I know the weather is getting warmer but I would like to pay tribute to something that got me through the winter....my heated blanket.
It started as a heated throw blanket, which I loved. But eventually, I wanted to snuggle with something bigger and more powerful. Target had twin-bed sized heated blankets at Christmas and I bought myself one. After my little throw blanket died, my husband ordered his own heated throw blanket. All winter, you could find us curled up, day or night with our heated blankets. The perfect companion to any winter activity: putting together a puzzle, watching a movie, reading a book, surfing the internet. My blanket was there for me all winter long and for that I am grateful.
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Two-thousand and eighteen was a really big year. A LOT of big changes happened and I want to record them here so that I can keep it all straight. The older you get, the more that memories seem to run together over the years and something that happened 10 years ago feels like just yesterday.
January We kicked off the new year with a trip to San Francisco. Our flight was delayed because the de-icing truck ran into the side of the plane at 4:00 am, so we spent the entire day at the KC airport waiting for our 3:00pm flight. We lost an entire day in San Fransisco, which we were very sad about. But the NYE concert in Oakland was so fun! We saw Primus and the night ended with a balloon drop. The next day we were so tired that we watched Black Mirror in the hotel room and ordered take-out, instead of sight-seeing. February Went to OKC to visit the Joyces, it was a just-for-fun girls-only weekend and we had a blast going to junk shops and getting coffee. March Went to KC to see the Royals Easter weekend...it was the coldest baseball game I have ever tried to watch and we only made it through a couple of innings before we were just too cold to stay and we went back to the hotel. April Went to the MAEA conference in Branson with my BFF, Leslie. It was such a memorable, fun trip. Also, we celebrated my birthday in Springfield. Finally, we went back to OKC (we had originally planned a camping trip but the weather wasn't looking good so we canceled it last minute). Almost every weekend we were out of town as we also went back to KC for another event with friends at the end of the month. May Saw Justin Timberlake in concert in Tulsa, bucket list! Got everyone together for a road trip to San Antonio. It was so hot, but it was so fun! June Got all of the adults together for a couples-only trip to Mexico. We stayed at an all-inclusive resort and had the time of our lives. So many fun memories: snorkling, seasickness, hiking in Yelapa, taco tour in Puerto Vallartae! July My aunt drove in from KY for a visit. We celebrated our anniversary in Springfield and then Jeremy had a hip replacement and was home from work for 3 weeks. It was rough at first, but it was nice to relax together. August I started a new job in a new school district! Also, I started back at MSSU taking master's level painting classes. Lots of changes this month in my routine and daily experiences. September We travelled to Montana for my great-grandma's 100th birthday. (another post about this later!) October/November These two months felt busy, but we actually slowed down a little bit after all the traveling we had done earlier this year. The only out-of-town trip was back to OKC for Friendsgiving in November. December We celebrated Christmas with a Mexico-themed party and we celebrated NYE with our friends at an 80s themed party. We watched a lot of Karate kid in preparation for our NYE outfits. It was an awesome and busy year! I have written about my guilty pleasures before but I have a new one that has emerged recently.
Facebook has a group called, For the Love of Old Houses. Each day, they post dozens of homes with many pictures of each one. Often, the photos are from a site like Zillow because the house is for sale and they are directly from the listing and include a price and a location. It is addicting to scroll through the houses on the site. I love to look at the interesting features of each house, most were built before 1940. Sometimes, they share mid-century modern style homes, which are my favorite. I also like when they post a castle in another country. It if fun to take a peak into another world and imagine how other people live. I especially enjoy seeing how each room is decorated. It is interesting to see homes that are staged to sell verses homes that are really lived in and eclectic. Sometimes, the site features homes in Joplin and it is fun to see inside! The worst part about this being my guilty pleasure is that once I get started, it is hard to stop. I go from house to house to house, and before I know it, I've wasted 30 minutes just scrolling through pictures. For the love of old houses!! What is your guilty pleasure? Last year I posted about a Valentine's Day memory so I thought it would be fun to write about something that happened this year on Valentine's Day. I've mentioned that I am in a painting class at MSSU. A few days before Valentine's Day, the class was discussing what would be appropriate Valentine's gifts to or from our partners. About half of the class is middle aged, and the rest of the class is young 20s and they ask a lot of questions about what people do/don't do for our spouses. The lone man in the class explained that his wife would hate flowers or chocolates as a Valentine's day gift, she always expects a shirt or an article of clothing that she can wear to work. I told the group that I bought my husband flowers last week to cheer him up when he was having a bad day, and he would love a little candy or really any gift would make him happy. Other people said that flowers were the worst because they are a waste of money. I remembered the GIANT stuffed animals I had noticed at Wal-Mart in January and I said how much I would love the giant sloth or the llama or even the flamingo. I didn't need one, but I LOVED them so much that I took pictures of them because they made me so happy. Emilie, a girl in the class said: "We should buy those giant stuffed animals for each other, I really really want the giant sloth!!" I told her I wanted it too but I would be happy with any of them because they were all so cute! Fast foward to Valentine's Day. In my final class of the afternoon, I got a special delivery. A stuffed koala, a reesie's heart, a plant and a card which read: "It's not the giant sloth but at least its not a shirt!" I died laughing. The students in my class were curious about where the gift came from, so I told them it was from my husband. After my art club that day, I rushed to Wal-Mart in search of the giant animals, I just HAD to get one for Emilie...who was also having her 21st birthday a few days after Valentine's day. The entire store was getting remodeled so everything was moved around. Annoyingly, I searched everywhere....and finally found a decent-sized sloth amongst the Valentine's Seasonal isle, which was thoroughly picked through. I grabbed a bunch of candy and went in search of the perfect shirt. I found a grey and white striped shirt on clearance for $3. Perfect. Then, I raced all the way across town (from 7th street Wal-Mart to the Olive Garden). I knew Emilie would be working as it was Valentine's day and the place was PACKED. I laughingly delivered her plush sloth, the candy and the shirt and we both giggled at the funny valentine we had celebrated just for fun. This school year, I started a new job. I also decided to go back to University and take a painting class. Each week, on Monday and Wednesday, I drive to MSSU after school where I am enrolled in an oil painting class. My class is for graduate level credit.....the nice thing about going back to school as an adult (with an established career) is that I don't have all the pressure I had as an insecure, young woman. Nowadays, I know what I like and I'm not afraid to take risks. Nothing is hinging on my portfolio. I can literally paint anything I want, and I do. No one is judging me. If they are, I don't care because I'm there for fun. My entire future isn't based on how well I can put paint on a canvas. It is so freeing to get to experiment and make things that I would not otherwise be inspired to make. So my paintings are weird. And colorful and different and busy. I like to explore the idea of overlapping shapes and images into new things that no one can imagine without them filtering through my brain and the perspective of my paintbrush first. I don't know where being an artist will take me, but it sure is a fun journey. If you are interested in seeing more of my work, I've created a website. I haven't shared it with too many people yet because I'm still trying to figure out that part out but you can view it here: nelliemitchell.art.weebly.com Last year, I read 53 books. Some were very short, others were very long, but I averaged about a book a week. Many of my books were audio books.
I am weird. I wake up around 4:00 in the morning and often I can't go back to sleep. Sometimes if I put on an audiobook, and set the sleep timer for 30 minutes, the sound of the narrator's voice will lull me back to sleep for another hour or so before it is time to get up for the day. I also started listening to books on my commute. I drive about 20 minutes to work and 20 minutes home, which is about 40 extra minutes of 'reading' a day. Some people call audio books cheating, but the story is still vividly in my mind and it is very motivating to log my books each week on Goodreads. My reading goal this year is about the same. Sometimes on long road trips, my husband and I will start an audio book together, we have listened to Stephen King's It, and Under the Dome. We have also listened to 1Q84 by Haruki Murakami. Reading is one of my favorite hobbies. I enjoy it so much. Do you read a lot? Do you have any suggestions? When I first starting teaching kindergarten art, I remember being so overwhelmed whenever a student started crying in class. I just wanted them to stop crying and I didn't always know how to help them. I had students that cried the entire hour early in the year because they missed their mommies. Or I had students cry because we were drawing and it was difficult for them and I always felt like it was my fault.
When I got to middle school, the crying situation was still an issue. Sometimes, kids would cry because they had anxiety over drawing...other times it was because they were in trouble with another teacher or they would cry because of issues with friends. I remember crying in middle school because of issues with friends, so that I could understand. Now that I teach high school, crying is still a daily occurrence. Mostly students cry over boyfriends, or grades, or frustration with parents but I always worry that they are upset with me or the class and I never feel like I respond correctly to the situation. Often, they are embarrassed that they are frustrated to tears and my bothering over them just embarrasses them and makes it worse. But I hate the thought that they are sitting there crying and feeling like no one cares so I will almost always check on them, however discreetly I can, and I am usually unable to provide any help to their situation but it eases my conscience. So, if you are planning to go into education, be prepared for some crying. Kids cry a lot and it is totally normal at any age. I've reached a new level in my life where I don't like to feel too busy. When I was younger, I was go go go go go all the time. Now, I purposely decline invitations or find ways to get out of certain obligations just because I don't like that feeling of being too busy. I like to chill. I am much more a homebody with a penance for alone time.
I still love spending time with my friends, but I need a certain amount of recovery time after a weekend away (especially if I had to work all week). I need a lot of downtime for my brain to feel rested. Too much time engaging with people, makes me feel more exhausted. Some people thrive on togetherness and they feel refreshed after a weekend away with friends. Not me. I only feel refreshed if I've had several hours alone. Sometimes when I am alone, I don't listen to music or watch t.v. I like quieter things like reading, writing, or painting. Does that make me an introvert? I guess it does. I am getting more and more introverted every year. Along with starting a new job in August, I also decided to go back to school. Taking art classes as an adult is WAY more fun than it was taking them fresh out of high school. For one thing, I am way more confident in my ability to create interesting and conceptual work. When I was 20, I was just way too insecure and I didn't have ideas. Now I have tons of creative ideas and it is fun actually taking the time to make work that matters to me but I don't really care about my grade or anything like that. I think my favorite part of my graduate-level oil painting class is the critique. Everyone in class looks at everyone's paintings and we all talk about them and give each other feedback. It is really encouraging to have someone tell you what they like/don't like about your artwork. When it is hanging in your house, no one takes the time to really look at it. I know that when my class ends, no one will care about my work, no one will want to talk about it. My husband said he was proud of me. I think that was the greatest feeling ever. He was watching me paint one day and he said how happy it makes him to see me creating artwork. I was in the biggest slump for a long time and now that I am in painting class, I am more motivated than ever to paint. Every day I....wake up at least an hour before my alarm. Although, I did mess myself up over Christmas break by sleeping in every day and it took a long time to get my sleep schedule back on track.
Every day I....used to drink coffee. Now, I limit myself to only drinking it on the weekends. Every other day, the high school coffee shop delivers a green tea to my room...and sometimes I request honey, but not every time. Every day I....commute to work driving west. For 12 years, I drove east every day, but now my commute is totally different, I don't take the interstate anymore, and I'm more likely to get stuck behind a bus for a few stops. Every day I enjoy a little peace in my classroom before the day begins. On white days, I have students starting around 7:48. On red days, I don't have my first class until 9:30. Every day I have a 90 minute planning period and it is heaven. Every day I have lunch with another teacher and it is nice to connect with another adult for 20 minutes. We talk about everything, she is seriously the best person to spend lunch with every day. Every day I teach 3 classes. Guys, I only have 3 classes a day and my life is incredibly more chill than I ever thought possible. Every day I feel like I have enough time and energy to get everything done that I want to get done. |
Mrs. Mitchell
This is my 'slice of life' blog. Archives
March 2020
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