Chronicling Through

lessthanaseven:

An Old Irish Blessing

May the road rise up to meet you.

May the wind always be at your back.

May the sun shine warm upon your face,

and rains fall soft upon your fields.

And until we meet again,

May God hold you in the palm of His hand.

My grandma was really proud of her Irish heritage (and so am I) and this blessing was said several times throughout her various funeral proceedings.  (For those of you who don’t know or haven’t guessed, my grandma passed away a little over a week ago at age 80.)  She was a wonderful woman and I really miss her a lot.

The prayer vigil was probably the most helpful and meaningful part of everything (which surprised me).  The funeral was too religious for it to mean much for me, but the priest was fantastic and made sure to include people from all religions.  Usually when I’m in a church, the religious leader’s words do not make me feel welcome at all.

My grandma, dad and I are peas in a pod, which explains why my grandma and dad got in huge spats and so do my dad and I.  However, whenever I visited my grandparents, my grandma always took my side because she agreed with me and she’d actually lived with my dad before, not me.  This might mean my grandma had ADHD too, but I’ll never really be able to know that.  Anyway, she wasn’t great with interpreting jokes (which is the same with me and many others with ADHD), but she married my grandpa…and he is rarely serious.  It’s one of my favourite things about him.  I loved (well, maybe loved isn’t the appropriate word) watching my grandma get mad at my grandpa for something and he’d just continue to joke it off.  My grandpa likes to tell us that eating certain foods will “put hair on your chest” and my grandma always answered, annoyed, that she didn’t want hair on her chest!

She was also a teacher and I loved listening to the conversations about education my family had when I was little and I loved being able to participate in them more recently.

She was a tiny woman (I’m not sure if recently she would’ve measured even at 5 feet) but she was definitely feisty.  She definitely lived up to her Irish and French heritage, anyhow.

I’m not sure if I really have a favourite memory of my grandma, but I’m glad I got to spend more time alone with my grandparents in the past few years.  I’ve spent Canadian Thanksgiving at my aunt’s and they’ve both come down too, I went out to breakfast with them last spring, and I went to Oktoberfest with them two years ago.  There’s lots of stories my grandpa tells (and a few I’ve heard my grandma tell) about the two of them that I love and I’m sure I’ll hear them again.

For example, anytime my grandpa mentioned that I would always ask him to take his teeth out, my grandma would share her teeth story with me.  I’d also ask her to take hers out too, because my other grandma’s teeth came out.  However, she had her real teeth and told me she couldn’t—but I still reached in her mouth to tug at her teeth because I didn’t believe her.

I don’t like stew very much, but I loved my grandma’s.  She bought the most delicious, not very nutritious bread and she always had ginger ale, cookies, and apple juice.  I don’t think she ever didn’t offer us food and/or dessert.  Her house used to be covered in elephants because she collected them.  She gave them to us a few years ago so they didn’t have to be divvied up later.  She also loved visiting Florida and going to casinos with my grandpa and his sisters.

I would’ve loved to have known my grandma better, but I’m glad I at least got to know her as well as I did.

I love you, Grandma.

How you know Kaia is Canadian:

somedayiwillmakeittochicago:

1. She asks about the score of COLLEGE hockey games.
2. She is wearing flannel in her driver’s license photo.
3. “Canadian Thanksgiving IS real!” *insert drunken pouty face here. 

(The results of this list were gathered at her 21st birthday party.)

I do not remember this.  Also, Canadian Thanksgiving IS real! :)

we can live like jack and sally if we want

In my EDMT 330 class today (a class about technology in the classroom), I did a presentation on blogging and listened to presentations about podcasts and Audacity.  There’ve been other various, awesome programs we’ve learned about throughout the semester, and every time I leave that class, all I want to do is play with the technology.  Unfortunately, I should be doing homework instead so I feel guilty if I decide to play around.

Right now I wish I’d stuck with learning to play the guitar because I’d really like to be able to play.  And then I could play with Audacity more.  I also just want to play around with podcasts and technology in the classroom—which would be fine, because this is homework that I need to get done, but I have a play to read for tomorrow, which would be a better use of my time.

For the rest of the semester, I have a unit plan, an online class unit to create, 2 more plays, some reading, and some minor assignments left.  Plus catching up on a little bit of work I’ve been slacking on—but I’ve caught up more now!  But in roughly 4 weeks, I’m completely finished with my undergraduate classes and I only have student teaching left until I graduate.  When that’s finished, I basically only need to get cpr certified (or something), send in some paperwork (and probably money) and I’ll be certified to teach in the state of Michigan.  At 21.  Weird.

Saturday, I’m taking certification tests for English and speech.  I still need to study for them.  I’m sure I’ll do fine, but I’d like to make sure I know the material on the exams well enough.  I’m worried that if I go in blind, I’ll fail one or both of them and I’m out $132 AND I’ll have to take the tests again in order to get my teacher certification.

I also have to finish my senior thesis and write my statement of interest so I can finish applying to grad school.  I’m so excited about the program, but because of unexpected things (coughDustincough) and because I’ve never lived more than 10 minutes from my family (and moving is hard and I won’t have friends there yet), I’m not as excited about moving to Canada as I used to be.  And depending on what happens, I might just move there for this grad program and then move back.  We’ll see.  Somehow I’ve managed to make my life more complicated than I wanted it to be…but I’m happy. :)

Also, I had a lovely time at my birthday (the parts that I can remember :/) on Friday night…my friends just managed to get me to drink more than I’d planned.  But it meant I got to spend all day Saturday with my boyfriend, which never, ever happens.

l wish I had more free time I could spend with my friends…my schedule pretty much leaves me free from 11 pm to 11 am, and I spend that time doing homework and sleeping. :(  I know I’ll be busy while student teaching, but maybe having more normal hours will leave me with slightly more time to see people?

I hate the end of the semester.  I get stressed out and my life is a mess.  Especially this semester, with the thesis and grad school application.  And work.  I’m not used to working a job where I can’t do homework anymore.  Being an RA took up a lot of time, and it really sucked to live where I worked (I don’t miss it!), but at least I could get homework done while I was working.  And see people all the time.

Let’s see how much work I can accomplish between now and my next class…

(P.S. I love Blink182’s I Miss You.  A lot.)