Watching you October 17, 2006
Ups and downs of a day October 14, 2006
Today was my cross country kids first day of competition. We took them (all 33 little middle school kids) to the 59th Annual Mt. Sac Invitational. This is one of the biggest cross country meets of the year. The competition has separate races for Elementary school, Middle School, High School, Jr. College and regular colleges. Hundreds of schools from around the country (specifically high school and college) come to compete with the best. Being a brand new school, our kids are not the best, and pretty much have zero experience. But they did great! I was soooo proud of all of them… some were having a real hard time at practice, many not completing their workouts (they would walk if they got tired). I am pretty sure all of the kids ran the entire race without giving up. Some students even suprised us! We teamed up with a middle school in our district to save money on bus fair and help unite the middle schools in our area. We had a great area set up for the kids to rest in, and for the most part they were very well behaved. We had an unfortunate event in which a student stole money from one of their teammates, and they are being removed from the team. I was really frustrated about this, but this student has had several chances and keeps making the wrong choices.
On the upside, the parent of the student that had the money stolen was very supportive and is going to take care of the incident with the school.
When I got home, for some reason I had TONS of energy. I sweeped and wiped down my entire kitchen floor, (on my hands and knees) I cleaned up the living room, vacuumed downstairs, cleaned the bathroom upstairs and did 3 loads of laundry. Then I showered and now I am a little tired.
While I was in the midst of cleaning… my neighbor from across the way rang my door bell. She is an older woman that lives right across from me that we have chatted with several times. Their son owns the condo they live in and they were staying in it for the summer. They are moving back to Canada for the winter. They are trying to sell their dinning room table and asked if we knew anyone that needed one (let me know if anyone is interested in buying it). Out of the blue as we were walking to look at it she asked me if I was a Christian. I said yes, and we briefly talked about church and how bummed we were that we had not talked about it before that. She also told me that a lady in another condo was a Christian and hosts a Bible study close by. She asked if I would be interested in coming and I gave her my information! Ok, yes it was 2 entries ago that I asked God to help me develop deeper relationships at school and wherever he wants me to. How funny that today I would do a little of both. I stepped out of my comfort zone with my neighbor and I am a little nervous/excited of what may become of it! Plus, I met two coaches at David A. Brown that are pretty great too. And, I work with a really cool PE teacher at my school. He and his wife are pretty great. They really care about kids and enjoy what they do.
How amazing it is when you ask God to make you grow and it actually starts to happen! I have always been shy and scared to talk with people I don’t know that well. I am always nervous that they will not like me or think I am fake or something. My friends and pastor have really encouraged me to step out of my comfort zone and serve and love people. Lord, please help me to step even farther out of my comfort zone to love people even more!
My Pets October 9, 2006
So the yearbook lady at school has her students interviewing different teachers for different pages in the year book. There is a Pets page that some of the girls stopped by the department to discuss. Well, I don’t have any pets (they would die of bordom). But, I do have plants! The girls were pretty sure that they had to be pets not plants, so they moved on. Well, a few days later they stopped by again, and this is what they said, ” Mrs. Gilliland, after discussing it among each other we decided that your plants can qualify as pets.” They took a picture of me, and then asked me to e-mail a picture of myself with my “plant pets,” to the yearbook teacher… below is a picture of me and my pets. 
Desparate House Wives October 9, 2006
Ok, so I decided to stop watching Desparate House Wives on Sunday nights from 8-9pm and start reading my Bible, well… it is 8:50 and WHY AM I ON MY STINKING COMPUTER!?!?!?
Today Pastor Matt gave an amazing message, God really uses him to spread His love to the Church. Today was the fourth week in our “Mission Impossible,” series. The message was about who our target should and should not be when it comes to spreading God’s message. (I.e, our target should not be people from other churches that already know God, but instead those that are seeking to know Him.) Check out www.sandalschurch.com for more.
So, I have decided to step out and grow… (wow, look at that a step of obedience who knew) I thought I was just terrible at witnessing, when in fact I was focusing on the wrong people. My husband and I came to the conclusion that we have a tuff profession to deal with, not many educators are curious about God, they already have their mind made up about Him. And the kids, well if they ask, I will most certainly tell.
Ok, here goes… God please use me to be available to share with those that want to know more about You and help me to be aware of those around me that want to know Him. Please help me to seek out those that want to know you instead of those that want to fight with me about you.
Easy to say, let’s see what happens next. Will I blow it, or will I let God actually use me?
To be continued…
Cross Country Practice October 5, 2006
So I have a few jobs at school:
1. I teach 5 periods of PE a day, our current unit is gym activities (Nationball, Commander Frisbee, Medic etc.) and 2 days a week of cardio (run/walk on the blacktop until the fields are ready for the Bulldog trail.
2. I am one of the Leaders of the Snowboard Team to start treding in January.
3. Cross Country Coach: I am one of 2 coaches, the other just had surgery so he can’t run with us, so I get to pretty much lead.
4. I was asked to be the cheer coach, but said no.
5. I was asked to be on the SST team, but said no.
6. I am a second year BTSA Teacher.
So, now that all of my jobs have been announced we had our first day of cross country practice after school. There are about 40 or so kids interested, and we decided to start them off today with an 18 minute contiuous run to see where they were at. Well, all but a few pretty much died, ok, so they didn’t die, but they didn’t run the entire time… we have lots of work to do. In the mean time I will stay in shape because I will be running with the kids at each practice. Our first invitational is October 13th at the Mt. Sac Middle School Races.
Tuesdays at School September 27, 2006
Ok, so I am a PE teacher, at a school with some of the sports facilities not quite complete. We want the kids to start developing some improvement in the area of cardiovascular endurance, however the lack of facilities is starting to get even me bogged down.
Today in 6th period, it was like usual: 8th graders not listening because they would rather go home than try to stay in shape. I know we have only beein in school for about 5 weeks and the 8th graders have no reason to like me, listen to me or even wonder if I care about them. But I am less concerned about how much they care, and more concerned about how many of them will die young because they chose to be inactive from such a young age. I have kid in my class that I could dust in a mile run, or 100 meter run for that matter.
I know not everyone thinks the same way about fitness that I do, but well, I guess I could use a simple analogy for everyone to understand my frustration. As a Christian, I know there are people lost and unaware that they need Jesus, being active is somewhat similar, they don’t know the long-term effects and it is going to kill them in the long run. It makes me sad that they don’t think I care or that I would ever give them something to do to make the time go by quicker. I just wish they truely understood how important it should be, Jesus and being active, for those of you I was confusing.
Getting to know them September 26, 2006
Today I got a chance to get to know a student after school because she is going to be involved in the cross country program with us. But, she is in dance also, and since the practices conflict, she is meeting with me on an additional day for practice. SO, it was just the two of us out on the track today. I really got to know quite a bit about her. We talked while we warmed up, streched and even while we did the workout. After wards she even talked with me in my office for a while. I found out she is a believer and I was super excited. I know I can’t openly express my faith to my students unless they bring it up, so believe me, when she brought it up, I went with it.
It was truly encouraging to know that the next generation cares about Jesus and living for Him. I almost cried. This school year has been really amazing, last year I worked far away and was never really able to develop any relationships with the kids and it made me sad. They only saw me as a PE teacher and not a person, this year I have been able to really talk to them, I even saw one at the grocery store yesterday! The good days are great, the hard days are no where near as bad as last year… thank you Jesus for providing me with a job close to home. May I use the talents you have given me to spread love and knowledge to our future.
