Yo Blogging Buddy

What's up? Time to catch up. First of all I didn't get the 6th grade job. Another candidate they interviewed had 6th grade experience. So these days I find myself with the job title "educational assistant" for 3rd, 4th, and 5th grades at Southeast Christian School in Parker. Although it is a good school, I miss DC! Packing up my 4th grade classroom was the most heart-wrenching thing I have ever had to do. I cried for two hours and I'm the type that rarely cries. I dearly miss teaching Bible and leading morning devos. :( I've spent the past week of school assessing reading and listening to 101 kids read the same stories over and over and over again. Not at all thrilling, but not difficult either.

Young Life started up again last weekend. This year we split our club into two smaller clubs, one for each high school in Parker, hoping to reach more kids. Seven kids came, which wasn't bad except that it was a reminder that we have our work cut out for us. There are well over 1,000 kids to reach in each high school alone. It is fun to hang out with the old leaders and kids and meet new ones too. I can't wait for leadership camp in a couple of weeks!

I've decided that I need to find a church this year. I find myself floating not wanting to stay in the "reformed bubble" but clinging tightly to it all at the same time. Somehow I think God is going to use this time in my life to teach me something. I just can't wait to find out what.

I also decided that I'm ready to move back to the MW. I wonder what my San Francisco born boyfriend will think of that. I also wonder how long it will be before I make it to the mountains and change my mind.

Things to look forward to this week:
- house/pet sitting for ten days starting on Friday
- Sushi on Friday
- having a weeknight free with no papers to grade!
- working out and whipping my butt back into shape

Books I'm reading:
- The Case For Faith by Lee Strobel
- Every Woman's Battle

I'm tired. Goodnight!

Ramblings

I am back in Denver and life is beginning to figure itself out. I really miss Iowa though. :( Sometimes I don't like going home. This time I loved being there except for the fact that I am beginning to miss out on so many things there. I got an offer to be a 3rd/4th/5th grade teacher-assistant at a Christian school here in Denver, and the day after I had a call back from a different school for an interview for a 6th grade teaching position. I already accepted the first job, but feel that I would be a great fit for the second job except they are looking for someone strong in science and if they look at my college transcripts they won't find grades in science that are very impressive. If only I would have actually tried in my science classes in college! Those grades are coming back to haunt me!! So I find myself in a pickle right now, having verbally accepted one job but wanting to be offered another. At this point in my career teaching is much better than assisting (even though it is less pay and more work!). Karla and Aaron's wedding was really beautiful. It was an honor to stand beside my friends, especially since I was there from the beginning. They are evidence that love often happens when you are least expecting it. As for my unexpected love, he came out for the wedding and not only met my family for the first time but many of my closest friends as well. It is good to be back in Denver with him, yet hard because I'm not sure our futures are headed in the same direction. Summer made me realize where my roots are and for the first time in a long time, I was proud of those roots. I'm a Reformed Christian, a farmer's daughter who values the Christian education the city rejects, loves my family and the midwest, and who wants her kids to know those values one day. I love Denver but sometimes I feel so lost here. I'm not proud of my church attendance in the past six months, (I need to stop shopping and realize that there is no perfect church...a struggle I think I overcame this summer). I was surprised to go to my home church this summer and love it and be renewed there. A place that I once found to be so gossipy welcomed me back home and that is cool. I don't like the fact that the CRC doesn't know how to outreach well in its home communities, but I'm beginning to recognize again its value and the overall value of the Reformed church and love it with new eyes.