Amococo

Last Friday, Austin and I popped over to the Mesa Arts Center to see their Amococo exhibit. We weren't sure what to expect but it turned out to be really neat! The piece is a huge display set up in a parking lot. It was created by a British artist who calls himself an architect of air.
I would say so! Huge, vinyl pieces were shaped to make a fancy looking bounce house. But inside, it's a maze and prismacolor luminarium. It was so fun! We loved it.

Afterwards we toured through the Museum of Contemporary Art and saw a few more fun pieces.

Spring Break

Spring Break is here! And while poor Austin only gets a break from classes, I have both work and school off. It's nice :) And although I'm going a little stir crazy from being at home all day, I am getting alot done. Taxes - check! FAFSAs - check! Spring cleaning and organizing - check!
I had hoped to be working at Kids Express for the break, but so far they have had very few kids attending, so no hours for me.
But I have kept busy looking for little projects. I found some bruised flowers for really cheap and filled a gift from Austin's grandma

And I started working again on a long time project - a tshirt quilt that I began probably 2 years ago.

Well, that's our thrilling plan for Spring Break. Nothing out of the ordinary - heaven knows we can't afford it. Although, we did have a little adventure early this morning.

Yesterday, Austin brought home 2 new frogs making our grand total of amphibians a whopping 7. We've got 4 African dwarf frogs, which are water dwellers, and live with our 15 fish.

Then, last weekend, we took home Rufio, the fire-belly toad that previously resided in Cole's (Ausin's brother) room.
And then these two guys, whom I believe we are calling Thud Butt

and Pockets (only if you've seen Hook, will these names make sense).

But anyways, at 3:30 this morning we both hear this strange noise, like a combination of a quack and those wooden, ribbed stick instrument. Austin sits strait up and asks me if I heard that and if I know what the noise is. Very groggily I answer that I think it was the frog. Turns out, I was right, and a very flustered Austin, whose adrenaline was pumping, got up and proceded to move the whole frog tank out of our room and set it back up by the front door. He continued the noise for the rest of the night, and I've heard it many times today.

That's all the adventure we have to report in the Baxter house today!

Hmmm... still busy

So I thought that maybe being graduated, taking a new job during the day and only having class 2 nights a week would make us a little less busy. But, of course, what was I thinking! Life is always busy. Just always in a new way :)
But despite the new things filling up our life, we are still doing well. Austin still works full time and goes to school before and after his 9-5 shift. He is taking his last science credit (yay!) so comes home late late after a lab on Tuesday nights.
But he still beats me home. Tuesday and Thursday I have class from 4:40 to 9:45. Man those are long days! But they are very worth it.
About 3 weeks ago, I started a new job, still in the Chandler district. It was hard to leave, but after 4 years working in the afterschool program at CTA Independence I was offered a position to be a special ed paraeducator at Humphrey Elementary.
I have worked in schools for over 5 years, been taking care of kids all my life. I know how to teach, been doing it for years. I thought, no big deal, I can handle this job. But boy... I sure was humbled.
My students are part of the SpEd "Edge" program. My classroom is full of k-2 grade students struggling with emotional disabilities (bipolar, Explosive Emotional Disorder, ADHD, ect...). I've been there 3 weeks and I've chased down a kid who was running off campus (4 times!), been told I'd be shot with a gun and stabbed with a knife, been called a whole slew of names I won't repeat, found a child hiding from me in a supply closet, and on and on and on. I never dreamed about this side of teaching! But on top of all that, every day I get dozens of hugs, excited "Hi Mrs. Baxter!"s and the joy of seeing a student GET IT when I finally reach him. Working with ED students has been the hardest job I've ever done, but it really is worth it. These poor kids have so much going on in their lives. They are growing up often in broken homes, with troubled siblings or imprisoned parents, and they don't have the same mental capabilities that we have to deal with it all. My heart breaks for them everyday, and even though they can scare me to death and drive me up a wall, I am so glad for this job at Humphrey!

Goodbye 2010!

2010 is over and we sure will miss it. 2010 was full of so many wonderful events :) Just in December alone, we celebrated birthdays, graduations, homecomings and of course the holidays.

I graduated with my BA on December 16 and I am so excited to be done! (Although I'm starting back right away) But to have one degree under my belt is a great feeling of accomplishment :)

Then, a week and four flights later, Austin's sister Ciara came home from her mission in Leeds, England. It was my first time meeting her and spending time with all of his family is so much fun. We are glad to have everyone so close! Ciara made it home just in time for Christmas, barely. She was scheduled to fly out of London twice, but got snowed in. Then she told she had a flight through Paris and arriving in AZ at 11:59 Christmas Eve

. But fortunately, she was rescheduled one more time and flew from England to Amsterdam to Seattle to Phx and made it home the evening of December 23.

Christmas with both families was wonderful. We love having family right here in town. We spent the morning with my family and then the afternoon/evening with the Baxters/Dunns.

My sister-in-law, Clarissa, gave all of the women in our family handmade temple slippers. It was so sweet of her to put in all that hard work! And they look great :)

These hats are from Ciara. She got them from a shop in Sherwood Forest. True blue Robin Hood! And it is great to see all the Baxters back together.
Forgive the sideways shot, but here's our little Christmas tree. Nice and cozy in our little apartment! It smelled so good and really brought the holiday spirit in. We had a blast our first Christmas together :)

The following week we drove up to Utah to spend time with my mom's family and visit Austin's mission friends (he served in Ogden). Oh, and of course to go skiing :) It was Austin's first time, and I have to say I'm really impressed with how quickly he picked it up! I hope this is the first trip of many :) (though he's not quite convinced yet)

While in Utah, we also got to see old friends of Austin's, like the Rogers family:

It was fun to meet all these people Austin worked with for two years. But while the friends and family were hard to leave, the weather made it a little easier. It was freezing! The poor Mustang had never seen snow... and man it sure saw alot of it at one time!

It's November!

Wow, time has really flown! This semester is moving in hyper-speed and we're doing all we can just to stay afloat! But it's encouraging to know we're so close. Graduation is in 40 days :) Woo-hoo!
Also worth celebrating: I have been accepted into the grad program in the ASU Teacher's College. I will start school again in January working on my 14 month MA in Elementary Ed :) I'm so excited! I love journalism and I'm glad that I was able to choose it for my first degree. But the farther I've gotten into it, the more I've realized it's very incompatible with having a family and just isn't what I love the most. This oppportunity to get my MA and AZ Teaching Certification has been such a blessing! I can't wait to get started!
I've been meaning to blog for over a week, so here are the somewhat outdated Halloween pictures :) We had some friends from our ward over to carve pumpkins. So spooky! (Austin the Artist did the Ghostbusters. Doesn't it look great?!)


And we dressed up as Lois Lane and Clark Kent. Superman is Austin's favorite superhero and it's always been our joke that I'm obviously Lois (journalist and all). Fun stuff!

I love my Bosch!

Today Austin had to work (even though it's a Saturday) so I was home alone for most of my Saturday. I put on a Michael Buble cd and tackled a long list of projects that have been building up for a few weeks. One of those was to bake rolls, yep, with my mom's famous recipe.

One of the secrets to her amazing rolls is using a Bosch to mix and kneed the dough. My grandparents and aunts and uncles chipped in to get me a Bosch for the wedding and I can't even say how grateful I am! I love having this machine, it makes such a difference! I've used it to make cookies several times, but this was my first attempt at bread on my own machine.

They are pretty good if I do say so myself!

Me and bread haven't always worked out. My siblings love to tell the stories of times I've set garlic toast on fire or blackened the rolls that were supposed to be for dinner... Needless to say, baking rolls that not only taste good but didn't catch fire is a BIG DEAL for me :)

Thank heavens for midterms!

I know, I sound crazy. Can you believe I just gave thanks for midterm exams? Well, in case you hadn't noticed, I've been pretty absent from the blogging world. Here is the #1 reason why:
And this isn't even the complete stack of all the books I have to read this semester. Literature classes are fun and I'm really enjoying them, but taking 4 at one time means a full schedule! Don't get me wrong, I love to read :) and I'd much rather have reading homework than math problems, but it gets pretty time consuming! However, this week I have 3 midterms, so I don't have to read a Restoration English drama, a Shakespearian play or a book that was later made into a movie. Just have to read King Arthur legends :)

Married life is treating us quite well! :) We are definitely busy, and don't see each other as much as we'd like, but we are grateful to both have jobs (and cars!) and be able to make ends meet.

Since it's been so long since I've blogged, I thought I'd put in a photo collage of how we've been staying busy and having fun as a new married couple :)

First, meet our cute, little apartment:

Here's a few shots from the Switchfoot/Goo Goo Dolls concert we went to about a month ago. It was both mine and Austin's first concert and we really liked it! (It helps that those are our two favorite bands)

And here's a couple pictures from our Honeymoon in San Diego, CA. We also went to Disneyland, but most of our pictures are all on Austin's camera, which I of course don't have with me right now. I'll try to get those up sometime soon.