green margaritas in Shreveport.

- Being ridiculously cold at the Independence Bowl.

- Hours and hours and hours of traveling together over Christmas break.

- Hours and hours of listening to Mariah Carey's Christmas CD while traveling. "Baby, all I want for Christmas is youuuuu"

- Having a Christmas tree in our apartment.

- Getting Brad's old Christmas ornaments and putting it up on our little tree, especially the one of Barney: the younger years.

- Getting my Nikon D-40 and taking pictures everywhere we go.

- Learning about a lychee.

- Being in love.

I love you, Brad. :)

I'm Bringing Conjugations Back

I have posted the following video for you to see. My reasons are 3 fold: 1) I don't feel like doing work 2) I haven't posted in a while 3) Who doesn't like a good rendition of Justin Timberlake's "I'm bringing sexy back?"

http://www.teachertube.com/viewVideo.php?video_id=25683&title=ConjugationsBack

Love it. I know you will too and besides, what better time than the present to review conjugations? We could all use a little grammar in our lives.

The Art of Teaching

I'm a teacher. That is my job. Some days it feels like a job and sometimes it feels like a hobby. Some days, I come home and think to myself....I am changing the world, I am making an impact, this is good. And then there are other days when I come home and think "If today's high schoolers are any reflection of the future of our country, we are in big trouble." But most of the time, I'm somewhere in between and today was an in between day. My kids didn't wow me with their Spanish skills, but they made me laugh and when they can make me laugh, that's a good thing. That's really what relationships are all about. And I think relationship is ultimately what makes a good teacher, not great lesson plans or cool school supplies. (Although, sometimes I'd like to believe its cool school supplies). Well, today first period was making me laugh. First they started playing a game where they went through the alphabet and started naming animals that started with the letters. They were working, they really were, but they were also yelling random animal names. They even had me googling animals that start with an "x". X-ray Fish...there you go. I even learned something new today. Then there was the game where they all said quotes from Finding Nemo. They were lucky that is one of my favorite movies. They were making me laugh...especially the part where they imitated Ellen Degeneres' character.....they were speaking whale. You know the part i'm talking about. Gosh, it was funny. That story had nothing to do with the content I teach, but if you were there you would have laughed too...and sometimes we just need to laugh more, don't you think?

11/18/1999

I remember the day I found out that the bonfire had fallen. I was a sophomore in high school. I remember talking about it at lunch. My friend, Annette, drove to College Station that night to be with her older sister and their friends, because someone they knew was injured. She said that the memorial service was overflowing...standing room only. At that point, I thought I was going to Baylor University. I wasn't really interested in Texas A&M. But I knew a little bit about the traditions. I had never been to a Bonfire, but what I remember most about the incident was the spirit....the spirit of Aggieland as we aggies call it. The spirit of Aggieland was at its strongest November 18, 1999. The Bonfire falling was a terrible thing. However, from that, I (along with many others) were able to see what it really meant to be an Aggie. They came together. They helped eahother. They were strong. And everyone across the nation saw it. I heard (although I can't prove it) but I heard that application rates went up that year. People just wanted to be a part of that spirit that everyone saw after the Bonfire fell.


That was my first experience with Texas A&M. From the outside, I found the spirit of Aggieland really special. And after 2 degrees, I am proud to say that it's everything I saw then and much more.


Thanks and gigem.

ps. The Texas Monthly has a really awesome article on the Bonfire. If you get that magazine, you should read it.

What's in a name?

Snead. When I started dating Brad it seems like such a normal name. People knew how to say it and would attempt it. Oropeza. Now, that is complicated. People always ask "how do I say it?" "Oropeeeeeza" "Is that Spanish?" "I know I'm going to butcher it" "Lauren OOOOO uhhhh."

Well today I come with 2 funny stories about my names...these are true stories of how Snead and Oropeza were used in my classroom. Of course I laughed at them 1) because its funny and 2) because if you can't laugh when high schoolers make fun of you, then you shouldn't be a teacher.

Story #1:

Student1: Bless you.
Me: I didn't sneeze
Student: Yes you did....Sneeead....you know, like sneeze.

Story #2:

Student #1 to Student #2: What do you like better? Oropeza or Snead?
Student #2: Oropeza. I like it. It's like an unusual bug....ohhh look (pointing to the floor) It's an oropeza!

It's just funny. Laugh, because its good for you and because high schoolers are weird.