Brb!!!

Yeah, I know! I know!! I'm sorry!

I've not been writing lately, because I'm teaching A LOT. Besides working on Saturdays, I'm working in two different schools that are extremely far away from each other and in the opposite direction, too. I've been working in THREE DIFFERENT CITIES. LOL! I have free time in the morning and on Sundays, but that's when I try concentrating on any shadow of creativity that gets through my tiredness safely while I take care of my house, try to get some exercise, correct student's papers and plan new classes.
I'm not complaining! I love this life!!! :D

I promise as soon as possible to post the purse I made for my mom, my phone case done by myself, pictures from my house "Casinha!", the shirt mom made, the crochet I've been (slowly) making and I already have many projects going on in my mind! I'm starting a small purse for me, thinking about more phone cases, drawings and a surprise that is knocking on my thoughts for days now to a certain sister-in-law.

Please, don't leave me! Be patient and wait... =P

Magnets and owls.

Sup, people!!!

I feel this is going to be a productive weekend! I'm going to teach tomorrow in the morning and in the afternoon till 5. Then I'll come back home to start making some nice crafts I've been testing today.

I used some of those buttons I've made with cloth and bottle caps to make refrigerator magnets:

And I've made a tiny baby owl using fabric, but it was just to test it. I'll try to make more tomorrow using different things and I'll take some pictures or maybe a video to explain how to do them:

I bet Adrian is going to love them!!! I gave this first one to my mom (who LOVES owls too). I'll try to make bigger ones, to use as paper weight or door wedge or something like that.

I hope everybody has a great Saturday! Write to y'all later!

Moonlight

Hey everyone!

The moon is so round and bright and gorgeous these days that inspires me in everything I've done. It's amazing how something that floats in space around a planet steals the light of a star and looks so beautiful! I'm not sure if it's everything true, but people say that the moon influences on the harvests, oceans, animal behavior and many other natural phenomenon in our planet. It's such an awesome thing!!! I've noticed that my mood also changes and I get more energy to do everything. I'm a happier person during this phase. Psychologically, physically and even sexually, everything gets 100% better!

I've tried to take some pictures yesterday at night, but with a regular camera and no techniques at all it's kinda difficult... The moon was so bright and shiny and the lights of the streets and houses were really cool.

And it gave me inspiration for one of the Photo-a-day challenge from Adrian's blog http://adrianlovesowls.blogspot.com ^^

I know it's for day 6, but I took on the 7... dark/light:

I know I haven't done many crafts or nice posts... But since the semester started I've been so busy!!! And so lazy in my free time... :( I'm really sorry for that! I promise I'll try harder!

Thank you for reading!

Seven Deadly Sins.

My beautiful sis-in-law Adrian is taking photos for her 29-day photo challenge. She has a photography degree from ASU and this challenge consists on taking one picture a day following a list of themes.
I'd love to participate in her challenge, but it would be ridiculous, since I'm not a professional photographer! LOL!
Her challenge reminds me of some pictures someone took of me in 2007, though. I was a nun, committing the seven deadly sins. It's not great, but I like the idea...
There's a 'cover' picture:

And the rest... Try to find out the names of these deadly sins!!! :D

Weekend at Bubba's

Hey, ladies and germs!

There's not much to do down here on weekends if you don't have money. The usual thing for people to have fun are bars. People here really like to get drunk and that's the coolest thing for everyone! I used to be like that for a while, but I guess I want something more from life than people here... Besides, Julian and I see that drinking too much with empty people and phony 'friends' is not only bad to our physical and mental health, but to our financial lives too.

We started working this weekend, so we spent some time planning classes and getting organized. We teach on Saturdays and we have to get used to the new routine all over again. Waking up early and teaching all day is a little tiring, specially after a month of vacation and waking up late!!!

This weekend Fiona and I played "Schrödinger's cat" ^^

The cat is alive!!! =P

The groups I teach on Saturdays are awesome! They are beginners, but they could handle the classes in English only much better than I expected!
They also gave me two groups of children this semester during the week. I see it as a challenge, since I hate don't know how to deal very well with most of them... I'll survive, I guess...

On Saturday, after work, Julian and I opened a bottle of wine and had some chocolate. We drank a TEMPRANILLO, which is amazing with dark chocolate and cheese. So if you're having a fondue, that's one of the best wines you can have with it!
We also love to drink a good MALBEC. The ones from Argentina are our favorite. Wines from BODEGA CATENA ZAPATA are awesome. There's a red wine from Portugal called Messias that we also like a lot. Someday I'll write here about wine and my recent experience with it...

On Sunday we went down to my mom's house and I made us lunch, using vegetables and pork. It's one of the healthiest types of meat, if it's well prepared. Better then cow and there's less hormones then chicken bought in the supermarket.

I used three types of peppers (green, red and yellow), peperoncino peppers,onions, tomatoes, ginger, some fresh spices (basil, oregano, sage and rosemary, everything well chopped. On the pork I used salt and ground pepper. Everything chopped and cooked, served with Doritos. Here are some pictures to inspire you in trying to do the same to tell me how it gets:

Fiona was there helping me!

Do you like cooking? I hope you share your experience on your comments down here! ;)

Brasil! Y u no see all that crap!!!

I've been questioned by many people about my future plans of leaving Brasil and living in the U.S. I know that I live in an amazing country, culturally rich and with awesome geographical features and open-hearted people. But I guess I just don't fit in here.
Our political history is flooded by corruption. There is no considerably serious option here. Seriously. I've seen a president who is a sociologist saying that people who are unable to do anything else become teachers, another one that quit school after the fourth grade, and now a president that is a former terrorist and bank robber in power.
The second-most-voted congressman in the history of Brazil is a former clown (literally!) who couldn't read or write until right before being voted into office. His campaign motto was "Do you know what a congressman does? Neither do I! Vote for me and I'll tell you!"... SERIOUSLY?!

Our school system is ridiculous. The government is creating new ways of making easier to get into the universities, because kids are not getting what they should from schools. At the same time, the investment of money for infrastructure or professors is not enough. Students protest against the price for public transportation, but they just complain about the educational situation and wait with their arms crossed for something to happen.
Political corruption affects not only the institutions, but also creates deep social problems. There are many conflicts and wars between police and drug dealers. This is a nation where millions die because of alcohol and tobacco, and it seems normal and socially accepted. On the other hand, something like marijuana, instead of being decriminalized and taxed in order to generate money for the government to invest in education or health, is seen as a terrible gateway drug and politicians make lots of money from it, because drug dealers illegally invest in their campaigns. For the dealers, it's not in their interest to decriminalize it, since their illegal profit is much bigger than if it were legal.
At the same time, it's possible to see someone smoking crack on every corner. Sometimes a group of people 'rescue' them from the streets and take them into rehab programs, which are not an obligation for them to stay in! So they just go back on the streets to steal and smoke more crack, creating a bigger problem every day.

Yes, I'm complaining about many things in this post. No, I don't have solutions for these problems. The only way out I can see is, unfortunately, giving up.

If you live in another state in Brasil or in any other country, please give me your opinion about what you feel when it comes to the political and social problems you see, but can't do anything about it!

A new semester starts!

Hey, dudes!

A new semester at the course I teach is about to start, and that's why there was no post yesterday and only this short one today... Sorry about that, but as soon as I get everything organized I'm going to create a new challenge to post on the blog!
Not only people from Brasil, The U.S. and Germany are reading the blog, but also from Thailand and Australia!!! I'm so happy for that!!! And I promise I'll make the best I can to write interesting and useful things for everybody to read! ;)

But the challenge for me now is that classes are about to start... New batch of students, class plans, new activities... I never thought I was going to become a teacher, but I really love what I do. As long as I keep learning new things and evolving, I'll keep loving teaching.
I know I'll always face lots of problems and difficulties in teaching. The income is terrible, students don't respect you sometimes, moms and dads also, you have to motivate students, create activities, correct tests, study hard... I think that's why I've been doing this and I haven't given up yet. Because it's always challenging, there're many obstacles to go through, many things to conquer, many ways to expand your limits.

My students asked me why did I become a teacher... I told them that I have no idea. And they think I've decided to be a teacher just to make a total mess in the classroom without having someone else to tell me that it's wrong! LOL!

What about you? What do you do and why? Are you happy with your job? What would you like to do?

Thank you for reading, for answering, and for the patience of waiting for a nicer post from me! ;)