Hi everyone,
Happy Thanksgiving, Merry Christmas, Happy New Year (or just Season's Greetings....)!
Well I figured I'd get all the holidays in one email... Since I missed Thanksgiving, Christmas is soon, and I'm sure I won't have much access to a computer over our holiday break coming up. I hope everyone has had a great Thanksgiving filled with many blessings, and I hope the holidays coming up remind you to thank God for another year gone by and all the wonderful friends and family in your lives. I know we've been blessed here, things are going well. I'm not even sure where to start though, because I can't remember when the last time I wrote was. Sad... sorry about that!
Well right now we are two weeks away from our two weeks' vacation for Christmas and I can't wait! It will be so nice to have a break from school and kids and our little island. Being on this campus day in and day out gets a little old, and I know we'll all be ready for some new scenery for a bit. That and we'll get to see some of the other SM's on Guam who will be there for their break as well. A few of us are planning on stopping at Chuuk on our way back, so that will be fun too. School is going pretty good, though right now we're all up a creek a bit because this last week was pretty chaotic. We had a typhoon come through--so school got canceled at about 10:15 in the morning on Wednesday, no school on Thursday, and then we had school from 9-12 on Friday, and mainly just worked on our upcoming Christmas program that day! So I didn't get a whole lot accomplished, and I know the high schoolers didn't either--which means the teachers are frantically trying to figure out what to do with finals coming up, since they won't make it through all their lessons they had planned. I'm sure it will all work out, but it's a little stressful. The Christmas play is slowly being worked on... I hope it'll all come together in this next week, and that there won't be another typhoon that will cause it to be canceled--since that seems to be the trend each year! I think we got the typhoon out of the way early this time. I actually like having the typhoons! The wind and rain keep it nice and cool (low 80's...that's as cool as it gets!), and it's pretty awesome to watch it just downpour outside our windows and see all the trees bent over. Call me crazy, but I love storms!
Thanksgiving was pretty good. They don't celebrate it here, so we had school that day (kind of sad), but then had a big feast over at Mr. B's house later that night with all the SM's and the other teachers and their families here. The food was delicious--we had an assortmant of things we were used to--like stuffing, mashed potatoes, pie, etc. and also island food. Melissa and I decided to make a cherry pie, and I made gravy for someone's mashed potatoes. We all left very full. I was definitely missing home--and family and friends all day, but I survived. Christmas is going to be a little tougher I think...
Last weekend we had another camping trip. We went back to Ant Atoll, the first place we went to, but a different island in that chain. It was really nice--white sandy beach, beautiful water, and this time there were a few huts that we could put our stuff under in case it rained. I set my hammock up about 20 feet from the water, and my camping pad underneath a hut and slept about half in one and half in the other. It was pretty awesome to be able to look out from my hammock and watch the sun rise... then go back to sleep of course. :O) We lucked out and it didn't rain at all. So we spent a nice relaxing weekend just getting a little sun, swimming, talking, snorkeling, and fishing. The snorkeling wasn't that great, but we did see a bunch of sharks when we rounded one corner of the reef! They weren't too big, so I wasn't worried. I also saw one when Melissa and I took this little raft out that they had on the island (there are some people who stay there on the weekends mostly and take care of it). We had paddled out and then swam a little bit to cool off, then were paddling back in when we saw it. We were glad it was AFTER we'd gone swimming, because it was kind of big! We kept joking about how we felt like we were shipwrecked--paddling around on that little dugout-style raft. It was fun. I got to go trolling (fishing) finally! And I actually got two fish! One was a little mackeral, and the other was a baracuda. The baracuda was a couple feet long--I reeled it in, then let the boys bash it over the head to kill it. Can't just let those things flop around until they die with the set of teeth they've got! I'm not sure who ate it, but I wasn't really interested so I let Mr. B take it. We saw a pod of dolphins while we were out there--they are the most beautiful creatures. That makes the third time I've seen them, and each time I just want to jump in the water with them!! If someone could guarantee it's safe I would go for it. But I guess you never really know with wild animals...
Well things are going pretty well with my little cherubs. Ha ha. I still struggle a little bit with the other half of the class--Drew's half. He just got the side that is a little more rowdy and would rather sing and dance around and play games than do any schoolwork I guess. Some days are better than others, but they are definitely more challenging. My side is doing really well. I've been really enjoying them. They find a way to make me laugh in everything we do it seems like. And even when things are not that entertaining for them (like verb conjugations) they still stick with it and get it done, which I appreciate, and I let them know that. They're funny--I'll come back over towards the end of the day, from being in Drew's class, and they'll be sitting really quietly at their desks--looking very "good" and will ask me how I'm doing, then sit there and wait... for me to dismiss them for a 10 minute break! I'll walk in to that silence and just laugh and say "So... you're not being quiet for any particular reason are you??" And they'll always answer me "No Miss! We're just waiting for you...." with these innocent expressions on their faces. Ha ha. Occasionally I'll give them an unscheduled recess--a 10 minute break before we do our last class. So that's the reason they always do that. Cracks me up though.
Well it's Sunday afternoon, and I need to get my lesson plans done for this next week. I usually try to do it on Thursday, but this week has just kind of messed it all up. So I'm going to head out and do that. I hope you all are doing well! For those of you getting ready to take finals, GOOD LUCK!! Hope everyone has safe Christmas travels. God bless!!
Much love,
Lindsey
p.s. It'd be great to hear how you all are doing! Even if it's just a short hello--some of you could have fallen off the face of the earth and I wouldn't know. I miss you all! Hope to hear from you.
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