Currently...

One of my favorite fashion bloggers, Kristine, does a post entitled "Currently" from time to time to kind of give a snapshot of what is going on in her life at that moment. I'm using her as inspiration since my life feels like it's moving at a lightyear a minute these days (update will come soon about the first week of teaching!). I want to do one of these every so often to give a checkup to myself (and anyone else who happens to care) of where I'm at. First two pictures, then down to what I'm currently loving, reading, watching, anticipating, listening to, planning, working on, and wishing.

View of the river in Milwaukee on Saturday night. I got to visit my TFA
friends for the night and realized how awesome of a city Miltown is.  

So excited about this one. That, my friends, is FINALLY my
official City of Chicago resident street parking sticker!
No $200 fines for me, thank you very much. 

I am currently...

Loving: My neighborhood. Pilsen is a really cool mixture of everything that I wasn't quite expecting before I moved here. To be honest, I was a little nervous as to why my rent was a lot cheaper than many other areas of the city. It's definitely not Lake View or Lincoln Park (really nice areas up north), but I am loving what I'm seeing in my little corner of Chicago. It's full of Mexican families, Students, and lots and lots of hipsters (ha). I see lots of Spanish words and speakers, cute little restaurants, and different flavors of people everywhere. It feels like a real Chicago neighborhood with real character. And I'm only 2 weeks in! I'm still brand-spanking new to the area so I'm no expert, but so far, I dig.

Reading: Blogs, blogs, blogs. (As usual!) My favorite kinds of blogs are travel and style (the one I linked above is a daily read for me), but I'm just now starting to search for some teacher blogs. If you have any recommendations, puh-lease let me know. Second grade calls for lots of inspiration!

Watching: When I get a few minutes to turn on the TV, The Olympics. While I mainly watch every four years for Bob Costas (the man is gold), Gabby Douglas won me over completely. Her beautiful smile and impressive poise at the age of 16 really amazed me. 16-year-old-Anna was not that cool. In other news, I also just watched Love Actually for the first time ever. I loved it, mostly because of the British accents. Can't get enough of those.

Anticipating: The next week of school! Second grade has proven to be both crazy (in a good way) and intensely challenging already. I'm itching to improve my teaching every single day throughout this first-year experience, but for now I'm starting small and getting anxious for the next five days in Room 27.

Listening To: Needtobreathe. Seemed good to me for getting things done on a beautiful and chill Sunday afternoon. "Something Beautiful" is on right now. I could play that on repeat for a LONG time. (Close second place: Coldplay's Xylo Myloto album, because they are coming to Chicago this week and I have to attend to real life duties instead of see their show. They are currently topping my list of "must see in concert" bands.)

Planning: More details for my brother and Heidi's wedding! It's coming up in just over a month in Washington D.C. and I could not be more excited. I'm finishing up a first draft of a playlist for the reception for my brother, so I am open to "must-have" suggestions for dance picks. I'll also possibly be putting together a dance routine that the family can learn to a song in flash-mob fashion. Hmmm. More on that later.

Working On: 2 things in particular. 1) Staying Calm. There are a lot of things coming up in the near future that will have me juggling to the point of dropping the whole shebang in one big heap on the floor. Between TFA professional development days, starting grad school on August 30th, and learning to lesson plan daily with my curriculum, there will be a severe need to take a breath and take it all one step at a time. 2) Giving Myself a Break. I can be more critical of myself than I am of others, which is not productive for anyone. I'm usually an optimist for sure, but that pessimistic energy spent on myself will just make me frustrated. I have to realize that I won't be fabulous right off the bat and that the best I can do is to do my best.

Wishing: For a night of Honey BBQ Wings with my girls at BDubs!

Hey friends, let's catch up so you can tell me what you're currently up to.