A Semester Confession

For the last 17 weeks my life has revolved around this little thing:

This 1 gig memory stick contains virtually every reflection paper, essay, chapter assignment, PowerPoint presentation, lesson plan, and research project that I have submitted for the last year, especially during this last semester.

I managed to finish off my third semester at Newman University with:

Theology 4443 (Faith and Society): A

Education 3123 (Technology and the Classroom): B

History 3073 (History of Kansas and the Great Plains): B

Education 3162 (Teaching Methods): A

Political Science 3063 (World Government Systems): A

I'll be honest, as I always should, I'm not happy with the results. My professors were wonderful and professional and more than willing to help. This is one of the many reasons why I love my exorbitantly priced, but small university. I was a total slacker this semester. It's actually quite ridiculous how badly I procrastinated. I missed an A in the Education class by .5 points because I decided around week #12 that I didn't feel like writing yet another reflection paper even if it was worth 30 points. The reason for my history class is even more foolish. Put plainly- I didn't study. I produced a research paper that was by far substandard. But that's probably because I started the research a day before it was due and then spent the entire day of the final writing it instead of studying for the final.

So why did I decide to sabotage my own grades and eventually my GPA? I just couldn't get motivated this semester. I was talking to two of my friends that I had in almost all my classes with last semester and they were feeling the same way. I think because last semester was SO intense and overwhelming with all the things that had to be done that when I looked over the requirements for this semester I thought, "Piece of Cake!" and then took a 14 week nap. Then I started a new job at a restaurant about 3 miles from my house. The money is not so hot but they were willing to work with my school schedule and I can ride my bike to work. Then there is house-work. I don't care what anyone says-that's a full time job in itself. I can't leave off the dog. I used him as an excuse to step away from whatever project I was working on at the moment to go on a 2.5 mile walk every day or play Tug-of-War. When it comes right down to it I put school at the bottom of the list when I should have made it my main priority. The worst part is I don't think I'll make the Dean's List this semester.

I did do stuff this semester that was pretty labor intensive, so it's not that I completely slacked off.

• I put together a 106 page, 8 lesson plan Unit on 8th grade Economics complete with Kansas standards, Goals, a visual map of the Unit, a pre-test and final test, a newsletter to the parents, 2 extensive WebQuests, a PowerPoint presentation, countless hand outs, and detailed 2-3 page lesson plans. I created about 99% of this massive portfolio and I worked on it all semester long.

• I created a WebQuest for the first time ever. I had never heard of a WebQuest before. Basically, it's a way to incorporate the Internet and technology into a classroom. Instead of giving the students a list of questions and just letting them roam through the Internet at random to find a bunch of information that's probably not reliable, the teacher creates a list of websites for the student to explore. It can be done as an individual assignment or as a group activity. I chose one of my favorite subjects: Christopher Columbus and the Colombian Exchange.

• I wrote my first 15-page research paper. Truthfully, it was a huge challenge and I don't think I did a very good job. My topic, Human Trafficking, was vast enough and I broke the paper down into 7 parts but next time what I think I'll do is write 3 5-6 page research papers on 3 different aspects of the topic and then combine them together to form 1 large paper. (Something to think about: we currently have 27 million slaves in the world today. That's more slaves then we had at the peak of the Atlantic slave trade from Africa to the Americas. Human trafficking is every where, including here in the United States. As a matter of fact, last year Chicago was named the #1 hub for human trafficking in the States. Thousands of extremely poor people are promised a "better life" if only they would come work for So-and-So. In the end they are transported illegally and put into a life of debt-bondage where they are required to do whatever it is that their Owners tell them too. They might work in a factory, a mine, clean your house, or be sold into prostitution. It's sad. It's tragic. And I am amazed that this isn't being addressed in every single church across the country.)

• I was invited and accepted into the Pi Gamma Mu, an honor society for the Social Sciences. I got my graduation cord, certificate, members card and pin just the other day.

So there it is. Next semester I will be taking 1 on-line class and will be working on my Senior Historical Portfolio, in addition to taking an Economic Class, another Political Science class, and 2 more Education classes. Until then I have the summer to recoup and get re-directed. That should be fun.

Happy Mother's Day

Wishing all my friends and family a wonderful and delightful Mother's Day!

Margie Harris

Linda Burke

Boba Pavlovic

Anna Pavlovic

Corey Byington

Donna Harrold

Civony Hill

Amy Larson

Jana Maldonado

Anna Mason

Sara Patchett

Britney Rimes

Stacy Shaw

Mindy Tillack

Jennifer Welsh

and all my Aunts

You are all amazing women and fantastic mothers. This world would not be the same without your nurturing, guidance, love, strength, and humor.

Afternoon Break

Today, I took a break in between classes to go see a movie. I think I chose wisely because I LOVED "How to Train Your Dragon"! It's the first 3D cartoon I have ever been too. It was worth the $10 per person matinee price and after a moment or two I totally forgot that I was wearing 2 pairs of glasses. I'm sure it would have been just as great in 2D but since Alex has never seen a 3D movie I figured what the heck.

This past weekend saw "Clash of the Titans", not in 3D. It was okay. If you really want to see it, wait until its out in the Redbox. It wasn't horrible, it was just...eh. I was hoping for better action scenes but I did like that there was no nudity or bloody violence.

On a completely separate note, my 67 year old father-in-law is in the hospital for a possible lesion or hole in his large intestine. The doctors are not sure what is going on as of right now, but tests are being conducted. Prayers are always welcome.

In Like a Lamb, Out Like a Lion

I slacked off a little. Actually, I've been slacking off a lot. I'm working again, but only part time, and I'm struggling with my ability to manage my time effectively between work, school, the dog, house-work, and spending time with Alex. So far school work and blogging seem to be at the very bottom of the list.

Winter has managed to keep its icy fingers dug deeply into the Kansas sod this year. The temperatures are finally starting to creep into the 60's and 70's. Yesterday was beautiful 72˚ and all the natives were out in their shorts and Birkenstock's. The mad race for "Best-looking Yard" began about 2 weeks ago. Half the neighborhood men were out in hardly 50˚ weather mowing, fertilizing, and watering their barely-dormant-barely-dead grass which caused a panicked frenzy in the other half of the males to rush over to Lowe's and Home Depot to see how they could out-do the others. Alex is of no exception after consulting no less than 5 yard-patriarchs as to what he should about his "dead grass".

Davey celebrated his first birthday on March 13th. I was sad for a moment that my puppy was now a dog but that only lasted a few minutes. I did find some of his first puppy treats in the doggy-bag we used when he was just a wee pup. As you can see his appetite has grown just a bit.

And, of course, in the doggy-bag I found his old collars. The one on the top left is his first collar, the one on the right is the one he's wearing now.

For his birthday I bought him a rubbery Frisbee. He LOVES it! He's not much of a fetch kind of dog. You can throw it and he'll go get it but he brings it back to you so you can play tug-o-war. He loves things that crunch and squish and make a plastic squeaky noise.

He doesn't lay on the carpet very often. He must have been eating a doggy treat when I took this picture.

The other part of his birthday present was that he got to sleep in our bed with us that night. Which meant that I slept curled up in a ball at the tippy-top of the bed with Alex on the left side of me, a night stand on the right side of me, and a warm dog-mass on my feet. It took him less than 3 minutes to fall into a deep sleep once we let him on the bed. I thought that he'd wake up around 4 AM to go to the bathroom and then I'd get the rest of the bed to myself. Nope! The bugger slept all the way until nearly 6 AM and hardly moved a muscle.

We went up to Chicago for a few days over Spring Break. While we were there we met up with Mike & Amy and Joe & Sara. The last time all 6 of us were together was at our wedding so it was great to hang out for a night. Here's a picture of Joe, Mike, and Alex at Anyway's Bar & Grill.

Here we are all together again.

(Amy Larson, Joe LePore, Sara LePore, Mike Larson, Amanda Pavlovich, Alex Pavlovich)

Amy planned this great surprise 40th birthday party for Mike. Tons of people showed up including his mom and dad from Pahrump, Nevada. Joe, Sara, Alex, and I stood in the back of the room waiting for Mike to make his way to the back of the group. When he finally saw us standing there staring at him- well, you could have knocked him over with a feather! It was a great surprise. We stayed at the party until almost midnight and then headed back to the massive hotel suite that Amy got for us all to stay in. The party finally came to an end around 4:30 AM when we found Mike passed out face down on his bed. In the morning we had breakfast together and then went our separate ways once again.

On our way back from Chicago, we stopped by to see my brother-in-law, Zoran, in Nebraska. He's attending Crieghton University. We treated him to dinner at PF Chang's, got to see his dorm room, and hear all about his exciting college life before jumping back on the road, but not before I was able to get a picture of Alex with his "little" brother.

That about sums up March 2010. It came in like a Lamb and went out like a Lion.

Naked Kisses

I opened up our semi-empty cabinet today and to my amazement discovered this:

On closer inspection, it appears to be a plate of naked Hersey kisses on top of a bag of raisins.

I'm not sure why they're naked. Perhaps it cuts down on the time required for impulse eating. Perhaps the Kisses were playing a game of "I'll-show-you-mine" and I caught them in the act. Or maybe the sneaky naked Raisins convinced them that they would acclimate to the temperature of the cabinet faster if they joined them in their nakedness. I was hoping to buy some Dove candies from the grocery store later this week but I'm not sure if this is a random act of strangeness or chocolate debauchery.