The Post You've All Been Waiting For!

Are you ready for the grand tour? I forgot to take a picture of this first entry room and the hall way leading from the street door to the house door (foyer, if you will ;)), but you can get a pretty good idea from these picture. I LOVE the ceilings that are the old exposed beams. In some rooms they're painted and in other's it's just the bare wood--very rustic and very beautiful in my opinion.

Enjoy!

This is the staircase. It's in the main entry room. The space underneath is perfect for my future Christmas tree :) and of course Belen. (YAY! I've already told Antonio and Jesus that for next year I want them to make me a Belen.)

--Upstairs--

This is the top of the stairs. It's a big open space between the bedrooms; if we wanted we could some day put up a wall and make another bedroom here... In the meantime, you can see it will serve as my office. I'm SO excited that this nice big desk and bookcase are being left. I currently have no such furniture. :)

This is the room above the one with the wood-stove (to the right as you come up the stairs). I'm not sure if this will be our bedroom or not... It is the warmest in the winter because the stove pipe passes through! And according to the previous owner, it's also the coolest in summer; still, I like the other room better. You'll see.

This was the little boy's room. It's a funky little room adjacent to the room that I think will be ours. This is now the left side of the office space at the top of the stairs. Some day we would like to make this a bathroom since there isn't one upstairs...but all of that will have to wait some time!

Here's my favorite room. The one I think we'll sleep in. I love the floors and if you can see there's a little window seat. The bottom opens up to be able to store shoes and things. In the left corner of the pic. you can see the armoire that's been left. It's very big. Once again, happy that's being left because our current armoire is just on loan. :)

--Downstairs--

This is the view from inside the room that's on your right when you enter the house. In this picture, you're looking out toward the main entry room. You can see the staircase through the door. The ceilings are REALLY high...I don't think you can really tell in the picture, but I'd say the door is about eight feet tall.

Ta-cha! The wood-stove!!! It's little, but it heats the house like a champ. :) When I picked up the keys on Thursday night I could have easily been in a T-shirt, it was so warm with that little guy going full blast. No more stressing over how to dry my clothes! ;) Do you love the colors? I do!

This is the "couch." The previous owners had this storage box built and made cushions to cover it so it became like a built in sofa. It was really cool...unfortunately they took the cushions so we're on the look out for cheap cloth to make some more. :) The roman blinds on the window were made special by the previous owner and are lined on the inside like a blanket to keep out the draft. Can you see how cool and antique the window is?

These are the doors that lead from the first room of the house down to the dining room, kitchen, and bathroom. The curtain is beautiful and was made by the previous owner.

This is the room adjacent to the kitchen where the table will go. If it fits, we'll also put our couch here... Looking through the white doors you can see a sliver of the front door and the doorway on the right leads to the kitchen.

Here's the kitchen. It's all new. Along with the patio, one of my favorite parts of the house. Can you see the porcelain, double basin sink? Just what I've always wanted (seriously!). You can see the fridge has been left. It's enormous--lot's of room to freeze my turkey soup!

This is perhaps the most awkward part of the house: the bathroom is off the kitchen. Weird. Someday, we want to put a bathroom upstairs...but for now this is it. You can see it's also new. And now we have an electric boiler. I'm not sure I'll like that; I'm used to gas by now, but we'll see.

And here's the intro to the patio:

This is the covered part of the patio/garden, when you first step outside. The blue on the columns are for tea candles. :) Fun! On the left there's a table and a wrap around bench...I couldn't get pics of everything! Anyway, being covered, it's perfect in any weather. Today is proof--it hasn't stopped raining since yesterday afternoon!

"The Walled Garden," close enough to a "secret" garden that I get excited just thinking about it! ;) So here's the patio/garden. This might be my favorite part of the house. The patio is perhaps six meters wide by 25 meters long...more or less; it's huge!

This is the view from the house looking through the garden too the garage. That door at the back is the garage.

One of the lemon trees (there are two). As I'm sure I've mentioned there is also a cherry tree and a fig tree. Angelines wants to tear out the fig tree, however, because they grow like weeds and attract a lot of wasps in summer. Another down side is their roots...VERY strong. They strangle water lines and would eventually burst through the concrete floor of the patio. So I'm okay with taking it out, especially since her idea for a replacement is a blue spruce. :) She fell in love with one she saw in Portland (near Alicia's house). It could be my Christmas tree year after year...

Here is the reverse view: the garage to the house. The little shed on the left is perfect for keeping garden tools and lawn furniture. :)

This is the AWESOME door that goes into the garage. I just love it! It's just so cool! I didn't take a picture of the garage, but it's big... maybe about 35 meters square.

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So, there it is. What do you think? Enough room?? The total space occupied (that is to say not counting the upstairs) is 200 square meters. Angelines has always promised me a dog once we had a patio... hehehe. I don't think she ever thought that would be so soon. ;) Probably not the very near future, but at some point I will have a puppy to keep me company in this big old place.

I'm currently making up boxes because although it's been raining for two days, it's supposed to clear up tomorrow. In fact, at the moment it's stopped. Cross your fingers...tomorrow's moving day. :)

If you build it... they will come.

That's a little how I felt this morning when Nuria called me at 9:45am to say that when she went to pick up our chicken the butcher had been able to get a turkey for us! So it turns out that if you "cook it" (ie. stuffing etc.) it will come! ;) We raced to stuff the turkey and get it to the bakery before the oven was too cool to cook it properly. It was 11:30am when we dropped of the turkey and at 3:00pm it was done. Slow cooked in a wood-stove oven--delicious! It don't think it's ever turned out this great before! Jesus and Antonio added their own "Spanish" touch before dropping off at the bakery: a bit of olive oil, chicken broth and a can of beer over and in the bird. Boy was it good! Everything else turned out fabulous as well, although, my poor friend, Sarah got sick at the last min. and couldn't make it.

We decorated the piso in full Thanksgiving style as you can see in the picture. All the decorations are thanks to my mom. She sent them four years ago for my first Thanksgiving in La Roda and Jesus and Antonio have stored them under lock and key to use every year. :) They made clear that the decorations were on LOAN to me this year so I've got to be sure to put them away properly for next year... maybe you could send me my own, eh mom?

One funny story I have to share. We know a guy who thinks he knows quite a bit about English and America and everything in general. Well the other day someone was mentioning Thanksgiving, referred to by my friends as "el dia del pavo" (turkey day) and he very snobbishly said, "Ah, that's right, Thursday is San Heeving in the U.S."! San Heeving is more or less what Thanksgiving sounds like if someone from Andalucia tries to pronounce it... But of course the very thought of a "Saint Heaving" makes me laugh out loud--a.) because it's so completely Spanish: all holidays must be related to a Saint (even if it's an invented one); b.) because we stuff ourselves just as much as the turkey on Thanksgiving and "heaving" isn't totally out of the range of possibility! ;) Pretty funny.

Happy San Heaving everyone!!!!

The Grinch Who Stole... Thanksgiving?

It came without family,cranberries or T-bird.

It came despite last minute cooking I've heard.

It came two days late, but Saturday aside,

Thanksgiving came...

It came all the same

(Alright, not quite Dr. Seuss...)

That's right, in the end we decided to go for it. My friends cheered me up and we decided to go ahead with our lunch plans: we'll have a stand-in stuffed chicken with our pumpkin pie, etc. tomorrow. I've spent the last three hours with the four of us (Jesus, Antonio and Nuria) crammed in my tiny kitchen prepping stuffing, sweet potatoes and pumpkin pie. The potatoes will wait for tomorrow and my friend Sarah's brining a green bean casserole. Pretty good...minus the chicken. Oh well. As Maggie pointed out, perfection is boring!

Thank goodness for my friends. :)

Turkey Delay!

So getting a Thanksgiving Turkey in Spain isn't easy. You have to notify the butcher ahead of time so he can order one to be killed especially for you. I did this. I went to the butcher two weeks ago and asked for a turkey on November 25. He said I was asking so early he'd forget and that I should come back the Monday prior and remind him. I did this too. Still, yesterday when I went to pick up my poultry...he had forgotten! Twenty-four hour notice wasn't enough to get one for me by today so it looks like our turkey day will have to be delayed! :(

I am sad since I've been looking forward to tomorrow all month...but I suppose really it's a good thing because now we can focus on moving and not have to worry about cooking and guests, etc. Our Thanksgiving will end up being a house-warming party!

Hope you're all enjoying your leftovers!

Big News Briefly:

Some of you know the big news already...I'm no good at keeping secrets apparently! ...Though there is also no reason why this should be secret, so here goes:

WE ARE BUYING A HOUSE!!!!

Can you believe it? We are buying a real, live house with a huge patio/garden, a woodstove (!) and a garage! You're wondering how we can afford this since I'm always talking about how tight money is, right? Well, we've signed a rental agreement with the option to purchase at the end of our contract. The money paid in rent up to the date of purchase will be discounted from the previously agreed upon price of the house. So basically we have three years to save, for me to find a real job, and for the lousy economy to turn around. (cross your fingers)

The papers are all signed and I have the keys! This afternoon I'm going on a picture spree so you all can see the house, too. It'll be empty until Sunday, when we move, but still...this way you can see before and after pics. ;)

The patio/garden might be my very favorite thing about the house. I've been lusting after the patios that belong to our downstairs neighbors here in the piso for three years now! Neither of our neighbors keeps a neat, clean patio. It's tragic and a waste of space, if you ask me. For three years I've been saying, "If I had a patio..." now I do! So the garden is huge and it's got lots of plants and trees already: two lemon trees, a fig tree, a cherry tree, a grape vine... :) I can't wait to plant tomatoes, peppers, and all my favorite herbs!

Can you believe the timing, too? Talk about something to be thankful for!

I'll write more once I have the pictures for you all to see. :)

(p.s. With this post, I've broken the 100 mark! Thanks for reading.)

First Reading

This is the beginning of the final paragraph from my reading tonight: first night back at school. I think it explains why someone like myself, who loves to learn also enjoys teaching so much:

"La enseñanza, pues, está en función del aprendizaje: no tiene sentido en sí misma. El proceso de enseñar está imbricado en el proceso de aprender: son como las dos caras de una misma moneda."

(my translation follows)

Teaching, then, is a function of learning: it makes no sense on its own. The process of teaching is embedded in the learning process: they are like two sides of of the same coin.

... I am pleased with my first night's reading. I read for my Nutrition and Education class and General Didactic Principals (maybe that's right?...you've got to cut me some slack; I'm translating class titles.). Anyway you get the point. The second one I mentioned is obviously where this quote came from.

The reading set up the basic principals for "Educación Personal" (Personalized Educaion). The theory behind Personalized Education is that education is a product of human nature and the human condition. Individual, collective and cultural understanding of our humanity creates an image of the ideal person (defined as a concrete, singular, unrepeatable being)to be fulfilled through education. The idea is that our humanness at once requires education and formation, and at the same time is the basis and the drive for said education. A kind of chicken/egg relationship.

(Wow, do I love thinking about these kinds of things!)

In a nutshell: it's good to be back to the books!

Good night!

Thanksgiving

Here's the presentation that Sarah and I put together for Thanksgiving. We got together this weekend to work on school stuff and bake sample foods for classes and co-workers. We made sweet potatoes and pumpkin cookies thanks to a recipe my mom sent from the Portola Reporter!

Today Sarah and I gave the presentation jointly in second grade (lots of paraphrasing and acting out...). They loved it! And I was pleased that the little worms held still for nearly all of it. When we asked what they were thankful for, my favorite answer was "milk!" :) ...Got milk? I gave the "full" presentation in sixth grade, complete with pumpkin cookies to sample--they ate it up! (ha ha ha)

After visiting the Norman Rockwell Museum in MA last Feb., I couldn't resist using his painting for the title slide. Remember that, mom? Still, the kids' favorite picture was of course the Simpsons' family Thanksgiving!

Happy Thanksgiving!

Thanksgiving1

View more presentations from violap22.

C is for Christmas...

I've got one private class that is really a tough one to get a hold on. It's mixed ages from 6-8. That doesn't seem too bad, but when you start to think about all the developmental changes between first and third grade, you can see my quandary!

The little six-year-old imps are still perfecting the art of using a pencil...so most writing activities are out of the question. One of the second graders is super hyper-active and can become quite disruptive...usually leading the way for the first graders (especially the little boy) to join in and start pushing, pulling or throwing himself on the ground. Then the third grader is a very sweet girl who earnestly works to understand what I say in English and carry out all the tasks, but understandably gets annoyed with her immature classmates. ...I can feel her there!

So far we've had some hiccups in the scheduling at the city building where I'm giving the classes. This week and next, we've had to forfeit the classroom to some other event that's been on the calendar for longer, which means we haven't even been able to fall into a routine of WHERE classes are held! The temporary place I'm using until next week doesn't have a chalkboard. That's okay, but sometimes drawing pictures when flashcards aren't available is a good tool! I've been challenged to come up with games that appeal to all the kids: games that are neither too difficult nor too easy; games that don't need a pencil or paper; and games that don't require too much new vocabulary because in one hour a week how many new words can a kid learn? Shouldn't be too incredibly difficult, but somehow I wind myself up about it all.

Anyway, after last class I told the kids we were going to start working on a Christmas presentation for the parents. I thought rehearsals would be a good way to use up at least 15 min of class time until Christmas break. Kids love Christmas and they love showing off to parents (plus, I think it's important for parents to see the kids in action. So many times they clam up in front of mom or dad) so they were really excited when I told them my plan: "Is it gonna be a surprise?," they all clamored. Bottom line: I promised my kids a Christmas play to rehearse for this Wednesday without the slightest idea of where I was going to find such a thing.

As always, the internet is a teacher's best friend when you're in a pinch for material or ideas. I got on Google and found lots of kids' plays, but not many that would be easy for ESL learners. And most of them were very religious focused, too. Although they're all (supposedly) Catholic, I prefer something a little less about Jesus. Just as the world wide web can be a great resource, it can also be an enormous waste of time because you have to sift through site after site of worthless ideas before you strike gold. About 25 min into searching, I was beginning to hate the internet and myself for promising this to the kids, when I stumbled upon the best idea ever: an acrostic poem play!

So using the word "Christmas," here's what my kids will perform for their parents on December 22nd:

C is for Christmas full of family and love

H is for Holly berries, red and bright

R is for Reindeer pulling Santa's sleigh

I is for Icy cold winter weather

S is for Santa, fat and jolly

T is for Trees we decorate together

M is for Mittens to keep our hands warm

A is for Angels spreading good news

S is the Star that guides the Three Kings

Each kid will memorize a line (or read it) and hold up his/her letter until they spell the word. Then I'm thinking we can sing the chorus to "We Wish You a Merry Christmas" because it's nice and repetitive for kids to learn quickly. :)

I'm excited...I hope they will be!

Back to School...

That's right, I've been meaning to get on and tell you all the good news: I'm a student again! Starting this week I am a student in the education program at the Universidad Internacional de La Rioja (UNIR). It's an online, distance program so I'm able to fit it in with my schedule at school in the morning and private classes in the afternoons. Well... "able to fit it in" might be jumping the gun a bit. Supposedly I'll be able to juggle all of this, but I've been out of juggling practice for so long now, and away from studies completely, that really I'm very apprehensive.

This week was sort of the orientation week. Next week begin actual (or should I say virtual?) classes. So we're supposed to be familiarizing ourselves with how the whole "virtual campus" works. Not as easy as it sounds, honestly. I can't really lay a finger on it, but it just seems as though it's all quite complicated with different forums and chats and video classes. I guess I'll get used to it, but quite frankly, this orientation week has been confusing more than anything else.

Today I got a call from my "profesor tutor," sort of a personal aid person, to see if I had any questions about everything. I couldn't come up with much because I understand so little! Isn't it ironic that to be able to ask clarifying questions you've got to understand the basics of a problem? Anyway, I just feel so lost in this electronic world that I can't even formulate coherent questions to ask! She assured me that she'd be happy to respond to my questions via email as they come up. They do seem to have a good student support system worked out, but I'm wary about so much contact online. It seems fake. I'm just not sure I'm going to like not having real face-to-face contact or communication.

We'll see...

Anyway, between watching orientation videos, organizing myself for school and prepping private classes, I've been nuts this week. (Hence my apprehension about REALLY starting back to school.) It's the same old story with my classes. I feel like I never learn from the past; like it just never gets easier! Every week I'm daunted by the task of filling an hour with useful, fun, engaging activities. I think most of the time my classes end up mediocre at best. Bah! :(

My current pessimism about classes has me thinking and rethinking my decision to study education. What else is new? A decision made by Viola just wouldn't be the same without second guessing, right? Maybe I'm just masochistic? I love to torture myself with what could have been IF...

But, as always, I am hopeful that things will get better, that I will once and for all get my sh*t together and my life will run like a well oiled machine...

...Where would we be without hope??? ;)

Creativity!

I'm a nerd.

...let's start there.

You can ask my sisters, you can ask anyone who went to high school with me and pretty much most of the people who met me post H.S. years. They will all confirm this fact. I'm a hopeless dork. I like to think I'm a "cool nerd," if such a thing exists. You know, not the kind that smells funny or has big round glasses (though in high school I did have a pair!), isn't any good at sports and gets sick a lot; I'm the kind of nerd who looks up random factoids on Google, or gets a kick out of listening to educational rap songs about nutrition. Still none of these qualities detract from my social skills (right?) thus, the "cool" part.

Some people say I'm curious...I just hope their refering to my curiosity as opposed to being a strange person. ;) In any case, as I've grown up, I've learned to love my nerdy self and delight in finding other, equaly "curious" people to befriend. Really, I believe that this is the root of my interest in education: curiosity about the world and a love for sharing what I discover.

So my nerdy inclinations have lead me to discover a vocation I never dreamed I would pursue, and, as I've found is true of most things, the more I learn about education, the more interesting it becomes. I don't "know" a lot at the moment, all of my opinions are based purely on experience and observation; but many times that is the best way to form opinons, right?

I spent the last two hours airing my opinions talking to my mom (a teacher). We talked about how much both of us enjoy sharing those learning moments with students and the importance of creativity in schools, which there seems to be so little of it here in Spain. I can't speak for the U.S. but certainly if I compare with my own childhood, these kids lack anything resembling creativitiy!

Maybe because my mom was a teacher or maybe because she insited that "only boring people are bored," I was always encouraged to explore, do, create and discover. I remember at about age six I was conviced that I was going to build a robot and for the next few hours, I rummaged through the garage for old scraps. An old pink tub with some leftover pipe and wheels (maybe?), was the best I could do.

My sister and I would never tire of building forts from couch cushions, lawn chairs and cardboard boxes. And when we were older we used to play with my mom's old Underwood typewriter and make up outrageous news articles or write formal letters to the president. I was never told these activities were worthless, or unimportant and I certainly wasn't given the option of watching TV. My mom refused to buy us a Nintendo either. (thank you, mom) I should also say that I always felt encouraged to be creative at school. I can't think of a time I was castigated for creativity.

In Spanish schools, however, I see the kids formed into perfect copy machienes. It's so bad that a fifth grader is very likely to ask you if he should use his pen or pencil to take notes of anything you've pointed out and writen on the board! They're so used to copying EVERYTHING that coming up with some original idea is the most impossible task. And many times, even the smallest inkling of originality is squelched. A second grader, last year, had his work torn up in his face because he had colored the bunny on the coloring page blue--"Rabbits aren't BLUE!"

In the midst of this conversation with my mom, Kristen sent me the link to this video: Ken Robinson says schools kill creativity Video on TED.com (I'm telling you, we have some kind of nerdy connection because this couldn't be more relavant.) This is Sir Ken Robinson, author and international advisor on education, speaking at the TED conference about the need to emphasize creativity in schools. He calls for a revolution in the world education system to move away from the traditional, cerebral, approach to learning and take more into account what we know about intelligence; we experience learning in all the ways we experience the world: emotionally, physically, visually, etc.

My favorite quote: "Creativity is as important now in education as literacy, and we should treat it with the same status." Think about that.

Procrastination

So the irony is, I found this article one afternoon when I should have been planning for classes. Typical.

As the author points out (and as I've often said), many times we're most productive when we procrastinate! We fill our time with all manner of other tasks just to avoid doing what we should be doing: clean the bathroom, organize the kitchen cabinets, catch up on email or current events, read the book we forgot we were reading...

For all of you procrastinators, check it out: Procrastination

My Name Is Khan - Official Trailer with English Subtitles (Aspect ratio ...

I'm suddenly becoming quite the film buff. ;)

Here's a wonderful movie I stumbled upon by chance: My Name is Khan. It's the most expensive film made in Bollywood history; and though I haven't seen many Bollywood films, I would venture to say it is very unlike most. It's not a musical, in the way other Inidan films I've seen are, where suddenly the scene cuts to fifteen women in gauzy saris singing and dancing on a beach with a strong breeze. This one's quite serious in its content and message.

It's the story of an Indian Muslim with Asberger's syndrome. He grows up in Mumbai and as an adult moves to San Francisco to live with his brother. The plot centers around life for Rizwan Khan and his family post 9/11 terrorist attacks. In some ways it is like an Indian "Forest Gump." Rizwan is innocently endearing in the way that Forest Gump was: despite his disabiliy, or many times because of it, he sees the world more clearly than the rest of us. That clarity opens the door for some truly enlightening insights into relationships, fear, love and human nature.

I highly recommend this one.