A Prayer

Heavenly Father,

Sometimes I feel so worn out.  I feel so tired.  Give me strength and energy to do the job You have called me to do.

I praise You for all the wonderful people You have placed in my life in the Dominican Republic.  Thank You for pushing me to go to Bible study tonight even though I felt so tired.  It is such a blessing to share with the women at church.  Continue to unify IBVN.  

I thank You for not abandoning Your children.  I am amazed at the way You answer our prayers in Your timing.

Guide me in what and where You want me to be next year, Lord.  Help me to be obedient to where You are calling me.  Push me outside of my comfort zone so that I need to trust You every day.  Help others to understand what You are doing in my life.

Help me to love those around me with all my heart, soul, and energy.  Continue to place people in my life here in Santiago that need to see Your light and grace and power.  Use me, Lord, here in Santiago.  Use me, Lord, wherever You will call me next.

Protect me and keep me safe.  Forgive me for not trusting You more.  Forgive me for the sins that I fall in every day, for my discontentment.  Help me to appreciate all the things You have blessed me with.  Help me to sing and dance when we have running water, and when we don't, allow me to pray for those around me in the world who constantly live like this.

Provide what I need, Lord.  Thank You for loving me so very well.  Do miracles.  Work through me to bring others closer to You.

Again, Lord, as I sit in my classroom, let me sleep well tonight so I can teach with all my heart tomorrow.  Give me time to spend just You and me.  Fill me up so that I may overflow into the lives of others.

In Your precious and powerful and mighty name I pray all these things.

Amen.

Just do it

What I've been doing for exercise:  Christin and I have been trying to work out a lot lately.  After my kidney stone episode in January, the doctor told me I needed to spend more time getting healthy.  He also noticed a slight curve in my back in the x-ray.  He said it could be corrected with exercise.

I hate running, but Christin and I have found some awesome videos that we do in our apartment.  I don't have the money to go to the gym, but I am motivated to workout in the apartment.  It makes it ten times easier to workout with someone else pushing me.  "Higher high knees, Hillary!"  Christin frequently yells.  :)

Here are some of my favorite videos.

Barre: This is a combination of ballet and conditioning.  Christin and I found this one routine that we love.

Kingdom Come - Barre

Zumba:  I love dancing, and these videos are so fun.  It doesn't even seem like I am working out, but the sweat dripping off our noses and chins indicates that we definitely are burning calories.

Salo - Adrenalina

Salo - Darte un beso (great for a cool down)

Salo - Shawty got moves

Insanity:  This is an intense work out program.  We just use the warm up and the fit tests and get a great workout.

Insanity Cardio Abs

Insanity Warm Up

Insanity Fit Test

Tone it up:  Karina and Katrina have an awesome program.  Their workouts aren't super long, but they kick my butt.  Here are some of my favorites.

Burn it up

Bikini abs

Bikini arms

Hump day HIIT routine

Holiday hustle

Love your body workout

Over spring break a few people noticed that I was looking thinner, which made me happy.  Everyone loves hearing compliments like that.  I want to workout because I love my body, not because I hate it.  Well, I also workout so I can eat yummy things like cookie dough and chocolate.  :)

Lately, curvy girls are taking over the world.  Size-16 model Ashley Graham has been gracing covers of magazines right and left this year.

There is another model, Iskra Lawerence who works with Aerie who posts awesome and inspirational pictures on Instagram.  Recently someone commented on Iskra's photo calling her a fat cow.  She took matters into her own hands and did a little photo shoot with bags of chips.  I love seeing confident women with real bodies portrayed in the media.

from: here, here,

Con mucho amor.

Paper towel and a stone

What I've been doing:  Last weekend I went to the capital for a women's conference with my church.  We left Friday afternoon, spent 3.5 long hours in traffic, and arrived right on time on Friday evening.  The theme of the conference was idols of the heart.

I used to think, oh those stories from the Old Testament don't apply to us anymore.  I don't know many people who have gold cows in their house that they worship.  But we do have many things in our lives that we think about and focus on more than we think about and focus on God.

One of the most convicting things from the weekend was a question the speaker asked.  She said, what do you spend your time talking about?  That is where your heart is.  What do you talk about most?  Work?  Money?  Shopping?  School?  Boyfriends?  Drinking?  Sports?

The second day of the conference the speaker drove in the point that we are BELOVED DAUGHTERS OF THE KING.  What would our lives look like if we really lived out that truth every day of our lives?

So what do paper towels and rocks have to do with anything?  Well here's a little story about obedience.  I share this not to pat  myself on the back.  I share this story to encourage you to bless someone else's day.  Do something so tiny.  You will never know the eternal impact that little act of kindness will have on the world.

Saturday we stopped at a mall on our way back to Santiago after the conference.  My roommate and I had to go to the bathroom, so we left our stuff with one of the ladies, Julissa.  I had never met her before the weekend, but it was fun to laugh and get to know her during the conference.  She is one of the funniest people I've met in the DR.  When we asked her if we could leave our bags with her while we went to the bathroom, she said, "Bring me back something."  Christin and I started laughing.

"Bring you back something from the bathroom?"  She just smiled and laughed as we walked away.

Well, I thought it would be funny to take a paper towel and rip it into the shape of a heart to give to her.  I made her close her eyes and open her hands.  She was extremely hesitant to do it since we had just come from the bathroom.  She was laughing and squeeling as she tried to decide whether or not to trust us.

When she saw the crumpled paper towel, opened it and saw that it was a heart, she laughed.

Our group from Vida Nueva

Sunday morning I decided to write her a little note and give her a love rock at church.  (For more about love rocks - read here.)  It was something so simple and so little.

Yesterday I get a message from the pastor's wife, Kelly.  Kelly said that Julissa showed her the little rock and note.  Kelly said that Julissa has blessed someone else because of my little blessing.  That other person asked Kelly about me and said she wanted to meet me.  I thought, wow, we really never realize the impact of our small, simple acts of obedience to God.  We never realize how He is going to use those to encourage or bless others.

This little Youtube video shows the ripples of kindness perfectly.

What are you doing for others?  How can you share God's love in a simple way today?

Con mucho amor.

Vamos a pasear

Where I've been traveling:  In the beginning of March, I left the city of Santiago for the first time since November (not counting Christmas break in December in the USA).  I got to travel with my students, with friends, and with a church.

New Hope

Thursday, March 10th we took a special day to go to La Vega and help at the New Hope house.  New Hope is a school and safe house for girls.  They just recently purchased a piece of land with a big house.  We went to help paint.

It was fun to get out and serve with our students.  Last semester and year we were helping out at Yve's school, but this semester has been too crazy for us to do that.  Instilling values of service in the lives of others is important.

Sosua

Friday, March 11th there was no school.  We took advantage of the day to go to the beach.  At first the trip was just going to be my roommate and I, but then we invited our friends Lyndi and Corinne.  We made a special trip to eat at Gorditos.

Then we sat on the beach and splashed in the waves.  It was such a nice and relaxing way to spend a day off.  Our bus ride home was a little cold.  I was bundled up.  We went to Mari's Cakes for dinner and dessert when we got back since the bus station was close to the restaurant.

Santo Domingo 

Sunday, March 13th one of the churches I sometimes attend had a national service together in the capital.  We piled in a bunch of cars and made our way to the botanical gardens.

I had never been there before, and I would love to go back and explore some more.  It was nice to sing and be with a bunch of people praising the Lord together.

I also spend spring break (Semana Santa) in Costa Rica with mom, dad, and sis, but that will go in a separate blog post.  :)

Con mucho amor.

Bud, Not Buddy

What we've been reading:  We just finished one of my new favorite novels to teach, Bud, Not Buddy by Christopher Paul Curtis.  I found lots of resources online that helped me, but I also just love the themes and morals from this book.  It is all about family, growing up, change, and the Great Depression.

One of the parts of the novel that I think is the funniest is all of Bud Caldwel's Rules and Things.  Bud is such a funny kid, and he is smart and innocent.  He has concocted all sorts of life rules that I typed and printed off for the bulletin board.  I would have loved to have time for the boys to create their own.  Next time I teach this novel I will incorporate this activity.

Names are important.  They are our identity.  Bud's name changes throughout the novel, and he talks about the importance of names.  I stole this idea from Miss Christin.  The boys and I looked up what do our names mean.  They had to create illustrations to go with the meaning.

I found a great pdf with ideas that came from a theater who adapted Bud, Not Buddy for the stage.  I absolutely love comparing different versions of the same story, whether from page to stage or screen. One of the activities in the pdf used the text from the novel to compare to the script.  Then, it asked the students to adapt a different part of the novel into a script.  We took the project a step further and acted and filmed the scene.  Here's the link to our version.

The pdf also had an idea to make rock journals.  I just printed off the page and the boys wrote three important days of their lives on the rocks.  It would be cool to purchase real rocks and have them write with a metallic pen on the rocks the memory.

At the beginning of the novel we created Bud's suitcase together.  We talked about the symbolism behind each object in his suitcase.  Then, I had the boys create their own suitcases.  I asked them what symbolizes them.  They wrote reflections on the back of their suitcases explaining each object.

I loved how this unit turned out.  I hope that I will get to teach this novel again someday.

Con mucho amor.

WWI

What the boys have been creating:  We spent the past month studying WWI.  I do not actually remember learning about this war when I was in middle school or high school, so I had to do some research about what happened.  We studied the key players in the war.  We used timelines to show the sequence of events.  We also talked about why the US joined the war.

To finish our WWI unit, the boys created a video about war strategies.  They included trench foot, being tired from fighting, the bathroom issues, and more.  Here's the link to the video that is posted below.

They also did a timeline and a mind map for their final.  Each one was so different and unique.

At the end of the year I want them to create a mega timeline like they did last year with eight or ten important things from the timeline of US history.  I am hoping these tests and evaluations will help them put together all their thoughts and ideas.

Do you have any WWI ideas or resources?

Con mucho amor.

Pi Day

What we've been eating: Monday was 3/14, a very important day in the math world.  Last year I did not celebrate the day with the boys, but this year Christin did an awesome job leading the morning activities.  I had an interview that morning, so I was unable to attend the whole time.

The kids started off reading this awesome article from Smithsonian Tween Tribune.  They had some neat ideas to help celebrate the day.  Here is their list of ways to celebrate and engage students.

There was a pi contest for who could memorize the most digits of the number.  Andrew got to 28 digits and Lesly memorized 30!

There was also a t-shirt decorating contest.  The kids came up with the most creative designs.  Lesly's t-shirt said "QT Pie" with a picture of a pie on the back.  

I found this article with different pi/math themed movies.  We watched An Invisible Sign which was interesting, different, and connected well with Pi day.  While we watched the movie, we munched on Christin's awesome pies.

It was a fun day to celebrate math.

Con mucho amor.