New Hairs + Wedding Hair?

If you follow me on Instagram, you’ll notice that I got my hair re-done this past Friday.

It needed it so bad.

Like…..seriously….

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Mind you, it was humid that day and I did literally nothing to it except wash it the night before and it was up in some makeshift bun before I pulled it down for the picture…

But…it needed help so much.

So, some chocolate-brown color and about 4 inches chopped off later…

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Real talk: I’m super bad at selfies, just an FYI.

There’s even some red undertones in it, which I LOVE!!

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It just looks so much better.  And it sounds odd, but I feel like darker hair just works better with my fair skin tone.  It makes my complexion and face look warmer and gives it some depth.  I feel like even just in pictures, my skin tone looks warmer with the darker hair around my face.  It could just be me thinking that, but I’m okay with it.

I’m slightly sad because this is the last time I’m going to be able to get my hair cut this short for awhile.  After this last cut, we’re pretty much on a maintenance streak, because I want to grow my hair out for the wedding (really not trying to get extensions for length).  While I actually like my hair in this shorter collarbone length, I’d like for it to be maybe mid-back-ish for the wedding.

Which means now just trims as opposed to “drastic” cuts and more frequent trims so it doesn’t get out of hand.  Then….after we come back from the honeymoon, I can chop it all off again.

I don’t fully know what kind of hairstyle I want for the wedding but I’m thinking of a half updo kind of thing.  I’ve started pinning a few things and I really kind of like something like this:

http://www.deerpearlflowers.com/wedding-hairstyle-inspiration/half-up-half-down-long-wavy-hairstyle-for-wedding/
Source

Something where it has a pretty wave but it’s not super rigid curls or a huge mound of curls that overtakes my head.

One thing I love about my hairstylist is that she already wants to see pictures of how I’m envisioning my hair for the wedding because she wants to start shaping it and cutting it the way that will best suit the style that I want. And she wants to start doing that with like the next time I visit her; this way when the wedding comes, my hair is already where it needs to be and shouldn’t need a ton of reshaping or cutting to make it do what I want.

I am also still open to suggestions on hairstyles for the wedding.  What I linked above is just what has stuck out to me the most so far, but any other ideas/suggestions are welcomed!

Currently, I’m just happy to have a pretty head of hair again.  And I’m not the only person that plays with their hair for like three days after it’s be done, right?

Please tell me I’m not the only one????

Shorts

*Today is the last day of my summer vacation.  Tomorrow is the first day of faculty professional development week and school “officially” starts two weeks from tomorrow. Part of me is excited, like I said, and part of me is this:

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*Devon doesn’t go back for two weeks and I just asked him what he’s going to do all by his lonesome for the next two weeks and he’s like “I have no idea other than be bored out of my mind…probably see a movie…or….five….I don’t know”.  Haha!  He talks so big sometimes about how happy he is in his alone time, and he is (as am I), but he’s so not good with a lot of it.  He goes like a day or two at home with just himself and then he’s over it.  He starts texting me “when are you coming home?!?!?!”  Okay, maybe not that whiny….but….close.

*He did help me move all my stuff into my new office yesterday.  It’s so nice to have it all out of my house and where it belongs.  None of it has been put away there, mind you, but at least it’s all there.  I’ll do pictures and a small tour of it once it’s all done.  It needs a bookshelf and a table and I need to get some sort of a rug for it (since it’s tiled floors), so it’s got some work.  But, it’s a really nice size, has a good big window and will work really well for me.  AND it’s actually where the students are, unlike at Keough where I was on the other side of the building; here I’m right in the middle of everything which is great.

*I think I’m all about keeping this short and sweet this week so I can enjoy some down time before the school routines start up again.

 

Hope everyone is having a great week!

Happy Birthday to me!!!!!!

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I just need Morgan Freeman to narrate my whole life.  All he has to do is call me and I will set up everything!

My 30th year has been….interesting to say the least.  There have been a lot of odd moments…. a lot of trying moments, a lot of stress, some moments that were utterly depressing.

But there have also been some really great moments.  And since I have a tendency to be kind of (read: very) pessimistic, some of those great moments get overshadowed by the stressful and depressing moments.

So, to celebrate my birthday I’ve decided to share 5 of the best moments of my 30th year and not dwell on the crappy things.

5. My New Car!  I realize that probably sounds incredibly superficial, but I spent the better part of four years in two cars: one of which I just needed and one of which I hated after awhile.  The fact that I finally have a car that is not only spacious and reliable, but that I love is something that I am really happy about.  I’ll have this car for years, it’ll hold car seats one day; so yeah this is one of the things that made me happy this year.

4. Our final graduating class:  Yes, this had some sadness with it.  Our last graduation ceremony was filled with tears and emotions, but there were two amazing moments for me.  The first was the military surprise for our salutatorian.  I’ve never seen one in person and may never again, but to see her Dad appear from backstage with her diploma in hand when she thought he wasn’t going to make it home was one of the best things I’ve ever seen in my life and I will never forget that moment with her.  That and seeing these young women that I’ve known for so long graduate and ready to move on to the next chapter was just a joy for me; even amidst the tears and emotions, I’m so happy I got to see these young women grow and I am extremely proud of all of them.

3. Deepening friendships.  As hard as this year was, I am extremely grateful for my friends who have been amazingly supportive.  I’m also really grateful for the co-workers that have become friends this year.  As a group, we had to deal with a lot of hard situations (most notably our school closing) together and it drew a lot of us closer together.  You noticed who really had your back and who was willing to be there for you when you needed them.  One of these people, my friend Tiffani, was already a good friend of mine, but she actually started working at my school this past year (so she’d only been a Keough teacher for two months before hearing about the closing) so we got to spend a lot of time together (pretty much every single day) and through she became very special to me, so special that she’s one of my bridesmaids:

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She’s the one on the right

I just love and appreciate her so much; she’s been an absolutely amazing friend to me and I hope I’m as good of one to her.

2. My new job! Obviously.  I think I’ve gone on and on about this one recently, so I’m not going to gush too much about it here, but I’m so excited to have such a great place to go starting next week.  I actually just got our schedule for orientations and holy crap I’m going to be busy the next couple weeks, but it’s all good.  I look forward to many years at my new school.

1. We’re Engaged! To no one’s surprise this is my favorite moment of the year.  It’s pretty hard to top this one for anything.  Probably the next thing that will “top” it will be our wedding.  It was so simple; not a huge to-do which so many engagements are these days, and it was absolutely perfect.  I still occasionally just look at my ring and love that it’s there and just love that it was given to me by my best friend.  I can’t wait to go into the next chapter of our lives together.

So, this may have been a pretty trying year in many ways; there have also been quite a few good things that have happened that have tried to balance out the crappy stuff.

Here is hoping that the 31st year has even more good than bad.

Happy Birthday to me!!!

Shorts

*I can’t believe this coming week is my “last” week of summer.  Holy Cross (my new school) has two weeks of orientations between new faculty orientation (which I obviously have to attend), regular back to school faculty stuff, and various student orientations.  So, I’m back to work as of Monday the 14th and the classes begin on August 28th.  Despite MD signing a law that states all schools will now begin after Labor Day, Holy Cross is one of the school’s that filed an exemption so we start before Labor Day. In all fairness, I’m not mad about it, I have three weeks off at Christmas and two weeks off for Easter.  Public schools have a week at Christmas and a 4 day weekend for Easter this year. I’ll take longer breaks over going back after Labor Day.

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PSA: Respect Your Teachers

I had a post scheduled for today but I decided to postpone it for a small PSA.

I love this time of the year for many reasons; like my birthday, mine and Devon’s anniversary, etc.

But, I also hate it because there is always so much teacher bashing that happens now. Between parents complaining up and down about the school supply lists and about how teachers don’t do their jobs; it’s hard to hear being an educator, especially right before the beginning of a new year where we should all be coming back refreshed and energized for a new year.

Devon shared an article with me yesterday (that I also shared on my personal Facebook page) about how “Teachers suck…”

Don’t let the title fool you; it’s not dogging teachers, like so many others do.  It’s explaining what we do other than teach all day long.  Teaching isn’t as simple as walking in the door and teaching a lesson and then leaving for the day.  You have to plan the lessons you’re doing (because most teachers have more than one class/content/subject/etc), you have planning for extra-curricular activities you run, you have meetings to go to, mandatory trainings to attend, PAPERWORK OUT THE ASS, mandates to follow, testing to prepare for, observations to prepare for….

And teachers do all of that along with teaching students, listening to them, caring for them, trying to help them be decent people.

The school day is roughly 7-8 hours.

A teachers typical day is roughly 10-12 hours.

And even still, at the end of the day, we’re not done; we’re mainly just going home because we’re tired and need to eat and see our families.

But we all do this every day because we genuinely love what we do.  There are parts we don’t like (like mountains of paperwork designated to us by people that have never taught a day in their lives) but what we like outweighs the annoyances.

Yes, I know, I’m not a “teacher”; no, I don’t create lesson plans everyday and stand in front of a room of 30 people and teach hours on end everyday.

I am a school counselor.

While I have a different job description, I’m still an educator; a teacher is an educator; we’re all in this together.

Devon and I were talking about this over breakfast yesterday.  There are parts of his job that are easier than mine; there are parts of my job that are easier than his.

For instance, I couldn’t make four lesson plans and teach 4 classes of 30+ 7th graders all day and he couldn’t listen to students cry, rant, complain, etc, all day.

But we’re both educators, at the end of the day, we want to teach students, help them, and do what we can to make sure they become decent human beings.

So every year, around this time of the year, we see this and it makes us both nuts.  And all I ask of anyone at the end of the day, is to try and understand your teacher or your child’s teacher.  Yes, your child is special to you, as they should be.  They are also special to their teacher, but every other student in that teacher’s room is also special and that teacher is trying to make sure every student feels special.

An educator is only one person; just as you as a parent do the best you can every day, the teacher is also doing the best they can every day with what they have.  They won’t be perfect every day but they are trying.  It’s okay to have a discussion with a teacher when something happens you don’t like; you’re a parent, it’s your job to make sure your child is well cared for at school.

But belittling a teacher/educator and making it seem like their job is insignificant isn’t okay.

We are in this profession because we love it.  We love seeing our students everyday (even those that frustrate us), we love seeing them grow, watching them finally get that concept that they’ve been struggling with, seeing them make a good choice or help someone else that they might not have before.  It’s why we’re willing to spend 10-12 hours a day at work and likely doing more work at home and why we’re willing to spend so much of our own money on our classrooms/offices for doing activities, parties, etc.

Teaching used to be one of the most respected professions in this country.  Back in the day, if you said you were a teacher, you would get the “wow, that’s amazing!” reaction. You say you’re a teacher now and a lot of the time it’s “wow…..that’s….something” and looks of pity and feigning sympathy.

We don’t really want sympathy.  Like I said, we love our jobs (most of the time).  It would just be nice for people to understand, we’re doing the best we can with what we have and no matter how many new mandates are thrown on us or how much paperwork we drown in, we’re going to keep doing that for our students and your children.

As I step off my soapbox now, I just want to ask all parents to try to remember that your child’s teacher does care about your child and does want what is best for them. IF we can all work together, we can help all of our kids be amazing young people and eventually amazing adults.