1/2 Marathon and Christmas Picture!

We finished the half marathon yay!! My time was 2 hrs and 3 mins! I was aiming for like 2:10, so I'm really happy with my time:) They put up some pictures on the Internet of me running....I copied them, but not going to order them so that's why they say "PROOF" on them haha. It was a great race! Supposedly downhill, but it felt flat most of the time until the end when there were a couple small hills. But they came at the worst time (like mile 12!) so I was exhausted. My other goal for the race was to run the whole time without walking, and when I saw those hills I was like "oh crap.." but I did it! I ran them! Even though I was going about walking pace, I still did it:) yay. Jen and her friend Alicia also ran the half marathon with really good times! After the race we all got free massages and then headed to a cupcake place. My cupcake was cinnamon-y like a snickerdoodle. DElicious !!!

Jen and I now are thinking of running a FULL marathon! Crazy right? ;) We've both never done a full, but there is an awesome one (Rock n Roll) in San Diego in June that we are considering. And it ends in Sea World! Sooo that's what we're lookin at...

Yesterday, we had our support people (Ann and Cece) over for a little Christmas party. It was fun! We did white elephant gifts (I got mine at Goodwill for $1) and had some cookies, chocolate, wine, you know the usual;) We also took our Christmas picture which we are going to send out! Here it is:

Casa Nacho Christmas!!!! I'm holding Alejandro, our new prickly pear cactus, Erin has antlers, Jen is holding a wreath (REAL!) that Jeff's parents sent us, and Jeff is holding a pretty stocking that Ann let us borrow! That wreath smells awesome btw.

So, that's us! All ready for Christmas! I'm leaving this Saturday for Guatemala! 3 more days!!!

Holidays!

It is time for the holidays!! For Thanksgiving I drove over to Palm Desert to hang out with Mom, Dad, Sean, Grandma and Grandpa! That was really fun :) Except then we went to Vegas for Sean's 21st bday and in the course of one night I lost my purse which had my phone, credit card, camera, and license in it....AND on the drive home I accidentally locked my keys in my car when I was 3 hours from Tucson. Soooooo I decided that I just fall apart when I leave Tucson hahha.
It was really nice to get back to Tucson and see my community members again and sleep in my bed! (not that couches aren't awesome;) I had only been gone for 5 days but it felt like a long time to be gone! For Christmas we are going to Guatemala for 2 weeks...that's gonna feel like forever I bet!!

In our house we are celebrating the Christmas season by handmaking cards and watching holiday romantic comedies:) the bestest! Jen and I have been making cards from construction paper, ribbon, and glue. I'm making cards for my co-workers with little peppermint chocolates on them~ we watched Love Actually and The Holiday. good stuff! We might decorate a little bit, but no Christmas tree for the house :( (too expensive!) But Erin and Jeff planted some things in our garden so that's exciting!!!

Work is going pretty well. For the 7th and 8th graders, I'm having them each research Christmas traditions in a different country. We're making Word documents with pictures, citing our sources, and hopefully printing them out when they are done...I'm low on color ink...but anyway....oh the 6th graders are making Christmas cards in Word. The younger kids (2nd-5th grade) all have blogs now and they are really excited about them! They love to comment on each other's blogs (usually things like "nice!" and "cool!" haha) And then the really little kids (pre-k thru 1st) are just mostly playing educational games that I find online for them. And doing some typing practice. So that's fun...

On Friday I got to be a chaperone for the first time in my life! We went to a high school with 17 K-4th graders to a Christmas party. It was held for those kids whose families are the most in need. They each got presents from Santa and got to pick out a present for someone in their family as well. It was really cute! The high schoolers also did crafts and played sports with the kids, sang choir songs and put on a few skits, as well as had a dance party with the kids! They were sooo excited when Santa finally came out to give them their presents! It was great too since there were so many high schoolers I really didn't have to do much. The kids were a little rowdy on the bus, but I decided to just play I-Spy with the 2nd graders sitting next to me instead of "shh-ing" them every two seconds. As long as they were sitting down, I just let the kids be kids.

I think the only real problem I'm having is that I'm a little too nice sometimes. I don't really want to punish the kids or be mean to them, so when they don't follow directions or chat with each other I just tell them to stop, but don't really do anything like yell or take their computers away. I think if I did take the computers away, they would just talk anyway. Soooo besides that, work is going well! They eventually listen to me :)

Only a week and a half left until I leave for Guatemala! Exciting!!!

Breathing Peace

Hello there again! Well last week was a short work week! Veteran's Day we all got off from work, so we decided to work on our garden! We borrowed a pick-up truck from Cece's dad and went around to different spots we found on craigslist for dirt, pots, and pallets for the compost. We also stopped by Ace Hardware to get potting soil, top soil and manure (we kept saying "that's horse shit!") haha. We constructed a compost that's right under our kitchen window, so we can just open the window and throw compost out into it. That's right, we're that bad-ass! We tied the pallets together with old plastic shopping bags. Doing the REUSE part!

(<---me+compost) On Saturday, we had some more time to work on our garden. When we went to actually dig it though, it proved to be more difficult that expected! The ground here is close to rock hard so it has to be pick-axed first, then dug up. It was very taxing on the pick-axers (I stuck to the shovel most the time, because I learned that I suck at using the pick-ax!) After digging, mixing in soil and manure and covering, we ended up with a garden that is about the size of a grave (it kinda looks like one too....oh well!)

<--Me, Jeff, Jen, and Erin with our garden (compost is behind me, kitchen window right above!)


Saturday night, to get ready for Sunday, we went to a gathering at Southside Presbyterian church (where the Sanctuary movement started!). And that is where I saw Father Matt! It was good to see him again and we talked a bit! He got to meet my community members as well! They had a free lasagna dinner and then a get together that included singing, prayer, reading and tai chi! I really liked the tai chi. Never having done it before, I didn't know what to expect, but I really liked the whole "breathing peace" idea. Coolness. So, what we were preparing for was Sunday when we drove to Fort Huachuca to protest torture and war. It was my first protest in a while, and definitely the biggest I had been to. There were about 100 of us protesting together in song and prayers for peace. Very awesome.

On the other side, there were counter-protesters who were very rude! They swore to us, told us to leave the USA and move to Afghanistan or Iraq. They kept telling us "torture works!" and shouting "USA! Support the Troops!" I don't think that promoting peace is anti-American, but they seemed to think so! Anyway, it was a very interesting experience to say the least!
Now, I'm on my last full week before Thanksgiving break. Next week I'm working Mon-Wed with a half day Wednesday and then driving 6 hrs to Palm Desert for a family Thanksgiving! woo! This week so far has been a good teaching week. I had a great class with the 2nd graders, teaching them computer terms and they had to search for them in an online picture search. Overall, things are going pretty well!! :)

Halloween/Dia de Los Muertos!

Heeeyyyy! So our Halloween weekend here was really fun! On Friday night we went over to the Mennonite volunteers' house in costumes! I was a unicorn (child's costume), Erin was Bob the Builder, Jen was a cow and Jeff was Dorothy from the Wizard of Oz (yes he wore a blue dress!!) Unfortunately, Jen has all the pictures from that night and hasn't posted them on Facebook so I don't have them, but they are on her blog if you want to see (here) Saturday and Sunday of that weekend were pretty lazy days. We slept over at the Mennonite house Friday night and ended up staying a lot of Saturday just hanging out and watching movies (Anchorman!)

This weekend was the Dia de Los Muertos (Day of the Dead) parade. One of the two houses from Phoenix came down to stay the weekend and that was really fun! There are 5 of them and they all really cool people (and funny!) On Saturday we went on a hike in Sabino Canyon to 7 falls (more like little ponds, but that's ok!) I took like one picture of it on my phone -- wow I need to get better with pictures here! Anyway, um that hike was really great! I love nature, it's so nice to get out of the city! Even though Tucson isn't a big city, it's still concrete and cars I like to get away from!

On Sunday was the parade! People dress up as skeletons and parade down 4th ave. through downtown. We actually didn't dress up, but some of our friends did. Even though we weren't dressed up, we still walked in most of the parade! At the end there is a huge show/concert/acrobatic thing. It was hard to see so we went to a nearby parking garage to watch from there. There was a giant paper urn that they burnt and a big crane with a jellyfish type thing and people hanging off...craziness! I got a couple pics of that on my phone too so I'll upload those soonish! The people we were marching with for a bit (Casa Mariposa) made a video of the parade (here)
So, yeah it was great. They made a big thing with butterflies on it-one for each person who died crossing the US-Mexico border this year.

So, those were the last two weekends. Other stuff that's going on-Nora, our site coordinator, is visiting us for a week from Santa Clara. She meets with each of us and our supervisors, then we have a retreat day on Friday. Also, Veteran's Day is Thursday, so I've got a three day work week!
And, our house has started to play this awesome board game called Settlers of Catan. It sounds kinda silly, collecting resources like sheep and wheat, then creating settlements and cities. It's kind of a cross between Risk and Monopoly, but it's really cool!

Yeppp that's my life right now! I've been running to train for the half marathon, but I fell on our hike on Saturday and when I ran today my leg still hurt :( but hopefully it feels better soon and I can run more than 2.5 miles like I did today! haha. It's also actually getting cold in Tucson! The high today was like 69! crazzyyy

End of October!?!

October is coming to an end--Halloween is on Sunday!!! Looking back on the month, I have definitely done a lot and at times it felt really slow moving, but now that the month is basically over, I'm thinking, where did the time go? Last weekend on Saturday I was walking back home after a concert at Plush with Jen and I was thinking--wow I don't want this year to end! It needs to go slower!!! But then there are those days that you just want to end--like any time I have to teach the 3rd graders *shudder*

I also still wish I knew my housemates better than I do. We did start having a good convo during Spirituality night on Sunday. But it feels the opposite of Freshman year in college where I felt like I knew everyone so well after a month. I do feel like I know my community pretty well, but sometimes I think--wow I really don't know that much about them. We have only known each other since August. I should probably make more of an effort, but sometimes after work it's nice to just hang out and talk or read a book. (I finished the Dragon Tattoo books btw!! very good~!!!)

So anyway, life goes on. Saturday we tailgated the U of A vs Washington game with some ACE people, which was an interesting expeience. I'm definitely glad I didn't go to a huge state school. It's kinda fun for the whole football atmosphere but I think that would get old really fast.I've also found (from what I've seen) that a lot of the U of A girls are a lil skanky. Jen was joking about wearing a red dress to the tailgate and when we got there we not only saw girls in short red dresses, but also girls in booty shorts and cut up t-shirts and so on. I mean, every school has got some girls like that, but this school seems to have more...?

Oh and I've decided to run the Tucson Half Marathon in December! I'm out of shape, but slowly getting back into it. My roommates think I'm a natural runner because I can run 4 miles without training. But that's completely opposite to how I think because I compare myself to my mama and sista who are super good at running--and me--not so much! haha. I did make it 4 miles yesterday with average pace at 9:48 so that was pretty good after only running once in the last week! I'm starting to run after work now which is nice (and the temperature has cooled off enough that I can actually do that!)

Oh some pictures from JVC orientation are up on Flickr at this link (Click)
This one is of the Santa Clara University group!
This is the whole group! I'm in the back mid/left
This is our CASA!

So, yeah. Oh and I got an aweessommmee package from the parentals yesterday that included candy, cookies and bike lights which are key because we can now ride in the dark~!!! (still need a 4th bike, but will hopefully get one soon!)

Peace Out

Meghan's Visit! and Reading!

Meghan and Michelle came to visit me two weekends ago! It was really fun! There were here from Thursday to Sunday (Oct 7th-10)! Michelle got two huge flower tattoos on her shoulder--so Tucson! Meghan took a test at U of A on Friday and then we had the rest of the weekend for fun! We went to Tucson Meet Yourself, which is a festival of food and music (mostly food!) from around the world! I had Thai food and churros the first day we went and Somalian food the second time! There were lots of foods but some didn't have vegetarian options so I had to be a lil picky!! It was great having them both visit, but also a bit strange! Meghan has known me for so much longer than my roommates (4 years, but still...haha) and she's a friend from the real world, not this new JVC world. But when the two worlds collided I think we still had a good time :)

Now---my life is consumed by these addicting books! I got The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo from the library because I had heard it was good. Well, IT IS!!! I wanted to get the second one, but all copies were checked out! Luckily, Erin's Mom is a fan of the books and sent all three to her daughter! Which meant when Erin was reading the first one, I could read the second! Now, I'm reading the third and final installment (The Girl Who Kicked the Hornet's Nest) and Erin is on the 2nd book. WE ARE OBSESSED!! I'm reading it during my lunch break, after school, before I go to bed....all the time! And the books are long too--it's kinda like my obsessions with Harry Potter and Twilight, but Harry Potter is the best of all of them (duh)!

Annyywaayy when I'm not reading I'm teaching and tutoring! I've had a good time mostly with tutoring. I especially like tutoring the two 1st grade girls, Julie and Katarina. Katarina is such a cutie I just want to take her home with me! (Oops--that's a joke...I'm not into kidnapping I swear;) And Mya, the 5th grader I tutor in math is doing really well also. I'm teaching her how to do long division. She's new to the school (like me!) and didn't learn division at her other school. She's very bright and learns quickly, which is a good change of pace from most of the kids I'm tutoring who need extra help for other reasons. I changed my time of tutoring the two 4th graders, Kristofer and Selena, to right before computers. But now they have to miss recess to be tutored, which is kinda good because they aren't missing out on class, but I also feel bad that I'm making them miss recess! Oh well!

We've also been missing the Internet at school for a couple weeks now. The router broke, and I'm trying to come up with creative ways for the kids to use Word and Paint. This week, the middle schoolers are doing something called Musical Computers that I found online. They start a story all the same then add to it, rotate computers, fix what the other person wrote, write some more, rotate again and so on. I had them start with "When I left school yesterday, I saw an alien in the parking lot." The kids had a good time writing and sharing their stories. I heard from both 7th and 8th grade that they had fun and would like to do this again sometime. It also was a good practice for typing skills and learning how to correct spelling and grammar on Word, so it worked out well! It's harder to find something for the younger kids to do without the Internet. They get bored of typing pretty fast. I am having them draw and also use a program I downloaded called Tux Typing. It's a typing game where a penguin eats fish with letters falling from the sky!

So, things are going pretty well here. We're getting to know our other volunteer friends better which is nice as well! Yay friends! And my roommates are super cool people so that's good too! It's great to have people to come home to and talk about my day if I've had a particularly hard time teaching or something! Sharing is caring! It can be fun! ;)

Birthday Fun and Tutoring!

Heyyooo! So my birthday was yesterday! It was pretty cool. My day started out with the morning prayer at school. Each day we all line up by class (ok I'm not a teacher of a specific class so I just stand on the side) and the kids/teachers say the Pledge of Allegiance in English and then Spanish. After that, they do a prayer. At the beginning of each week, they do a prayer for the students whose birthdays are that week. Only this time, they included me too! So, I stood up there with a 1st grader and 6th grader and the rest of the school (all 200 of them) said a prayer for us! It was nice. Then of course all the kids knew it was my birthday so they would shout out "Happy Birthday Miss Devlin!" throughout the day and a few kids even came up to give me hugs! :) Aw, so cute!

I went to go teach the Pre-K in the morning and after the class was over they all sang happy birthday to me! To take the computers over to the building where the Pre-K is, I have to take two trips so on my way back, when I walked in they were having a dance party! It was so funny to see these little 4 yr olds dancing to pop music all together hahaha!

I also got some spontaneous singing from a few of the grades. I felt bad in the 4th grade because I went in to just get the two kids I am tutoring, but the whole class stopped the lesson to sing me happy birthday (and then a round of "may the good Lord bless you!") But the teacher was singing along, so it was all right! But when they started to do the "cha cha cha"s, she stopped them!

When I took the computers to the 7th grade after lunch, a few of the girls decided to write "Happy Birthday Miss Devlin" on the board in markers and draw balloons and streamers. Then 3 of the girls sang me a birthday song on the spot. It was funny! For the lesson that day, I had the kids make a party invitation in Microsoft Word to their own birthday parties. It went really well! It's sometimes hard with the middle schoolers to get them to focus, but they were mostly in tune to the assignment yesterday. Maybe they were just being good because it was my birthday?

I also started tutoring this week. I'm tutoring 5th-8th grade in Math, 4th in reading, a few 3rd graders in Math and a couple 1st graders in reading. I had to brush up on my elementary math, but it's a lot easier than I remember it being in school. When the kids ask me "Are you good at Math?" I have to remember to say "Yes!" instead of my usual "No..." because I must be good if I'm tutoring them right??? Well I've got up to 8th grade math down anyway, so to them, I'm good at Math!

At the end of the day yesterday, since it was also the Feast of St. Francis, the kids all got popsicles and pencils! I was the one handing out the pencils (all sparkly!) and there was always a crowd trying to figure out the best pencil for them. One of the 7th grade girls was joking around with me about how important it is to get the right pencil and she said "If you get the wrong one, it might write French!" haha I thought that was hilarious!

The kids crack me up most of the time! Last week, one of the 4th graders (Angelica) asked me "Are you a Judas?" haha. She meant a Jesuit I think because Mr. Chavez was telling his class that I'm a Jesuit Volunteer! Also, this one little preschooler, I pretty much see her every morning and she always goes "Hi computer teacher!" So cute! And another one of the 4th graders (Tiffany) gave me a note with a heart in it the 2nd week and later on told me she cut her hair like mine! (which was funny because it looks nothing like mine) And then there is the 1st grade girl that likes to say "Yum Yum!" to me and point to my tummy hahaha. They are just so funny!

I'm really enjoying teaching more than I thought I would! Especially with the one-on-one tutoring, I feel like I am imparting knowledge and making a difference!

OMG!

Soooooo yeah. A lot has happened! Like.....we met Brian Lopez!! It was extremely awkward and funny at the same time! We were acting like 13-year-old girls meeting their idol hahaha. Here's our amazing picture with him!
(Jen, Me, Erin, Bribri)
Oh yeah and in the picture, we are wearing our new Tucson dresses! We decided we should look more Tucson so we went dress shopping on 4th ave!
But..that was like 2 weekends ago.
Last weekend was Erin's birthday party and we got to meet the Presbyterian volunteers (Young Adult Volunteers aka YAVers)! They met us for the first time as we were having a dance party in our living room, so that was fun! We were dancing to Poker Face hahaha.
Yesterday we met up with them again and some of the MVSers (Mennonite volunteers) at La Placita where they show free movies! Last night's movie was The Princess Bride, which was of course AMAZING! We're going hiking early tomorrow morning (6am woo!) with the YAVers and some of the MVSers! Then later on we are going to a BBQ with some of the teachers from Santa Cruz. And Sunday, we are going to a new church, then were invited to a Wine and Cheese Night with the ACErs and the teachers. So, it should be a good! I'm really enjoying our weekends!! My roommates are so fun!
We have also decided to get more involved in the community and plan things during the week. On Wednesday we went over to the Casa Mariposa Restoration Project. I'm not 100% sure what they do, I need to look more into that, but they offered us a free (veg) meal and the people were all really nice! On their facebook page, it says "Nourished and empowered by the Spirit, the Restoration Project seeks to live in right relationship with one another, the community, and the earth through hospitality, simple and sustainable living, playful spirituality, and peaceful, prophetic action." So, yeah it's pretty awesome. They have their own garden and the meal we ate was mostly (if not all) local and organic, some from their own garden!
As far as work goes, I'm having a great time! My main troubles come from the kids being too loud as I try to explain things to the class. That, and the technology issues with the computers. But, I'm enjoying teaching so far! Sister says we got a grant for technology related stuff, so I think we will get some software (Mavis Beacon!) and headphones. That should be good!
I'm really starting to get used to life here. Even though the high tomorrow will be 99, I'm not worried. I do miss Santa Clara and Portland, but there are some good things here too!

Brian Lopez and Tucson Weirdness

Last weekend was really fun! And we were introduced to Brian Lopez! (I'll explain!)

So, on Friday we went out for some pizza (our first time going out for food!) at Brooklyn Pizza, which is connected to Sky Bar and this lady in a sparkly shirt came up to us and was like "You can't sit here, we are going to set up for the fire show" And we were like whhaaa??? But yep, they had a fire show with ladies throwing fire in the air and eating it....weird. We have decided that Tucson is very strange!!

The fire looked really cool on my camera after I changed the shutter speed haha. Ok so Saturday we drove up to the top of Mount Lemmon to go hiking. We stopped in the town of Summerhaven and got out, ate PB+J sandwiches while walking to the trail, and then hiked! It was really fun! It's also weird up there because once you get to the point where the cacti end, it almost looks like a forest. For about 10 minutes it almost reminded me of Oregon! But then we kept going and saw dead trees and I was like "Yep, back in Arizona!"

Jeff, Erin, and Jen hiking in front of me with the dead trees in the background!All four of us on the hike!

Saturday night, we went to PLUSH, where they have live concerts. Ted (Music/Art teacher from Santa Cruz) invited us to come see Brian Lopez because it was only $5 and Brian was really good! Well, Jen and Erin (and me to a lesser extent) fell in love with Brian! Jen even decided if (when) she marries Brian, her name will be Jennifer Lopez! So, of course we now call her JLo haha. I thought his music was ok, but he was a great performer. And he made all of us like Tucson better. Tucson is just a very strange city. Downtown has 3 big buildings and that's it. We are in the middle of a desert and everyone's house is one story, it's really spread out and....just weird! So unlike Portland or San Francisco, except 4th ave. which is probably the coolest area around here. This is Brian Lopez and his band! We are going to see him again today at a music festival with other local bands. There is supposedly a midnight dance party as well, so it should be interesting!

On Sunday, Jen and I drove to Nogales, Mexico with Mr. and Mrs. Chavez and their children. We stopped by the Mexican Walmart to get supplies and food, then dropped everything off an orphanage for boys. We got to look around a bit and meet the children! So cute! Maria, Mr. and Mrs. Chavez's adopted daughter from Mexico had a hard time letting go of one of the little boys and started crying because she remembered what it was like to be in an orphanage in Mexico. But at other times she was cracking jokes about how they make kids work in Mexico and how Jen and I should find boyfriends there. The whole day was pretty fun!

On Labor day, we woke up REALLY early to do that run I was talking about. We drove to the Quigley's house and Mr. Quigley drove us to the race from there. He was doing the 8 mile and we did the 5k. It was great! I hadn't been running because of the heat, but it felt ok! I ran with Erin until the end when I lost her for the last half mile or so. Ended up getting 26.48ish mins. Not terrible! I do need to start running more tho! It's just too hot later in the day and I'm too lazy to wake up at 5:30 before work in the mornings! But I ran this morning so hah! After the race, we grabbed lotsa free gear (and got free massages! woo!) then went back the Quigley's house where they had a big breakfast for us with homemade biscuits! ahhh!

The workweek went pretty well. On Tuesday, Mrs. Chavez asked me to watch her 1st grade class for the last 45 mins of the day because she had to go to the doctor. It was great! The 1st graders are soo funny. I read them a story about apples and they loved it! I was like "what colors are the apples?" and they screamed out "yellow! green! red!" haha. They also thought they had to tell me every little thing in their lives. When I took them to a bathroom break, one of the little boys was like "Two boys just dared me to stick my head in the toilet." I wasn't so sure how to respond to that, but oh well! I had him tell me their names and I said I'll tell his teacher (of course I forgot their names, but at least he felt heard;)

On Thursday, I taught the kindergartners for the first time! They are adorable!! I got them to turn on the computers and play with Paint for a while. they mastered the click and drag! I was so proud. Once they could determine which side was left and how to hold down the clicker with the mouse, they were golden! When I asked the class why we should be careful with computers, one of the little boys raised his hand and was like "I lost my tooth!" I was like.."ok!" haha.

So, yeah I'm liking work--but also glad it's the weekend! A little rest and relaxation before another week with the kiddos!

Starting To Get It

Now that we've been here for 3 whole weeks, I've started to get into at least a little bit of a routine. It doesn't kill me to wake up at 6:15am Monday thru Friday like it felt the first week. I've finally got a set schedule at school of which classes I teach when (I start teaching the Kindergartners beginning next Thursday!) The kids are starting to recognize me at school saying "Hey Miss Devlin" or "Bye Miss Devlin" at the end of the day. The teachers are apparently going to Happy Hour after the faculty meeting today, so maybe I'll go to that!

It's a long weekend because of Labor Day, so I'm excited. On Sunday, I might go to an orphanage in Nogales, Mexico if it works out with some of the other teachers. We'll see! And on Labor Day, we're planning on running a 5K in Saguaro National Park. We didn't actually sign up for the race, we just want to participate (for free;)

So, it's going pretty well. I had the realization sometime maybe last week that this isn't just a trip to Arizona, I'm actually going to be here for a year (I mean, I knew that but it still kinda felt like a trip!) I started to miss family and friends and it is also strange that I'm not going back to college. I know I went through that whole graduation thing, but now I guess I'm in real life? But yeah, I'm getting more used to it as time goes on!

Making new friends, Museum, and Redecorating!

So, our weekend was pretty chill. On Friday night, we hung out with the Mennonite volunteers (no they aren't Amish) at their house and ended up playing cards with them for 3 hours! It was an intense game of President! They are actually completely normal (different from what I expected after Googling "Mennonite")!! And there are four of them, four of us! [also one guy, three girls] So, yeah new friends! With the ACErs that brings our total of outside friends to 11!

Saturday we went to the Desert Museum and it was really cool! We got to see lots of cacti, animals, and rocks! They had javelina there (kinda like boars) that I had never seen before and a mountain lion! Oh and a big bear too, but he was sleeping and wouldn't wake up even though we were like "wake up bear!~" lol. We also decided we would probably die in the wild because we are the ones provoking a bear! The museum was very well put together though and even included a hike to get around the desert setting. The cacti that were flowering were so pretty! I took some pictures, but they are still on my camera. The saguaro cacti look like this!! They grow so slowly (about a 1/4 inch per year!)

They also had a cave area with bats and they had this big thing where you stick your head in and hear like a bat would hear. (If we were bats, our ears would be this big!) We each took a picture in the bat hearing thing:


On Sunday, we moved our furniture around and redecorated our living room and kitchen! I'll take some pictures and put them up here when I get Cricket internet (hopefully tomorrow, but it could take a lot longer! who knows!!!) We stopped by the thrift store to get some pictures for the walls and a couple board games (Life and Clue, good ideas for Community nights!) Then we had a JVC potluck with our agencies, support people, and former Jesuit Volunteers. It was really great to see everyone who helped put our house together and those who are going to help us out this year all together in the same room! Plus, they brought tons of food and we got the leftovers! Woo!

So, yep! It's going pretty well. Having a good time at work too. Little Anthony V. in first grade ran up to me today on my way back to my trailer and he said "Hey! What's your name again?" I was like "Miss Devlin" and he was like "Miss Devlin, I'm playing Halo" and was holding an imaginary gun. I was like "Oh that's cool, are you shooting aliens?" and he said "No, they are more like gorillas" and then ran off. So cute!

I'm Really Teaching!

My first real week of teaching started on Monday when I taught the 7^th grade! I was a little nervous, but grabbed all the confidence I could and pushed my cart of laptops into the classroom. The cart itself is a little hard to maneuver. It really should be pushed by two people and pretty much has a mind of its own. Sometimes a teacher will see me struggling and help out, but most of the time I'm on my own trying to push it to each classroom! But anyway, I got the cart to the 7th grade classroom early and waited for them to get back from lunch. I went through the lesson about passwords and had them all pick their own password then change it on the computer. They finished the lesson quickly, but luckily I had a backup plan of having them type in Microsoft Word a paragraph titled “What I like about Computers.” I went through the laptops later in the day and read through them. Everyone really liked computers because of games, Internet, music, Youtube, Facebook, Myspace, etc. Except one little boy named Diego who wrote “I don’t like computers because they are unreliabel. And if you have one you might get robed” I’m guessing he meant robbed. Those are two pretty good reasons, Diego! Thanks!

That night, Jen and I decided we wanted to craft to decorate the house, so we drove to Wallgreens and got some poster board and markers ($5 to decorate, not too bad!). We created flowers for our room, a sign in our kitchen that says CASA NACHO and a cactus called Alejandro (pictured:) Jeff and Erin helped out with the Casa Nacho sign as well, so it's a community effort! Also, Mr. and Mrs. Chavez (Spanish and 1st grade teachers) brought over some chili for our house. It was so nice of them!! And really tasty! We had it for dinner Tuesday and it was the main part of my lunches for two days in a row!

On Tuesday I taught 4^th grade in the morning and 8^th after lunch. The age groups are so different from each other! But even in each class there will be much disparity in terms of how much they know about computers. These kids haven’t had computer classes before (at least not at this school) and may not have one at home or even touched one before. So, I shouldn’t be surprised if they don’t know how to turn it on or how to click and drag. Most of the 8^th graders had some computer sense, but some of the 4^th graders struggled. It doesn’t help that I didn’t have enough laptops for each kid! (Some are broken!)

Wednesday, I started by teaching 2^nd grade in the morning (adorable!) 6^th grade after lunch (not too bad) and ended with 1^st grade (cute!) For the 2^nd and 1^st graders it’s kind of difficult because some of the kids know a lot more than others. But luckily, especially in 2^nd grade, I got a lot of help from the students. Two of the girls helped me pass out the computers and the ones who were sitting next to people who needed help mostly helped out. There are 27 kids in the 2^nd grade though, so some of them had to share laptops. I asked beforehand who wanted to share because I figured that would be easier. For the younger kids, I started with a game of Simon Says to see if they could "point to the screen" and "put your finger on the mouse!" Then I had them log in and use the Paint application and draw a picture. Most of them were scribbling, but I saw a couple cool tidbits of art in there!

Mr. Mount, the volunteer IT guy, came in and showed me a bit more about the computers and the internet. The wired internet works fine at the school, but the wireless is iffy. We think it's the router, but not totally sure. After some explanations and a couple (failed) attempts at fixing computers #12 and 23, Mr. Mount went on a long 20ish minute rant about how the kids should not be using computers this young. He justified it by comparing to how the younger kids lose their math facts if they use calculators. At the very end of the rant he goes, "not to belittle your job or anything." uhhh yeah thanks Mr. Mount;)

Today, I taught the 3rd grade. They were SOOO excited to each have their own laptop (for the lesson). I've been hearing for the past two weeks how unruly and badly behaved this class is, but I thought they were great. They have one of the ACE teachers this year, (Christie) and I think she's doing a good job disciplining them! When they were too loud in Spanish class, she had them each personally write an "I'm sorry" note to the Spanish teacher. He read some of them to me today. They said things like "Dear Mr. Chavez, I'm sorry I was bad. Have a great day." haha so cute.

So, yeah that's my week so far! I'm at Pima Community College on an internet binge with Jen. I've learned I'm not going to Mexico this weekend, but we might go hiking and other fun things! Will update! Also I've decided it would be great to get internet at home (Ok..I always wanted that) and the Cricket outcome isn't looking great :( But we'll see!!!

"Miss Devlin"

Soooo I finished my first week at work! yay! As you can see by my new ID badge, I'm an official member of the Santa Cruz staff!! It's been a very long week, but also fun getting to know the school better and some of the kids! I didn't teach any computer classes this week because the principal thought it would be best for me to just prepare before jumping in! School officially started on Tuesday, so Monday was mostly full of paperwork and stuff. On Tuesday, the kids arrived, and they are so cute! I helped out the 1st grade teacher getting the kids to the prayer service and back. One of the first grade girls' name is MysticalRose. What an awesome name! And there was this adorable kid named Anthony who kept turning around to talk to me during the prayer service. I told him to shhhh but he just had A LOT to say! The principal, Sister Leonette, gave each kid a (plastic) pearl (saying they are all special, aww) and Anthony had to tell me and his classmates "These aren't real pearls!!" Of course they aren't, kid! We're not going to give you real ones haha. Apparently kids up to grade 3 were putting them in their mouths!

For my first three days, I was going through the cart of 25 laptops clearing off what the kids put on there last year. I got to see backgrounds on the computers of Justin Bieber, Taylor Lautner, sports teams, cars, and one girl had a banana as a background! Some of the kids had the gadget on the side where you type on post it notes. Someone wrote "I love superman!!!!" and one wrote "Wherever the sun does not shine, that is where Justin Bieber is" which didn't make much sense to me since she looked like a Bieber fan haha. I worked with volunteer IT guy (who used to be a math teacher at the school) named Mr. Mount on Wednesday for a little bit. He told me I have the "patience of Job" for going through all the computers and erasing everything. Each of the 25 computers had 8 different grades on them so it did take a while! I guess Job was patient in the Bible? It's been a while since I read it....uh oh bad JV :O

Also on Wednesday, I taught my first class! One of the middle school teachers had to leave early, so I subbed for him. It was 6th grade science and they were doing their first hands on lab. It was about the senses, they have 5 different stations they went to (one for each sense) and for example, they would smell an onion in a tissue box with holes in it so they couldn't see. Then they wrote a paper about why the senses are important to science. It was a little scary to teach my first class, but 6th graders at least listen to you. (Unlike 7th and 8th!?) There were these two girls who kept asking me questions about the paper and I didn't know, so I pretty much made it up haha.

The next day, one of the two 6th grade girls who asked me all the questions came up and gave me a hug before school started. It was cute! She said "I finished that homework in ten minutes." I'm guessing that's good? On Thursday I didn't have much work to do, so I lesson planned at my new desk in the air conditioned trailer! Isn't it pretty? :) I also found out I might go to Nogales, Mexico next Saturday with some of the other teachers to an orphanage that the kids raised money for Lent last school year! That would be really cool!

On Friday, I helped the 2nd grade get to Mass in the morning. It's the biggest class in the school-27 kids! Then, I observed Mr. Chavez teach Spanish to the first graders. He had this cute way of having them memorize the months of the year. They all pulled out imaginary "dough" from their desks and made tortillas. Each time the tortilla switched hands, they said the next month. It was adorable. They were also counting like "first, second" and when they got to sixth ("sexto" in Spanish) This little girl puts an arm on her hip and goes "I like sexto!" I wasn't sure if I should be amused or a little scared haha. Oh and I got my own box in the teacher's lounge. It says "Miss Devlin" on it. Still trying to adjust to being called that. I'm like "Hi, I'm Ka...um...Miss Devlin'" lol. So, yeah from the picture you can definitely tell I get lots of mail compared to the teacher above me;)

So---that was my work week! In community, we've been having a great time. I get along well with my casamates and we've had some great dinners! On Monday I made Asian stirfry, Tuesday Jeff made an amazing frittata, Weds Jen made yummy pasta, Thurs we all made burritos (soaked the beans and everything!) and Friday Erin made a great couscous and veggies dish! So, I'm lovin the food so far! We have found some potential stores to save more money than we did last week! Last night we went out to the bars for the first time. We were just getting to know the area, and we ended up seeing some of the ACE teachers. It was funny. Anyway, the adjustment is going pretty well. We also got a bike from one of the teachers at my school, so we only need 3 more! And, I might get Cricket internet at work that I can bring home! (So I can actually Skype! And blog more than just at the library!) Woo!

First Week!!

Casa Nacho=Jeff, Me, Erin, and Jen! :)

Jesuit Volunteer Corps is just starting for me and it's all so confusing and exciting at the same time! We had Orientation in Aptos, CA by the beach (but cold!) for five days (Aug 7-11) then drove down to Tucson on Thursday! (822 miles!) It's been so crazy! There were 86 volunteers at Orientation, and there are only 4 of us in the house in Tucson. The other cities in our region with JVC are like San Francisco, LA, San Diego, Phoenix, etc. So, I got to meet most of them at some point. Our Orientation was full of meetings, prayers, and lots of good food! But, we had to sleep on cots in big dorms! It was great though.

This year, I will be working (volunteering) at a Catholic elementary/middle school called Santa Cruz and I'll be teaching computer classes for grades Pre-K to 8th grade! So, yeah!! I don't really know that much about computers or teaching, so it should definitely be an experience! Yesterday, we got a little tour of the city and got to go to each of our volunteering sites. I got to see the school (it's so little and cute). There is one classroom per grade at Santa Cruz and a church attached.

So, if you don't know much about JVC, (jesuitvolunteers.org) it's basically a volunteer program rooted in four values-Simple Living, Spirituality, Community, and Social Justice. My casamates and I will be living in our house with limited budgets for food and basically no luxuries (so, if anyone wants to send us some cookies or chocolate that would be great, can't fit that in the budget yet!) Our house is called Casa Ignacio Ellacuria (or Casa Nacho for short)! It's very cute, 3 bedroom, with living, dining, and kitchen. We tried grocery shopping today, which is very hard when you are on a tight budget!! So, it's all just so new. We'll get used to it soon I'm sure!

I haven't taken any pictures yet, the picture on top we took about 5 minutes ago at the library (where I am posting this because I don't have internet at the house) When I do take some pics, I'll post them on facebook and a link on here!
I start work on Monday ahhh! And Tucson is sooo hot I am drinking water every 5 minutes!