"I Wanna Kiss You"

I wasn't quite sure what to say on my first day of subbing in preschool on Monday, when a cute little 2 year old came up to me and said, "I wanna kiss you!"
"You want to kiss me?" I asked, "ok, you can kiss my hand." And I held out the back of my hand for him.
"Noo! I wanna kiss you!"
"What do you mean," I asked, confused. "Show me."
And with that, he got out of his chair, ran over to the counter, and pulled a tissue from the Kleenex box.
"A KISSYOU!" He said, and wiped his little nose.

Angel Food Cake with Strawberries

You thought this would be another recipe, didn't you?

But it's not.  It's a sentiment.

Angel food cake has made it into every special day with my family as long as I can remember.  As a little girl, I looooooooved Sundays when Papa and Ami came to visit, because I knew that on their way to our house, they would stop at the little farm stand on the side of the road and buy a few baskets of strawberries.

People who have tasted Oxnard strawberries know that it's not worth buying them anywhere else.  That's why my grandparents would drive from Ontario (Cali) to Oxnard before picking up the pièce de résistance for Ami's angel food cake.

Strawberries grow year round in Oxnard in the fields that take up the 1.2 miles of land between the house I grew up in and the ocean.  But they start smelling their sweetest right around Easter when the ocean breeze lifts the scent of warm, sun-ripened strawberries and swirls it around our homes.  There's nothing like that scent.  I've lived away from my parents' home in Oxnard for 5 years now, but every time I get off the freeway and go over the bridge into Oxnard, I roll down my window so that the sea breeze and strawberries can welcome me.

Ever since we began dating, Jesse has called me his "Celtic-harping-beach-strawberry girl."  It fits me pretty well :)

Pretty much, just combine these two pictures and there I am!

Anyway, back to angel food cake: today is my last day in Kindergarten, and really, at First Lutheran School.  On Monday, I'm moving over to First Lutheran's Preschool which is run completely separately.  As happy as I will be to be back in a preschool setting (if you don't believe that I miss my "Miss Bethany" days at Turtle Rock Preschool, check here and here), I will miss being a part of this school, and the kindergarten class.  They make my days so much fun!

Today being my last day, I decided to bring angel food cake, strawberries, and whip cream with me today for all of the teachers and staff.  Somehow, bringing a childhood favorite with me today made me feel better about the whole thing of having to say goodbye to what has been my job since August.  I still can't believe that I came here to fill in for a teacher's maternity leave the first week of school and have been here ever since.  What a blessing!  I loved teaching 1st grade; I grew exponentially while teaching 4th/5th combined class, and I'm having a blast singing my songs and dancing along with the kindergarteners. 

God showed me through this year that I really can bloom where I'm planted.  To step into three very different classrooms and be able to lead in and learn from all of them has been incredible.  A year like this for a substitute teacher is very rare!

I'm just hoping that God will plant me in a classroom of my own this upcoming year.  I've learned so much in the past two years as a substitute, but I am starving for a place to call home.  Please join me in praying that God already has it all arranged for me, and that He's waiting for just the right moment to show me.

Today is my last day, and I'm sitting in "my" class for the last time, watching precious little sleepers as I eat my angel food cake and strawberries.  Truly, it does make life feel better!

Brubaker on the Mind

I laughed at myself yesterday when reviewing something I had typed up quickly for the classroom.
Instead of typing February, I had absentmindedly written
F-e-b-r-u-b-a-k-e-r.
Apparently, my mind automatically fills in the rest of the letters for my last name when I see b-r-u on the screen.

I never saw that coming.

Today is Monday

...which means I only have four days left of my precious kindergarteners.

Man, I'm going to miss them.

Who wouldn't?!?

Today was our first day back from Easter Break.  Every single one of them hugged me and told me how much they missed me last week.  I love that!  They are so sweet, so unafraid to share their feelings. 

So stinkin' cute.

Today I received a form from the vision screening company that came to check out the kids' eyes two weeks ago.  It was addressed to Mrs. Bluebaker.  Turns out, they didn't know what my name was, so they asked one of the kids!!!  It was funny to see that in print :)

A classroom full of toothless grins, shoes full of sand, pockets carrying "pet" bugs, children small enough to fit inside the backpacks they carry into the room, hands anxious to write, laces knotted from trying to learn to be tied, bodies that love dancing, hands that love clapping, hearts that love singing.

It's a joyous place.  I love it.

The kindergarten children are confident in spirit, infinite in resources,

and eager to learn. Everything is still possible.

~Robert Fulghum

Play is often talked about as if it were a relief fro
m serious learning.

But for children play is serious learning. Play is really the work of childhood.

~Fred Rogers

Most of what I really need to know about how to live,

what to do, and how to be, I learned in kindergarten.

Wisdom did not lie at the top of the graduate school mountain,

but there in a kindergarten classroom.

~Robert Fulghum

Chicken Marsala

This is a Jesse and Bethany Brubaker family favorite :)  We had it last night, and I realized the recipe wasn't up here!  Let me know if you try it...it's yummy!

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
1 stick of butter
1 cup flour
1 cup milk
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
3/4 cup marsala wine
1 cup sliced mushrooms

In a large skillet, melt butter.
while butter is melting, combine flour, salt and pepper in a bowl.  Cut chicken into long strips.
Dip each piece of chicken in milk first, then dredge in flour and add to skillet.
Sauté chicken in butter over medium heat until browned.  Add more butter as needed (no one said this recipe is healthy!)
Remove chicken from skillet and keep warm on a plate..
Add mushrooms to skillet and sauté until cooked.
Add marsala, stirring to get brown bits off sides of pan.
Stir frequently until sauce has thickened.
Return chicken to pan, mix, and serve atop linguine.

Priscilla's Prediction

This happened about a month ago, but I was never able to put the picture up, so I didn't both writing about it.  Now that I have a new computer, I can!  Please don't get sick of my posts as I play catch up :)
(I found the camera cord, by the way, in case you didn't figure that out!  Jesse's car is an excellent black hole for all of your lost item needs...)


On the way to a field trip to see the play "Miss Nelson is Missing," I sat next to little Priscilla, one of my kindergarteners.

"Mrs. Brubaker, do you have kids?"
"Nope."
"Well, do you want kids?" She persisted.
When I answered "someday," she asked to see my hand.
She looked at it carefully for a few minutes, tracing the lines and studying every curve.

"Two girls...and a boy," She said matter of factly.
"Two girls and a boy?" I repeated.
"Yup, that's what I think you're gonna have."
I looked at her surprised.  She looked back at me with a question:
"Can you tell me if I'm right?"

Chicken Marsala

This is a Jesse and Bethany Brubaker family favorite :)  We had it last night, and I realized the recipe wasn't up here!  Let me know if you try it...it's yummy!

4 boneless skinless chicken breasts
1 stick of butter
1 cup flour
1 cup milk
1 tsp salt
1/2 tsp pepper
3/4 cup marsala wine
1 cup sliced mushrooms

In a large skillet, melt butter.
while butter is melting, combine flour, salt and pepper in a bowl.  Cut chicken into long strips.
Dip each piece of chicken in milk first, then dredge in flour and add to skillet.
Sauté chicken in butter over medium heat until browned.  Add more butter as needed (no one said this recipe is healthy!)
Remove chicken from skillet and keep warm on a plate..
Add mushrooms to skillet and sauté until cooked.
Add marsala, stirring to get brown bits off sides of pan.
Stir frequently until sauce has thickened.
Return chicken to pan, mix, and serve atop linguine.

Kindergarten Testimonies

Last week, I had the kindergarteners decorate paper crosses with colored tissue paper to put up on the bulletin board right outside the classroom door.  After they decorated their crosses, I had them each write "This cross reminds me..." and fill in the blank.  Here is what they wrote!

"This cross remind me JESUS did for me."

--Kevin

(remember that Kindergarteners spell phonetically, and you have to be pretty creative to sound things out as they would!)

"This cross reminds me Jesus died on the cross."

--Vincent

"This cross reminds me JESUS dit on the cross."

--Jeffrey

"This cross reminds me wen Jesus died, he ros ugen."

--Charlie

"This Cross reminds me Jesus diot and I can go to Heven."

--Jacob

"This cross reminds me Jesus did on the CROSS."

--Lucas

"This cross reminds me Jesus saved me."

--Reine

"This cross reminds me uv Jesus on thi cross."

--Priscilla

"This cross reminds me ov win Jesus did for R sins."

--Lauren

 Jesus said, "I praise you, Father, Lord of heaven and earth, because you have hidden these things from the wise and learned, and revealed them to little children.

Matthew 11:25

Doing a Happy Dance

Hope you all had a wonderful Easter!
I will definitely be blogging about ours later, but I had to share my exciting news!  I received a wonderful and very unexpected gift on Easter--a new laptop!

My poor old laptop was four years old and was at the point where it would overheat and crash every few minutes.  It was so frustrating that I basically gave up on using it, so blogging had to wait until Jesse was home from work with his computer (when I wanted to be spending time with him instead of the computer!).  Needless to say, it's taken a dive.

Jesse and I participated in a Murder Mystery Dinner at church last weekend where we both acted parts to make a play for the congregation.  Mom made me a beautiful gown for the event, and Ami (my dad's mom) has been asking my mom when I would be sending them pictures from the night.  Mom had to explain to Ami that my computer was too old and was really making me unable to put pictures on it these days. 

I'm not exactly sure what all transpired after that, but yesterday when I went to visit Ami, she gave me a box with a beautiful brand new HP Pavilion!

I was so surprised by such an incredible gift that I didn't know what to say.  My sweet oldfashioned Ami (the one who doesn't know how to check her voicemail or turn on the computer Papa used) smiled brightly and said she knew how important a good computer is.  Especially if--Lord willing--I have a teaching job in the fall.  Bless her!

I'm so thankful.  It's silly how much people depend on computers these days, but it's true that it's really difficult to get by without one.  The computer is so beautiful--and so high tech compared to what I was using!

I'll be gone pretty much all of this week (Easter break!), and of course, the one day I am here, I don't have the camera cord to upload pictures from all of our recent doings! 

I'm looking forward to playing catch-up, though :)

Aper Foos!

Today is April 1st.  I had to explain to the kindergarteners yesterday what that meant. 
I also had to explain that on April Fool's Day, we can play jokes on each other, but we have to make sure that our tricks do not hurt our friends' feelings or our friends' bodies.
The concept is pretty lost on them, anyway. 
"Mrs. Broomaker, the sky is blue! Apee Ful!"

It's cute, anyway, and it makes me think back to the good old days...

When I was about 7, my friends and I would prank call each other all the time.  It didn't even have to be April for us to scream with laughter after the prank was realized and shout out "April Fool!"

"Hello, is this Emily Dinwiddie? Oh.  Is your refridgerator running?  ....well, you'd better run and catch it!"

"Hello, this is Ronnie MacDonald from the pig farm.  Just wanted to let you know, your order of 20 pigs will be delivered to your front door in half an hour."

Once, we spent an entire afternoon calling our friend's house with fake pizza orders.

It's amazing our mothers kept us.