Milk- I mean "Math and Cookies"...

Since we've moved to Indy, I have been cooking a lot more. Some of it has to do with saving money- some of it has to do with eating healthier. I typically utilize the stove-top and Crock-Pot. However, on Friday night, I had this sudden urge to bake...

I made German Chocolate cookies with milk chocolate chips:

I followed the cookie recipe my Grandma Helen gave me just before we moved. The first time she told me about this, I couldn't believe it---THERE IS NOOO WAY A RECIPE COULD BE THAT SIMPLE- COULD IT?!? It is so easy and so delicious, I thought I'd share with you:

Ingredients:

1 box of your favorite cake mix

2 eggs

1/2 cup vegetable oil

*Add in whatever other goodies you want...nuts, chocolate chips, raisins, coconut....etc.

Pre-heat oven to 350. Mix all ingredients, roll into balls, place on greased cookie sheet, bake for 10-12 minutes and voila!

I plan on making yellow cake cookies with butterscotch chips next time...if you try this recipe, let me know how you like it, okay?

This past Thursday, we held our 2nd English as a Second Language Parent Night! The theme was "Fun with Math" for grades 1-5. My teaching partner Alissa and I, along with our two bilingual instructional assistants have been working for weeks in preparation for the event!

We were fortunate to be able to recruit several of our staff members to help serve dinner to the families and help proctor the math activities presented in the workshop.

We had over 140 people in attendance- AWESOME TURN-OUT!!!! WOOOO-HOOOOO!!!!These family nights are by far the BEST part of my job! I love interacting with parents and being able to share information/activities that can bridge the home to school connection.Here are the presenters....yours truly and my beautiful partner, Alissa.

I took a Power Point I had made for one of the workshops Michele and I did back in CA, and changed it to reflect Indiana Content Standards. Alissa and I selected 3 Math games that could easily be transferred from addition to multiplication (since we had a wide variety of student ages) and had our IAs translate the directions in Spanish. We modeled the games on the "Elmo" (3-dimensional projector) for all the families to see...After each game was taught and modeled, we had the families practice with their child(ren) and had our staff walk around and assist as needed...

The first game we presented utilized adding/multiplying using a deck of cards. I found this awesome playing card template on-line, so we were able to print and laminate a deck of playing cards for every student.
The second game was played using dice. Students had to add/multiply the results of the dice roll and tally to 10 to keep track of the person who received the greatest sum/product.

The last game taught regrouping. I got this game from Michele Capriotti when I taught at Bear Valley. It is called, "Go for the Red." We laminated colored construction paper squares in 3 colors. Each color represented a different value- 1's, 10's and 100. You roll the die and receive the corresponding number of squares...you trade in your 1's for a 10 and your 10's for 100...the first person to get 100 is the winner!

We are going to try to have one more parent night before the end of the school year. We have been very successful in establishing a positive rapport with our ESL families. I love teaching...and the most rewarding part of my job is knowing I have done something positive in the life of a child.

Here is a picture of me and Maria V. one of our Instructional Assistants. She is so sweet.Here I am with 2 of my favorite co-workers- my partner Alissa and Amanda (1st grade teacher).
Oh and our dining room table arrived...YAY!!!

I have been so excited about this room, because it is the only room in the house that I get free reign over. I love our house, but every room is very "uni-sex" and earth-tone in color palette. I love love love that the dining room has some femininity...

I love our oil paintings and am so glad we have some furniture to accompany them. We got those two Tuscan paintings at Wicke's Furniture in Moreno Valley just before they went bankrupt. They were a steal...80 percent off the original price!Since our furniture is so dark, I tried to incorporate color from the paintings into our glassware and table runner. I think eventually I would like to get some colorful window draperies as well. Those Tiffany style stained-glass candle holders were a Christmas present from my Grandma Genie and I absolutely love them! I am so glad I have a room to display them in! We still have more to go, but Ryan and I are pleased with the progress we have made on our home. It feels so good to not have empty rooms everywhere we walk- especially since we have to spend so much time indoors...

Ryan was telling me last week how much he missed...yes missed the snow (we had 2 weeks without it...). Well his wish came true...it's baaaccccckkkkk!!!!

I know someone else who is happy about the white stuff....


Until next time...xo

Casa de Beavers

Sorry I have not blogged in awhile, but to be honest...not a whole lot has been going on. This is the time of year when the holidays are over and the weather is still chilly (although not too bad- in fact, all the snow has melted and we had 2 days in the 60's last week). We have mostly just hung out with our neighbors, focused on work and school (for Ryan) and enjoyed the comforts of "home sweet home."

I did manage to snap the beautiful sunrise this morning...

I wanted to share this pic of our city's library. It is sooooo NICE!!! It has 3 levels and check this out- not only can you check out books and audio CDs, but you can rent movies....real new Blockbuster quality movies for FREE!!! You can even rent seasons of TV shows for FREE! How cool is that??? I know, I am easily amused...Here are some pics from Super Bowl Sunday. Our neighbors Zach and Kristin were our gracious hosts.Here are me and Sabrina:

Sabrina's husband Brian and the kiddos...
Ryan, me and Eric watchin' the boob tube...

Eric's wife Liz ignoring the game and reading a book from the Twilight series...she and Sabrina are OBSESSED with those books. I am on the 2nd one- they are good reads, but reading during the Super Bowl??? All of you "Edward groupies" understand, I'm sure...

We have lived in our new house now over 8 months. As most of you know, we moved from a 1,200 square foot 2 bedroom, 1 bath house in Beaumont, CA to a 5 bedroom 3 bath house in Indiana. I'm sure you can imagine how empty our new 3,000+ square foot house in Noblesville was after moving in....

Well, it stayed empty. In fact, we were only able to furnish half of our house in the last 8 months. We vowed that we would not purchase any more furniture until we paid down our debt from the first round of furniture....so we waited and paid and waited and paid and waited and paid...

Even though it was a long time, I am glad we waited until the first round of furniture was paid down...I am a planner and am a firm believer that you should NEVER bite off more than you can chew. We were able to score an AWESOME deal on a President's Day Sale from a local furniture store. Our house is now complete (with the exception of one room).

Since most of you will not be coming to Indy to visit our home, I thought I would bring Indy to you...

Our kitchen:

Our living room:Our new dining room (minus the table- they delivered the wrong one...I will post pic with table next week):The runner I bought from Pier 1 for the table that I do not have yet...LOLDining room buffet...Downstairs guest room- furniture look familiar? This was our old Master bedroom furniture in Beaumont...Down-stairs bathroom:Upstairs loft- furniture from the Beaumont house...View of the foyer from the loft area...Upstairs new office furniture...FYI- Organizing our office was NOT fun...check out this DISASTER!! We had to sort through all of our office junk that had been boxed up for over a year and a half...Check out this tornado that ripped through the Beavers' house in Noblesville...hahaha!Upstairs guest bathroom: Upstairs guest room. My mom gave me this furniture- thanks, mama!!!
New Master bedroom furniture...Master bath:Upstairs laundry room...
The empty room...aka the "Junk Room." We are not sure what we are going to do with this space-- we need some time to process. We hung the white fan when we first moved in with the intent to one day make it a nursery- we'll see. I'd like to have a substantial "Nest Egg" saved up first before even thinking about the possibility of a child....I know, there goes that planning again...heehee :)Our new furniture was our Valentine's day present to each other. I was going to make a fancy dinner that we were going to eat on our new dining room table...but you know how that turned out! We did however, manage to break down and purchase a heart-shaped chocolate cake...I love you, Ryan!!!! xoxoxoxoxo

I love you, Brookie!!! xoxoxoxoxoxo

Ryan will forever be my true love...but we both are having a love affair with...
Shhhhhh....don't tell anyone- It is just soooooo good- we can't control ourselves!!!

We miss "In-N- Out" and "Del Taco," but "Steak and Shake" is making the pain go away...heehee :)

I wanted to "save the best for last." There is NOTHING SEXIER than a man that cleans!!! I am one lucky gal!

Hope everyone had a Happy Valentine's day! Until next time...xo