This Crazy Life.

Could this week be anymore ridiculous? I mean really it's the like the universe said, "Hey, this girl's life is just SWELL. Let's make her sweat a little." It's been a crazy stressful week at work. I think I have eaten more chocolate and drank more wine this week than...EVER. I am really looking forward to a day off on Friday and fun Halloween times this weekend. I need a BREAK.

I'm gonna be a fairy! I feel like a 5 year old being all excited about it. Whatever. Don't judge me!

In other news, I had to give up some blood today. Let me explain. A few months ago my hair dresser commented on how dry and "frizzy" my hair is. Apparently, this is a sign of thyroid problems? At that time, I wanted to dye my hair a light strawberry blonde color. Well, she wouldn't dye my hair until I found out what was up with my thyroid. After giving it some thought and Googling, I decided that it probably wasn't a bad idea to have it checked, especially after my own mother had her entire thyroid removed because of pre-cancerous lumps that were found (thyroid problems are hereditary). It took me several months, but today I decided to get that little blood test done. Plus, I was at the doctor anyways for this cute little sinus infection I have. Anyways, I should find out the results on Friday. I don't want to be on medication the rest of my life so I'm really praying that everything is normal.

These song lyrics are what have gotten me through this week. Music has some power, huh?

Joy unspeakable that won't go away

And just enough strength to live for today

So I never have to worry what tomorrow will bring

'Cause my faith is on a solid rock

I am counting on God.

(Counting on God by Desperation Band)

A Perfect Saturday Night.

iPod blasting+door open+fall weather+baking=the perfect Saturday night (in my humble opinion).

Yeah...I made those. And they were delicious. Now to top off a wonderfully relaxing Saturday evening, I shall go watch random Netflix movies. I love it.

Our Church.

This is what church should be about.

True. Powerful. Inspiring. Love it.

Education Nation.

Here I stand on my soapbox. Once again. I'm going to try not to rant too much here. My apologies ahead of time.

NBC news has done a feature on all their programs this week called Education Nation. Basically, it has focused on the state of education in our country (crappy) and we ALL need to do to fix it. There are lots of issues I could address here but the one that strikes me as the most important at the time is the fact that a teacher can not be held solely accountable for a child's education. I am a teacher. A pretty darn good one at that. I love my job. I love my kids and I will fight to give them my best. I am also a human. A human that realizes I can only do so much. I can't walk all my kids home everyday and make sure they have a balanced dinner or go to bed at a decent time or practice their spelling words every night or read a book before bedtime. I have these smiling faces in my classroom for 7 hours a day. I can take those 7 hours and shove as much reading, writing, and arithmetic down their throats as possible for a 7 year old to handle. The other 17 hours in a day are out of my control.

Unfortunately, the other 17 hours of the day are where most of the breakdown in a child's life comes from. Bad home lives dramatically affect a child's performance at school. That has nothing to do with their intelligence.

Here's what I want:

• I want to be held accountable for what I am doing in the classroom. I am not afraid of accountability.
• I want families to also be held accountable for what they are doing at home. It takes a village to raise a child, right??
• I want people to stop thinking of teachers as superhuman individuals who can solve all the world's problems with one flick of their wrist. Although we may try to do this (and some believe they actually can), above all we are humans who have lives outside of our classrooms. We can only do so much.
• I want to see this documentary:

Like I said, there are so many things wrong with education in this country right now. They can't all be solved by teachers. Yes, we are the center of the issues because we are the ones that are the easiest to blame. I will admit, there are teachers out there (plenty of them) who should not be in the classroom. They don't have the heart for their kids. They need to retire. However, I would wager that for every one ineffective teacher there are ten that are willing to do whatever it takes to help their kids succeed.

It takes a village to raise a child. The End.