Springtime..almost

So it's really leaning toward being spring here in Minnesota. I use the word leaning carefully. There still are the occasional flurries (yesterday) but there have been a few days in the upper 70s. The lake by our house has completely melted so I think that's a good sign of spring. The trees are budding, the bulbs are coming up and the birds are busy chirping early in the morning. I think it's safe to say that spring has come!

Kurtis and I went to Washington for spring break for Steph and Kyle's wedding. Julie was the matron-of-honor in the wedding and apparently has captured the heart of her nephew Grant with her red vixen dress. I don't know what I did Jana! Aunt Kathleen and Uncle Steve surprised us with a fabulous trip to Victoria, BC on the Victoria Clipper for a night. THANKS AGAIN!! We had a great time and even with Julie's cold and Kurtis having to work a few hours, we got to see the gorgeous Butchart Gardens, the BC parliament building and pay extra in Canada with our pitiful American dollars. It was a great vacation from our vacation to embrace our Canadian heritage. :)

School ends the beginning of June for Julie. She has survived her first year of teaching. Her colleagues say that she's done a tremendous job with our group of lovelies this year. One teacher is actually threatening to take a "mental leave of absence" because he's never encountered so much disrespect and defiance or been so frustrated in his 14 years of teaching. She recently took 5 hours worth of tests to get an official MN teacher license. Hopefully she passed all her tests even though she messed up on the bubble sheets multiple times and even wrote an essay on the wrong page! Kurtis is liking IBM now that his contract load has gotten manageable. This summer Julie will teach a 2-week community class to incoming 6th graders on how to cook (yes!) and then she's heading back to LDS Girl's Camp as the camp director. Later this summer Kurtis' sister will get married in Utah so we get to see all his family!

We had such a great time seeing all the Gillman's (even Mark on the computer!) in Washington. We love and miss you all and can't wait to see you again.

What's with the tears?

Julie has a few things to say...

I've made it halfway through my first year of teaching. Whew! It's been an adventure. Dealing with over 150 12-13 year-olds, parents, and faculty on a daily basis leaves me feeling like I'm a chicken running around with it's head cut off some days! There haven't been any major catastrophes but I still have to convince myself that I'm not ruining any lives and that I'm doing the best I can. As a perfectionist, those are not easy things to accept. However...

I'm a little concerned. I've made a number of people cry and it's not just students...I had a parent cry on me yesterday. No joke. I felt like the biggest jerk in the world, and I didn't really do anything! I just assigned a science fair project! Oh, no, did she say "science fair project?" you might be thinking. Yes, it was time yet again for the dreaded science fair project. It's a huge part of 7th grade curriculum! There was no way around it. Anyway, there were many parents upset over their child's' performance on the project and I tried to explain that if the requirements weren't met, there were fewer points awarded! It's a simple concept, I thought. I even gave most of the kids a whole WEEK to work on their project (the final write-up) in class. On computers and all. They had plenty of time to ask questions and to make sure they had everything. They had a requirements sheet. They had examples of experimental procedures in class. But some of these kids still don't get it, or they leave their requirement sheets at school, or they aren't paying attention because they're too busy talking and goofing off. Anyway, this parent was upset because her son worked very hard on his project, which I could defiantly tell, but his grade didn't reflect that. I tried to explain everything that was required when she realized she was the cause of her son's downfall. When he went to her for help, she told him what he had done was too much, she made him cut it parts out. (I should mention that he was one of the students who left his requirement sheet at school. Mom didn't know any better!) Anyway, she felt TERRIBLE and started bawling, leaving me thinking, wow, I don't think making a parent cry is a good sign. I, being the naive and inexperienced teacher I was, tried to console her and lift her spirits. I told her I'd talk to her very shy son and figure out a way to award him more points on his project so he didn't have to suffer from Mom's unfortunate errors in judgement. She was more then grateful and felt like an idiot for crying. But hey, I've made others cry, at least it seems that way, so maybe I should just get used to this. Hopefully not. I guess the moral of this story is: Parents, don't help your kids too much. They should learn from their mistakes, not from yours.

Family history road trip!

We took a long weekend and drove to northern Indiana to see where Kurtis' grandma and grandpa's family came from. (Neither of us are from the Midwest, so saying we went to Indiana sounds very odd!) Anyway, Kurtis' grandma gave us the grand tour of her family's farm, the house she grew up in, the summer house on the lake (which was where we stayed), gravesites of family members and the small towns where Kurtis' grandfather's family originated. We had a wonderful time learning about our heritage and seeing the beautiful countryside. Kurtis found a deer tower (left), which only encouraged his aspirations to become a hunter, and we found a photo of some of the Tucker family members who were in city positions in the town's city hall (above). Oh, forgot to mention that the first night we were there, there was a tornado about 10 miles West of us that leveled the next town over. Fun times.

All we want for Christmas is WARMTH!

We went to Florida for Christmas and New Year's Eve this year to spend the holidays with Kurtis' family. Everyone was there, even Grandma Tucker who came down from Orlando. There was about 80+ degrees difference in the temperatures between Miami and Minnesota. We had a blast goofing off with family, fishing, canoeing in the Everglades, going to the beach, sleeping in, snorkeling in the Keys, laughng and playing games. Julie even caught a fish! This is just a taste of the Tucker brothers. :) Typical.

Apple Picking

We finished out the fall season with a trip to a local orchard. This is the fruit of our labor! haha..