Work is going well. CoyoteMan commented the other day that I seem to be very content and gaining professionalism and confidence daily. I concur.

I have been going to the gym again. Not as much as I would like because I came down sick about three weeks ago and it has been a hard recovery. I would say I am still only about 80% well....and my voice varies between 30% and 75%, which is very frustrating. I did sing a couple of Broadway solos with the California Symphony just as I came down sick. Only good training got me through that and I feel like I did a superb job on the Les Mis pieces.

As a mom, things are interesting.....it is getting emotionally difficult at times when I think of A1 and S2 heading off to college next year. I'm enjoying their company quite a bit and I'm not ready to see them off. M3 has been struggling with high school, but CoyoteMan has been on top of her and that has been helping a lot.

CoyoteMan and I have been doing well. Every marriage has its ups and its downs. In the past few years we've eliminated quite a bit of drama from our lives.....yes, most especially that created by ourselves. We are dealing with some stuff now that is taking a lot of talking, patience and careful thought, but I also know we love each other dearly and are going to work through it just like we have in the past....and, if anything....because of the work we've been doing the last couple of years it will be easier.

I'm still directing the Youth Choir at church, which is going fabulously. They are working on two pieces now and I'm just constantly impressed with their talent. I'm also directing the beginning choir at work and they are blowing my socks off too. In addition, I get to teach Musicianship/Theory to 3rd graders and Art to 2nd graders.

My life is full and way too busy. I'm blessed to have three of the dearest lady friends I know who keep me honest and are there for me when I need them. I hope I can give back to their lives as they give into mine.

And that is a very brief, fairly superficial but mildly informative update. Now, I need to go set the oatmeal in the rice cooker, make the morning juice and head for bed since I need to be up and at the gym swimming by 5:30 tomorrow morning.

I am so incredibly busy these days. I had begun to use Facebook almost exclusively because, initially, I was limited to a certain number of characters to post and it allowed me to post quick and get out. It also allows me to stay really up-to-date with a lot of family and friends that didn't have LJ. For a lot of those people, I was hiding a lot of who I was/am. I'm not so worried about that now. I'm 48. I've been Christian, Pagan, Agnostic, Straight, Bi, Squirrely, Open, Closed, Confused.....if people want to judge me that's their problem. If they want to love me for who I am and learn from me and let me learn from them, that's the best. So, I'm slipping back over here to LJ and I'll cross-post several of my posts as I move forward. Still checking in on FB regularly, but I'll probably not post in any one particular place that often.

The busy? I'm scrambling constantly. They wouldn't let us into our classrooms to work till this last week. I had hauled all my supplies down from the 5th/6th grade room, as well as supplies from the warehouse and supplies from home....and, well, the two closets were piled messes. I had to, at the beginning of this week, toss trash, organize desks and centers, set out what I could AND THEN start emptying the closets. Currently, my once almost neat room is now covered again in piles. Organized piles, but piles. And school starts on Tuesday!

Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Friday were in-service meetings so we've only gotten limited time in the classroom.

So, I've been spending my evenings either in rehearsals or in the classroom working my tail off. I'm so not close enough yet. But I'm working diligently. I've emptied the closets, sorted things so I have them piled in their "centers" or in a category and now, on Sunday, I will spend the entire day there putting it all away so that on Monday I can set the room up, put up the bulletin boards, make copies, and make absolutely certain I'm ready for students for the next three days. Luckily for me, as a kindergarten teacher, my students go home at 2:00 on Tuesday and Thursday (1st-8th stay till 4:00) and we all have half-day on Wednesday and Friday off. But I have to be ready Monday evening.

So, that's why you don't hear from me that often. My Pacing Guide for the year is complete, my Assessments are not only completed but already administered to all 24 students, and I have a rough outline though not completed lesson plans for the first three days of school. My room is a shambles, but I have a hard deadline for fixing it so it will be done. I need to cut out and put up a huge paper tree. If I get the tension rods and fabric before Monday, then I'll sew those up Monday night and put them in the windows on Tuesday morning.

I'm really hoping that as I go into this year, supposedly more prepared, that my life can slow down and I can be a human as well as a teacher.

Anyone want to come help me out on Sunday and/or Monday? Any volunteers during the day on Tuesday through Thursday? (I don't let parent volunteers in for the few couple of weeks so I can establish my place with the students.)

Diving back into it. Today, I'm going to unearth my walk-in closet at home, clear off my back porch, try to fix the broken (completely fallen over full of grapes and vine) grape arbor, and see if there are any ripe tomatoes on the vine. Hey

If you can help out our students, that would be great. We are a Title 1 school, with over 70% being low-income students. We cross all ethnicities, though last year we were 85% black. However, we are one of the rare schools that has no achievement gap between races. We simply love and teach our children.

**********

Getting the classroom ready. I'm putting up a Donors Choose link. Please don't feel you have to contribute. If you can GREAT. If not, please repost the link (and the following list) so that maybe someone else can help out an inner city kindergarten class.

Here's the link: http://www.donorschoose.org/darla.tuning

I'll be putting up Donors Choose links throughout the year. I have equipment and supplies I need that I and our school cannot afford to just go out and purchase.

Speaking of purchasing (the "do you have it?" list comes after this one)

Target has two things I really, really want in my classroom.
***24 of their $3 plastic milk crates. These would be cubbies for my kinders in their closet.

***They were also selling five packs of the clear plastic, shoe-box sized storage containers for $5.99. I need three more packs of the ones with green lids and four more packs of the ones with blue lids. In Emeryville they were on an endcap in the plastic-storage-organization area.
***24 Plastic pencil boxes for the children's desks to store their desk-math-sets.
***3 packs of IKEA cardboard, plain white, magazine boxes.
***4"x6" index cards
***Gift cards to Michaels, Target, Walmart, Lakeshore Learning, Stone Mountain Daughter Fabric, and Daiso would be helpful.

Do you have this and don't need it?
Many things that I loaned to last year's kinder teacher, well, she just took them and she's not responding to anyone's email. I don't have the funds to replace things or get new things so I've been doing tons of FreeCycle and scavenging.

The list typed below this are things that if you have them (or want to go buy them) would be so greatly appreciated!
***1 gallon of white gloss paint (I want to paint three chairs and one bookshelf with the white and below colors)
***1 quart each of red, blue, green, yellow, and black (orange, purple, pink, turquoise if anyone can find them)
***The book, "The Kissing Hand"
***A fan (it gets hot in there)
***Three cheap shower curtains and LARGE rings. (Some kids once hung and swung and then broke bathroom stall doors and the owners of the property won't replace them. If we had five little girl stalls instead of two, it would be so much better!)
***Eleven tension rods that can extend between 18" and 36" (cafe curtains in the windows)
***Felt Squares of different colors (for making characters and "sets" for flannel board stories)

I really need a trip to Daiso (the Japanese dollar store) and/or a US Dollar Store. Someone could say, "Let's go shopping. My budget is $x," and I would pick up the smaller plastic storage bins or other things that we need in the classroom.

I'm sure there are things I'm missing, but this is a good start.

We are taking Sarah down to Valencia for her stay with the California State Summer School of the Arts.

On Friday, June 12th we will drive down and look at colleges with Abbie. WE NEED A PLACE TO STAY THAT NIGHT. It would be nice to use a shower that night or the next morning. On Saturday, the 13th, we drop Sarah off and come return home. We may or may not have Maddie with us.

We can pitch in $ to pay for our water usage if need be.

Thanks in advance for offers and leads.

Yes, Virginia, there is a DeeDee. *wry grin*

I have 16 more teaching days and two extra days of "clean-up" in the classroom. Of those "teaching days", there will be two days of dress rehearsals next week, the following week I'll be missing kids for honor trips (unless I get to accompany the honor trip, which I hope to, but don't think I'll get to and I won't go into why because it irritates me), and then some kids will be on the (performing) Disney tour....and then there will be the cast party and the graduation day....and yeah, we won't really have much more teaching to do this year.

It has been a real mixed bag for me this year. Going to school full time, teaching full time, still being a Mom in a year when my kids really needed me for various reasons and directing youth choir at the church, still trying to keep up my own singing....oh yes, I have a husband too, and rarely getting to see my friends....

....suffice it to say I'm more than relieved this year is over. It is a Saturday, I woke up at 9:00 (unheard of), ate the breakfast CoyoteMan made for me and I'm still sitting here in my pajamas....too tired to move.

This last week? I taught every day and either had a dress rehearsal or a concert in the evenings....every day. Today is my day off and tomorrow I go to church, sing with the Chamber Singers and then sing an afternoon concert with Voices of Music Sacra.

Next week gets easier. Monday night rehearsals are over, ef2p is coming by on Tuesday, Thursday is church choir and then we leave for a four day camping trip. Man am I looking forward to that. We camp with friends up on their property near Kennedy Meadows and this year they also invited one of my closest friends and her husband to join us. He doesn't like to camp so SingingScienceLady will join us and we'll sit in the hammocks and knit and take hikes and breathe in the fresh air. I'm almost in tears at the thought of four days of relaxation!

June 14th will be the beginning of a new phase for me. I'll have the summer free and then when school starts again it will be at a new grade level but no full time school to do as well. I might be able to be truly successful and intentionally me as a teacher this coming year.

What I realized for this past year is that really I had three full time jobs, four if you count family. But it is part of the reason I stay at the school with CrazyBossLady. Because of this job I can still have a music career and one that is blossoming. This year I taught Music Theater, Music Theory/History, Music Appreciation, Individual Voice, as well as directed Youth Choir and sang in three different groups on my own. At the end of the year, the rewards came flowing in: an invitation to collaborate towards a book on American Art Songs, an offer from a professor to do a workshop with my voice students "because of their amazing talent", three of my students placing Gold at the State Solo & Ensemble Festival and one receiving a Command Performance, five of my choristers qualifying for the UU National Children's Choir (only three decided to follow through), and a successful conducting and singing season. So definitely worth it!!!

But I'm tired. I pushed through this year because I needed to keep hold of each opportunity because I didn't know what this next year would bring....and I really needed to finish my credential work. I send off the last of the paperwork this weekend, the office will process it and I will be officially credentialed. Wow. Finally.

But, no, really, I'm so tired that my thoughts seem rarely coherent, I've gained weight, my arthritis is worse and the thought of going out to work in the garden is almost repulsive....that is totally unlike me.

The summer will be restful but still full.....we are travelling to Texas for the UU Musician's Network Conference, we are hoping to go to Idaho for a week in August, we are hoping to do more camping, and we have to facilitate the lives of our kids. M3 has been placed in honors English/History for next year and has Summer work to do and is also trying to get a part time job/internship with a local music store. S2 will need transport to LA and back where she will spend a month at the California State Summer School of the Arts.....an audition process that was greulling resulted in her acceptance into their ballet/dance program. And A1 will be taken two or three classes at the community college, hopefully working as a political intern, considering a part-time job, and running the UU Youth Summer Camp for about 200 kids. And during all this, I have to work on lesson plans for the Fall for whatever new grade I will be teaching (yes, I asked for a new grade, middle-schoolers are not for me).

Do I even have time for a garden?

I think CoyoteMan and I will be spending time on the patio, computers in front of us, he planning next season for Voices of Music Sacra, Diablo Valley Chambers Singers and the Mt. Diablo UU Choir....as well as expanding his private music studio and me.....

......I'll be writing lesson plans for not only my academic classes, but also for Theory/History and then planning the season for Youth Choir, the season for Music Theater, hopefully for the Beginning Chorus at COVA, possibly lesson plans for third grade recorder class....and giving singing and tutoring lessons throughout the summer. Wait! What? Where did my summer go?????

Again, do I even have time for a garden?

What I've been hankering to do is sew some clothes and get back into quilting....but we do need the food from the garden and I promised myself to build a new chicken coop and re-situate the run....

....OH YES, and the Landlord has plans to remodel the kitchen and bathroom (both upstairs and downstairs) as well as refloor the bedroom/diningroom/livingroom/hallway.....so our lives will be in a mess.

Wait, didn't I say I was looking forward to some relaxation? Yeah, right. *sigh*

There. That's my life in a quick nutshell. This is why I write seldom here and seem exhausted when I do. I'd like life to slow down a bit, that's all.

I haven't been to LJ in so long, I almost forgot the way....and the look has changed since I was here last.

If you see me on FaceBook, you know I've been plugging away at my credential, a slog of an uphill battle, but I am nearly there. Receiving today's four out of four score on my last TPA (big state exam) was a reward until itself. I still have to finish writing up my Community Based Unit and then create my Portfolio, pass the RICA, get an A for the term (must be an A to pass since I got sick and got a C last term) and I can be done. For a bit. (BTSA, followed by MA, followed by tremendous sleep.)

Anyway, today I find myself saying, "Lord, I am wearing, so very weary. I know you know this. Just give me a bit more strength, I just have a bit more to do today. Please."

Today? Left to do? Organize next week's lessons in preparation for visiting observations of the superintendent, the principal and next year's executive director. Finish up the Community Based Unit. Finish correcting papers, get portfolios together....yeah, I'm pretty tired right now.

Anyway, a quick scan of LJ and then I'm back to work. Hope all is well with the world here.

Bold the ones you have and use at least once a year, italicize the ones you have and don't use, strike through the ones you have had but got rid of.

I wonder how many pasta machines, breadmakers, juicers, blenders, deep fat fryers, egg boilers, melon ballers, sandwich makers, pastry brushes, cheese boards, cheese knives, electric woks, miniature salad spinners, griddle pans, jam funnels, meat thermometers, filleting knives, egg poachers, cake stands, garlic crushers, martini glasses, tea strainers, bamboo steamers, pizza stones, coffee grinders, milk frothers, piping bags, banana stands, fluted pastry wheels, tagine dishes, conical strainers, rice cookers, steam cookers, pressure cookers, slow cookers, spaetzle makers, cookie presses, gravy strainers, double boilers (bains marie), sukiyaki stoves, ice cream makers, fondue sets, healthy-grills, home smokers, tempura sets, tortilla presses, electric whisks, cherry stoners, sugar thermometers, food processors, bacon presses, bacon slicers, mouli mills, cake testers, pestle-and-mortars, and sets of kebab skewers languish dustily at the back of the nation's cupboards.

We had an agreement with the school at which I teach to continue to borrow the instruments that Maddie had been using. Unfortunately, the principal decided that wasn't going to work after all. At first she wanted the instruments back immediately, then she gave us til December.

Wow! Was that a shock! It wouldn't be quite as big of a deal if it weren't for the fact that Maddie is now attending the Ruth Asawa San Francisco School of the Arts (SOTA). She was accepted in part because she is not only a promising flute player but also a fine piccolo player for someone her age.

Without instruments there would be no place for Maddie at SOTA. The school doesn't rent them and we don't have the funds to just go out and buy them.

To complicate matters, some of Maddie's succes is directly attributable to the intermediate/pre-professional instruments she has been using. Returning to a student grade instrument would adversely affect her performance.

So, on our behalf, folks started trying to get instruments or funds for her. Our downstairs neighbor, who is a publicist and writer, wrote up a page for Maddie on www.indiegogo.com, and we've already raised $1080!!! We've set a goal of $4500 for both piccolo and flute, matching the instruments she has now, and new in case we can't get refurbished.

CAN YOU HELP OUT? You don't have to contribute if you aren't able...but boosting the signal by sharing the link below could mean that someone who likes talented kids and wants to be a patron of the arts might have the opportunity to help Maddie out. By all means, if you do want to contribute, please do so. I just want to get this out to as many people as possible.

HERE'S THE LINK:. http://www.indiegogo.com/Maddiesplays

Thanks for sharing the link and helping us help Maddie. She deserves this.

I keep meaning to share news of life here, but I keep getting distracted by, well, life. It is much easier to toss up a short post on FaceBook and run, I admit.

Since returning from the cruise, I have helped with household chores and projects, worked in the garden and cooked. Man, do I miss cooking. When I'm in school and attending school, there's not enough of me to manage cooking dinners too. Add to it that I've really been fighting with arthritic-type pain and, well, yeah, it only happens on rare occasions. But in the summer I get a different chance.

We also run tight on money in the summer so I'm trying to be really careful about using what we have in the garden and house as opposed to caving and ordering out or making a quick run to the store for something "fast".

Last night was a culinary success though. I had been reading a magazine lately in which I saw a recipe for zucchini soup. I'd never heard of such a thing before so when home last night I searched the internet and found lots of recipes but not one that seemed just right. So, I decided to trust myself. I've been cooking on my own for many a year now and I had just reviewed enough recipes that I understood enough about the basics that I should be able to come up with something on my own. (I did print a recipe to remind me of the basics, but I really didn't follow it all that well.)

Below is approximately the recipe. I say approximately, because I've reached that point in life where I do not carefully measure but toss-and-splash.

MamaDee's Zucchini Soup
Half of a Large zucchini, seeded, cut into smallish cubes
4 leeks cut up into smallish bits
4 potatoes, peeled and cubed
2 carrots, peeled and chopped
4 largish cloves of garlic, cubed
Spices included basil, thyme, rosemary, white pepper, Mrs. Dash, curry and soy sauce (we'll talk more later)
Splashes of white whine (the only one I had on hand was a dry but sweet rhubarb wine, it worked)
4 tablespoons of butter
Generous splash or two (as needed) of olive oil
Four cups vegetable stock (chicken stock if you're not eating vegetarian)
water as needed
milk as needed (about 1/2-1 cup)

OK, so, I know that a lot of the amounts are approximate. Bear with me. Remember, I was "sploshing".

+ Melt the butter in a large frying pan (I used the wok). (I don't recommend doing this in the bottom of your soup pot, the way I was taught when younger, it really works better in a sauteeing type container and then transfer it to the soup pot.)

+ Saute garlic and leeks.

+ Add in spices and wine. OK, here's where the measurements are really vague. I shook in about a teaspoon of dries thyme. I then harvested two four inch sprigs of rosemary from the garden, along with about the equivalent of 12 leaves of purple basil. I added some pink sea salt and white pepper to taste and sat back to let things simmer in. When I didn't agree with the taste or aroma, I reached up and grabbed down the curry and added in about 1/4-1/2 teaspoon, as well as a generous shake of Mrs. Dash (approximately 1 to 2 teaspoons, probably closer to 1). When this seemed about right, I...

+ Add potatoes, zucchini, carrots and potatoes. If necessary, this is where you add in the olive oil to keep things from sticking. Saute together for about 5 minutes.

+ While things are cooking, bring the vegetable stock to boiling.

+ Take all of the yummy goodness from the saute pan and put it in the soup pot. (If you used a big wok pan like I did, save it now. Don't wash it yet! There may be an easier way, but the next step worked well for me.) Add water if necessary to just barely cover yummy goodness. Cook yummy goodness for about 15 minutes.

+ Now, taking yummy goodness out of soup pot in amounts equal to what your blender or food processor can handle, puree it. Put it back into your huge wok pan rather than back into your soup pot that you are still pulling yummy goodness from.

+ Once everything is pureed, splosh in about 2 tablespoons of soy sauce and a healthy dose of milk (enough to make your soup creamy, not babyfood thick), stir, reheat some if necessary (most likely not) and serve.

We ate our soup with slices of cheese and yummy bread. A salad would have been a great addition, but by the time I was done with the soup, I was done in.

I have never, ever, shared a recipe before. I feel a bit like simplykimberly! I'm really proud of this soup. It was really, really good and Mr. Coyote and A1 really liked it! (S2 wasn't home and M3, even though she's 15, still eats like a picky little kid!) Hope you enjoy it. It is certainly a good way to use those wonderful zucchini we get during the summer.

Maybe another day I'll share my Caribbean-inspired tequila and guava marinated pepper tilapia and herbed polenta in a lime and mango salsa....

I'll be performing in the Laramie Project sometime in May. Not sure which part till Tuesday's rehearsal. Director said I was great. *grin*