"Far away there in the sunshine are my highest aspirations.

I may not reach them but I can look up and see their beauty,

Louisa May Alcott

My apologies for getting to this late.  I had a family emergency and needed to leave town for most of our frst week...so I am now playing catch up!  But the advantage of this is that I have had a chance to peruse all your wikis and have a sense of who everyone is as I write this.  (And who knew Angela and I both grew up in CT...just miles away from each other!  A small world.)

My first comment is that we all seem to have followed a similar indirect/winding path to librarianship.  I too did not take the straight and narrow to get here.  I grew up in Connecticut and all my life loved reading and books.  However I went through high school in the 70s and I felt I had a calling to save the earth from pollution and all other evils...remember it was the 70s, and I was a John Denver fan! So I attended the University of Connecticut and majored in Environmental Science- thought I would also go the Peace Corp. route after college.  But life has a way of intervening.  I did work in a lab right out of college doing environmental testing and hated it! Eventually, through various other jobs, I found myself working as a children's library assistant/storyteller at the Darien Public Library in Darien Ct.  I worked with some of the best librarians I've ever met there.  They inspired me, I loved the little kids...I had found my calling.  At this point I started library school and was loving it.  In between I got married and had my first son.  Anyone who knows CT knows that this area is an extremely expensive place to live so my husband and I decided to investigate upstate New York as a place to raise our family.  And here we are.  I took 10 years off to raise Matt (son #1) and later Brendan (son #2).  I started substituting in the school libraries when they were older and realized I loved being in the school environment.  Originally, when I first went to library school,  I thought I would only ever want to work in public libraries...and only as a children's librarian.  Well, here I am 25 years later a high school librarian and life is good.  I absolutely love working with high school students.  They are incredible. 

My two children are as different as night and day. Both boys played tons of sports growing up and I still do my share of schlepping. Matt is 19 and a sophomore at LeMoyne College studying History and Political Science.  He is the quiet, introverted of our two with a very dry sense of humor.  Brendan is almost 16 and a sophomore here at BHS. Brendan loves photography and is an awesome bass player.  He plays in the orchestra here and at Hochstein, plus several garage bands...needless to say, none of which play John Denver!   He is also the extreme sports fan...skate boards, skis, snow boards, etc...if you have to fly or jump into the air at ridiculus speeds using some type of equipment...he's there!  Having children in the same building where I work is interesting and never dull.  My office is often the satallite locker, I do put my foot down when the gym cloths start smelling.  In addition to two teenagers we have one very spoiled golden retriever named Riley, and two cats called Fred and Ron.  The animals actually run the house, we are merely allowed to live there. 

We love Maine and have vacationed there every summer for the past 14 years.  We stay in a cabin on Flood's Cove in Friendship, Maine.  How could you not love a place called "Friendship"?  We keep thinking, "This will surely be our last year, the kids are getting older, they're not going to want to come next year."  But miraculously they do!  My husband, Mark, and I are huge readers and our luggage usually contains at least 3 boxes of books.  We've read every Harry Potter book aloud on our way to and from Maine.  I thought that this year the kids would rather read it on their own...but they insisted we keep to tradition and read it aloud.  It is a loooong car ride.  My favorite books tend to be the ones I've just finished!  However,  recent favorites would include Water for Elephants by Gruen and Under the Baseball Moon by Ritter.  My all time favorites are A Tree Grows in Brooklyn by Smith and Little Women by Alcott.  When I'm not reading I love to quilt.

I must admit I am finding things a bit confusing with this project.  Seems like there is so much, everywhere, I don't know where to go first!  I am hoping to catch up now that I am up and running. I always thought I was somewhat technosavy until this!  I've had a few blogs and hey, I know what a wiki is!  But boy, am I eating humble pie.  This year I would love to investigate video or pod casting for student instruction, and to more fully utilize blogging.