Lots of things are going on right now, it almost takes my breath away to think of all the amazing changes that are happening. The three at the top of the list would have to be the choir I’ve been singing in since the beginning of the year, as well as the master’s degree program I’ve begun and possible teaching change for this next school year.

Here’s a photo of the First Presbyterian sanctuary, with my choir:

the choir

At the risk of gushing, I’ll keep my comments brief. A few Sundays ago, we sang Ubi Caritas, a beautiful Gregorian-style song by Duruffle, and it hasn’t left my head yet. Our choir director Jim calls this serious tune-bondage. Our latest undertaking is the Brahms Requiem, and we’re scheduled to play with the Colorado Springs Philharmonic orchestra for the church’s Good Friday service. I can’t wait… the music is seriously intense with so many accidentals and variations. It really keeps me on my toes. Rob joined with me and is SO brave to take on something like reading music for the first time. He’s taking some extra classes offered by a choir member called Music Reading 101 on Monday Nights, where he can get some extra practice. It seems like every week we have so many fun musical things to discuss as we’re driving back from choir. I can’t believe I’ve let myself be away from a musical group for 5 years now, with the joy I get from it.

And in a sudden turn of events, I decided to plunge into master’s classes at UCCS. I was feeling so down about the missed cohort opportunity- like I wanted to be learning and couldn’t- when I was encouraged to schedule an appointment with an advisor the first week of January. He then convinced me to register for classes that began THE NEXT WEEK, so with great excitement and some fear mixed in, I registered. Rob is so very supportive and knows that this is a dream I’ve wanted to go toward for a long time. He’s doing all sorts of things around the house when I’m out to help with the workload. I just love all three of my classes right now. My research and statistics class is all semester long on Tuesday nights, but the other three are nicely staggered. I’m currently in a curriculum/multicultural class Monday evenings (which is wonderful and inspiring), and my Saturday class is for supervision/evaluation. I even love studying at this point, it’s so strange.

Oh, one more thing. I might move up to teach 5th grade at my school in the fall. But I don’t really know yet. I really love my group of kids and would learn so much by following them for another year. There’s another 5th grade teacher who wants to move to 4th and loop continuously with me, meaning that each year we would alternate grade levels. It would create a really neat consistency in our school, knowing that if a kid is in one of our classes for 4th that they would follow us to 5th. I’m really excited about the possibility because I loved looping with my 3rd graders just 2 years ago- and I learned a lot, even cried when they moved on to 5th grade. My only wonder is whether it would mean a lot of learning and new stress for me when I’m already going to be taking more classes next fall.