Week One

Hi, I am a senior in the elementary education program at UVU. I am married with four children. I enjoy being outdoors, spending time with my family, reading good books, and riding bikes. My favorite food is homemade macaroni and cheese and I like all the colors of the rainbow. Here are some other interesting things about me.

1. I have a lot of favorite children’s books. So many in fact, it depends on the time of day which book I would say is my favorite. At this very moment, one of my all time favorites is Owen by Kevin Henkes. This story tells the story of a little mouse named Owen who has a favorite blanket he takes everywhere and a nosey neighbor who sticks her nose in Owen’s business. It tells of the lengths the parents go to get Owen to stop carrying his blanket with him. When it is time for Owen to go to school his mother comes up with a perfectly satisfactory way for everyone to be happy about the blanket. I love this book because Henkes makes the reader understand how important the blanket is to Owen and how his concerned mother makes everything all right in the end. It is heart warming. I highly recommend it.

2. As strange as it may seem, my favorite T.V. shows include Masterpiece Theater, 60 minutes, and the evening news on channel 5. I probably could be considered a news addict because if it is at all possible, I like to make dinner each evening between 5:00 and 6:00 p.m. so that I can watch the local and national news while I make dinner. I love Masterpiece Theater and am looking forward to this Sunday as the second season of Cranford is beginning. Tune in if you want to see excellent entertainment!

3. I collect Children’s books and have done so since practically the beginning of time. My main collection is paperback scholastic books, but I do have some hard cover books and am now working on my big book collection. I have more books than I should ever admit and I categorize them by type. For example, I organize books by themes such as apples, weather, etc. I keep my favorite authors altogether such as Henkes and DePaulo. I keep series of books together like Clifford, Froggy, and Authur. My newest addition to the collection is the hardback copies of the Caldecott Medal winning books. My oldest daughter has been giving me a new Caldecott Medal book complete with gold sticker on special occasions.

4. I keep writer’s notebooks to remind me of things I find interesting. One day, I might like to try and write children’s books and I plan on using the things that I record in my many notebooks as ideas in my books. In addition to my writer’s notebooks, I try to write in a personal journal so that there will be a story of who I am for future generations.

5. If I had to be a sponsor of an after-school group my first choice would be ecology, my second choice would be art or music appreciation, and my third choice would be a book club.

6. Besides a pottery class I took during summer in grade school, the only art lessons I have had were tole painting classes I took while I lived in Idaho. I would never consider myself an artist but I feel confident in my ability to create different types of art. I am pretty crafty and enjoy creating things with paper, scissors, and glue. I think this is partly why I think being a teacher will be so much fun.

7. As a little girl I took private piano lessons for about three or four years. When my younger sister drove my mother batty about not wanting to practice anymore, she let us quit. At the time, I was happy to be finished with all the practicing; however, now I regret that I did not continue with lessons or at least practice occasionally. I am only able to play very easy piano pieces after a great deal of practice.

8. As a little girl, I took classical ballet lessons. I had dreamed of being a dancer in the Nutcracker. My favorite part of dance was wearing pink tights, a pink leotard, and tiny pink ballet shoes. I can remember standing at the bar in front of a big mirror doing warm ups to live piano music. After my family moved, my parents were not able to drive me to the dance studio anymore and the dance studios near our new home were not the same. I missed my friends and my teachers and I lost interest in dancing.

9. As a child, I considered myself extremely shy and I would never have considered drama classes or performing in theater productions. I would never have wanted to draw attention to myself. However, I love Broadway type shows and have attended them with my parents since I was a little girl. This past summer I had a fantastic adventure with my sister and my three daughters. We traveled to New York to see Wicked, Phantom of the Opera, The Lion King, and Mary Poppins. I love watching a good musical!

10. In addition to all this, I like to work in my flower garden and dream of having a garden nice enough to be featured in Better Homes and Gardens.