October Highlights

October has been a busy and fun month for us. Aaron coached his girls varsity soccer team to the state semi-finals! He has been really busy with practice and games, and now that the season is over he may even get home before me on some days. We still love BYU football, and have enjoyed some exciting wins the last couple of weeks.

Julia came into town for one last Utah visit before she has her baby, so we threw her a baby shower. I made this blanket with sock monkey flannel prints. It wasn't super complicated, but I did use a sewing machine (which isn't a common occurrence) and searched extensively to find just the right fabric. I thought it turned out pretty cute...mostly because of the fabric, not my amazing sewing skills.

After Julia's visit and remembering how much we loved Disneyland in October, we decided to make a spontaneous three day weekend trip to California because Aaron had Friday off. We drove down Thursday night to spend Friday at Disneyland. After a few hours of sleep, we headed to Disneyland around 7:30 and started off the day on Dumbo. Then I suggested Thunder Mountain, but Aaron said he wanted to ride Pinocchio (a bit strange, I know, but he must have been inspired). So we went to Pinocchio and as we get off the ride, there is the Disney dream team handing out fastpasses to people as they exit the ride. The Year of Million Dreams blesses us again! We have won Dream Fastpasses 6 times! Since Disney's annual attendance numbers are above 14 million...I figure you have about 1 in 14 chance of winning one of the million dreams...so Mickey Mouse is definitely rewarding us for being some of his biggest fans.

I love Disneyland around Halloweentime. It's actually a toss up between Halloween and Christmas, I can't decide which I like more. But the Halloween decorations are fabulous! California adventure has an area called Candy Corn Acres that is really cute.

And, of course, we love the giant Mickey pumpkin head!

We spent Saturday in Torrance visiting Julia and Stephen's home. There are a few things I have come to love about this town...and most of them involve food. They have a great beach bike store, a huge Forever XXI, and best of all two of my most favorite restaurants--The Original Pancake House and The Lazy Dog. The Original Pancake house is definitely the best breakfast restaurant I have ever been to, and I'm a big breakfast fan. This place is seriously good. Now Ruby's may have it beat in the ambience category. But if you just want great breakfast food, this place is the best! The omelets are huge (see Julia's plate) and the apple Dutch pancake is huge and delicious (Aaron's plate) and the strawberry pancakes are my favorite! And don't worry, if you don't live in California, they have one in Salt Lake!

I know, I'm probably a bit too old to enjoy these movies, but I'll admit that I've enjoyed High School Musical 1 & 2. So, we decided to go to High School Musical 3 last weekend. I guess I should clarify that "we" doesn't include Aaron. He had absolutely no interest in the movie. Here is my quick movie review. As the sequels increased, so did the cheesiness. There were a few moments in this movie that were just over the top, even for a musical. I could appreciate them for what they were and get a good laugh, but I think Aaron would have walked out before the movie was over. The storyline was a bit lacking because they were trying to cram so many songs in...but there were some great dance numbers as always and we had a good time.

My mom has a great tradition of having a Halloween chili and cornbread dinner. This year we actually did it the Sunday before Halloween as our monthly cousin dinner. I think this year was her best year ever! She used my aunt Jimae's chili recipe, but instead of ground beef we used slow roasted shredded pork. It was fabulous! And I made the cute halloween tablecloth (the second use of my sewing machine in a month).

Aaron decided to be Gregory House from "House" for Halloween. He had gray hair, a scruffy face, walked with a cane, and was sarcastic all day.

I opted for the easier, more traditional route of being a witch. The coolest part was my purple hair and striped tights, which you can't see very well in the pictures.

Now the Halloween decorations are put away, and the pilgrims and turkey are out. We are looking forward to a busy November including my first trip to Disney World! And hopefully more frequent blogging so I don't have one really long one at the end of the month.

After all these years, it still brings a smile to my face!

Yes, I am referring to the movie Newsies. I brought it to school to show a clip to my students when they finished their test today. They didn't know what a printing press was...so I thought what better way to see a printing press than to watch a clip from Newsies. We watched the educational printing press clip, and then I let them watch a few minutes of the beginning. I have to say that Carrying the Banner is one of my favorite parts of the movie and I can't hear it without humming or singing along. Well as I'm quietly humming one of my students notices and points out that I'm humming. To which I reply, well I've seen this movie a lot of times. He asks how many. And I proudly answer, probably 40 or 50 times. Yep, I've probably seen this movie more times than any other movie in my lifetime. My friends and I were slightly obsessed when we were in junior high. I saw it a few times in the regular theater, many times at the dollar theater, and many more times after we could rent it. We just couldn't get enough. Our lockers were plastered with pictures of Newsies and we even created our own Newsies stationary.

I look back on many of my teenage obsessions and think they were a bit ridiculous. And I may have a been a bit over the top on this one, but I do have to say that even to this day I still think it is a pretty fabulous movie. I did feel a bit old when I looked at the date on the dvd and told my students that the movie was 15 years old. I almost couldn't believe it. That means they were only two years old when this movie came out and they have never been exposed to the goodness that is Newsies. But thanks to me, now they have, and they didn't even make fun of it despite all the dancing and singing. And now I may just have to go home and finish the movie.

5 Year Anniversary

No, I haven't been married for 5 years. But I have been working at Provo Canyon School for 5 years this week! I can't believe it has been that long; I never would have thought I would still be here 5 years later. But here I am, and there are a few good things about reaching this milestone, the best of which is I earn 3 more days off a year...which translates to 3 more days I can spend at Disneyland.

From day to day my feelings about my job change, it can be fun and rewarding one day and extremely frustrating and difficult the next day, but overall I can say that it has been a good experience for me. I've learned a lot of things that I probably needed to learn, and couldn't have learned in a regular public school job. And it is a great job for me because I constantly get to be studying and learning new things...almost like being a student again.

Some people think I'm crazy for working where I do, but I've had a lot of positive experiences with my students and they make me laugh all the time. Here some of my favorite recent conversations:

Student: Mrs. Barth, she called me bulemic.
Me: Do you throw up after you eat?
Student: No...you know, when you can't see colors.
Me: You mean, color blind?

Me: After the constitutional convention, how many states ratified the constitution?
Student: 48
Me: There were only 13 states at the time.
Student: 25
Me: Again, there were only 13 states at the time.
Student: 35
Me: There were 13 states.
Student: 18
Me: ???????

A few other favorites include the questions "Is there a life-size map of the United States?" or "Were you around when Colombus came?" Or when I'm teaching about Ancient Egypt and somehow it becomes a conversation about chickens and hobbits and what kind of shoes they wore...and my professor is observing me (and laughing out loud).

As you can see, my job can be pretty entertaining at times, but I might have a new career ahead of me. A student informed me this week that he plans on writing my name in on the ballot for president (we haven't quite gotten to the part about requirements for being president, specifically the age ones). But maybe I can get an early start on my political career...slowly working my way to the White House one vote at a time.

Why I love Fall...

While I realize that it isn't officially Fall just yet, the cooler temperatures have reminded how much I love Fall! Here are just a few of my favorite things about this season.

1. I love "Back to School" time. I used to love shopping for school supplies, getting the new crayons, pencil boxes, and backpacks. And then when I went to college I loved it because it was new classes (and most years a new major too) and it was when all my roommates came back! It doesn't have quite the same excitement for me now that I work at a year round school...but it still makes me a little excited. I was at the BYU bookstore a few weeks ago and was really wishing it was me buying my books and getting ready to back to school. (weird, I know, but true).

2. I love the changing of the leaves! I love seeing the leaves change around town and I especially love driving up Provo Canyon to see them. It's a bit early for this...but I'm looking forward to it and hoping to get some good pictures this year.

3. I love peaches! I look forward to peach season all year long and get really excited when I see that Allred Orchards has opened their peach stand. We have already made peach cobbler, crisp, shakes, and ice cream and plan on attempting peach jam this weekend. (Picture below is when I bought a peach in June in Italy...one of the best I've had...and probably one of the most expensive).

4. My favorite TV shows start again.

5. I get to start wearing sweaters and sweatshirts again.

6. I can use my favorite warm flannel blanket without getting too hot.

7. I love Halloween and fall decorations.

8. I remember the fall I spent in Jerusalem.

9. Thanksgiving-I love seeing family and eating such good food.

10. And last, but definitely not least...BYU football! Growing up I never would have thought I would get excited about football. I watched basketball, but thought football was extremely boring. I only went to games in high school if my friends were going and we never really paid attention to the games. Then in 2001 some friends talked me into getting tickets with them and once again I went along for the social aspect. But as it turns out, after my friends taught me about the game, some of their extreme enthusiasm rubbed off on me (thanks guys)...I came to love BYU football. It probably helped that BYU had an awesome season that year, winning 12 straight games. But I continued to go to all the games during the less successful or "dark years" and have loved the team that Bronco has created the last few years. I still don't care for watching any other football games, but I get really excited about BYU football. Here are some pics from the first game of the year.

The view from our seats. I love the location of the stadium, right there by the mountains. The location of our seats on the other hand, isn't so great...but we are slowly trying to work our way up in the season ticket holder hierarchy.

I interrupted Aaron's intense concentration pose...so I think that's why his hand looks so weird.

Aaron singing the fight song.

Caleb playing with his new toy. It is so fun to have him home and going to games with us again!

I wish you all a great fall season and hope you enjoy it as much as I do!