Monday, January 26, 2009
Mom's Visit to Arizona
Hello from Sarah and Mom in Arizona! (Rob also, but he is asleep.) We have had a wonderful weekend! Mom came out Friday afternoon and we surprised her with Sprinkles cupcakes at the airport! We had cupcakes and guac for lunch...obviously well-balanced :) We shopped at all the lil markets that Rob and I usually go to and picked up chicken sausages to grill out Friday night. On Saturday we woke up early to sight-see across Arizona! We stopped by Montezuma's Castle, which was the remains of an old Native American village, then headed up to the Grand Canyon. It was really foggy along the way, but cleared up well enough for us to see a good bit of the canyon. Here are a few pictures (you can tell, it was much colder there!)
Next, we stopped at another lookout point and showed Mom the road that we would take into Sedona...check out how it curves through the mountain!
In Sedona we drove through the touristy center of town, checked out the airport and ended the day at the lil park where Rob and I got engaged last year. The rock he proposed to me on was covered by rushing water this time, but we discovered the actual area all the websites talked about. He was too nervous and excited last year to continue to the end of the path I guess!
We got back into Chandler later than we originally expected, but still made our favorite--home made pizza and breadsticks! We didn't eat until almost 9:00 pm (11:00 EST!) and crashed pretty much right after. On Sunday we slept in and relaxed all day. We had bought Cookiedoodle flavored coffee (don't ask, just understand the deliciousness) and had wonderful coffee, read the paper and eventually cooked our healthy version of an Egg McMuffin at home. We spent the afternoon touring around Chandler and Gilbert...we stopped by Rolly Pollies, Rob's helicopter school, the mall for Cardinals Super Bowl gear to send home, our favorite local park and Rob's old apartment. Mom sat out at the pool with a book and Rob and I researched commercials online to use on Thursday to introduce a unit on persuasion. It's not too late for anyone to chime in with their favorite humorous commercial! (Unfortunately, no beer commercials. Those are the funniest though.) Honestly, any thoughts would be appreciated...I can always add more to the lil video I created :)
Mom and I cooked dinner last night while Rob napped before work. We made a delicious chicken pasta in a garlic/olive oil sauce...and served it in my Fiesta serving bowl! It was beautiful. I am ridiculously disappointed now that we are lacking pictures of the meal. Please visit to see and enjoy it in person.
Today, I taught my very first lesson to the kids at school. We discussed dreams and analyzed a Langston Hughes poem. I left to go out to lunch with Mom, and then she came back to school with me to observe fifth bell! I was glad everything went well. Interesting side-note: there was a small gang fight at school today. I was oblivious to it all...a good way to be. I am sure there will exaggerated stories to laugh at tomorrow though!
Shortly here, we are going to wake up Rob (he worked last night) and head over to Texas Roadhouse for dinner. (We'll also stop by the helicopter school again because it was closed yesterday and the helicopters were in the hangar.) He heads to work again tonight and Mom heads to the airport as well in the morning to make the trip back to the single-digit Cleveland weather. I think she has really enjoyed a lot of the sunshine. It's been a great trip/long weekend. Next week Bubs comes to visit and then a few weeks later, it's Dad's turn! It is great to see people, share the sunshine and makes the time fly by because we always have something to look forward to! We hope all is well with you and Mom will be seeing many of you very shortly. Love, Sarah, Mom and Rob
Next, we stopped at another lookout point and showed Mom the road that we would take into Sedona...check out how it curves through the mountain!
In Sedona we drove through the touristy center of town, checked out the airport and ended the day at the lil park where Rob and I got engaged last year. The rock he proposed to me on was covered by rushing water this time, but we discovered the actual area all the websites talked about. He was too nervous and excited last year to continue to the end of the path I guess!
We got back into Chandler later than we originally expected, but still made our favorite--home made pizza and breadsticks! We didn't eat until almost 9:00 pm (11:00 EST!) and crashed pretty much right after. On Sunday we slept in and relaxed all day. We had bought Cookiedoodle flavored coffee (don't ask, just understand the deliciousness) and had wonderful coffee, read the paper and eventually cooked our healthy version of an Egg McMuffin at home. We spent the afternoon touring around Chandler and Gilbert...we stopped by Rolly Pollies, Rob's helicopter school, the mall for Cardinals Super Bowl gear to send home, our favorite local park and Rob's old apartment. Mom sat out at the pool with a book and Rob and I researched commercials online to use on Thursday to introduce a unit on persuasion. It's not too late for anyone to chime in with their favorite humorous commercial! (Unfortunately, no beer commercials. Those are the funniest though.) Honestly, any thoughts would be appreciated...I can always add more to the lil video I created :)Mom and I cooked dinner last night while Rob napped before work. We made a delicious chicken pasta in a garlic/olive oil sauce...and served it in my Fiesta serving bowl! It was beautiful. I am ridiculously disappointed now that we are lacking pictures of the meal. Please visit to see and enjoy it in person.
Today, I taught my very first lesson to the kids at school. We discussed dreams and analyzed a Langston Hughes poem. I left to go out to lunch with Mom, and then she came back to school with me to observe fifth bell! I was glad everything went well. Interesting side-note: there was a small gang fight at school today. I was oblivious to it all...a good way to be. I am sure there will exaggerated stories to laugh at tomorrow though!
Shortly here, we are going to wake up Rob (he worked last night) and head over to Texas Roadhouse for dinner. (We'll also stop by the helicopter school again because it was closed yesterday and the helicopters were in the hangar.) He heads to work again tonight and Mom heads to the airport as well in the morning to make the trip back to the single-digit Cleveland weather. I think she has really enjoyed a lot of the sunshine. It's been a great trip/long weekend. Next week Bubs comes to visit and then a few weeks later, it's Dad's turn! It is great to see people, share the sunshine and makes the time fly by because we always have something to look forward to! We hope all is well with you and Mom will be seeing many of you very shortly. Love, Sarah, Mom and Rob
Monday, January 19, 2009
Exploring Arizona
It has been a lil while since I've had a chance to update this...and even longer since we've shared pictures! I have been busy with teaching, tutoring and Rolly Pollies and Rob has been flying Monday-Friday. We are both always ready for the weekend :)
Last week, Rob went flying with a guy from work he's become pretty good friends with--Logan. The company he works for bought a small plane that they're allowing their employees to rent at a ridiculously discounted rate and Rob had promised Logan he'd take him up as a thank you for switching out a lot of days over the holidays. They flew over a bunch of cities --Prescott, Flagstaff, Sedona. I didn't realize this before the flight but there's a big volcano crater in the middle of the desert and Logan told Rob that it is responsible for the weird landscape out here (all the mountains and the super flat desert). I really know less about this tourism flight than I thought and Rob is flying helicopters right now, then will want to sleep a lot the rest of the day so I'm just going to throw up the pictures and maybe he'll add more detail later. :)
the crater (obviously)
these are the controls in the cockpit of the plane...it's an all-glass cockpit, which I guess is pretty cool :)
also, I can't figure out how to write below this next picture, but it is Rob and the plane in Flagstaff, with Humphrey's Peak in the background.
Here are a few pictures of Sedona from the air...
Yesterday we went hiking at Lost Dutchman State Park. Rob helped me pick out a new pair of hiking shoes a few weeks back and I was excited to try them out! The top of the mountain is about 3,000 feet of climbing and I think we made it about 1,800. Rob took me hiking at the same mountain almost a year ago when I came out to visit last February and I made it farther than I did then. Sometime I'd like to make it all the way to the top, but there's a lot of climbing and areas where there isn't much to hold onto to pull yourself up, so I'm going to need a lot of practice. Also, going down is probably harder and scarier than up. Good thing Rob is patient and helpful!
Another lil fun fact about our hike...last year when we were there we took a lil break and were chatting and that's when I started talking with Rob about how I really didn't like my job and wanted to be a teacher. We visited my "life crisis" rock again this time. :)
New hiking shoes! Apparently hiking in wool socks is best. They are the tallest socks ever. Not so much of a fashion statement!
We are almost to the spot we turned around at here.
Last week, Rob went flying with a guy from work he's become pretty good friends with--Logan. The company he works for bought a small plane that they're allowing their employees to rent at a ridiculously discounted rate and Rob had promised Logan he'd take him up as a thank you for switching out a lot of days over the holidays. They flew over a bunch of cities --Prescott, Flagstaff, Sedona. I didn't realize this before the flight but there's a big volcano crater in the middle of the desert and Logan told Rob that it is responsible for the weird landscape out here (all the mountains and the super flat desert). I really know less about this tourism flight than I thought and Rob is flying helicopters right now, then will want to sleep a lot the rest of the day so I'm just going to throw up the pictures and maybe he'll add more detail later. :)
the crater (obviously)
these are the controls in the cockpit of the plane...it's an all-glass cockpit, which I guess is pretty cool :)also, I can't figure out how to write below this next picture, but it is Rob and the plane in Flagstaff, with Humphrey's Peak in the background.
Here are a few pictures of Sedona from the air...
Yesterday we went hiking at Lost Dutchman State Park. Rob helped me pick out a new pair of hiking shoes a few weeks back and I was excited to try them out! The top of the mountain is about 3,000 feet of climbing and I think we made it about 1,800. Rob took me hiking at the same mountain almost a year ago when I came out to visit last February and I made it farther than I did then. Sometime I'd like to make it all the way to the top, but there's a lot of climbing and areas where there isn't much to hold onto to pull yourself up, so I'm going to need a lot of practice. Also, going down is probably harder and scarier than up. Good thing Rob is patient and helpful!Another lil fun fact about our hike...last year when we were there we took a lil break and were chatting and that's when I started talking with Rob about how I really didn't like my job and wanted to be a teacher. We visited my "life crisis" rock again this time. :)
New hiking shoes! Apparently hiking in wool socks is best. They are the tallest socks ever. Not so much of a fashion statement!
We are almost to the spot we turned around at here.Okay, I have errands to run and big plans of reading a lot of non-fiction by the pool today so I am ready to grade a lot of non-fiction book reports in a few weeks :) This 3 day weekend thing is wonderful. A short week and Mom comes to visit at the end! Sending you all love (and some warmth!) Love, Sarah and Rob
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Wine Cube Weekend
It has been quite some time since I have had a "regular" Saturday/Sunday weekend...and definitely even longer since I've not been dreading the back to work Monday morning. Rob and I had a relaxing weekend together. It more or less revolved around a box cube of wine that made me the happiest wine connoisseur ever. After graduation I decided I was a lil too grown up for Franzia/boxed wine. However, I've decided that the cube is geometrically classy and convenient because it is good for a month...which is basically never ending deliciousness for people who struggle to finish a bottle before it goes bad. The wine cube purchase was made at Super Target (grocery heaven) Friday night. We also bought sausages (chicken for me and regular for Rob) from an organic/healthy grocery called Sprouts...so we grilled out and drank Sangria...it felt like summer! (Also, skip this part if you live in Cleveland and are very cranky about snow and cold, the 70 degrees and sunshine all weekend has helped the summer feeling.)
Honestly, the rest of the weekend was pretty plain. I worked one party yesterday and two today at Rolly Pollies, we worked out, went to church, did some teacher planning. Oh yes, I made homemade meatballs for meatball subs earlier today, which I was proud of. Now you understand the thrill of the wine cube. (I wanted to take a picture of it because this has really lacked pictures lately, but you'd really just see the inside of our refrigerator, which is boring, so hopefully more pictures next weekend.)
Tomorrow I am introducing a non-fiction book review paper for the kids to write. My cooperating teacher is going to teach a unit on the book Anthem, which will wrap up next Thursday, leaving me Thursday and Friday to do a mini-lesson on Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream speech. I am going to pair it with a Langston Hughes poem and have the kids do some freewriting on dreams, read each piece and then write an extended metaphor paper about dreams. Lots of planning and details to work out still, but I am really looking forward to it.
Alright, I am off to bed. Up at 6:30 for another busy week! :) Hope your week is great as well. Love again, Sarah and Rob
Honestly, the rest of the weekend was pretty plain. I worked one party yesterday and two today at Rolly Pollies, we worked out, went to church, did some teacher planning. Oh yes, I made homemade meatballs for meatball subs earlier today, which I was proud of. Now you understand the thrill of the wine cube. (I wanted to take a picture of it because this has really lacked pictures lately, but you'd really just see the inside of our refrigerator, which is boring, so hopefully more pictures next weekend.)
Tomorrow I am introducing a non-fiction book review paper for the kids to write. My cooperating teacher is going to teach a unit on the book Anthem, which will wrap up next Thursday, leaving me Thursday and Friday to do a mini-lesson on Martin Luther King's I Have a Dream speech. I am going to pair it with a Langston Hughes poem and have the kids do some freewriting on dreams, read each piece and then write an extended metaphor paper about dreams. Lots of planning and details to work out still, but I am really looking forward to it.
Alright, I am off to bed. Up at 6:30 for another busy week! :) Hope your week is great as well. Love again, Sarah and Rob
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Finally, I'm a Teacher Again! :)
Believe it or not I have been planning for the past few days since March of last year when I started petitioning education committees at MU to let me student teach here in Arizona and studying for the Praxis exams. I'd had quite a bit of time to get nervous, but mostly excited for the past few days. Yesterday was my first day student teaching--it was a teacher in-service day--and today was the first day with the kids back. Yesterday was primarily workshops and department meetings. I met two other student teachers--one is teaching Spanish and the other is teaching English as well. Unfortunately, they are teaching in a different part of the (huge!) building and eat lunch during different bells, so I don't seem to have too much contact with them yet, but it is still early. My cooperating teacher is so wonderful--we spent a lot of time yesterday working on lesson plans together and making a plan for the semester...this week the kids will be working on career projects in the career center/computer lab and we'll each go around to work with students individually. Then for the next two weeks she will teach the book Anthem, after which I am taking over the classroom to start with writing persuasive research papers--nothing like jumping into a huge project! :)
It was a surprisingly calm day today with the kids back--most of them complained about not being able to fall asleep last night and waking up early so I think they were sleep walking through a lot of it. Tomorrow should prove to be a bit crazier. I was introduced to each class and they had the opportunity to ask any questions of me they could think of. (Rob being a helicopter pilot came out in each class and was a big hit!) Also, I still get a lil confused for a quick second when people refer to me as Sarah Andrasik. This Mrs. Andrasik thing is ridiculously strange. At any rate, this is what my schedule looks like:
Bell 1: planning bell (which is wonderful because I can get into school a lil after this bell starts, miss the traffic and still have time to eat breakfast and finish last minute preparations. I've been leaving the apartment about 7:10 and getting to school/into the classroom about 7:30...including my ridiculously long walk from the very back of the parking lot. What a wonderful commute!)
Bell 2: honors English
Bell 3: honors English
Bell 4: student council...today we brainstormed themes for "morp" which is the undergraduate dance in February...it's their "prom." The theme we decided on is a sports theme, so everyone will dress up like athletes, cheerleaders, fans, etc. It's called "Will you be my MVP?" I love it!
Lunch
Bell 6: honors English
Bell 7: another planning period...so I can stay to plan and grade if there are meetings after school, otherwise I can leave to work from home around 1:15-1:30. It's fantastic!!
It has been a lil tough for Rob and I working out time to see each other the past few days because now our work schedules more or less totally overlap, with the exception of about 2 hours between when he wakes up and goes to work in the evenings. We both are so ready for the helicopter school to hire him and this stupid night shift schedule to be over. He started classes for his final license yesterday morning, but hopefully will be hired before he has them finished. Fingers crossed it will be soon!
I can't believe people are still reading this. It's ridiculously long. Hope all is well with you and that your back to work after the holidays as been as enjoying as mine! :) Love, Sarah and Rob
It was a surprisingly calm day today with the kids back--most of them complained about not being able to fall asleep last night and waking up early so I think they were sleep walking through a lot of it. Tomorrow should prove to be a bit crazier. I was introduced to each class and they had the opportunity to ask any questions of me they could think of. (Rob being a helicopter pilot came out in each class and was a big hit!) Also, I still get a lil confused for a quick second when people refer to me as Sarah Andrasik. This Mrs. Andrasik thing is ridiculously strange. At any rate, this is what my schedule looks like:
Bell 1: planning bell (which is wonderful because I can get into school a lil after this bell starts, miss the traffic and still have time to eat breakfast and finish last minute preparations. I've been leaving the apartment about 7:10 and getting to school/into the classroom about 7:30...including my ridiculously long walk from the very back of the parking lot. What a wonderful commute!)
Bell 2: honors English
Bell 3: honors English
Bell 4: student council...today we brainstormed themes for "morp" which is the undergraduate dance in February...it's their "prom." The theme we decided on is a sports theme, so everyone will dress up like athletes, cheerleaders, fans, etc. It's called "Will you be my MVP?" I love it!
Lunch
Bell 6: honors English
Bell 7: another planning period...so I can stay to plan and grade if there are meetings after school, otherwise I can leave to work from home around 1:15-1:30. It's fantastic!!
It has been a lil tough for Rob and I working out time to see each other the past few days because now our work schedules more or less totally overlap, with the exception of about 2 hours between when he wakes up and goes to work in the evenings. We both are so ready for the helicopter school to hire him and this stupid night shift schedule to be over. He started classes for his final license yesterday morning, but hopefully will be hired before he has them finished. Fingers crossed it will be soon!
I can't believe people are still reading this. It's ridiculously long. Hope all is well with you and that your back to work after the holidays as been as enjoying as mine! :) Love, Sarah and Rob
Thursday, January 1, 2009
Happy 2009!
Happy New Year! Rob and I spent New Year's Eve together (luckily he was able to switch out the night with a guy at work who wanted the holiday pay so he didn't have to work)...we watched a lil football (but nothing compared to today!), the movie Mr. and Mrs. Smith and the tape delay of the ball dropping in NY. It's a lil strange to think that the majority of ya'll reading this were living in 2009 while we were still in 2008! It was a quiet, calm end to a crazy year. It's hard to believe sometimes that so much happened in 2008. Looking back, I began last year relatively content with a job in fundraising and was newly engaged, planning a 2009 wedding. How things have changed. 5 weddings (one of which was our own), 4 heart walks, 3 helicopter licenses/ratings, 2 Praxis exams and 1 road trip across the country later, Rob is certified to instruct helicopter students, I am gearing up for my student teaching and we are both living together in Phoenix. Wow. I've spent the better part of today compiling pictures into a slideshow of the past year of our lives. (Also, watching an obscene amount of football bowl games and eating delicious pulled bbq pork sandwiches...we finally put our crock pot to good use! It has been a fantastic lazy day.) I really wanted background music, but that wasn't an option with the free version of the software, but clicking on the picture below should open the slideshow in its own window, which will allow for bigger pictures than you can usually view on the blog. Enjoy!
Last, but not least, I feel that I should mention now (while it still lasts) that the Andrasiks are doing remarkably well in Dad's bowl pool. We were in first place this morning, but were knocked down to second with Clemson's loss. Hopefully we can pull back through for a victory!
Hoping 2009 is off to a fabulous start for everyone! Love, Sarah and Rob
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| Make a Smilebox slideshow |
Last, but not least, I feel that I should mention now (while it still lasts) that the Andrasiks are doing remarkably well in Dad's bowl pool. We were in first place this morning, but were knocked down to second with Clemson's loss. Hopefully we can pull back through for a victory!
Hoping 2009 is off to a fabulous start for everyone! Love, Sarah and Rob
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