seriously....

epic fail. has it seriously been 4 months since i've last posted on here? i was so blogtastic for awhile and rocked at this blog business. i guess life kinda carried me away and i got too busy enjoying my life to actually sit down and write about it. but, NOW...it is my summer holiday and perhaps this is a great moment to pick back up on the blog business. i'm not making any promises...but scouts honor that i will try my very best.

i will be back in the states on july 7th, which is exactly a week from now. i'm excited to go home to see my family and friends, but at the same time i really hate leaving hong kong. i always get that bittersweet taste in my mouth when i go from home to home. however, i leave with great excitement for the time that is afforded to me to have some really fantastic fun.
so, here is my list of summer 'to-do' activities:

1. increase my oxygen levels with fresh mountain air
2. have endless amounts of coffee, hugs, and love time with my mommy, daddy, sisters and friends.
3. walk my sweet dogs everyday.
4. observe the majestic starry night sky.
5. climb mountains with daddy.
6. catch up on that endless list of 'books i want to read'.
7. practice my Cantonese skills and find some decent Chinese food
8. road trip!
9. write and reflect.
10. relax.

"rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass on a summer day listening to the murmur of water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is hardly a waste of time." -john lubbock.

here's to summertime!

the best thing and the worst thing.

the best? okay, am i becoming blog-obsessed? perhaps, just perhaps i am. i have found my thoughts often wondering during the day to what i should post on my blog. i found myself today actually brain-blogging. i was literally forming sentences for what i would want to put in my blog. it's all random and in-sequential and also totally distracting. i think one of these days i might get caught brain-blogging when i fail to listen in on a conversation or end up running into a sign on the street. but, with that being said i think that my new found blogsession has helped me look at my life in a different perspective. it's helped me to feel excited about things that normally would seem so ordinary as something that is extraordinary because i get to share it here with you, my 3 followers. haha. i mean it honestly doesn't matter how many people are following because i've found great pleasure just by writing here. and maybe somebody will read it and comment and that will make me happy. but, i will also be content to just write out into the unknow blogosphere. so...here i am. blogsessed.


okay...after the best comes the worst. i know i know. but, i'll keep it short. the piggy flu has invaded my classroom. ahhh! just what i need right before parent/teacher conferences. apparently there's been another large outbreak of swine flu in hong kong and it's snuck it's ugly way in and attacked my classroom and students. i was missing 1/4 of my students today who are out sick with flu like symptoms and one of my boys is confirmed with H1N1. yikesers. so, now my class is basically being quarantined. my vice principal gave us our own set of masks to wear when we leave the classroom (apparently it's okay if we don't wear them around each other, but we can't spread it to the other classrooms? odd.) and loads of hand-gel. i can already tell that this will just be one of those weeks. bring it...

i'm off to bed to get my rest so i can face the morning ready to fight this nasty piggy.

wishing you all the best things today. : )

desperately seeking....something.

i'm sitting at home on sunday night, well...i should be sleeping, but i'm feeling a bit restless. and i have a million things running around on the little track in my head. so, i figure i'll blog.

i've just spent all weekend at work. allll weekend. i should invest in a cot. i've taken down and put up three bulletin boards, finished report cards and comments for 21 little third graders, written lesson plans galore, and inhaled probably more coffee than humanly possible. (i also rearranged my bedroom furniture last night and was up until 3 am. and by rearrange i mean that i moved my bed from one wall to the other wall. that's really all you can do in hong kong. limited space.)




now, i love my job. well...let me rephrase. i love my students. and i love education and learning. and getting to invest in young peoples lives. all the politics of school and teaching, i don't love that part so much. but, i don't do it for those reasons...i do it for my kids. i go in on a weekend and try to create fun and creative bulletin boards for them. my reward is that they get to enjoy and benefit from an environment that i can provide for them. today after work i just felt so exhausted. i love doing my job and helping my students, but this weekend i realized that i often neglect myself in the process. i neglect friends in the process. i feel like i don't have a life because of my job. and perhaps that's because for me it's more than just a job. but, i really think that i need to find a new hobby or...something.

last night i watched the movie "julie and julia" after my furniture rearranging. it really inspired me and perhaps it's what has gotten me on this tangent of thinking. but, julie invested herself in a project. she had a goal. she set a time for when she would meet her goal. and she struggled and toiled through the entire process, but she was able to do it. i so admire that. it desperately makes me wish that i had some sort of ambition like her. i've been thinking all day about this. it's pathetic. but i've been thinking "what could i do?" and "what do i want to do?" i've always been the person that starts a million little projects...knitting, scrapbooking, photography, cooking, writing, painting, yoga and i'm sure that this list could go on. for year i've always started something, but the second it started getting too difficult or i started feeling like i just wasn't really good at it or i got bored of it, it would just be done. tonight i went and bought the book that julie powell wrote that inspired the movie. i thought that perhaps if i read her memoirs about her own ambition that perhaps it will spark one of my own.

here's hoping that is will spark...something.

goodnight friends.

midnight poetry.

it's midnight and my mind is soaking in beautiful poetry. i've been a bit stressed out with work this week. i went into work today (saturday) for pretty much the whole day. got back home after 9. i watched "julie & julia". and now i find myself decompressing with poetry. e.e cummings, poetry. i never realized how relaxing and therapeutic poetry is to me. anytime i read mr. cummings my mind wanders to far away places where i feel not like myself. i'm reminded of beauty and his words capture me and i float away. so, goodnight world...i'm going to float away on the wings of a poem.

i thank you God for most this amazing

by E. E. Cummings

i thank You God for most this amazing
day:for the leaping greenly spirits of trees
and a blue true dream of sky;and for everything
which is natural which is infinite which is yes

(i who have died am alive again today,
and this is the sun's birthday;this is the birth
day of life and love and wings:and of the gay
great happening inimitably earth)

how should tasting touching hearing seeing
breathing any-lifted from the no
of all nothing-human merely being
doubt unimaginable You?

(now the ears of my ears awake and
now the eyes of my eyes are opened)

i know. i know. i know.

okay, i know that is has been a LONG time since my last update. I've failed majorly at updating my blog. i know. It seems like every time i get some sort of inspiration to write something on my blog i get busy and then i forget "what was that amazing thing i was going to tell the blog world about?" anyways, excuses aside. here i am! and i'm back. so, here's the update on my little life. get ready, this is a long one.

While i was away from blog work, i went on a little adventure to a land called Australia! I have wanted to go to Australia from the time that i learned about it when i was in 3rd grade. there has always been something so enchanting about this land to me. so when the opportunity arrived for me to venture Down Under, i took it! My friend Paulina was going to Sydney to be a bridesmaid in her friends wedding, which happened to be over Chinese New Year, so I asked if I could tag along and we decided to go on a little outback journey together. I spent the first 3 days in Sydney. My first day I ventured out alone to explore Sydney while Paulina was doing her bridesmaid duty. It was a bit of a dreary day...but i still was able to explore the city and hit up the Australian Museum. And I'm a sucker for museums, so it was great. The next day Paulina and I went to the Circular Key, which is where the Opera House and the Sydney Bridge are. It was amazing to see them up close. Whenever i saw it, i just wanted to sing. i loved it. We ventured around and went to "The Rocks" where they had a cute little Sunday market. I purchased a lovely bracelet, so the rain couldn't get me down too much. The best day that i spent in Sydney was going on a day trip to a wildlife park where i got my first encounter with kangaroos and koala bears and other outback creatures. i felt so touristy, but it was fun to get to hang around with kanga's and koalas. that's what Australia's all about! we also journeyed to the the Blue Mountains on our day trip to see the "three sisters" rock formation. it was a truly breathtaking view. i wished we could have spent more time there, but unfortunately we had to continue on. then, we went to a rain forest and took this crazy steep railroad down into the bottom of the rain forest. it was pretty amazing! after we explored the rain forest for a bit, we took a cable car back up to the top. i just felt in awe this whole day getting to experience so many amazing creations and just how beautiful the Earth is and all of it's creatures. it was so inspiring.



After our time in Sydney we hoped on another plane and headed north to Cairns. It has such a more laid back vibe than Sydney, which I really enjoyed. And our first day there was indeed very laid back. We hung out next to the pool, or "lagoon" and enjoyed the beautiful sun and read our books for literally the whole day. It was fantastic. The next day we headed out to THE GREAT BARRIER REEF! Now, this was my first time to ever snorkel and scuba dive...but, I got to do them both. And in the most beautiful part place of all. At first I was a little bit uncomfortable with the snorkel. I'm sure i looked utterly ridiculous because i kept trying to breathe through my nose which doesn't really work. However, once i stopped hyperventilating and got my breathing technique down I was good to go. It was the most breathtaking thing I've ever seen, it's no wonder I didn't just stop breathing all together. For the moment of time that you are in the water, you are a part of a totally different world. And it's such a privilege to be there. We snorkeled around for a little bit and then met up with our SCUBA instructor for our dive. I was a little terrified at first, honestly. But once I got all my equipment on and we went through everything that we learned I was pumped. My heart was beating crazy fast as we descended into the water that I did almost forget to breath a couple of times. But again, I found my rhythm and I totally got into it. We didn't go down very far since it was just a "fun dive" for non-certified people, such as myself. But, what I saw was amazing. I got to touch a sea aniname, soft coral, and a clam (which i was terrified would snap my hand right off) and of course swim with some amazing colorful creatures. It was a short experience, but definitely not one that I'm going to forget very soon.
Our next day in Cairns was another fun-filled and thrilling adventure day that unfortunately had to start at 6:00am in the morning. (Who has to wake up early on vacation??? Apparently white water rafters...) So, we woke with the dawn and headed about an hour and a half drive to Tully for some wicked white water rafting. It was an amazing adventure and even cooler with the rain coming down creating some crazy water for us to ride. We were led by our fearless 19 year old leader, Marlow, who i am shamelessly in love with. the kid was the most adorable thing ever. sigh. anyways....it was an awesome rush the entire time and even falling out of the raft was exhilarating. (yes, i was rescued by my hunky Aussie boy). I was extremely sad when this day was over. I could have kept going until the sun went down. Both scuba diving and white water rafting were such amazing experiences and it was my first time doing both. It definitely got me hooked and i hope that I have more opportunities to do both. It made me really want to get my PADI SCUBA certification, so that might be something that I start working towards. And I'm hoping that I get to hit up some white water rafting while I'm home this summer.

Unfortunately our trip had to come to an end. There were so many incredible experiences and first's on this trip. Often by the end of a vacation I feel like I'm ready to go home, but this was the first time where i just wanted to stay forever. But, alas. I'm back in Hong Kong and onto planning for my next adventure...

G'day mates!
Sarah


for more picture, you can check out my facebook album

curry pumpkin soup

I love using the application "All Recipes" on my iphone. It's so easy to access simple and delicious recipes right at my finger tips. I can be on the bus on the way home and have dinner planned by the time I get off the bus. If no i-phone, simply go to allrecipes.com

Here is one of my new favorites: curry pumpkin soup

Ingredients:

-2 tablespoons butter
-3 tablespoons of all purpose flour
-2 tablespoons of curry powder
-4 cups of vegetable or chicken broth (*i used chicken broth to add more depth to the soup)
-1 (29oz) can of pumpkin
-1 1/2 cups of half-and-half cream (* i used coconut milk...so delicious!)
-2 tablespoons soy sauce
-1 tablespoon white sugar
-salt and pepper to taste
*i also added one yellow onion for extra texture and taste. :)

Directions:
1. Melt butter in a large pot over medium heat. Stir in flour and curry powder until smooth. Cook, stirring, until mixture begins to bubble. Gradually, whisk in the broth, and cook until thickened. Stir in pumpkin and half-and-half (or coconut milk). Season with soy sauce, sugar, salt and pepper. Bring to just a boil, and remove from heat.

That's it! Super simple and tasty beyond belief! Go try it...now! I know you will love it.

Happy eating,
Sarah :)

starting now.

Here I am. Blogging...again. The first time didn't work out so well for me, so I have revamped the blog and we are starting new. starting now.

My last blog focused mostly on starting my new life in Hong Kong. Last year was an excellent and very exciting year for me. I started my career (gulp) doing what I have always wanted to do and what I love more than anything, teaching. I lived an ocean away from my friends and family and learned how to cope and found that there are many challenges living in Hong Kong. Yet, I fell in love with my life here and learned to embrace it. Now, here I am in my second year in Hong Kong and I love it each and every day (well, almost.) After I returned from my summer in the states I found it very easy to settle back into my everyday life in Hong Kong. I am content with my life here. My job is rewarding. I have great friends. I get to travel so many amazing places. Overall, I can say that life is good. Life in Hong Kong is always moving. There is always something new to do, see, or eat. (Eating is very important.) As I look forward to this new year I am ready to discover more about life and myself. I want to challenge myself more this year. Set goals and not stop until I reach them. I want to stop making excuses that always seem so easy to make and face life head on. There are so many things in life that I want to explore and I think that now is the time. Here are just a few things that I want to explore more of in this new year...

• cooking: i really love cooking, but it can be challenging in hong kong. my new apartment has this amazing open kitchen though (minus oven...hence, the challenging part) and i'm ready to put it to good use. i want to make is a goal to try at least one new recipe a week. in fact i've already started! yesterday i made an AMAZING curry pumpkin soup. it was so simple, delicious and reward to make my own homemade soup.
  
• fitness: last year i was super proud of myself because i lost a little over 20 pounds. i've found that this year i've been more complacent with my working out schedule. which means, it's non-existent. no longer my dear friends! i'm teaming up with jillian michaels and looking forward to getting back on the right track. if i did it once, i know i can do it again!
  
• pottery: in october i took a beginning pottery class and i loved it! it was so rewarding to learn something new and create my own pottery. i found it so therapeutic. i would really like to continue learning more about pottery and dig in and get my hands dirty again!
  

There you have it. It's just a start, but I'm exited about this year and looking forward to what is in store. Why wait any longer? Starting now...my life will be anything but, ordinary. Welcome to the journey!

peace,
sarah

(I must give credit to my inspiration: Kaity "Weaver" Weigang. My best buddy from kindergarten began a blog and I've been following her as she discovers that her "Ambitions never go out of style". She has completely inspired me to get on board and discover more than just the ordinary in life. Thank you dear friend....you have inspired me to really start living again!)