National Boards

At the end of the last school year, I decided was going to try and get my National Boards teaching certificate.  This is basically a year long process, with a 4 entry Portfolio followed by an essay test, with six essay questions. Earning this certificate will certify me to teach in any state in the nation.  On Wednesday I turned in my “Blue Box.”  It was a great feeling to finally be done with my portfolio and submit it for grading.  Many Saturday and evening hours were spent in front of the computer.  Rob stated several times, “You’re Boring!” as I repeatedly ignored him and made him fend for himself in the kitchen and work around the house on his own. 

The Portfolio consisted of 4 entries, with very specific directions.  With each one I had to show how I was improving as a teacher and how what I was doing was benefiting my students.  When I was all done, I ended up with the following totals:

2 video entries

20 pages of evidence/documentation

50 typed pages

16,000 + words

Needless to say, I was more than happy to finally be done and turn my box over to UPS to have it shipped off. 

This is a picture of me with a few co-workers (me, Aylish Duff, Meghan Garner, Jessica Rydecki).  We all got together after school on Thursday to pack our entries and make sure we got everything in the correct order and in the correct envelopes. 

Next up:  Essay test on May 7th. 

I won’t find out if I passed until November.  Wish me luck!

Good Eats

I had some ripe bananas lying around this week, and I really wanted to make some banana bread.  I was a little hesitant because the last few recipes I’ve used, my bread did not get done in the middle.  So, I decided to try a recipe off the web.  This is what I found.

Banana Bread Recipe

Ingredients

• 3 or 4 ripe bananas, smashed
• 1/3 cup melted butter
• 1 cup sugar (can easily reduce to 3/4 cup)
• 1 egg, beaten
• 1 teaspoon vanilla
• 1 teaspoon baking soda
• Pinch of salt
• 1 1/2 cups of all-purpose flour

Method

No need for a mixer for this recipe. Preheat the oven to 350°F (175°C). With a wooden spoon, mix butter into the mashed bananas in a large mixing bowl. Mix in the sugar, egg, and vanilla. Sprinkle the baking soda and salt over the mixture and mix in. Add the flour last, mix. Pour mixture into a buttered 4x8 inch loaf pan. Bake for 1 hour. Cool on a rack. Remove from pan and slice to serve.

Makes one loaf.

It turned out perfectly.  The crust was slightly crunchy, the inside was moist but completely done.  It was delicious.  Two thumbs up.

Also, last night Rob and I decided to try a new place for dinner.  About a month ago, Ezell’s chicken opened up about a mile from our home.  There are several locations in the Seattle area, but I’ve never been to one.  Everyone talks about how it is the best fried chicken anywhere, now that we have one so close we thought we should give it a try.

We got the spicy chicken (which was is the best seller),rolls, and mashed potatoes and gravy.

 

My thoughts:  The rolls were delicious, the best part of the meal if you ask me.  The chicken batter was also delicious.  Crispy with great flavor.  Both Rob and I decided that the chicken was almost too juicy.  And the gravy for the potatoes was bland. 

Overall, the chicken was good, but didn’t completely wow us and it was too expensive for what we got.  We probably won’t be going back anytime soon. 

Poker Run

So far this year, for the Northwest, La Nina has been a bust. Our mountains have had less snow than ever. Considering we just purchased two snowmobiles this season, this has not been good news for us. We’ve been snowmobiling twice this year, once in Montana and once up by Snoqualmie. Since the mountains close to us have not had snow in 6 weeks we’ve been looking for new areas we can go that are within a reasonable driving distance. Rob found an event put on by a the Lake Chelan Snowmobile Club called the Poker Run. It is a fund raising event for their club. We checked it out on the website and decided it would be a fun thing to try out.

We left on Friday after I got home from work and drove to Chelan. We checked into Cambell’s Hotel which we absolutely loved. Huge, comfortable bed, huge room, great views. It was great. We highly recommend it if you ever to to Chelan. After a great nights rest, we headed to the town of Manson to enjoy a community sponsored breakfast at their community center. I’m pretty sure everyone was over the age of 65, but the food was great! Then we headed up to the snopark to draw our first card.

I’ve never participated in a poker run before but it was a lot of fun. Everyone starts at the same place and you draw a card from a hat. You then drive to 4 other stops and do the same thing. You have sheet of paper that is stamped according to the card that you drew. The goal is to get the highest hand in poker and you win. It was only $5 to enter, they served us lunch, and we got to learn about a whole new snowmobiling trail system. I thought it was definitely money well spent.

Rob and I both got off to a great start by drawing Aces out of the first hat. There was plenty of time to check out the area and play around a bit in the snow. It was an area we really liked and we are planning to go back again. The third stop was at the club’s warming hut where they served us hamburgers and hot dogs. We met some really nice people who were already planning ahead and inviting Rob to come back and go dirt biking with them.

Rob had two aces to start, but his hand quickly lost steam. I ended up with the second best hand of the day by drawing Three Aces and Two Kings. I even won $75! WOOOHOOO!

We had a great time, and met some great people. We are hoping to be able to do it again next year. In the meantime we are hoping for a little more snow in our area so we can go sledding a little closer to home.

Rob Striking a pose at the top of the hill. The views all day were amazing. It was perfectly sunny and there were just enough trees to make it beautiful but not too many to block your view.

Even in Chelan conditions were a bit sketchy. We rode about 65 miles total on Saturday and 55 of those miles were beautifully snow covered. The first few miles in and the last few miles out were a little sketchy with not much snow in some spots as you can tell from the pic. Even still, the snow on top was great.

After a day of snowmobiling, we stopped at the Apple Cup Café . It was recommended by several local residents so we decided to try it. We weren’t disappointed. We both ordered Chicken Fried Steak. YUM! Service was great, food was great. Rob loved it so much we decided to go back for breakfast the next morning. If you ever go to Chelan you’ll have to check it out.

On the way home we stopped by Leavenworth to check it out. After our trip to Munich a few years ago, it was hard for us to be impressed. We did stop and get a hot chocolate and a German pretzel, which of course was delicious.

All-in-all it was a great weekend!

Happy Birthday Jaxon

My nephew Jaxon turned 1 year old on January 26th.  My brother Michael and Jaxon came over a couple of weeks ago so we could celebrate. 

We opened presents

We played with toys

We laughed!

And of course, we enjoyed some cake!

HAPPY BIRTHDAY JAXON!

Nativity

This Christmas, Rob’s parents bought me the Nativity set I have been coveting for a long time.  I was totally surprised when I opened it.  I can’t wait to use it next year when we decorate for Christmas.  

I love this nativity for it’s beautiful simplicity. 

Thank you Sandy and Bob!

Christmas Fun

Over the Christmas break Rob and I went to Great Falls, Montana to spend Christmas at his parent’s house. On the way we stopped off in Kalispell, MT to pick up a Snowmobile and trailer that Rob had found on Craigslist.  Our trip was full of adventures, some of them more challenging than they were fun, but overall it was a great trip and we had a wonderful time with all of his family.  Unfortunately my camera spent more time in my purse then it did in my hand, so I will just have to trust me that we were actually there.  Here are a few of the pics that I did manage to snap.

 

Rob and Alex gassing up the snowmobile.

 

One of our newest Craigslist purchases.  We have a matching one we bought last year. Now we have two twin sleds.

 

Rob and his Cousin Colton.  The jacket Rob is wearing was my Christmas gift to him.  We decided after our day in the snow that it wasn’t the perfect jacket.  After his motorcycle accident he is looking for one to replace the one the paramedics had to cut off.  When he tried it on, we thought this one would, but after a day of use, we decided it was a no go.  When we got home I took it back and bought him a Tool Cart instead to try and contain his ever growing tool collection.

                   Rob’s nephew Alex came out snowmobiling with us. 

               

Me and our new sled.

After our day of snowmobiling Rob and I went skiing with Rob’s sister Lisa and her family.  After a day of skiing we followed them to their home in Bellegrade, MT. 

           Rob’s nieces Abbey and Emily and I.

       Rob’s sister Lisa and I .

    Rob wearing my bright orange neckgator on his head.  No he did not ski like this.

The night before we left to head home, it snowed over a foot in Bellegrade, MT.  We went out that night and played around for a while.  Rob even took the girls out for a snowmobile ride around the neighborhood in all the fresh powder.

     

Maya enjoying the snow. 

     

Rob and Emily on the snowmobile.  She even got to drive a little, even though she wasn’t very good at turning.

Rob and Abbey on the snowmobile.  It was FREEZING that night. 

Other adventures included:

• Chrismas Eve looking at Christmas lights that never were.  We blamed it on the recession. 
• Cindi blowing up an engine on one of the snowmobiles we were using (NOT HER FAULT!) 
• Cindi being pelted with flying snowball chunks as she was towed back to the trucks and trailers after the engine blew. 
• A flat tire on the trailer in the snowmobiling parking lot
• A flat tire on the trailer after we got home from snowmobiling in front of Rob’s parent house
• Driving all over Great Falls looking for a tire store that was open on Sunday
• Alex Cady slamming into another skier, getting a bloody nose, a bitten and bloody tongue, and a black eye
• The Cady family hitting a deer on our way home from skiing (Thankfully no person was injured.  Sadly we can’t say the same for the deer)

We had a wonderful trip and enjoyed time with family.  I big thank you to Bob Samsel for keeping us warm and helping with all of the trailer fixes we had to do.  Another big thank you to Sandy Samsel for feeding us every time we turned around and making sure our every need was taken care of.  Thank you to the Cady family for the countless games of Mario Kart on DS and Clue, and for letting us crash at their place for a few nights. 

We hope everyone else had a Merry Christmas as well!

Craigslist Christmas

So, Rob and I decided that we would put up Christmas lights outside only if we bought the lights on sale after Christmas was over.  It was something that we were planning for next year.  Leave it to Rob and his Craigslist obsession to get the job done this year…

Everyone in our neighborhood puts up lights, even the 70 year old couple across the street.  So we had to “keep up with the Jones” and do our part to make the neighborhood beautiful.  Thank you generous people on Craigslist for giving us free lights and thanks to Rob for putting his life on the line, climbing around on the roof, to make our house look festive. 

MERRY CHRISTMAS!