Somewhere over the rainbow

Someday I'll wish upon a star
Wake up where the clouds are far behind me...

On Friday I saw the most incredible sunset. The sky caught fire with bright strokes of orange and magenta. Looking out at the ocean, humpback whales breached in the distance. Perhaps they were taking in the beauty just like us before their long trip back to colder waters. After the sun disappeared, the water began to glow and mirror the colors of the sky above it. It was perfection.

The sunset was just what I needed after a week of HSA testing. As a teacher, it was a pretty easy week because the kids were testing all week. But proctoring the test and seeing how my kids fared wasn't exactly a cakewalk, and it was actually pretty painful at times. I think it's pretty clear by now how I feel about standardized testing and its relationship to special education. Still, I've spent a lot of time this year trying to prepare my kids for the HSA and convince them that if they use their skills, they can do alright. But when it came to test time, I think a lot of them reverted into old habits and didn't perform as well as they could have. Still, you could tell that they had come a long way since the beginning of the year, and when the results come back this summer, we'll know exactly how they did. I'm just glad it's over. I feel kind of free now.



The sun is finally out to stay! And it's hot! On Friday we had a half day, so I cleaned up my classroom pretty quickly, headed up to the North Shore, and got some lunch with a few of the other Wheeler TFA teachers. Then we made our way out to Waimea Bay to swim and lay out under a cloudless sky. After that we went back to Waialua to catch that epic sunset.

On Saturday I woke up early to run a few errands. I got my hair cut and then finally bought an ukulele at Costco. I don't know how to play it yet, but it's a really nice one, made of koa wood and decorated with an abalone-shell border. There are only four strings on it, so I don't think it will be too tough to learn. Hopefully in not too long I'll be jamming like Braddah Iz. After that, it was getting hot and I made my way to Ali'i Beach in Haleiwa to catch some waves on my boogie board. The sun was blazing by now but the waves were perfect. I spent a lot of time out there...too much because I got a little sunburned. On the way home I still felt so hot. The salty ocean just couldn't refresh me. When I got home, I turned on the hose and just stood under it for like five minutes. It was divine.

Finally, this afternoon the rain came. It was really refreshing and I love the sound it makes on the roof of our house. That being said, I love that the heat has returned. There's nothing like a warm and sunny day up on the North Shore. It's absolute paradise.

Now it's back to the classroom for the final stretch. I just found out that I'll probably be looping up to seventh grade with my kids, so I really want these last weeks to go extremely well so that everyone is excited to pick it up again next school year. There is such a huge opportunity for these students to make so much growth in two years! I am putting together a pretty sweet unit on poetry as we speak. Hope everyone is doing well, and if you want to experience a little Hawaiian sun, tickets are pretty cheap. I'll even play you a few tunes on my ukulele. Arrivederci!

Spring Break!

Well, unfortunately Spring Break has come to an end. I can't tell you how great it was to have such a large amount of time to just relax, get around the island, and simply do as I pleased.

Looking back, I didn't really get to do nearly all the things I had planned. I spent most of my time on the North Shore, at Ali'i Beach down the road and at a couple others. But that was just fine. After all, I'll be here for a while and there's really no rush. No rush. That was the motto of break, and it was a good one. I remember one day, Kathryn Zeilony and I drove all the way to Sunset Beach on the North Shore, only to find it cloudy and windy. So we drove all the way back down and around the island to the Waianae side where the weather was flawless. No worries. It was one of the best days.

The first week was mainly dedicated to sleeping in, but I got to get out on my boogie board a couple times. I didn't know that Ali'i Beach was good for it, but I found out that the waves there were definitely rideable. This is great news because it's so close. I got to ride some decent waves and catch a lot of rays (the weather was especially nice during the first few days).

On Friday, after watching the Zags get destroyed by UNC (it's okay, because it turns out every team that the Tar Heels played faced the same fate), we finally went down to Target and purchased a fire pit. I say finally because we've wanted to get one for so long, but there aren't too many on this island. We've already used it a couple times, and it's a great addition to our already spectacular house and yard. There's nothing like burning a fire underneath the stars with the sound of the ocean in the background.

The second week, I went to Maui with a few friends. It was great! We stayed in Lahaina in this tiny, really old hotel right in the middle of town. Though the accomodations were, let's put it this way, old fashioned, the location was unbeatable. This is the second time I've been to Lahaina and it's a great little town. We spent our days at the beach, which wasn't a spectacular one but had surprisingly great snorkeling past the reef. On the second day we went on a whale watching trip and got up close and personal with several humpback whales. Seeing them from the beach is one thing, but watching them swim under your boat takes it to a whole new level.



After returning to Oahu, break was winding down but I still took a couple days to be lazy. I did get a lot of work done, however, so this week back is off to a decent work. I still have a TON of work ahead of me, but it feels good to be back at school, which is a great sign. My new batch of eighth graders are already a little rowdy, so we'll see how that goes.

So that's my Spring Break in a nutshell. It may not seem like much, but it was essentially a two week vacation in Hawaii. And let's face it, you can't beat that.

Highlights

• An epic faceoff with a cane spider that managed to get into our house. Cane spiders are giant, tarantula-like Hawaiian arachnids. Nothing to mess with. We destroyed it with a shoe attached to a stick and a lot of Raid cockroach spray.
• Boogie Boarding at Ali'i Beach in Haleiwa. I felt pretty local on my sponge.
  
• Spending all day in Makaha jumping into waves. There wasn't a cloud in the sky and the water was so blue. I could've stayed there forever.
• Island hopping to Maui for a few days. It was good to get back to Maui for a little vacation.