Top 3 reasons I'm not asleep at 3 in the morning:

#3- The outrageously excessive amount of sugar currently in my bloodstream.

Today for us was Halloween, since the sister school to the elementary school we usually teach at invited us to come give lessons to their students about how we celebrate this holiday in the States. The 31st of October is, apparently, almost as American a holiday as Thanksgiving (not even the English have started doing Halloween like we do until just recently). So, since the school wanted the day to be American, and since we Americans have added amazing amounts of candy to almost every holiday we celebrate, candy was everywhere.

These may not look very good, but they are my current favorite: ирис кис-кис. Caramel-y goodness.


The day ended up being a blast. Not only did it give us an excuse to dress up (I was an injured Ukrainian soccer player), but it presented a new challenge, which was good for me. Our standard teaching is usually 6 -7 kids, that we now know pretty well, for 20 minute segments in which the goal is simply to have them repeat back the things we say. These lessons were to be for 20-25 kids that we'd never met before (and therefore had little idea what their English comprehension levels were at) for about 75 minutes, in which we were supposed to convey new concepts to them.

Us with a few of the Russian teachers in the "haunted house" they made for us. :) The teachers were all so excited to have us there!


After worrying about how I would go about this for a couple of days, the thoughts that finally helped me figure out how to organize and deliver my lesson were, strangely enough, memories I sort of suddenly had come back to me from my days as a kid in Primary. In the end, all those years of leaders telling us stories using cartoon-people cut-outs taped to popsicle sticks, simple yet very brightly-colored visuals, and that tacky junk (that I have only EVER seen in church... is that just a Mormon thing?) to stick the latter to the large, wheel-able board at the front of the room as they spoke in slow but cheerful voices to us paid off in a way they hadn't, for me, before today. While I don't remember ever dancing to "The Monster Mash," hearing scary stories about teeny-tiny ladies finding teeny-tiny bones in teeny-tiny graveyards, or having contests to see who could wrap another classmate in toilet paper the fastest in Primary, remembering how things went in Primary definitely helped me figure out how to organize and deliver the lesson. I guess the church is true. ;)

My kind of pathetic attempt at looking tough.


Reason #2 I'm not asleep- This series:



I started reading book #2 a few days ago, and was reading it every spare minute I had the last week. I can't adequately describe how completely engrossing and just plain great these books are. I hate to say it, but they may even rival Harry Potter books. That good. All four of my roommates agree, too: I'm the last one of us to read them here. Our theory is that its the books' "train of thought" sort of writing that, somehow, so convincingly makes you feel like you are the tribute from District 12--not Katniss--shooting at Careers and fleeing from Trackerjackers and struggling to sort out your feelings for the seriously adorable bread-boy named Peeta you are supposed to be plotting to kill. Oy. Anyway, as you can probably tell, even after finishing the book an hour ago, much of my brain is still buzzing w/ Hunger Games.

And the #1 reason I can't sleep...



Tomorrow we leave for our big vacation. St. Pete --> Helsinki --> Stockholm --> Helsinki --> Tallinn --> Riga. I can't believe its tomorrow! So excited! But not even packed. I don't know where to start. Could start right now, but my roommate is very asleep. Guess I better try and get some sleep, too.