Day 106 - May the fourth... be with you! :D

In honor of May the Fourth, me and Maddy educated the kids today on the importance of Star Wars in the American culture :) We made light-sabers and watched a short clip from the original Star Wars movies. It was great :) Here's some pictures of us with us with our light sabers!

Day 83 - Piano, Pasta, People and Legos! :D

Okay, one thing most people know about me is that I absolutely LOVE piano. Last Saturday at Conference, I was talking to Sister Powell and it turns out her kids are in need of piano lessons! I've been their music-teacher at church for a while now, so I know most of them pretty well. Anyways, yesterday was my first day teaching piano over at their house, and it's already a great learning experience for me! Who would have thought that four different kids could all be at such different levels of piano :P (PS any ideas for teaching a three year old piano??)

I can't get paid while I'm here in Ukraine because of my Visa, but the trade is food for extra piano-teaching experience, which is just a double bonus for me! We had pasta, with garlic bread, and COLD water! Haha you wouldn't think it's so amazing, but I rarely have real pasta with real garlic bread here, and I never ever get cold water! So it was an awesome treat for me. 

After dinner I ended up hanging out and talking with A, their oldest daughter. We sat in her room with all her toys (my favorite, Littlest Pet Shop!) and talked about random stuff. The other kids started trickling in until all five of us were in A's room just chatting away. The parents came in after a while too and we all just talked about random things (like AFV and random funny moments). We had "family prayer", then the little one's all had to get to bed. 

So A. and I talked for a while longer before deciding that we should most definitely go work on the Lego house she had just started (which was in her other room/ the guest room). We worked on that for a long time (it's a pretty detailed house, with stairs, a doorbell, and even a barbecue-grill outside!). But I eventually decided I should probably be heading home (it was already past her normal bed-time). We were just about to finish the roof, but we decided we could finish that next week. 

So I've decided that that's my current equation for a fabulous day. I just need to be able to share my love of something I think is wonderful (like piano!), eat some tasty food (like pasta!), have good people around to talk to and be with (like the Powell family! :) ), and do something that really brings me joy (like LEGO's!!). Yep, pretty sure that's all I need in life, thanks for reading! :) 

Day 74 - Mondays :)

Denay and I switched classes on Monday, so she went to school at 9am, and I only had to be at school by 3pm. It was crazy having all morning to work on things, I can't remember the last morning that I've really had freed up like that, it was nice. Most of the day seemed to be that of a lazy summer day, doing everything sort of at my own pace. Georgo (a guy working in cosmetics with Lena from Italy) would be coming that night (more about Georgo later, he's an interesting guy), so I cleaned my desk and organized my closet, and finished up laundry, and talked with Sasha and Lena, and ultimately really felt pretty accomplished all before the time I even thought about leaving for school. It was a nice sort-of break from all the rush and hustle of my every single day (it seemed) that I was on vacation :)

Day 61 - FULL Day

I love days like this, I was seriously walking and working and walking and going and being and thinking and walking and riding and talking and pondering and standing and always doing SOMEthing all day yesterday! Maddy was still sick, so I decided to sub for her myself by combining both of the classes and working the full three hour shift that way. I talked with Nelya, my coordinator for a while, then Marie, my head teacher, then food came, then we had Russian lessons, then I had to leave for the temple. I forgot all about food and eating something for dinner until I passed hot-dog stands and babushka's selling fruits and bread and other tasty things like that. I bought a 9 grivna little pizza at a stand near my bus stop, and enjoyed that. I eventually made it to the temple, and there, I met some super awesome people. There were people that had come all the way from Moscow, Russia or further to come to the temple here in Kyiv. They all had amazing stories, and it was fun getting to know those people. I loved being there, but all too soon I realized I had to head out to get to Julia and Anetta's house. The ride there ended up being WAY longer than I had expected (I think there was a car-crash on the road which backed things up quite a bit), but eventually I made it there too and enjoyed every minute of talking with them and their babushka and the sisters and some random others that came by :) I was suuper exhausted at that point though and had to work to keep myself upright and not slouching or yawning as we talked. We had some awesome discussions, funny, serious, confusing (mostly when everyone started talking and laughing in Russian :) ) and thought provoking, but again, I was cut off on time to spend there. We headed out at about 9:30, then I made my way home on the marshutka (little buses) and Metro systems.

Sorry for not a whole lot of detail, but I've only got SO much time in my day to write about it all! Maybe one of these days I'll come back and edit and write more specifically about all the events in my day :)

Day 60 - Work!

I'm sorry I seem to be getting SO lax with keeping up with this blog lately. The truth is, I am! There's so much going on in my each day, and I've gotten in this routine of constantly having other things to do, that I don't give myself the ten minutes to a half hour that it really does take for me to keep you (whoever you readers are) updated on my life! I'm sorry about that..

Anyways last Monday was actually quite great! It's amazing how much your day can change when you simply choose your attitude! I knew I'd have to teach ALL day, so I got up early and headed out around 7 in the morning. I went to the grocery store for some goodies for the afternoon classes (which I promised Denay I would sub for), and then got to school and prepped for my usual morning classes. I realize I haven't written a WHOLE lot about my teaching experience here, maybe I'll write a bit about that when I share about yesterday (Day 61, and Tuesday)'s post. The day was long, but I enjoyed working with the new group of kids and seeing what things that I've learned about teaching apply to their groups too. Like counting down! Who would have thought that counting from 5 to 1, getting quieter with each number would make a class full of kids bouncing off the walls sit down in their chairs, fold their arms, and look directly at me, waiting for the next instruction? I really have learned a TON about working with people and children and groups and parents and myself in all of my experience in teaching here, and I'm feeling more and more grateful for the opportunity to teach here and all the things that I've gained from it.

Day 47 - School Cleaning

Okay, tell me if this is a crazy idea, or if I just need to calm down :P The area that we work has been and is becoming even more beyond disorganized. I start work in the morning at 9am, but I usually get to school about an hour early so I can clean the classrooms and put my lessons together. Kind of out of frustration, I'm thinking I will take on the challenge of getting this place fixed up. I don't know if I'd have much help from the others (they seem to be more content than me about messes), and it is a huge project.. Am I biting off more than I can chew? Do you think it's worth a shot? Or should I really just not worry about it? Anyways, those are my current thoughts, any advice would be much appreciated! Thank you :)

Day 33 - Kinder Joy!

I can not believe I have lived my whole life without knowing about these! Today was one-of-the-kids-I-teach's birthday and he brought goody-bags for everyone; which we all got after classes were done. I opened up my little goody bag and there was some chocolate and a juice box and this little egg-looking thing called a "Kinder-Joy". The kids seemed to know just what to do with these toys, but it was all new to me, so I had them show me how to open the plastic egg in half and use the tiny plastic utensil to scoop out the chocolaty treat from one half of the egg. The other half had a "surprise" in it, which was this little toy that I got to assemble together (kind of like a McDonald's toy). Mine was a mini-version of that ant game where you have to get the ants to jump into the pants (I think it's called "Ants in Pants"). Anyways it basically made my entire day :)

Day 29 - My Birthday!

I feel like I should write some spectacular episode about this oh so important day of my life. But really, it was just about like any other day I've had here in Ukraine. I woke up and hadn't even remembered it was my birthday until I went to my wardrobe sort of thing in the hallway. My host-parents, Sasha and Lena, had made a big card for me saying, "Happy Birthday!" on it with a big present of a picture. It made me smile, and I was determined that I would allow myself to have a pretty good day for the rest of the day. Maddy was still sick, so I had to improvise a lot, but on the way to school, I had this genious idea to do "kitchen" early that week (we usually have it on Fridays), because the kids LOVE kitchen, and they tend to be more well behaved when they know it makes a difference between cookie and no cookie at the end of the day :) Adrienne and Denae came and subbed for the 30 minute cross-over where we have the kids that overlap. The kids were pretty great though that day, and the activities I had prepped seemed to all work out, so things flowed pretty well through the school day.

Oh! And Nelya (my coordinator) gave me a box of chocolates that were SO tasty. The closest thing I could compare them to would be "3 Musketeer's", but they were fluffier and fruitier than what I know. After school, I stayed around a while to hang out with the others/ wait for my daily lunch to come to the school. We got the crepe-sort-of-things that have chicken and other tasty things all inside. I came back home and my host-family (and Julia's Tutor and the cleaner lady) all congratulated me on my birthday (I was thinking about it, it's kind of funny that we congratulate each other on getting a year older, or maybe it's just a Ukrainian thing, I've never really noticed before). I got some art-work from Julia and a really nice dress from Lena. The art work is something like a spider web drawing  with a ribbon to hang it from the middle, it sort of reminds me of a dream catcher. My dress is a gold color and would look really cute with a belt and leggings. But I'm not exactly sure how to wear it at the moment yet, because it's pretty short, and I don't really feel comfortable just wearing leggings with it. Maybe with some dark jeans or slacks? Anyways, its a wonderful gift, and I hope I can find a way to make it work with my standards AND find an opportunity to wear and show it off while I'm still here in Ukraine with my host-family.

At about 7:30, I met up with some people to go to TGI Fridays. As you may or may not know already, my phone is currently lost, and I didn't have any telephone communication devices in which to call people and invite them to come. I don't think the others will be offended though. We had a fun group though In the picture to the right, you can see from left to right Adrienne, Christina, Igor, Madeline, and Igor. The food there was great; truly American stuff, hardly a tint even that reminded me I was still eating food in Ukraine.

The whole time I really wanted to be sung to by the restaurant people. I asked Igor to ask if they do anything for birthdays. When he did, the waitress only asked for an ID to prove it was my birthday, then said, "Happy Birthday!" I felt gypped. I thought maybe they just needed proof to be able to tell me "Happy Birthday" or something. But later there was this whole group of waiters and waitresses that came out from the back. They were all so smiley, and at first I thought they were even singing in Russian. But it was an English song I think (Du Wah Diddy). At the end of the song, Adrienne got the perfect picture of me blowing out the candle on the ice cream they gave to me. We ate SO much dessert, but it was so tasty, and it was my birthday, so I thought it was a good enough excuse to just indulge :)

Day 5 - First Day of School and Waffles!

 I'm actually on my sixth day now, sitting in the office just after my second day of school has finished. Anyways, on that first day of school (yesterday), I woke up early (I mean reeally early, like 3:30 in the morning) and worked on stuff until about 7:30, when I left for the Metro. I felt like I had everything completely set for the day. I had my little go-phone completely charged, my laptop and charger safely in my backpack, some grivna (money) in my wallet, my water-bottle filled with filtered non-sparkling water, keys in my pocket, my lesson plans prepared, and a smile on my face. Nothing in the world could have gone wrong yesterday, or so I was thinking that morning. We didn't even get lost or turned around once on our whole way here to school (it's about a 45 minute commute to here from home). When I got here to school, I printed out sheets for my lesson plans, and talked my jitters out with Maddy (my co-teacher), Marie (the head teacher), and Nelya (my coordinator who works in the office here).

Turns out only two of the six students we teach could make it that day (we had three today!) because of sickness and the snow, so we ended up winging most all of the day. We had our head teacher there though, so we did have a little guidance in what we should do. Even with her help, I felt like it was basically chaos for the entire four hours. One second we were playing "Simon Says" and the next, the two kids were braiding our hair.  It wasn't absolutely awful, but I've decided it should only be able to get better from here. Who would have thought teaching two kids would be so hard! I don't know exactly how this post thing works, but if anyone has any ideas of how I could better take control of and teach the class, that would be much appreciated! :) Thanks! 

I hung out with the other teachers after school for a while, but eventually me and Maddy headed out to the Metro again. On the way, we decided to get these amazingly tasty waffles! I don't know what they do to make them, but they are probably just about my favorite thing right now :)