Okay, I know it is August 6th and I am a bit late on this recap. I didn’t think that this would be a good month as it is county fair time. Two county fairs, one that my daughter competes in for 4-H and I am the co-chair of the Creative Arts open adult class so a busy two weeks and then I work at another county fair selling tickets so that is 5 days there. Basically, that left one week free and the fairs seem to zap the energy right out of me.
So how did I do?
Goal # 1 Reading. I only read 6 books this month, but the good news is that I have already read 6 books for August. Hopefully, things will be getting back to normal.
- Kingdom Keepers 3: Disney in Shadow
- Ranger in Time: Escape from the Great Earthquake
- The Handmaid’s Tale
- Hidden City: Lost in the Shadows
- Disrupting Thinking
- The Blessing
I read Disrupting Thinking for the Penny Kittle Book Love Book Club. Wow, lots to think about with this book. The online discussion was deep and full of ideas. I can’t wait to try some of them in my classroom.
The Handmaid’s Tale was for another online book club. I really enjoyed this book, but it had a different feel to it. I know that this was a book club for teachers, but I am not sure if I would be willing to teach all of this book in a high school class. My daughter saw me reading the book and informed me that she to read this for one of her classes in college. It was fun to be able to talk about a book with her.
The author of The Blessing sent me a copy of her book to review. You can find my review below this post on the blog.
Goal # 2 Crafting Time
Managed to get a little bit done here, but not much since I was at the fair so much. Surprisingly this tends to pick up more once fall comes. There are many Saturdays when I am the only one home. I will go into my craft room and play all day, one of my cats likes to join me during this time.
Goal # 3 Decluttering
The weather decided to help that goal along a bit. A couple of weeks ago we received somewhere between 3-7 inches which of course meant water in the basement. Thanks to this, we had to go through and get rid of things. We were able to salvage some things, but much of the basement has been cleaned out, items washed and either donated to Goodwill/Salvation Army, thrown away, or cleaned up and taken to the storage unit. Just a small section in the basement to go. I hope to start redoing the basement and turning it into a family room sometime during the next school year.
Goal # 4 Filing
I did get a bunch of stuff filed and the pile was almost nonexistent until the flood, then I found 4 boxes of things that I needed to go through. Much was trash (why do we save some of the things that we save)? but I also found the bill from the hospital when I was born and then the bill from when my oldest daughter was born almost 24 years ago. Those were fun to compare. Now I have some more stuff to file.
Goal # 5 to write more
Nothing happened at all on this goal sad to say. Someday I will be able to participate more with the Teacher’s Write.
Goal # 6 School Prep
Once again not as much as I would have liked. Actually, I knew there wouldn’t be much in July, had hoped to get more done in June. I did do a little bit with the Interactive Notebook and spent one day this month in my classroom trying to organize and update my classroom library. Since we go back in a week and a half, I will probably get more done in this area for the month of August.
Overall about what I predicted for the month of July. June is usually the month that I am most able to get things accomplished. Once fair season hits, then there doesn’t seem to be much time or energy for anything else. We still have one more fair to hit. I will take Kristen out to the Iowa State Fair early tomorrow morning. She is on the State Youth Council for 4-H and will be at the fair grounds for 2 weeks. She gets to spend the first few days cleaning out the 4-H building and getting everything set up. Then she will spend the rest of the time either assisting with animal shows (she is excited that she gets to help with the pig release, please don’t let her bring one home) and with many of the communications events in the 4-H building. The last two days of the fair she will give her Educational Presentation and then her Extemporaneous speech. Sarah and I will make a trip out to Des Moines in a week for a couple of days. Looking forward to this time with Sarah as it has been a long time since she was able to attend the State Fair. We will pop in and check on Kristen during that time, maybe even get a picture or two of her working. Then I will be going back out on Friday after PD so that I can be there for her two communications events and of course to bring her back home for the start of the school year.
Musings of an old English teacher 