Fly. Run. Walk.

After having been an English teacher for almost eight years and a mom for about two and a half, my husband and I have decided it’s finally time for me to be done with teaching and be a full-time “stay-at-home-mom”. A friend half-jokingly asked me the other day what I was going to do with all my free time, now that I’m no longer going to be teaching Honors English III in a local Christian school. I half-jokingly replied that I was going to blog. Upon reflection though, it seems like this really will give me the opportunity for the intellectual engagement, interaction, and discussion that I love about teaching and will truly miss next year. I am a student at heart, one of those kinds of people who always loved school and loved it so much that she decided to be a teacher so she would never have to leave (or work in the summertime!). I read as much as I can, even if it’s just Mike Mulligan and his Steam Shovel or Bread and Jam for Francis. I also love to cook and find putting a good meal on the table and sharing it with family and friends one of the most satisfying experiences of my life. One of my favorite childhood memories is sitting around my family’s dining room table, having good conversations. I still enjoy a good conversation more than almost anything in the world (but watching Britcoms on PBS and listening to books on tape would definitely come in at a close second). I’m also developing a near-addiction to New York Times crossword puzzles (got a book for my birthday) but have to admit that it doesn’t take much to make me look in the back of the book at the answers.

Books on my nightstand:
Innocent Blood by P.D. James
Stealing the Mona Lisa: What Art Stops Us From Seeing by Darian Leader
branded: The buying and selling of Teenagers by Alissa Quart
Pride and Prejudice by Jane Austen

Books I keep Coming Back to:
Peace Like A River by Leif Enger
Jaber Crow by Wendell Berry
The Supper of the Lamb by Robert Ferrar Capon
Crime and Punishment by Fyodor Dostoevsky
Anne of Green Gables by L.M. Montgomery
Four Quartets by T.S. Eliot
Mariette in Ecstasy by Ron Hansen

Movies I’d see again and again
Chariots of Fire
Strictly Ballroom
Big Fish
Dead Poet’s Society
The Princess Bride
Moulin Rouge

The Soundtrack of my Life
HEM
The Wailin’ Jennys
Innocence Mission
Over the Rhine
U2
Jason Harrod
Claire Holley
Andrew Peterson
Beethoven’s 9th Symphony
Chopin’s Piano Concerto
Nessun Dorma
Wynton Marsalis and the Lincoln Center Jazz Orchestra