I am a business woman! :)

As many of you know, substitute teaching is not a highly demanding job...I have MUCH more free time than when I was student teaching, so I've been trying to figure out my get rich plan and a hobby to occupy my free time. I looked into a few home businesses that operate on the party plan and decided to try Usborne Books. This will help me earn some travel money and free books for my future classroom! :) After I get all of my materials I can start having book shows...wanna host a show? :) And you can also buy books from my website: www.ubah.com/U2101. I'm so excited! I'll keep you updated on shows, etc...(does anyone actually read my blog?).

Taiwanese Kids!

Teaching the Taiwanese kids has been an amazing experience so far. As their teacher I coordinate classroom visits so that they may participate in American school lessons and activities. I also create my own lessons to fill in empty spaces in the day. Today we went to Starbucks to experience a popular American shop. Starbucks was very generous and gave all the students a tall hot chocolate and a piece of coffee cake! The students loved it, especially when they found out that Starbucks started in Washington! :)

There are 11 Taiwanese kids and 3 Teacher's Assistants. Today they also brought with them a Taiwanese reporter who took pictures and asked a lot of questions for the children's section of their Taiwanese newspaper! :)


In the afternoon, after school, the Taiwanese students lead a Chinese Culture Camp for the students at Illahee. They teach them Ocarina (a type of instrument, kind of like a flute), Kong Fu, Chinese Yo-yo, Aboriginal dance, Erhu (Chinese violin), Chinese flute, and Chinese drums. It is amazing to see these kids teach the Illahee students. I supervise the Ocarina, so today I bought one from the Taiwanese students so I could learn to play too!

It's hard to tell from the picture, but the Ocarina has 4 holes in the front and 2 in the back. You wear it around your neck and blow into the top (the blue area).

A get rich plan?

I've decided I need a quick, get rich plan....this plan must not involve too much work or include weekends (cause I want to be able to visit friends!). I am not sure if this kind job even exists...but I need money for all of the adventures coming up that I want to take part in! :)
There are many trips in discussion: a weekend beach trip, a spring break Vegas trip, a trip to Florida to see the space shuttle launch, etc. Sadly, these all cost money. :(

Here are my ideas so far:
-Write a children's book (but what do I really know about writing a book?!)
-Get a night job (could involve weekends and they may not like the idea of me taking time off to travel)
-Tutor students (I'd have to find some first...)
-Clean houses (but who wants their house cleaned at night, and cleaning other people's dirt is no fun...)
-Make something to sell (not sure what i could make that people would buy, but its an idea!)
-Flip houses (however, this would first involve me having enough money to buy a house and remodel it...)
-"professional" gambler (this could also turn into a get even poorer plan though!)
-sell pampered chef, mary kay, or one of those other types of items (this would require other people to buy stuff...would you? :)

Sarah also suggested standing on a street corner. As she pointed out, this "job" would allow me to pick my own hours, would pay well, and would allow me to get in some much needed exercise...haha, we'll call this plan b for now... :)

As you can see my get rich plans so far are lousy....if you have any get rich plans for me, I would love to hear them! ;)

Happy New Year!

New Years was amazing this year! I got to spend it with some of my closest high school friends in Seattle. We had a view of the Space Needle from where we were at, so we were able to watch the fireworks at midnight. The was great food, yummy drinks and fun people to hang out with....

I absolutely love these girls...

All the girls. We found a convenient location for our shot glasses and used our shot glass drink holders as pretty, princess like hats! :)

Our first walk in the New Year...we're being healthy already! :)

My New Years Resolutions: (Maybe I'll be more likely to keep them if they are in print)
-Be healthier (eat better, exercise more, take better care of my body)
-Make more time to visit friends (in Seattle, Bellingham, etc.) I love my friends so much and don't see them nearly as much as I would like to!

Good luck with your New Years Resolutions!

Winter Break

It has been so much fun seeing friends that I haven't seen in forever since everyone is in town for the holidays! One night we went bowling at Big Al's. I had never been to the bowling side before and it was so much fun! They even have it set up so that at each lane you can have bumpers pop up on your turn...I did so much better than usual! :)

Christmas with the Rods!

We celebrated Christmas a little early this year because my mom had to work on Christmas Day and we wanted to celebrate with family. We headed up to Stanwood and celebrated with the whole family...we had so much fun! Little Craig is such a fun little guy to watch...he is hilarious! We had a ton of fun hiding under the table and playing "where is Craig?".

Craig and Scott having a little pre-dinner cracker snack...they were delicious! :)


After dinner we opened presents...little Craig couldn't quite reach his hand to the bottom of this bag, so he found a different way to the bottom of the bag! :)

The cousins (minus Greg, Tami, Lauren, and Holly who couldn't make it over from Idaho).