I'm on vacation right now for the whole month of July! I'll still be blogging while I'm gone, but not here. If you want to follow what I'm up to, check out my xanga.

Animal Kingdom

I went with Ismael, Andrea, and Lorie to Animal Kingdom. Here are some pics:

Abby's Baby

My sister had her baby! The beautiful and healthy Sephora, my new niece! Ok, definitely more pictures to come, these are just the first batch. Here's my mom, my sister, and my niece, three generations of women in my family:



and this is Abby, Jobe, and Sephora:



Oh, and another update: A correction on her name. I guess I left out a middle name. Her full name is: Sephora Ember Rain Ewing.

More pictures to come. Thanks for all the congrats!

I Love Movies!

Here's a list of my 100 Favorite Movies:

1. Braveheart
2. Good Will Hunting
3. Disney’s Robin Hood
4. Once
5. Brick
6. Children of Men
7. Contact
8. Gattaca
9. The Postman
10. Jurassic Park
11. Magnolia
12. Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (and Trilogy)
13. Babe
14. Matrix
15. Primer
16. Moulin Rouge
17. Groundhog Day
18. Fiddler on the Roof
19. A Clockwork Orange
20. Me and You and Everyone We Know
21. Clue
22. Romeo + Juliet
23. Aladdin
24. Swingers
25. Amadeus
26. Bicycle Thieves
27. It’s A Wonderful Life
28. Miracle on 34th Street
29. The Secret Garden
30. Flight of the Navigator
31. Phenomenon
32. Requiem for a Dream
33. The Parent Trap
34. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles
35. Gerry
36. Shakespeare in Love
37. Maverick
38. Mr. Smith Goes to Washington
39. The Lion King
40. This Is Spinal Tap
41. Schindler’s List
42. Swiss Family Robinson
43. The Incredibles
44. Willy Wonka & the Chocolate Factory
45. The Shining
46. Forrest Gump
47. All the Real Girls
48. Mulholland Drive
49. Singin’ in the Rain
50. Saving Private Ryan
51. The Princess Bride
52. There Will Be Blood
53. Punch-Drunk Love
54. Fight Club
55. Full Metal Jacket
56. The Godfather Part I
57. I Am Sam
58. Memento
59. Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless Mind
60. The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (and Trilogy)
61. Rounders
62. Gladiator
63. Back to the Future (and Trilogy)
64. The Conversation
65. The Neverending Story
66. Fame
67. Hook
68. Spirited Away
69. Garden State
70. Spanglish
71. Zoolander
72. Tombstone
73. Annie Hall
74. The Passion of Joan of Arc
75. Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?
76. Lawrence of Arabia
77. Love Actually
78. Almost Famous
79. American Beauty
80. Atonement
81. Serendipity
82. The Usual Suspects
83. The Dark Knight
84. American History X
85. Paris, je t’aime
86. Glengarry Glen Ross
87. Amorres Doggies
88. Some Like It Hot
89. The Shawshank Redemption
90. The Sword and the Stone
91. The Fugitive
92. Wait Until Dark
93. Stargate
94. Ocean’s Twelve
95. Toys
96. The Adventures of Baron Munchausen
97. Die Hard (and Trilogy)
98. Cabaret
99. Closer
100. Apollo 13

First-year teaching

Well, some of you might know that I'm teaching an 8th grade class this year. I've never taught before and this is a very new experience for me. A lot of teachers say that their first year teaching is always the hardest. That kind of makes any problems in the class better. I think though that the class is going pretty well for me. We're talking about economics and for a project I've been having them assemble some Coach knock-offs for the last couple weeks. They've been tracking the profits that I've made on ebay from them, and as a group project they're going to plan my trip to the Bahamas to stay within the budget of the profits. Sure, they don't pay attention sometimes and complain about all the work I make them do, but that's normal for 8th graders, right? I know I have a lot of ways to grow as a teacher, but at least I'll have a lot of nice, quiet time in the Bahamas to come up with some good strategies.