Job Interviews

So, I've interviewed for teaching positions several times since last summer. Most recently I've interviewed with Box Elder school district (7 of their elementary schools have openings) and Thomas Edison Charter School. Today I did my second interview with Thomas Edison (they do at least 3 interviews). The principal said he wants to touch base with me after April 15th to set up another interview, so that's great news. I've also decided to try and get my certification for the state of Idaho because Preston district has quite a few openings as well. However, in filling out the paper work to send to the Idaho State Department of Education, I realized I have to take another test. So, $180 later & a test date set for June
14th, I'm waiting to take that test (It's another Praxis test for those that know what that is.). I have another interview set up with Logan district for Thursday this week as well.
I keep crossing my fingers that I will get hired despite being very pregnant at this point! Anyway, my point of this post is to let those know that I have listed as references that they will likely be getting contacted by a couple principals to follow through on my references. Thanks for putting in a good word for me!
Hope you have a great week!

Samantha does math homework with dad

On Wednesday, Samantha had a homework assignment that involved coloring some bears & cutting them out and then doing some addition and subtraction problems as she listened to a story. Once Samantha had everything cut out, I did the story with her. She did pretty well, so when Travis came home, I told her to show her dad her homework assignment. I was standing in the kitchen doing dishes while Travis and Samantha were sitting at the counter. Travis reads through the directions and then starts to do the story with her. When he gets to where he's gone through the whole story with her, he continues with his own version. He preceeds to tell Samantha that the bears got on the bus one at a time until all the bears are on the bus and some are riding on top. Well, then he gets creative. He tells Samantha that the bus driver slams on the breaks and the three bears on the top of the bus go flying off & the bus driver runs them over and then continues down the road. At the next bus stop, one of the bears that was run over gets on the bus (he has no legs now because they were squashed off in the accident). So now Trav asks Samantha how many bears are on the bus. Samantha of course, counts all the bears telling Trav there are 5 bears on the bus. Travis tells her, No, count again. So, Samantha counts again and this time tells him there are 3 bears on the bus. Again Travis tells her, No, count again. Samantha is confused at this point and just kind of looks at him. At which time Travis counts out 4 1/2 bears. This is where I had to but in and say, "Travis, there are NO imaginary bears on the bus! There are no square root bears on the bus - there are only whole bears on the bus!"
For those of you that don't know, Travis is a bit of a math nerd. He absolutely loves math and will do the same problem 3 or 4 different ways, just for the fun of it. It was cute to watch him with her and funny to see Sam's reaction. At least I know he'll be good help with math homework next year!

Pampered Chef Again

Ok - those that said they were coming are in trouble!! I only had 4 girls show up!
If you want to order something I want to close on Tuesday so either look online or call me and I'll get you a catalog. Thanks

Pampered Chef Show

Alright, I know, shameless plug here, but here goes anyway!
I'm doing a pampered chef show on Friday night. If you can't come but want to order something, let me know (preferably before Friday). You can go to: http://www.pamperedchef.biz/amyskaug to see a catalog online.
Thanks!

Easter

Hope everyone had a good Easter. Ours was filled with all kinds of fun and adventure. We made the trip to Manti and made it safe and sound. We got there Friday night & spent the night at the farm with Grandma & Grandpa Bown. Saturday morning we made it to the Easter Egg Hunt at the square. This easter egg hunt is the best easter egg hunt I've seen. I think they fill about 4 garbage bags full of candy. They divide the square out into 3 different age groups. Then, they take all the candy and spread it out everywhere. There are a ton of kids there, but my kids never fail to fill their baskets completely (and their baskets are not small.). After our candy gorging, we went to Mayfield for the Whitlock family easter party. My kids got 2 more easter baskets out there to add to what they had collected that morning. Saturday night Trav's aunt Lori did an ultrasound for us. The baby is definitly a boy & he likes to show it off! We got some really amazing pix that I'm going to try to scan so I can post. We spent Sat. night at Brad and Lori's house so that the kids could wake up to have easter where there were other kids. The Easter bunny dumps a truckload of candy at this house every year! Well, Sunday morning the kids got up and gathered another unbelievable amount of candy up (which Lori then added to their already overflowing Easter baskets). After trying to figure out where we were going to put all this candy, we headed back out to Grandma & Grandpa Bown's house for the Bown easter family party where my kids got yet another easter basket. Easter at the farm was pretty quiet this year, only half of the family was there but we still had a lot of fun. The kids got to go over the hill on the four wheelers and see the new baby lambs. Travis caught one of the babies so the kids could pet it, which they love doing. After our Bown party, we headed home. We made pretty good time and were home before 10 pm (that's early for us!). Once we got into the valley, we stopped at my mom and dad's house to pick up the dog. I decided I'd bring all the candy inside to show my mom that I wasn't joking when I said my kids got "an ungodly amount of candy." I decided at my mom's house that I was going to pile each kid's candy into the appropriate easter basket and weigh it. Much to my surprise, each of the kids brought home 6 1/2 pounds of candy. Yes, 13 pounds of candy for 2 kids!!! I think the Easter bunny over did it again this year! Oh well, we had lots of fun and now dad can eat some of the candy without the kids taking too much notice!!

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A Purpose Driven Life

So I went to our Enrichment night last night and we had a really wonderful speaker. She spoke about several different things, but mostly she spoke about finding joy in the journey. She also made reference to a book called A Purpose Driven Life by Rick Warren. I was wondering if anyone has it and will be willing to let me borrow it for a little while. Thanks!

Happy St. Pat's Day!

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More pix from our trip!

Day 8 & 9

The Trek Home-Well, like I said, we were at the Jacksonville airport by 5 am. Our flight left at 6 am without any trouble. We were scheduled for an hour and a half layover in Atlanta and didn't expect any problems there. Well, we were delayed for 3 hours thanks in part to a mechanical/electrical problem. Fortunately, they got the problem fixed and we were able to take the original plane to Denver where we were originally scheduled for about a 45 min. layover and then a connection to SLC. Well, since we were delayed for 3 hours in Atlanta, we missed our connecting flight. However, we arrived in Denver at about 1:!5 and were able to get onto a 2:15 flight. At 1:45 I took the kids down to the bathroom. While washing my hands, Nash took off running out the door as I yelled at him to wait. I swear I was no more than 10 seconds behind the kid but when I got out of the bathroom, he was gone. I figured that was it, someone had snatched my kid. I sent Samantha back to our gate to get Travis while I looked for Nash and asked around if anyone had seen him. About 30 seconds later, Travis comes out & is like, "Mis- we have to go. They're boarding our plane." I just looked at him and said, "I lost Nash. He took off running out of the bathroom before I could grab him." Within about 2 minutes I had 2 police officers with me and his description had been put out to the officers. Travis had a police officer with him & I was giving Nash's description to the guy at the information desk so they could put it out over the PA. After I finished writing down his description, I look up and clear across the way, I see him standing there with a lady & an officer. I of course, took off running for him. Apparently, he made it from the bathroom (next to gate C40) all the way down to gate C34 (that was 10 - yes, TEN terminals away!). Once I picked him up, we ran for our gate. We were lucky because Delta had held our flight for us. Once we got on the plane, I realized that they had split the four of us up for our seats. I sent Nash with Travis & I took Samantha with me. I knew I needed a minute before I started talking to Nash because I didn't know if I was going to kick his butt or squeeze the guts out of him! Some how, we managed to get to SLC 10 min. before our flight was scheduled to arrive AND all our luggage made it with us! Needless to say, we were pretty happy about that! We didn't even hit any traffic on our way home (which of course, it didn't dawn on either of us that we wouldn't hit traffice because it was Sunday until we were about half way home!) and were able to get in the door about 5:30-6:00 pm with everyone & everything in tow (only about 5 hrs after our original arrival time!).

So, it has been quite the week for us, but we have enjoyed every single second of it and were sad to see it be over. Hopefully this week will be a bit calmer at our house, but somehow, I doubt it!

Day 8 (Our last full day) -
Today we went to the Jacksonville Zoo and the Jacksonville Beach.

The kids had a great time at the zoo despite the fact that the wind was blowing pretty good. It was kind of like Hogle Zoo, but smaller. They just had a new exhibit open called Sting Ray Bay. If you pay extra when you go into the zoo, you can actually pet a sting ray.

We thought that would be pretty cool, so of course we did that. Samantha wasn't too excited about it but Nash got quite a kick out of it. I'm not sure if Nash ever actually touched one or not but he was soaked from his chin to his belly button by the time we left the exhibit! I think Sam's favorite part was the flamingos.
After we left the zoo, we headed to the beach. If was the first time the kids had seen the ocean so they were pretty excited to be there. The wind was blowing pretty good still by the time we got there so it was too cold to get in the water. The kids were ok with that though because they had a great time digging in the sand looking for sea shells and whatever other treasures they could manage to find.
After we left the beach, we stopped at this really neat gift shop that was down the road a bit. They had every sea shell you could imagine for sale along with a million other treasures. We actually ended up spending about 30 min. or more here but loaded up on treasures before we were done. After our adventure at the gift shop, we stopped to eat at a place called J.L. Trent's Sea food & Grill where Samantha was insistent that she get to eat Gator Tail again. Apparently she quite likes it now. I'm afraid Jamie will have to bring some home next time she comes because I know I won't be able to find it anywhere around here! Travis ordered a seafood platter that had several types of seafood on it that neither of us had tried before. We now know we both like Flounder and that sea scallops aren't too bad. Travis also tried the Calamari (wasn't his favorite) and a stuffed crab and oysters. Everything on his plate was fried so it was a different experience in that manner as well. It was my first time to try Hushpuppies and Samantha's as well (she wasn't too fond of them!).
After dinner we had to head back to Jamie & Robbie's house to get ready to go. We stayed up until about 1 am watching a movie (The Heart Break Kid) and then had to get up at 3:30 in order to be to the airport by 5 am! Luckily we made it without too much trouble!

Days 4-7

Day 7 - More rain & tornado warnings! This morning it was still raining and when Robbie turned on tv for the kids to watch cartoons, we heard there was a tornado warning the for counties just to the east and north of Clay County (which is where Jacksonville is). Finally at about 3 pm we decided we'd go to the Budweiser factory and do the tour their since it was still raining and we couldn't go to the zoo or the beach. We made it to the factory in time for the last tour so we were glad we left the house when we did. It quit raining long enough for the drive over & for us to take some pictures of the kids with Larry the Clydsdale but when we came out of the tour, it was raining again!

They say it's supposed to just be windy tomorrow. The fishing charter that Robbie and Travis were hoping to go on today got cancled because of the size of waves that were predicted and they aren't going out tomorrow due to the same reason. The lady said if they came Monday, they were likely going out then. I wish we could send them Monday!! Tomorrow we're going to hit the local zoo and the beach - weather permitting! Then we'll have to come back & get ready to go because our flight out on Sunday leaves at 6 am!! Hope you're having a great week!

Day 6 - Disney World!!


We got up fairly early, but it took us longer to get ready and check out than we had hoped. We made it to the Sizzler breakfast buffet and we took awhile there making sure the kids got full. We got to Disney World (about 30 min from the hotel we stayed in) at about 9:30-10 am. We got our tickets and got into the park and the first thing Sam wanted to do was find the princesses (big surprise). Well, much to her dismay, her father had other plans. We had to start at the left of the part and make our way around. Well, the princess stuff was in the middle and we didn't get to the park until 10 and they were closing at 7 pm that night so I was a bit irritated that we had to play by her dad's rules. Sam rode several rides she didn't want to (yes, she was crying when her dad put her on them). Nash rode several as well but wasn't able to ride as many as I had hoped because he's about 2-3 inches shorter than the 40 inch ride requirement on most of the rides. The kids were really good the whole day though - even when it started to rain on us. We did find Ariel and both of the kids got to sit up with her and meet her and get her autograph. When we asked Sam what her favorite part of the day was, she said meeting Ariel.


We debated about staying for the Pirate and Princess party that went from 7pm-midnight but it would have cost another $150 for tickets for the three of us (Nash was free) and we'd had rain for the better part of the afternoon. So, we left the park at closing and headed to Downtown Disney to find Planet Hollywood to eat
dinner.
When we got to Planet Hollywood there was an hour and ten minute wait just to get seated and it was already 8:30 pm. After spending about 15 min. trying to decide what to do, we left and headed back toward Orlando. We stopped and ate dinner at a Denny's at about 9:30-10:00 pm. We had to wake the kids up to eat, but I'm glad we did because I knew they were hungry because they hadn't eaten any "real" food since breakfast at 9 am. After Denny's, we headed back to Jacksonville to Jamie & Robbie's house. It was raining pretty hard and apparently, there's a short in the windshield wiper box in Robbie's truck. We had to pull over on the freeway twice to pound on the box to get the wipers going again. Finally, the box just gave out so we spent probably an hour or more looking for a gas station or some other store that was open at 11:30 at night that sold RainX. We finally found it at a Walgreens around midnight. Then we had to find a gas station that wasn't in the middle of the ghetto so they could put the RainX on the windshield. We finally made it home around 2:30 am!


Day 5 - Spring Training Game Day.
We went down to Orlando first thing in the morning and was going to check into our hotel so that we could leave our luggage there instead of hauling it another hour south with us to the baseball stadium, but they weren't ready for us to check in yet. So, we made our way to Winter Haven and got tickets to watch the Cleveland Indians play the Atlanta Braves. It was a pretty dull game. The Indians didn't even get a hit until the bottom of the 9th with 2 out. The final score ended up being 4-1 Braves. The kids were pretty good during the game - of course, I bought coloring books and treats at Target the day before, so I'm sure that helped!

After the game was over we went back to Orlando and had dinner at Cici's. It's a pizza, pasta and desseret buffet. It was interesting to go there - especially with the kids. They had every kind of pizza you can imagine, including macaroni & cheese pizza (yes, I did say macaroni and cheese pizza).
After dinner, we went back to our hotel and played in the pool and the hot tub for about an hour or so and then hit the sack!


Day 4 - It rained most of the day. We finally went and ate at The Pig. It was pretty good - everyone ordered ribs. We pretty much just stayed at Jamie & Robbie's house this day, which was ok because we needed to get ready to go to DisneyWorld on Wednesday. Jamie, Samantha & I went and got pedicures and manicures. Sam sat up in the big massage chair and they gave her the whole treatment. She was so cute to watch - it was the first time I've taken her to do that. She got Barbie pink nails with a flower on her ring fingers and big toes. She managed to touch the heat lamp Jamie was drying her fingernails under though and it burnt her pretty bad. We had to make a trip to Walgreens to find some burn spray and bandaids. Robbie & Travis went and bought rain gutter to put up around the back of the house to keep rain out of the lanai. Apparently some guy in Home Depot told them they were a bunch of Yankee's and didn't they know you don't need rain gutter down here? Jamie and I were just glad they didn't get in a fight with the guy because they were both pretty mad when they got back to the house!

Day 3 - Imax, St. Augustine Light House & Dog Races

(Looking out from the top of the Light House.)



(This is looking up to the top of the lighthouse from the bottom. It's something like 300 stairs all the way to the top. Samantha & Travis were the only ones to make the trek up!)

So, we made it to the Imax theater, the lighthouse and the dog races today. We would have been able to make it to the fort too but we got stuck in traffic for like 30-45 min. because they had to raise and lower the bridge to let a boat through so traffic got WAY backed up. After we got done at the lighthouse we went and walked through all the shopes downtown. I found some fabulous treasures that are sure to surface soon!! One treasure won't make it home - we found a fudge shop!! I did exercise control though. They had buy 2 slices get 1 free and I only bought 1 slice because I knew if I bought 3 I'd eat all 3 by myself. Jamie on the other hand, bought all 3 so there are now 4 pieces of fudge in the house! Travis was adventurous today and drove Robbie's truck. Taking 2 vehicles was nice because we weren't so squished and Robbie could go do work stuff after the theater. We wanted to hit the St. Augustine beach today too but ran out of daylight. I guess the fact that we didn't even get to St. Augustine until 3 pm was a bit of a factor though! At least we got Clayton in to see the dr. before he had to be on his nebulizer every 4 hours instead of 3 times a day. He does have a fever tonight though.

Jamie won 2 times at the dog races but Trav and I were the big losers of the night. That's ok though, it's not like we went expecting to win! The kids really got a kick out of seeing all the dogs and getting to pick which one was going to win the race. They totally got into it and cheered their pick on. It was cute to watch.

Tomorrow it's supposed to rain pretty bad. Jamie has a dr. appointment in the morning and they are supposed to be coming out to set up cable between 10-12. There's a few things we have in mind to do while it's raining. The boys want to go to WalMart to check out fishing gear for their trip on Friday and it sounds like we'll go have lunch at The Pig.

Well, it sounds like the movie is starting so I'd better go! We're watching The Game Plan tonight - starting it at the early hour of 11:15 pm too!

Day 2 - The Gator Farm

The weather is holding for us so far. We went down to St. Augustine today and did the Gator farm. The kids got quite a kick out of that. We even had our picture taken with Trav and I holding baby alligators and the kids on our laps. It's pretty neat. Even Samantha pet the baby alligator several times - which surprised me. We were going to go to the Lighthouse and the Fort but we also wanted to go to the IMAX (which was back toward the freeway). We were worried we weren't going to make it to the IMAX before they closed so we skipped the Lighthouse and the Fort and headed for the IMAX (it's at the World Golf Hall of Fame). Well, when we got there, there weren't any movies starting for an hour and the only movie that was left to see was the Spiderwick Chronicles which was the most expensive. So, we left St. Augustine and came back and had dinner at Gator Docside (the kids did try the gator tail and really liked it). Then we were going to go to the dog races. Jamie called them yesterday to make sure they'd be open today and they said they would be from 7-11. Well, when we got there at 8 they were closed! We're going to try again tomorrow. The guys were going to go on their fishing charter tomorrow but the lady called and canceled because they're supposed to have 6-7 ft swells. So, they're going to go Friday instead. Jamie is still feeling sick but has been a trooper and gone along all day long.

Tomorrow I think we're going to go back to St. Augustine after Jamie goes to the dr. so we can do the Lighthouse and the Fort and try again at the IMAX. I think if we would have gotten to St. Augustine earlier in the day we would've been fine time wise, but we didn't get there until around 1:00. I think we're also going to hit the St. Augustine beach tomorrow. That will be fun - the kids keep asking when they can go swimming.

Anyway, just wanted to let you know we're having a good time & hope you are enjoying your week as much as we are!!

First day in Jacksonville!

So, we made it here in one piece. The kids were SO good all the way here. They slept to the airport in SLC and then were awake until we landed in Denver and then fell asleep in Denver b/c we had a 2 hr layover and they slept all the way to Atlanta where we woke them up to get off the plane at 530 am local time (2 hrs ahead of UT time). Then they stayed awake until several hrs later. We got here and went to baggage claim and didn't have any baggage. As I was filing a claim with the guy he got a phone call from Frontier saying our luggage had showed up with them an hr ago. I knew something like that would happen! I'm just glad we have our underwear!!

After we got here we came to Jamie and Robbie's house (such a cute house by the way) and were here for a bit. Then we went and grabbed some lunch and went to the flea market. Wow - it's amazing the crap people think they can sell and the crap people will buy!! We didn't find anything too fabulous but a guy did give Samantha a purple barbie car for free. Oh goodie. I also bought some name things that say each of our names, where the name comes from and what the name means. They're pretty neat and I think they'll look really good in the front entry with all the family pictures. Nash fell asleep in the stroller (so glad we brought it with us) while we were at the flea market and slept for about an hour. When we got back to Jamie & Robbie's house Trav, Me, Clayton, Jamie & Nash all fell asleep while Samantha watched Cinderella and Robbie went to work for a bit. Later Jamie & I went to Target. I bought me some flip flops and the kids water shoes and a few other things.

Tomorrow we're going to St. Augustine. We're going to hit the gator farm and the light house/fort and then hit an IMAX theater. When we get back to Jacksonville, we're going to go to the greyhound dog races. I think the kids will get a kick out of those!

Anyway, we're having a good time and the weather ROCKS. There is none of the white stuff in sight (although it is kinda naked without the mountains)!! The weather is just right - we're in shorts and no jackets but it isn't blistering hot and there's virtually no humidity to factor in. The kids actually insisted we put sunscreen on them this morning after we changed into fresh clothes and were sitting out in the lani. It was kinda funny to hear Samantha be so insistent that she needed to have sunscreen on because she was getting burned.