Finding treasures while cleaning

Today I was at my parents' place and was sorting through some of the stuff I left behind in my old bedroom and I found my Gameboy Advance and some of my games. I used to love this little thing and it brings back so many memories. Tetris was always so much fun to play before the touch screen versions came along. I'm looking forward to catching up with some of these games.
Cleaning/sorting can be a lot of fun especially when you find stuff you forgot you had.

It's officially summer vacation!

Yesterday was my last day of work. It still hasn't sunk in that I have 2 months off. It always takes me a few days to adjust to not having to work. It was definitely a bittersweet ending to the school year. I was surplused at the school I've been teaching at for two years and was moved to a new school. The upside to this move is that I am now full-time. I consider myself extremely lucky to have a full-time permanent teaching job because I know that it is extremely hard to find work as a teacher, especially with the new hiring process. My last day at my school was full of tears. The thing that hurts the most is leaving all the kids behind. There are so many of them that I am not done with. Some of them I can tell I was getting through to...I just needed a bit more time. I don't deal well with change. I hate it. I am trying to adjust to this move and have to be grateful that I do have a job next year.

On a more positive note, you can expect a lot more posts from me this summer as I have a lot of ideas for this blog.

Happy (belated) New Year

Happy New Year!! I am finally getting back into the swing of things after two weeks off. Is it just me or did everyone get really sick during the holidays? I was out for almost my whole time off and I am still not back to feeling 100%.

There will be a few changes to the blog this year. I am not going to have a schedule for my posts this year. I found it a little too constraining and there were certain days that I just tended not to post because I had nothing to say about that "topic of the day". So this year will be a little more random but will be focused on books, food and my artwork. I have added a couple of pages at the top of this blog where you can see what books I am reading this year. You will also be able to see my artwork as I complete each piece. After a couple of years of absolutely no drawing, I am finally getting back into it...slowly but surely and am enjoying it very much.

Back from a little hiatus

I have not posted on here for almost a month. I have been in both a reading and writing slump for the past couple of weeks. I had such a hard time picking up a book in the month of April. I managed to read one book and a short story in the whole month of April. Sad, I know. My goal was to read 6-7 books per month but I couldn`t immerse myself in a book no matter how hard I tried. The same thing happened with writing on this blog. I am usually excited to post my book finds, quotations, beauty tips and whatever other randomness I find. But every time I would sit down to write in the past month, I would become easily distracted and move on to another activity. I can say that I am not over this reading/writing slump and am excited to dive into my TBR pile of books and to continue my daily blog posts on here.

Bath Time

I'm probably one of few people who never enjoyed taking baths. My friends would talk about taking a relaxing bath after a long day at work and I could never see the appeal. The few times I tried to take a bath I would quickly get bored. I can't seem to just sit still in silence. The few times I brought a book with me, I ended up destroying the book by getting it all wet. So, I gave up on baths all together. I recently moved into my own place and it has a great bath tub. I decided to give it a shot last week and I absolutely loved it. I can now appreciate taking some quiet time to de-stress at the end of a long day. I'm now excited to look for different bath soaps and candles. It has become a ritual of mine to take a few baths each week.

Tweet tweet

I've jumped back on the Twitter bandwagon after a long hiatus. I have a new account. You can follow me here.

Everyday posts?

My goal is to try to post something everyday. I want to try to have themes to go with each day of the week. That being said, I often do post random things throughout the day. Having a theme won't keep me from writing my random posts.

So far I have:
Monday Reads
Thursday: Thing I like this week
Friday Foods
Saturday Songs

This week I am going to add a theme for Wednesday which will be Beauty and Health Tips. I will try to add themes for Tuesday and Sunday but I have yet to decide what they will be. If you have suggestions, please let me know!!

Umm...thanks? I think?

Last week one of my grade six boys randomly came up to me and said "I think you may have a few split ends in your hair." That is probably the most random/strange comment I've gotten from a student. I honestly did not know how to respond to that. Then, today I was helping out one of my other grade six students and all of a sudden she says to me "you have some gray hairs." I think I'm going to shave my head.

Book love

One of my favourite things to do either on a lazy weekend or after a crazy work day is to get ready for bed early, get comfy in my bed and get lost on a good book. Sometimes I get super busy and having a little bit of time to get immersed in a good book always reminds me how much I love reading. I could not be without my books.

I want this mug for my new place so much!!

Too cute!!

Saturday afternoon nap

There's something satisfying in taking a midday nap on a weekend.

Paris, je t'aime

I kind wish this was me right now. Years ago I visited Paris and have always wanted to go back, especially after reading Anna and the French Kiss. This would have made a beautiful cover for the novel!

A big thank you!!

Today, for the first time, I was able to see how many page visit I get. I was very very pleasantly surprised. I honestly thought that no one was reading this. A big thank you to everyone who visits my page!! I will make sure to update more often!

I'm back

It's been way too long since I've posted. I went from writing almost everyday to being MIA for more than a month. I have a few blogs that I follow and reading them over the last week has put me in a blog writing mood again.

I can't believe that it's already the end of November. I sometimes wish time could stop or slow down just a little bit so I can really savour the good moments. In just a little over a month, it will be Christmas and I really need to start my Christmas shopping.

Stay tuned for my next few posts for some gift ideas. Remember that it's the thought that counts and not the money spent.

TGIF

Making time

It is very easy to get caught up in everyday to-do-lists. And if you're a lister, like me, you'll find that sometimes the tasks pile up quicker than they get done. A resolution I made before going back to work this year was to make time for myself each and everyday. I know that this can seem impossible when there are always so many things to do all the time. I have decided that my cut off work time is 8pm and after that I take an hour for myself to either read, catch up on emails, talk to a friends, surf the Internet, or catch up on a good show. For a procrastinator like me, making this 8pm deadline was difficult because most days I tend to start my work later in the evening. But I have tried to make an effort to get as much as I can done right after school. I can't say yet if it's going to work...I've only been back for two days. But so far so good! And today I'm even done a little early!

I sometimes wonder...

...if being on vacation for a long time makes it more difficult to go back to work.

School tomorrow!

Sorting part 2

The sorting process has become kind of crazy in the last few days. Remember the clean stacked up boxes? A few hours later this is what the room looked like:




And it only got worse. I will not post the disastrous mess that exploded out of the rest of my boxes. But I did get everything packed up to take to school. All that is left is the task of getting rid of all the garbage....and there is a lot of it!!

Sorting time.

What is contained in the boxes pictured below is my life as a French teacher from last year. Unfortunately, when I packed up my office my goal was to get it done quickly and I didn't think too much about organization. I was even carrying all my books home in laundry baskets because I was not sure how many boxes I would need to pack away everything. So now I am left with the task of going through each and every box. Let the fun begin!

Sometimes I wish I had continued my ballet lessons