My 100 list

My cousin, Julie, has been encouraging me to make a 100 list for my blog. That was about the time that I started this blog, and haven't gotten around to it... until now. So here goes:

1. As a child, I was very shy. There were some days at school where I would not say a single word to anyone.
2. People don't believe that when I tell them. Probably because I never quit talking.
3. We moved a lot when I was a child. I have lived in West Jordan, Pennsylvania, Georgia, Clinton, Syracuse, Logan, Taiwan, and now I'm back in West Jordan.
4. I have been caught in quicksand twice. Both times were in the lake near my house in Georgia.
5. I'm a band geek. I played the clarinet and contra-alto clarinet in junior high and high school.
6. I wasn't ever very good, even though I really liked it. Probably because I never practiced.
7. I tutored children with autism in high school and college.
8. I get really passionate about teaching. It's a little out of control sometimes.
9. I speak Mandarin Chinese.
10. I served my mission in Taiwan, and I really love that place.
11. I am the second of six children.
12. My brother Nathan was my best friend growing up. We were such good friends that as a three year old, I was planning on marrying him. (Luckily, I've changed my mind:)
13. My brother Ian is now my best friend.
14. I am afraid of a lot of things, including heights and balls flying at me.
15. Even though I'm afraid of heights, I have been cliff jumping one time.
16 I graduated from Utah State University with a dual major in early childhood education and early childhood special education.
17. I graduated summa cum laude, which I didn't even know until I got to my own graduation.
18. I love to go dutch ovening up the canyon.
19. I own my own dutch oven. I only know how to make cobbler and that's all.
20. I love chocolate, and I love milk... my two great loves in life.
21. I really love warm, comfy sweaters.
22. I love to go swing dancing. That's big band swing, not country swing.
23. When I was in junior high school, I would force myself to ask the young men to dance, even though I was shy then.
24. Sometimes they said no.... but I figure that's probably only because I was a foot taller than them with buck teeth.
25. I like to bake, and I have gotten so much better over the years!
26. I never did figure out how I managed to fail, "Never Fail Fudge."
27. I like to sew and I have sewn most of my own skirts.
28. I usually sew pajama pants for all of my brothers and sisters at Christmas time.
29. I am a home body. I love to be at home, doing things with my family or friends. I prefer eating meals at home with my family instead of going out to eat.
30. I like having my mom at home. I'm 24 and I don't even live at home, but for some reason, I feel more secure when I know she's at home.
31. I'm a little Chinese. The Chinese people really love things when they are shufu and fang bian (meaning comfortable and convenient.) Me too!
32. When I was a junior in college, I bought a stuffed green frog for a class I was taking. It was really soft and I named it Flops.
33. I sleep better when I'm holding it.
34. I considered taking Flops on my mission, but I didn't. I missed that silly frog the whole time I was gone!
35. I have only had two boyfriends in my life. Curiously, they both had the same birthday.
36. I like to cross-stitch. I am currently working on a cross-stitch that will probably take the next ten years to complete.
37. There is a woman in Taiwan that prays every night that I will find a man to marry.
38. I took a semester of sign language, and three years of Spanish, but I can no longer use either language...just Chinese.
39. My favorite constellation is Orion.
40. When I was in high school, I covered my entire ceiling with little glow-in-the-dark stars. I even put up my own constellations, including the female version of Orion (she had a skirt.)
41. My bedroom was given away to my little sister, and I totally forgot I had those stars until one night this past summer when my brother and sister-in-law were visiting and I slept in Erin's bed.
42. Those stars brought back a lot of good memories, so I put up glow in the dark stars in my bedroom at my new place.
43. When I was in high school, you could see the Bountiful temple from my bedroom window.
44. I'm still disappointed that they built a house in the way.
45. My favorite temple is the TaiPei temple. My second favorite is the Bountiful temple.
46. As a child, I was a Girl Scout. I sold a lot of cookies.
47. While singing in a Girl Scout Choir at the Cherry Blossom Festival in Georgia, I fainted on top of my sister, Chelsea's, head. I don't know if she ever forgave me for that.
48. I wanted to be a ballerina when I was a little girl.
49. I also always wanted to be a writer.
50. I think I'm a good story teller.
51. I have been skiing exactly 4 times in my life. That's when I broke my leg and gave the sport up for life.
52. My name is Alisa. I've always liked my name. Unfortunately, very few people in this world know how to say that.
53. I have a mortal fear of needles.
54. I hate needles so much that I signed myself up for a research study to have my four impacted wisdom teeth removed while I was awake, just to avoid getting an IV.
55. I get pale and whoozy just talking about needles, blood, and other medical stuff. I am a pansy.
56. My brothers are bigger pansies than I am.
57. I like to wear ear muffs. Chelsea has always been embarrassed for me because of it.
58. As a child, I was obedient to a fault. I really was.
59. As an adult, I'm rather stubborn. I don't like having people tell me what to do. Just ask my Dad.
60. Someday, I'm going to build a house that has higher counter tops, just so that I don't have to bend over so much to do my dishes.
61. I listen to Christmas music out of season.
62. I don't actually have a working radio in my car, so I just sing loudly to myself.
63. In college, my roommates named my computer "Gilbert" and referred to him as my boyfriend. They felt like I needed to get out more.
64. I don't like to eat tofu. That includes when it's baked, broiled, steamed, boiled, fried, and barbecued. Just not a fan.
65. I ate a lot of tofu as a missionary.
66. I pretended to like it-- but I didn't.
67. My car is named Meshach(!!!). Ian helped me name it. We love that car.
68. In college, I drove a 1974 land yacht... I mean, Ford LTD. It would slide if it saw ice, or even thought about it.
69. I have so many cousins that when I moved back to Utah, I took the time to memorize all of their names.
70. I love to go on walks in the rain.
71. I like to go on drives into the canyons or pretty places, just to go driving.
72. I like to go hiking, but I kind of mosy when I hike. Some say I'm lazy, but I say I'd rather enjoy my surroundings than make it to the top.
73. As a child, I really liked to go on walks by myself, just to find my own "secret hide-outs."
74. Nathan and I used to write to each other in code. My favorite one was "code silver."
75. I like to tell my students really, really dumb jokes, just so they'll laugh.
76. I really do love to teach kindergarten.
77. When I was in first grade, there was a little boy that wrote me a love letter every day. Not knowing what to do and distressed about the situation, I wrote him a hate letter. He quit writing the love letters.
78. I still feel kind of guilty about that.
79. When I was in high school, I was really good friends with my ninth grade seminary teacher's family and would hang out at their house.
80. I used to win eating contests in junior high school... and then complain about still being hungry.
81. I got in trouble in school for reading too much.
82. I won't let myself read books during the school year. I lose all sense of time and place and get absolutely nothing done.
83. When I was in seventh grade, I tried to make an adobe brick for a history project. My friend, Danielle helped me. We collected mud and grass from outside and mixed in a pot, before pouring it into a shoe box. We then put it into the oven to "bake."
84. We learned a few things. a. Never put mud mixed with snow in an adobe brick. It gets soggy fast. b. Find out the origin of the mud. If the construction site used to be a cow pasture, don't touch. c. If you forget the aforementioned rules, avoid your mother for awhile.
85. I once performed in a play where I played the part of Romeo.
86. I do not like games where balls come flying at me. That includes most sports.
87. A friend once told me while playing volleyball that I would be great at karate... I had mastered the art of avoiding the enemy.
88. I'm a good swimmer.
89. There are no balls in swimming.
90. When I was in sixth grade, my mother went on strike. She wasn't going to cook breakfast for us anymore. I tried to make breakfast for my family. I made pancakes, but I cooked them at too high of a temperature, and so they were gooey inside. I just told my brother and sister to put m&m's on the top and eat them anyway.
91. As a child, I loved to play school. I was always the teacher, and Chelsea was my student. I don't know if she's forgiven me for that yet.
92. I loved to play with dolls as a little girl.
93. Chelsea's favorite doll had only one arm and was named, "Beep Beep."
94. As a little girl, my grandpa taught me how to idiot stitch. It's called that because, "any idiot can do it." If you want to know how, I'm offering lessons.
95. I like to ice skate, even though I can hardly stay on my own two feet. I learned how to skate backwards once too.
96. I know a lot of children's songs.
97. I taught myself how to type in ninth grade. I can type about 80 wpm.
98. I'm trying to learn to read Chinese.
99. I had really long hair as a child that went down to my waist.
100. I've always loved tulips.

Vianne Speaks!

My classroom has many children of very different backgrounds. There are ten different languages spoken in my classroom (including English), and about 50 percent of my students are learning English as a second language. Most of the children do have some minimal understanding of English, or at least are using some words and can imitate spoken words.
However, there is one little boy that has only been in America for a short time that speaks Kirundi. (I know what you're thinking. Where do they speak Kirundi? That's easy! In Burundi! You don't know where Burundi is? Well, Google knows everything... that's how I found out.) He has been mostly silent since coming to my class. I say mostly silent, but that would not be entirely true. There was that one day in the very beginning where he was just so overwhelmed that he began to howl for some period of time. That wasn't very quiet.
I have heard him speak briefly to his brother in their native tongue, which helped me know that he at least does talk. No matter what I've tried, up to this point at the end of October, he would not even imitate sounds I made... until today.
Today, while playing a game of Cookie Monster ABC, he would imitate the names of the letters on the cookies when it was his turn! This was a breakthrough! In fact, it was such a big deal that every time he did it (and it was quiet even at that), one of the little girls in the group would touch me and say, "I heard him! I heard him talk!" The kids have been super good about including him and remembering him. I think they know that he needs extra help... and so they are as excited about his progress as I am. Hurrah!

Snow Bird and Pumpkin Pie

This weekend was super fun! Snow Bird had a deal where you could ride the tram up to the top of the mountain for free, as long as you brought a can of food to donate to the food bank. My friend, Nathan, and I doubled the donation. We brought 4. It was cold and windy up there, and way above the tree line. For some reason I was thinking, "Won't that be fun to see all of the fall colors?" Just as a note, there are no fall colors on the top of a mountain. :) We sat in the warming hut to eat lunch and took some pictures before we headed down.
We then went home and carved a pumpkin... I think my kindergartners are going to love our jack-o-lantern. We did a pretty sweet job. I cleaned out the pumpkin, Nathan separated out the seeds (for yummy toasted pumpkin seeds!), and Nathan carved it (my carving skills are a little inadequate)... and then we ate pumpkin pie. As my family well knows, I love pumpkin pie. I also love milk. And then, on top of that, Nathan loves pumpkin pie, and he loves milk too. So, we ate the whole thing, all but one piece, with big glasses of milk all in one sitting right out of the pie tin. Why bother with plates when you're going to eat the whole thing anyway? It was great!

Errand of Angels

So, tonight I went to the dollar theater with Julie to see the movie, "Errand of Angels." It actually cost 2 dollars per person, and the theater was pretty ghetto, but I really liked the movie. It wasn't necessarily that the movie was all that spectacular in and of itself. It had mostly to do with the fact that it brought back so many memories, and that it was so true to life, just sister missionaries doing their best, usually feeling like it isn't good enough, but also seeing that the Lord works in mysterious ways, and despite our failings, does amazing things. I highly recommend it!!

Chocolate Legs

I wore black nylons to school today to match my skirt. I thought they looked nice. But you never know what they look like to a five year old.

Today, a boy named Loi asked me, "Miss Parrish, why do your legs look like chocolate?"

Cool! There's a truck at our school!

We had a trucker visit my class today. That's right. He brought his 18-wheeler and parked it in our bus loop. My kids got to learn all about trucks and climb in the truck, and watch it get hitched up and unhitched from its trailer. It was incredible.

In preparation for this activity, I read a book to my students about trucks, called "Truck" by Donald Crews. And then, I had them brainstorm questions. My students have gotten really good at asking questions. Everyday when we do the sharing bag, we have them practice their "wonderings" instead of making random comments. I was really, really impressed today! They all asked questions, and they were really good! Here are the questions they asked,

1. What do you carry in your truck?

2. What do you do?

3. How do you drive the truck?

4. Are you handsome?

5. Do you ever drive in the spaghetti bowl?

6. Do you have to change gears?

7. Do you play with toys in your truck?

8. Where are you going next?

9. How long is your truck?

10. Do you take a bath?

11. Does smoke come out of your truck?

12. What's your favorite color?

13. How many tires do you have?

I was really impressed that so many of the questions were so on topic! At the same time, a few of those showed their true five year old colors. The kids LOVED the trucks! Even after we were done, they kept saying, "That was so cool!"

CHINA!

So, today was an exciting day... probably too much excitement. It wore me out! I just found out today that I might have the chance to go with a group of educators to CHINA! Did I mention that we were going to CHINA!?!? CHINA!! I am so excited! And, I would get to go for super cheap. I don't know all of the details, I just know that it's to CHINA. Oh, what a happy day!

The Hike to Timpanogos

Today was so much fun! Julie, Sarah, and William and I decided to go hike up to the caves on Mount Timpanogos. The kids were great troopers and walked most of the way on their own! They also had a ton of fun in the cave. We even got to see a bat! I'm so glad I get to spend time with these guys! Isn't family great?

The Room of the Boy

This weekend, I had some big plans for getting lots of school stuff done. But sometimes, things come up, things that are more important than big plans. The thing that came up? The Boy's room. The Boy has a bedroom that for some time could be compared to a sinking swirling pit of despair. The more you climb into it, the less of a chance you would ever find your way out. The Boy had mastered the art of jumping with a flying leap from door to bed.
We decided that had to change... and the results were miraculous! Here are some of the "after" photos for the transformation. I've also included a picture of the trash can... completely full from the trash removed from this bedroom. There are a few things I would like to point out. #1 The flower arrangements look lovely (thanks to my new flower arranging skills). That's right! My 17 year old brother let me put flower arrangements in his room. What can I say? He loves me!
#2 There is a Barney doll on his bed. As a small child, Boy was quite attached to this Barney doll. We recently rediscovered Barney in a toy box and he has renewed the attachment, though he mentioned that he remembers it "being bigger."
#3 The big orange tub is Ian's toy box. Yes, he needed a toy box. :)
#4 There is no laundry anywhere to be seen. The Boy learned how to do laundry this weekend. It's a miracle!
#5 There is a big cozy red rug. It matches the red candle... the Cranberry Mandarin candle... these two bright red pieces in the room bring friendly Chinese reminders to all who enter... or at least to me and to Ian.
I feel like the weekend was a huge success story. When we were done, Ian bought us pizza to celebrate!

The Art of Flower Arranging... I'm a Natural! (with help)

Last Wednesday, my friend, Tasha, invited me to a super fun flower arranging class. It was my first try, and I think I did all right. I'm not going to lie, I was pretty proud of my handiwork. However, since I wasn't going to be home for most of the weekend, I figured I should probably give it away to someone who would enjoy it more. Since I had a dentist appointment in Roy on Thursday morning, I ran over to my Gramy's house right after and brought the flowers to her. She seemed pretty tickled that I thought of her. So, I think it was definitely worth it!

Night at McDonald's

Tonight our school had a super fun night at McDonald's. Several of the teachers went to serve food and the students came to enjoy the night. 10% of all of the profits of the night went to our school! So, it was a win win situation for everyone and it was so much fun. I saw a lot of my kids there and they were so excited to see their teacher! I love my job. I definitely went into the right profession.

I've put up a picture of some of the teachers that were there that night.

My Classroom Exploded!

I love fall! I love watching the leaves change colors and going on walks in the rain, and the cooler weather (just as long as it's not actually cold- not a fan of that!).
In kindergarten we have been learning about the season of fall. So, we made scarecrows! It was super fun, except that I didn't predict the mess it would create. We took two pieces of butcher paper together and stapled it for heads. Next, we stuffed them with newspaper (the vocabulary word of the day? Stuffed!!) We then decorated the heads, made hats, and added shredded paper for hair. I think the kids loved it, but when all was said and done, there were puddles of glue on the tables, a wastebasket overflowing with newspaper, but mostly, shredded paper everywhere!! So, it kind of went like this, "All right, boys and girls, how many of you can count to 50?... Good! Go pick up that many pieces of trash!" Well, the kindergartners worked really hard, but you can only shove so many pieces of trash into your hand before you have even more leaking out the other side. :) I'm making really good friends with the custodians!
Actually, one of the custodians there in the evening is Ron. Ron and I are friends. I keep reminding him that we're friends in case he forgets. Sometimes about ten minutes before we are supposed to be out of the school, he gets on the intercom and says, "Teachers, we are beginning to lock up. The building will be closing in ten minutes." I don't know why he gets on the intercom. I'm the only teacher there to hear the message... and he has to walk down the hall to lock my door in a minute anyway. One of these days, I'm just waiting for him to get on and say, "Miss Parrish- go home!" I think if I wasn't there every night, he'd miss me. I'm sure of it.

Here's a picture of some of our scarecrows. The paper to the left lists all of the directions needed to make a scarecrow as excellent as ours!

Teaching School: Getting in Touch with Myself

Teaching school helps me to be more in touch with myself. In saying that, what I really mean to say is, "Kindergartners have a wonderful way of pointing out all of my quirks and imitating everything I say." That scares me.
Yesterday, my whiteboard marker ran out of ink. Without a second thought, I made a comment to the effect, "This marker's fired!" and threw it away. I don't remember saying this, and I would probably claim that I didn't except that today, it happened again. I told the children, "My goodness, my marker must be out of ink." That's when the children asked me, "Is the marker fired?"
"What?" I asked. I was totally confused.
"Is the marker fired? Do you need to throw it away?"
So, that marker was fired too, and currently, we're accepting applications for new markers. You can contact me if you know of any that may meet the qualifications.

Today, though, I was paid a big compliment by a child. His grandmother came to pick him up and told me that he had told his family, "When we do something wrong, Miss Parrish doesn't get mad. She just tells us to try it again."
That is another phrase that I use a lot without even realizing it, but I'm glad I do... because I hope that all of my children can have that attitude: doing it wrong doesn't make me bad. It just means I need to try it again. (Some of the children may have also realized, though, that you may need to try it again about 1400 billion times. :)

Lucky for me though, this also helps me get to know the students' parents as well. The other day, I was trying to get the attention of a child to get in line. He wasn't listening or hearing what I had to say, so I used both his first and last name to get his attention. That didn't work. So, I went up to him and asked him, "Did you hear me calling your name? It's time to get in line." To which he responded, "You didn't use my middle name." Note to self: learn middle names.