Read, Read, Read!

As a teacher, I always talk to my students about how I love to read and that you should read as much as you can.  This is true, but sometimes life gets in the way of reading.  I feel like I am always going a million miles a minute with work, running, exercising, watching reality tv-shows, and everything else going on!  This leaves me little time to leftover.  However, this all changed recently.


I had debated on wether or not to get a kindle for a long time.  At first, I thought I liked the idea of having a book in my hand and did not want to read from another electronic device.  I recently changed my mind though as I thought about how easy they are in terms of not having to lug books around and being able to read easily at night in bed.  Therefore, for my birthday this year David bought me one!


I started reading from it last weekend after I finished my last book that I bought (Little Bee - do not read this!  I didn't like it!).  I first started with Sarah's Key.  I started it for a book club I am in, but ended up totally loving it.  It was basically about a French girl during the Holocaust.  I would recommend it to anyone!

After finishing Sarah's Key.  I read a book that I saw in People magazine, Heaven is For Real.  I thought it looked interesting and it was, however just a little too religious for me!  It was about a 4 year old boy that claimed to visit heaven while on the operating table.

I have continued to read because I have been laid up in bed for 2 weeks with the worst sinus infection ever (still leftover from St. Patrick's Day week).  I have also continued to read because I am seriously in love with my kindle!  It makes it so easy to read and I have picked reading from it over my other things lately.  I am now half way through The Help, which I am totally loving!  I would definitely recommend it AND buying a kindle!

Mrs. Barnett : ) 

St. Patrick's Day

This week was St. Patrick's Day!  I have always enjoyed the holiday because of my Irish roots.  For as picky of an eater as I am, I love corned beef, cabbage, and potatoes!  Yum!


Unfortunately, I have been sick with a sinus infection this week and David has been out of town in Costa Rica.  Therefore, I did not get to enjoy my usual St. Patrick's activities.  I even missed the day at school!  I made it up to my kids though....I had been telling them all week that I have a good friend that is a leprechaun and his name is Lucky.  I let them know that I was not sure if Lucky would find me at my new school to say hi for St. Patrick's Day, even though he used to visit me at my old school.  When I came back to school on Friday, I set the following up for my kids...

The kids noticed the trail of "leprechaun glitter" coming out of the closets as soon as they walked in.  They followed the trail to the note and then found the pot of goodies.  They were beyond excited!  I was a little nervous that they were too old to believe in leprechauns, but I was wrong!  They each collected the glitter in zip-loc bags and said they planned on keeping it forever.  It is fun to be able to have such a good time while working!

Mrs. Barnett : ) 

A Race a Month.

I officially have a new goal.  It started when I was down in Disney and heard someone talking about doing a half marathon each month.  I know that is not realistic, nor good for you, but it gave me an idea!  Instead of a half marathon a month, I could do some sort of race each month for a year! 


To start reaching my goal, I signed up for The St Paddy's Day 5k in Naperville.  My friend Lauren ended up coming down for the weekend, so she decided to run it with me.  Unfortunately, the race was sold out!  We decided to head down there anyways and see what would happen if she would try to be a "bandit runner".  I gave her my race shirt and she ending up blending right in!  She ran ahead of me because she is super fast.  I ended up being happy with own time.  I let myself walk up a hill for a minute which I regret now.  I am hoping to get a 5k in the books under 30 minutes!


Below if a picture from after the race and my stats from their website!

975  85/171  480/1106 SARAH BARNETT          1389 F 28 GLENVIEW       31:24 10:07

Mrs. Barnett : ) 

Disney Princess Weekend 2011

Well, we did it again!  We survived another Disney Princess weekend!  I was a little nervous going into the weekend because our winter weather has made it difficult for me to run!  I spent most of my training on the treadmill which was both not fun and not as realistic to running outside.  I was also a little nervous because the weather was going to be so warm, which is tough for runners!  Nonetheless, we made it and loved every minute of it!  


This year, I decided to run with my friend Jennifer.  We wore tutus and tiaras and stopped at each of the characters along the way to take pictures.  It equaled a higher clock time, but we had a blast!  Below are just a few of the pictures we took.  I can not wait for next year to do it all again!

Kathy and I at the expo...it was her birthday!

Jen at Il Mulino...our traditional pasta dinner!

Jen and I with The Sleeping Beauty Fairies along the race course!

We did it!

Our classic picture along the fountains...

Hanging out at the Polynesian before dinner!

Our traditional celebration dinner!

Mrs. Barnett : ) 

Yikes...Bugs!

My school has an awesome science room where I take the first grade students daily for 6 weeks on a rotation with second grade.  We just finished up a 6 week unit involving habitats.  For this unit, we learned that organisms were living things and created habitats for them to live in.  We put together a terrarium which housed woodland plants and animals and an aquarium for freshwater plants and animals.  The aquarium was not so bad...we had guppies and snails living in it.  The terrarium was another story!  I had to order bess beetles and pill bugs to become a part of it.  I was obviously not a fan of this!  The things we do for our students...


Enjoy the pictures!

One of the bess beetles up close...sick right?!

The aquarium.

The terrarium.

Mrs. Barnett : ) 

Nina

This past week my family lost our cat Nina.  Nina was a Russian Blue and we picked her out as a young kitten.  When I was young, we went to a cat show where I saw a Russian Blue kitten.  I remember begging my parents to get one but they were not ready for a new kitten.  When my birthday rolled around, I was given a book about the breed and was told that I got to pick one out.  I can still remember going to a very old house and picking Nina out of the litter.  The woman whom we got her from put a nail polish mark in her ear so that we remembered which one we picked out (we did not take her home that day for some reason).  My grandmother Monica helped pick out the name because it was Russian.  Nina was shy at first but became a great family cat and friend to our other cat Boo.  Her health has deteriorated in the past years, but it is still sad to know she is gone.  Above is the last picture I took of her in October at my Mom's house.


Mrs. Barnett : (

Froggie and Frogette...A Love Story.

During my second year of teaching, I ordered a tadpole from Grow a Frog.  We were sent a tadpole and my class named him Froggie.  After Froggie had turned into a "froglet" I ordered him a new fancy home.  With the new home, came a friend.  We named the friend Frogette, but sectioned them off from each other in their home because Frogette was much bigger and I was afraid that she would eat our little Froggie!  Eventually, they both moved into these two larger tanks and stayed in them for some time.

When I first ventured into the frogs, I figured that we would just let them go at some point and be done with them.  However, I was wrong!  The frogs were African Water Frogs and literally would not survive out in the wild.  I did not have the heart to give them to a family not knowing if they would be taken care of, therefore they became my official class pets.  My kids have always loved having them and they even made the move up to Chicago with me.


Over the summer and during the fall, David and I noticed how we were having to clean their tanks (they were still living separately) more frequently and it was getting grosser and smellier very quickly!  Therefore, I decided to splurge and get them better tanks with a good filter!  I went to an aquarium store and talked to someone who told me he knew all about frogs.  He said to get them one 15 gallon tank and put them together.  I knew that I had a male and female and he said that would be no problem.  He also said that they were big enough that they wouldn't eat each other and they would like the company.


I trusted him and bought the one tank still nervous about what would happen.  David and I went to school on a Sunday and set everything up.  We nervously put the two frogs in together and within an instant we saw this...

It goes without saying that I was obviously freaking out.  I was not going to be the one that introduced mating to my first grade students!  The two did not separate by the morning on Monday, so colleagues helped me to cover the tank so that the class could not see what was going on.  I told the kids that the aquarium workers told me that the frogs needed to "get to know each other" and I could not take the cover off until they were ready.  Unfortunately, this "getting to know each other" was not stopping!  It went on and on and on and after over a week I was totally fed up!  

Randomly one morning Froggie decided to take a break and get off Frogette.  By this point, I was pretty sure he was dead because he was not eating and lost weight!  One of my co-workers quickly scooped him out and banished him to his old home!  He was not too happy but luckily survived.  I ordered the two frogs a separator for the tank and they now live like this...

I am positive that Frogette is happy but am not so sure about Froggie.  He will just have to survive though!  Oh frog love...

Mrs. Barnett : ) 

Valentine's Day

A quick post to show off my Valentine's "Loot" from my kids and talk about the red roses from my husband (I did not take a picture before they were dead!).  We actually had our class party on Friday instead of Monday.  Teachers in my school thought it was more appropriate on a Friday instead, so I rolled with it!  On the actual day, I played in an 8th graders vs the teachers basketball game.  I spent most of my time cheerleading and danced in the half-time show.  I did go in for about 30 seconds and apparently got a technical foul?!  After the game, we went on a romantic trip to Target and ate at Sweet Tomatoes.  It is one of my favorite places to go, so I loved it!

Mrs. Barnett : )