So what has happened in the last 2 years that I have been neglecting this thing? Let's see (and I will elaborate in other posts on some of the big things):
Spring 2014: I started teaching my main course I had taught in a new format, and started teaching 3 other new classes. To say that spring was crazy was an understatement. My husband and I also got massively taken advantage of by people who were renting our home. Spring/Summer 2014 was not the most fun time in our lives...we learned a lot. We learned about the state landlord code, and we learned not to always take people for their word. We had been pretty naive to say the least.
Summer 2014: We had 2 students from Catalonia come stay with us for 6 weeks, continued dealing with the rental, and I taught my first summer class! It was literally one of the craziest classes I have ever taught, to say the least. Also...keep an eye on the guy in white. He becomes important in a little bit. (Ok, the guy in blue is important too). Fall 2014: I had another set of classes that were similar to my spring classes. The best part of the fall, though? I finally got to go to Harry Potter world! My husband and I took my fall break from classes, drove to Florida, and spent 3 days in one of my paradises. It was truly magical, and just what we needed after a long summer.
Spring 2015: Nothing much changed for me, in regards to work. I did start thinking about what my end goals were and how I could reach them. But, the big news was preparing for that guy in white above. The first step in our preparations was to buy plane tickets to go to Catalonia to visit both of our boys, their families, and other friends we had!!!! It was to be my husband's first time to Europe and my 2nd.
Summer 2015: Started with kind of a bang. Well, more of a slosh. A week before our trip, a bad storm hit our city that left thousands without power. We were 1 of them, and our basement flooded, AGAIN. This time resulted in over a week of drying out, ripping out carpet, and replacing it with vinyl when we got home from Catalonia. And the trip to Catalonia itself was, again, nothing less than magical. That guy in white (his name is Aran, the guy in blue is Joel), his parents, and our friend Coma had a magnificent itinerary planned for us...which I had asked about over and over for 4 months. Coma and Aran thought that it needed to all be a surprise...so when we landed in Barcelona I had no idea what we were going to be doing. This is a problem for a control freak! I would have been perfectly happy sitting in Aran's hometown spending time with his family, Joel's family, and Coma. But, no. They had 16 days of non stop amazing planned for us, which I will talk more about in another post!After coming home, we came back as a 3 person family for the year. Aran is staying with us for the entirety of the 2015-16 school year as an exchange student. His being with us has opened my eyes to a lot of things. We also went to see the MotoGP races in Indianapolis because Aran is a family friend of Marc Marquez, and while I wasn't sure what I would think about it, I really ended up loving it! We also went to Chicago for Labor Day weekend.
Fall 2015: Was the Fall of Aran in many ways. Aran participated in cross country at the high school he is doing exchange at, and we met some wonderful people during his time on the team. He also really enjoyed being on the team, and made some great friends. We also learned what it is like to be parents to a teenager...quite different than being just the 2 of us and some fur-babies. Aran isn't even a difficult child, quite frankly he is pretty much perfect, so I can't imagine what we would do with another.
So that bring me to today. There are obviously lots of things I mentioned above that I will expand on in future posts, and it's kind of amazing how you can boil 2 years down to so little. However, I felt that due to my absence I needed to write an extended reintroduction blog, and I hope to write more soon!
That project I mentioned above: Demonstrative Pocket. Check it out, in the coming weeks we will be launching the site and have some cool articles for people to read!
