Hey Friends! I hope you all had a fantastic summer. It makes me sad to have to say that, knowing that summertime is almost gone. Being a teacher, my summertime pretty much ended this last Monday. I have had meetings all week and we begin another school year this coming Tuesday, August 13th. I can hardly believe that I’m about to start my 7th year teaching orchestra!!! How the time sure flies!
Well to start this post off, I thought I’d first share about a HUGE career change! Last year I accepted the orchestra director position at a local middle school and high school for the year 2019-2020 and I couldn’t be more excited! It was definitely hard to leave my students at my previous school and I will always love them and I’m sure I’ll miss many of them, but I felt God’s peace and I knew that these schools were my future. So I’m getting ready to start out with my first year at a couple new schools, asking for new vision, blessings and for God to go before me and use me. The last orchestra concert at Carver was bitter sweet… It was the most beautiful concert and I was BEYOND PROUD of my students and all their hard work! I had already started to cry while I was conducting, but as five of my 8th graders came forward to say a quick word about me, the few tears being shed became a flood.
Here’s what I wrote the day of the last concert:
“Long post ahead: 6 years…. 822 students… 42 performances… my first BIG girl job!
Today is my last orchestra concert at Carver. I knew the day would come sometime, but it’s hard to believe that that day is actually here. This was my first big girl job and it has been an amazing adventure. I have found support, encouragement, have so many memories- some hard but many good, And so many moments of pure joy! When I think of the years here at Carver, while some days have been hard, I feel that I have become a better person because of being a teacher here. It’s hard for me to even put into words how special this job has been to me and the students that I’ve been able to invest in. It’s hard for me to even put into words how special this job has been to me and for the opportunity to impact so many students. Because I teach orchestra, I get the awesome opportunity to be with some students for 3 years, making memories, becoming a family, getting on each other‘s nerves, and creating magic. The moments when everything fades away and we’re just one with each other, working on a project , creating something bigger than ourselves- Those are the moments that I hope the students will remember and take into their lives as they grow.
I am definitely a very sensitive person and I feel a lot of emotions when I’m passionate about something… I’m passionate about Orchestra and my kids— passionate about sharing the joy of music with them, and about reminding students that they can achieve great things with hard work and determination. We’ve shared a lot with each other… We’ve shared funny moments, sad moments, joyful moments, fearful moments, anxious and stressed moments, and honest moments, and become a family! Being very sensitive, it’s funny to me that one of the goals every year for the students is to make me cry while they’re performing a piece. They know if they accomplish this, they have played the best to the best of their ability, with passion, excellence, but most of all with beauty, elegance, and grace.
While this is my last concert at Carver, they (all 822 of them) will forever hold a special place in my heart!”-
May 14, 2019
It’s been a crazy, eventful, fun summer, so my posting schedule hasn’t been the best. But I thought I’d do a fun little check in with ya’ll sharing what I did this summer and what’s new in life. If you follow me on Instagram, then you probably already have some idea of what happened this summer and my new updates, so you’ll just have to listen again.
I had a couple of really fun trips that I planned this summer! The first was a fun weekend away with some local and regional lifestyle and fashion bloggers. My friend Jessica was the brains behind the whole blogger and creatives retreat! I helped her a little, but she really worked hard to give us gals a great weekend, reaching out and networking with multiple businesses to do exchanges with! We all met in KC, enjoyed a night dancing at the Power and Lights district, some shopping in the West Warehouse District (the cutest shops ever), an awesome lunch at HopCat, cocktails at the swankiest Tiki Huts in town, Tikikat and then enjoyed some shopping and dinning at Jack Stakk on the Plaza. It was a fun weekend of exploring new places in KC, meeting new friends I had met on Instagram in person, and taking lots of pictures to use for the blog and Instagram.
The second trip Dave and I planned this summer was our trip to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina with all his siblings and their families. We had been planning this trip the whole year and June couldn’t get here fast enough! We drove the WHOLE WAY.. super long trip- but we had the chance to go and spend the night in Nashville with our good friends, Marie and Alex. Once we got to Myrtle Beach, the time seemed to speed up, but it is a trip I will always remember! We’re already talking about our next vacation.. It’s gonna happen! I definitely recommend Myrtle Beach, South Carolina if you haven’t gone and you should stay at the house we stayed at, it was perfect! Here are a couple pics from the week!
My third trip was a family visit trip! I also love to travel to Chicago to see my parents and then Nashville to see my sister and brother. The first leg of my trip began on July 18th as I traveled to Chicago to see my mom and dad. We enjoyed awesome talks, watching the news ( well me watching while mom and dad fell asleep) and some movies they selected from the library, eating deep dish pizza at Giordano’s as always, and watching my mom perform with her orchestra. While visiting, I traveled into downtown with my mom and met up with a good friend, Stephanie, a fellow inspiring blogger and friendship formed through Instagram. We had a lovely afternoon eating breakfast foods and sharing the good and the bad of our lives up to that moment, and we decided to use the last 90 minutes of our time together to do what we both always enjoy… Encourage others. We went to the nearest Walgreens and bought some sticky notes and then began to write encouragements and inspiring statements, to share and spread all over downtown Chicago. A couple summers earlier we had been a part of a fun challenge called #Randomloveletters , where you write out love letters and place them randomly around town. Check out Stephanie’s blog post inspired by this challenge – http://citrusandsun.com/kindness-confetti-random-love-letter/
Neither of us had done that in a while and we recalled how happy we felt while we were doing the challenge, and decided we wanted to do it more often! We came up with the hashtag # Intentionalloveletters — so if you’re reading this and you want to help spread a little more love and happiness, make a stranger smile, join us and write some fun letters tagging #Intentionalloveletters at the bottom.
After visiting my mom and dad and Stephanie in Chicago, I made my way to Music City! I adore Nashville and I’m super glad I have family that lives there to allow me to visit every now and then. This trip to Nashville was a little more chill than in the past. My agenda wasn’t to take lots of pics for the blog, or find something really cool to share on the blog– in fact I didn’t even bring my computer so as to not feel pressured to take moments away from my family. But instead my agenda was all about hanging with my family and being present and in the moment. I stayed with my sister, Emily for a couple days and then made my way to Waverly, TN to see my brother, sis-in-law and my adorable nieces. This was where my trip kind of hit a bump. You see, as I was driving to my brothers house ( 90 min away from Nashville), the dashboard of my car light up like a Christmas tree. Literally almost every light was on and it caused me to freak. Long story short, my trip got extended a little bit due to having to get a fan replaced in my car. Although it was a stressful situation and I was unsure if the diagnosis was actually correct (after being told numerous things throughout the couple of days) my car drove home fine! Hallelujah… Thank you, Jesus!
O and I forgot to mention that while staying with my parents our well pipe went out, so we didn’t have any running water for a couple days. It was definitely an interesting, but fun trip!
Okay, and last thing about this summer! I became a beachbody coach and I’m loving it! My mission behind doing it is for myself to get more fit and healthy and for me to inspire other busy ladies to take care of themselves. I want to help them see that taking care of themselves is HUGE and plays into all the other areas and roles in their lives. I want to show other busy ladies that they can workout and feel great… they can inspire others… they can change their lives…. they can change their friends and families lives! When you feel better, it can do incredible things! I’m on a journey to bettering myself physically, emotionally and spiritually and its a 100 day journey… today was Day 5! So excited for whats to come and all that God is going to do in mine and Dave’s lives this year! Thank, friends for supporting me!
