Mi Vida Ocupada: My Busy Life!

Another Random Post....

One.

GO VIKINGS!!!!!!!  Having some major Purple Pride this week after the Vikes kicked Dallas' butt last Sunday (there is no doubt that Favre is THE MAN and Sidney Rice can catch just about anything)....we are now headed to the NFC Championship against The Saints.  If we win this game we are headed to the Superbowl!!!!  C'mon Vikes, don't let us down again.

PS Had some chili dogs for dinner after the game (and you know I always take pics of food!)

Two.

Our Teacher Union voted on a new contract last week and it passed.  Due to millions and millions of dollars in budget cuts and the State of MN delaying payment to schools for two years, we were expecting a pay freeze for the next two years.  Instead they are giving us each a raise of $1,000 a year, which takes effect this pay period.  That probably averages $70 more a pay check after taxes.  I'll take it- Better than nothing!

Three.

Today is my niece Bianca's 3rd Birthday.  Wow, did that 3 years go fast since she was first born!  I am so glad that I have been blogging as long as I have, it is fun to call up old posts like that one.  Here is Bianca a few days ago,  Photo taken by her talented mother Michelle. (Check out Michelle's Photography!) Bianca's big sister Annika has her half-birthday today as well (born 7-20-05)

 

Four.

Happy Birthday to Dana Leigh tomorrow! Hope you have a good one :)

PS Dana is a Vikings season ticket holder and got to go to the game last Sunday vs the Cowboys.  Lucky girl!

Five.

Sad news in my neighborhood community yesterday.... there was a murder/suicide of a couple my age who lived just a few blocks from my house.  I didn't know them at all but it is very sad.  They had a 4-year-old son who was found wandering around at the crime scene.

Six.

Apparently I am really out of the loop because I just heard about the Conan O'Brien situation last night.  Is it true that NBC is paying $30 million to walk away from the Tonight Show? Craziness. I think Conan is sooo funny!

Seven.

My dad, brother and uncles are still in South America.  I have seen some of their photos on Facebook and it looks like they've been having a very nice time in Chile and Argentina (they even watched the Vikes game last Sunday somewhere in Argentina!).  Hopefully Jeff blogs about it soon so that I can link to some of his posts.  I am somewhat anxious for them to get home because I need Jeff's expertise with moving my domain name and blog to a different platform. (because I know the first thing he'll want to do after traveling abroad is come to my rescue.  Yeah right!!)

Eight.

I have now taken around 500 photos with the Nikon and have maybe ten good ones out of the lot.  Most of them are just trial shots.  I. am.going.to.get.this. SLR.figured out! Planning to take an online photography course in February so hopefully it helps!

That's about it, Folks.  Happy Hump Day!

Random Thursday Stuff

One.

It is supposed to get up to 39' today! What a warm up that is from the near 0' it has been for the past month. I am sick of freezing.

Two.

My dad, brother Jeff, and two of my uncles left for Chile yesterday.  Wish I was going somewhere exotic!!  I hope Jeff blogs about his adventure! After this trip he just needs to visit Australia and Antarctica and he will have visited all the continents. I think his goal is to visit them all by age 30 but we'll see!

Three.

As soon as Jeff comes home I am having him help me move this blog/domain (and the Twin Cities Restaurant Blog) over to Word Press.  Word Press installed blogs are amazing with all that you can do.  Wish I would've started that route but glad I learned about web design and html in the meantime!

Four.

I have yet to really start using my new camera.  I've taken maybe only 200 photos so far, mostly just of nothing.  The frigid cold has prevented me from doing any outdoor shoots and there is only so many things I can take photos of around my house.  Thank you to everyone who gave their input last week about lenses and camera bags.  I am debating between the 35mm and 50mm.  I discovered that since my Nikon D5000 is NOT a full-frame camera, the actual focal length is multiplied by 1.6.  So a 35mm looks more like a 50mm and 50mm looks more like 85mm.  Eventually I will have both but I just don't know which one to get first!

Five.

I need a good book to read.  I have not read a book in like 3 months and it has been much longer than that since I read anything that was actually really good.  I need to put more time into reading again, it is truly one of my lifelong all-time favorite hobbies.  Any recommendations? Anyone want to swap a book with me??? Here are the books I am willing to swap on paperbackswap.com.  I will add more later :)

Six.

Photo Hunt #5 was completed at the end of December and I am now starting to post my favorites.  Head over to Photo Hunt Challenges, check out the photos and start voting! More favorites will be added throughout the next week until I get them all up!

Seven.

I never feel like I have enough time to do everything I need to do.  Don't ya hate that? I feel like this every. single. day.

Eight.

My hair is beyond ridiculously long.  It is looking pretty bad these days.  One of my bff's even threatened to cut it off and a colleague has been telling me about haircut specials around town.  Another friend wants to bring me in to her stylist.  OKAY, I get the hint!! I know its bad, I am just the worst about making appointments.  I promise I will get my hair cut sometime in 2010 ;)

Nine.

Speaking of my bff's (and other friends!), I really miss them.  I haven't really seen or talked to anyone other than Lanee and Denise lately.  One of my resolutions for 2010 is to be a better friend and to make a better effort to see my friends.  

Ten.

Thanks to everyone who commented on the Bleu Cheese Meatloaf Recipe.  To everyone who said they're going to make it, I hope everyone likes it as much as we did.  As I mentioned yesterday, I plan to make a new recipe every week which I will post here along with photos of the food.

Eleven.

Looking forward to a three day weekend! Hope everyone has a good one!

Friday Randomness

I have a lot to catch up on in the bloggy-world so I thought I would do a random post 

One. Oh Happy Friday! This week seemed to take forever.  Looking forward to my upcoming break which starts next Wednesday.  Wish it was the full two weeks like most other years, but 8 days off is still a blessing.

Two. Noemy and Traves found a place to have their wedding tomorrow! Yay! And Oprah's Angels had nothing to do with it.  I will taking a million photos..... sure wish I had a DSLR camera with some awesome lenses to capture the day.

Three.  Speaking of photography, I have majorly stunk at taking photos this month and it might be a Christmas miracle if I can finish Photo Hunt #5 by the end of the month!

Four.  My SIL Michelle was featured in the local paper for her Photography business.  We are all so proud of her accomplishments!

Five.  I have most of my Christmas shopping done.  Online shopping is awesome!!

Six.  I have been dining out a lot frequently and have at least six restaurant reviews to write for Twin Cities Restaurant Blog

Seven.  I feel like I am always working.  My day job as a Gifted Education Specialist at two schools requires a lot of time plus I was hired as a consultant for testing at a 3rd school.  I also teach an after school program two days a week and have been working on web design for a client as well. (No wonder why I am behind on blogging!?)

Eight.  The web design project I am working on has been a great learning experience with CSS and HTML.  Its a cycle of extreme frustration and then great satisfaction when I conquer each new thing

Nine.  We got our first significant snow fall in MN last week.  The icy roads caused a lot of problems for many people and I ended up getting slammed into from behind while I was stopped at a stop light.  I felt only a little sore at first but the muscles in my back have really been sore ever since.  Lovely.

Ten. I will be back as soon as I can with photos from the past few weeks (once I actually have a chance to upload and view!)

Have a great weekend everyone!

Random, Schmandom

It has been ages since I have done a bullet-style random post, but I have a lot of little things on my mind to blog about, so I might as well go for it!

• This school year has been beyond busy and stressful.  I am teaching way too many things to way too many groups of kids.  There just isn't enough time to plan it all effectively (but I am doing my best!)

• I had last Thursday and Friday off due to MN state teacher conferences (MEA).  The weather was cold and rainy for the 3rd week in a row so I pretty much just stayed home and didn't do much.  It was nice to have the break.

• I need to get moving on Photo Hunt Challenge #4.  I have my dad's camera on loan until the end of the month,  but there have been so few days with nice weather that it has been really hard to get motivated . Anxiously awaiting the return of real Fall weather soon.  Do you hear that, Mother Nature?

• I feel like I am on my way to making a blogging come-back.  It is no surprise that someone who maintains FOUR BLOGS (yes I might be crazy) falls behind every once in awhile.  After getting a slight kick-in-the-pants to get rolling on my restaurant reviews, I cranked out 5 reviews this past weekend for the Twin Cities Restaurant Blog (nothing like working on my days off!).  Just a few more reviews to post from my trip to the North Shore and then I will be all caught up for the time being.  I also started uploading photos to my Daily Photo Blog and it feels good to get going on that again.

• Speaking of blogging, I have added a couple of special features to this blog.  There is now an option to "Tweet" or "Favorite" any of my posts.  There is a little button at the bottom of each post that allows you to do this.  Give it a try!

• If you are a blogger using Typepad, have you set up your Typepad profile yet? Here is mine.  Makes it easy to follow other Typepad members and/or have them follow you. I guess the benefit to this is attracting more traffic if you want it, and also being able to see what blogs your contacts have commented on, etc

• Halloween is 1 1/2 weeks away! I am going to a Super-Hero themed costume party on the 31st and I need some HELP on what to dress as!!! Any ideas? PS I do NOT wear tights but I will wear a halter top and a cape! LOL

• I thought I would post a link to one of the funniest bloggers I know at Moving to Mexico.  After her (secret) husband was deported to Mexico a few years ago, she made the move to Mexico to be with him.  The craziest stuff happens in Mexico!! Or at least it is funny to hear the perspective of a transplant Gringa!! This chick has been cracking me up for years, but she is now pregnant and has been blogging up a storm about all sorts of random pregnant or Mexico-related stuff.  You gotta check her out!
• I have hives all over my face and it itches like mad.  They started last night after dinner (steak, baked potato and zucchini- all of which I have eaten a  million times before so I don't know WTF is going on!) and I didn't have any Benedryl (or so I thought).  I woke up this morning and it is still just as bad.  After searching the house I found some Benedryl and just took two.  Hopefully it goes away, I have to work 10 hrs today!

So that's all I got for now, be back soon ;)

Aardvark!!

This is totally one of those "you had to be there stories", but I think it is still funny so I am going to post about it.
The other day I was outside playing "4 square" with some of the neighborhood girls (ages 9-10).  Do any of you remember playing that during recess as a kid??!  Well anyway, we were playing and one of the girls makes up a rule that you have to name an animal when the ball come to you, or you are "out" and no animals can be repeated.  Easy, right?
So we each say our first animal, continue to play for about 10 seconds and then just as the ball is coming to me, I had to think fast about an animal and the next thing you know, I shout out,
"Aardvark!"
It was such an impulsive thing to yell (I mean really, who thinks about aardvarks?!) and caught me by such surprise (even though it came out of my own mouth) that I immediately started ROFLMAO!!! (For those of you not in the know about internet lingo that is "rolling on floor laughing my ass off").
The girls had never heard of an aardvark and didn't quite understand what was so funny, but I do not think I can hear that word again without recalling this incident and laughing!
Aardvark!

A FISHING Seminar??!!

Hey folks,
Its me Kristi, your favorite non-fishing blogging friend.  I'd like to just tell you that I opened my horizons last night when I was dragged talked into going to a seminar at a local Sporting Goods store.  On Crappie fishing.  No kidding.  I really went! The full impact of what I had gotten myself into didn't quite hit me until I was about to walk into a room full of old, white fishermen.  Then the anxiety started.  I mean I was wearing a pink jacket of all things!! Everyone would be looking at me, I just knew it. I almost turned tail and hid in one of the tents on the showroom floor!  Turns out it wasn't that bad...there were actually two other women there in the room of 200!! And one of them was also wearing a pink jacket that was even more eye-catching than mine ;)

I probably will not be doing much Crappie fishing anytime soon (surely that involves baiting a hook) , but since I sometimes tag along with the guys when they go fishing, at least I can supervise.

Vote for New Minnesota Critical Habitat License Plates!

Hey fellow Minnesotans,
Have you seen the new designs for the new critical habitat license plates?
They are choosing 4 of the 8 listed here.  Go to the MN DNR website and vote for the ones you like best! Voting ends Sunday night.

Random Updates

Its been 4EVER since I blogged a real post, huh?

Going to just jot a few things that have been going on lately in La Munda de Kristi

• I got my wish and had corned beef and cabbage for St Patty's Day.  Yum!
• I have come down with a cold- first one in a year.  Seems that I get sick every dang spring in March during conference time.  It really stinks being stuffy and feeling like crapola when you're required to put in 12 hour days
• I should know by now that I need more than 5-6 hours of sleep a night and that constant lack of sleep wears me down to the point of getting sick. 
• There is always so much to do and so little time!!!!
• Despite being sick, I have had an out-of-control-appetite lately.  I am afraid of gaining weight back, so I especially need to watch my carbs.  It will be awesome to do more walking outside again since its finally starting to get nice out.
• Had a nice time at Texas Roadhouse last Saturday night with friends.  Here are me and Janeen

• 

• Have you visited my Daily Photo Blog yet?  Still looking for VOTES in the Photo Scavenger Hunt contest.  Visit Nicole's Blog and make sure to vote for me in the right sidebar.  Thanks!
• I desperately need a new banner for this blog but I don't have the energy to make a cool one
• Spring Break is one week away and I have Arizona Fever.  I desperately need a trip there but nothing is in the plans :(
• The last two books I read were major sleepers.  Not into them AT ALL.  I'll do you a favor and tell ya now to skip The Year of Magical Thinking or Fragile Things.  Boring!
• I am currently reading a thriller by Jude Devereaux and it is much more exciting!
• I am compiling a comprehensive list of Sunday Brunches around the Twin Cities.  If you know of any restaurants that offer a regular Sunday Brunch, please let me know what they are so I can feature it on the Twin Cities Restaurant Blog.
• Spelling.  Thanks for everyone who contributed their thoughts on my Collectible VS Collectable post.  I have always spelled it with an "i" and I think that is the original way to spell it, but there are several examples of it spelled with an "a" also, so I think they're both correct.  If you are interested in the 25 most commonly misspelled words in the business world, take this spelling quiz!
• I have kind of missed these random little posts.
• This is one of my friend's little boys.  He was in a such a great mood when I took this picture and I think he is so cute!
•  
• I hate having a stuffy nose.  Spicy foods are my BFF more than usual at the moment ;)
• Speaking of BFFs, I haven't talked to any of mine in awhile, hopefully we will plan something together soon.  I am the worst at making phone calls (well next to Mary Ellen, she is the WORST).  Can't wait to see Kimmy's baby Jake again soon- he is already a month old!
• Earlier this week or maybe last week Facebook changed the format of their home page and it seems that many people are complaining about it.  I actually like it and think its easier to get updates....although I am not on FB too much these days
• I JUST added a search engine on this blog that searches through all my old blog posts.  That will make it even easier to find a specific old post.  Go ahead and try it out.... see what happens ;) You can access it in the right sidebar or here.
• Time for me to sign off, too drained to think of anything else at the moment!

End of a Long Week

TGIF!
This has been one long week.
I have been very busy with work the entire week.
Exhausted right now.
The crappy, cold snowy weather has not improved the spirits.
Hoping to chill out all weekend.
Catch up on things.
Wonder how many days until Spring Break starts??

That's all I've got energy for at the moment.

Birthday Week for my BFFs

This is THE biggest week of birthdays between my group of BFFs: Mary, Kim, Lanee and Sonja.  We were all either born or gave birth within one calendar week:
Me 2-11 Lanee 2-14 Chase 2-15 (Mary's son) Jacob 2-17 (Kim's baby boy) and Angelina 2-18 (Sonja's daughter)
Mary, her daughter Taylor, and Rog (Lanee's hubby) are also all Aquarians.
Is that crazy cool or what?

25 Random Things

Both Lindsay and Anne (and several people on Facebook) posted 25 Random things about themselves this week and since their posts were quite enjoyable, I thought it would be fun to post 25 random things about myself that I have probably not already divulged in my last 1,030 blog posts.

1. I was born on February 11th, 1977, one month premature.  My dad didn't believe that my mom was in labor, so they barely made it to the hospital before I was born.  

2. I went to Montessorri for pre-school and learned to read at the age of 4.  I could also do fractions and count in bases other than 10.

3. When I was 3 or 4 years old, I fell off the bed while jumping and put my tooth right through my lip.  I have an ugly scar to prove it.

4.  Speaking of lips, I have had no feeling in my lower lip or in my chin since I was 15 years old due to a severed nerve from my mandibular osteotomy.  That's a fancy name for jaw surgery.  The surgery took 8 hours and I have 6 titanium screws in my lower jaw.  Food on my face or chewing through my lip are common occurences.

5.  I used to be a scrapbooker and LOVED it but have lost all desire to do it anymore.  I have only scrapped twice in the past year and don't know if/when I'll ever want to do it again. 

6.  My favorite past-time is reading.  I have read thousands of books in my lifetime and hope to read thousands more.  I'd read over watching TV 95% of the time.

7.  I believe in angels.  My guardian angel saved my life back in 1994 when I was in a bad car accident, hit by a drunk driver.  I am VERY anti drinking and driving.

8. The two longest friendships I have had have been since I was three years old (almost 29 years!), with Bradie and Leslie.  They are both very dear to me and I still talk to each on a regular basis :)

9. I never got to meet my paternal grandparents, they both died before I was born.

10.  I have ear and hearing problems.  I am slightly hard of hearing and also have auditory discrimination problem and an auditory processing delay.  I can hear vowels but can't always make out the word, so it sometimes takes me awhile to decipher what a person is saying.  If words are mumbled, I will not be able to understand them.  If there is noise in the foreground, I cannot hear anything in the background.  It is extremely frustrating.  I also have a lot of pain in my left ear that has been nagging at me for 2 1/2 years and has been associated with my severe jaw problems (TMJ).

11. I have magically lost a bunch of weight in the past year.  (All I really did was quit drinking soda and switched my BCP).  I weigh significantly less than I did at my biggest weight, which was in 2006 after my knee surgery.  I do not feel any smaller but all my clothes are way too big on me.  It would be great if I magically lose another 40 lbs!

12. My lifelong career aspiration was to be a Dr. one day.  Like an M.D.  That changed when I was 17 and discovered that my true calling was to become a teacher.  I am happy with my decision (for the most part) but would surely love to trade my salary for that of an M.D. any day!!

13. I have been to Mexico 20 times.  Some of the places I have visited (some multiple times!) include: Nogales, Puerto Penasco, Puerta Vallarta, Acapulco, Cancun, Playa del Carmen, Cozumel, Mexico City, Taxco, Guadalajara, Tijuana.

14. I watched the movie House Bunny a few nights ago and thought it was pretty funny.  I can't remember the name of the actress (she is also in the Scary Movie series), but she is hilarious!!!

15. I don't watch much TV at all but if I do, I love watching Travel Channel, Discovery and History.  You will probably never catch me watching Prime Time Reality TV, it just isn't my thing.

16.  I have 900+ albums on my iTunes but I have never had an iPod.  What's wrong with that picture??!

17. This is weird, but I have HUGE sinuses.  Three times the size of normal.  One ENT Dr. even told me I have the biggest sinuses he has ever seen.  I am not prone to infections but have chronic stuffiness (for which I need to take meds).  I suffered from major headaches for years and always thought it was my sinuses, turns out it was my jaw.

18.  Growing up, I hated seafood or rather I thought I hated it because the smell was so strong.  My parents are Catholic and eat seafood every Friday during Lent.  It wasn't until I was 20 years old and came home from college for Easter that I finally tried seafood.  On Good Friday of that year I had crab legs and sword fish and have loved seafood ever since! I was really mad at myself for not trying it sooner.

19.  Speaking of food, I am obsessed.  I love to eat.  I had major stomach issues and never ate anything fatty or spicy until I quit smoking cigarettes in the year 2000.  Once I quit, all of my stomach problems went away and I started to eat all the delicious things I could never eat before.  Hence all the weight gain (a lot of which I have since lost...see #11 above).

20.  I have one of the worst singing voices you'll ever hear! Seriously.  I think its because singing high notes is foreign to me....I can only sing low (and even that sounds terrible).  I try not to sing out loud unless I am by myself and even then I can barely tolerate to hear myself! LOL

21. I do not consume any products with aspartame because it gives me the worst headaches.  I have also been 99% caffeine free for the past 10 years.  The 1% is an occasional piece of chocolate or cup of cocoa.

22. I am allergic to bee stings.  I have been stung three times in my life, each time with much worse symptoms.  Its been 16 years since I was last stung and I am supposd to carry an epi-pen during bee season, but it has been about 5 years since I last had it refilled.

23. I lived and did my student teaching on the Tohono O'Odham Indian Nation in southern AZ ten years ago.  The school I taught at was in a village less than 15 miles from the Mexican border.  This experience was similar to living in a foreign country.

24.  Speaking of foreign countries, I got a passport two years ago and have not yet had a chance to use it.  I have never been overseas but would love to visit many places.  Top of my list includes Spain, Costa Rica, Japan, Brazil, Italy, but I would travel almost anywhere as long as it is safe.  I love to learn about people and places around the world.

25. I don't ever take naps.  The only times in my life that I have taken naps is when I was in college (too many late nights of partying) or when I was really sick.  I like to sleep but often see it as a waste of time.  I usually function on 5-6 hours of sleep per night.

 

Things to Blog about......

Want to blog but you have no idea what to blog about??  Here are some ideas that might get you started!

• Friends
• Animals/Pets
• Family (characteristics, special events, reunions)
• Science
• Historical and Current Events
• Neighborhood/Community
• Cooking/food
• Dreams
• Objects/things
• Consumer reviews
• Sports
• Holidays/Parties
• Plans/upcoming events
• House/ Moving
• Books/Movies/TV
• Music
• Poems
• Hope & Dreams
• Feelings
• Lists
• Jokes
• Wonderings
• Childhood/Past memories
• Home
• Vacation/Places
• School
• Hobbies
• Weather/Nature
• Celebrities
• Things that are funny
• Websites and services for others to check out
• Rants & Raves 
• Social issues (think Thoughts for Thursday)

Now I challenge all you bloggers to choose something on this list that you have not blogged about before and create at least one post this week!!

3:20am

Right now its 3:20am!
Normally at this time I would be sound asleep, enjoying the last two hours of sleep before getting up to go to work.  Its only been one week since I have been on summer vacation and already my sleep schedule has flipped.  You won't catch me up before 9am!
I haven't been in the mood to blog here lately (but I have been working on Twin Cities Restaurant Blog), but I suppose I might as well share a few randoms.....

These are some of the lilies blooming in our garden that I thought looked so pretty after it rained one night last week.  (One of the few shots I took before the battery in my dad's camera died on me)

 

The battery is now recharged so I am going to take photos of my Stargazers tomorrow- they are gorgeous!!

I have a new desk in the living room that I absolutely love.  This is my place to do my thang (whatever that may be at any given moment!).  

I sold a very tall bookcase because it didn't fit with my new arrangement, but now I have room on my wall for a big-screen TV.  I have been practicing what it would be like to have 60" on the wall with the projector I borrowed from work for the summer.  Watching a movie like this is so much fun....kind of like being at the drive-in...but in my own living room!

 

Alright, its realllllllllly late now, I need to get to bed

Too busy to blog!

Man, I have had so much going on this week.  I have tons of things to blog about, just no quality time to do it.  maybe one of these nights, but I am swamped with other priorities at the moment.

In the meanwhile, you can check out my bff Kim's blog....she just started it today because she loves reading both mine and Michelle's blog so much.  Kimmy is another MN girl :) She reads many of your blogs but just never comments.  She likes our little blogging community, so go welcome her!!!!!I am off to watch the Celtics beat the Lakers  (I hope!!!!!!!).......

What's new?

I haven't felt like blogging lately....I was busy with training all week and needing a break away from my "interfacing" time.  Here is a little randomness:

• The Celtics are ONE WIN AWAY from the Championship!!!
• I have had a headache for about 5 days straight.  Nothing is working to get rid of it.
• Happy 30th Birthday to my dear friend Kara (It was yesterday but I will celebrate with her next Sunday)
  
• My friend Bradie is having her third baby girl today.  Hoping the induction goes well!
• My Praxis this morning sucked.  I studied and I found out there really is no way of studying for this test.  I know I got 10/90 correct...hopefully I guessed okay on the others.  The essays weren't bad, but I had only 7 minutes to complete the last one and was stopped in the middle.  The cutoff for this test is much higher than the other....many people were there re-taking it (for the 3rd, 4th time!) I don't even care at this point!!!
• Its finally sunny out today, hopefully I can take advantage of it..... I am still a white girl with no summer color
• I made the best chocolate chip cookies the other night (let me know if you want the recipe!)
• Hanging out with my BFF tonight (given that this headache goes away)
• Heading up to spend time with my family tomorrow for Father's Day
• Start my unpaid job on Monday.  (Actually, I am paying over $300 a week to teach for free)
• I am going out of town next weekend for a scrapbooking weekend with my SIL Michelle and her friends

My Confession...

I have never watched Sex in the City.  Like NEVER EVER.

That's right, ladies....I am sure you're all gasping in shock and horror.
I am not much of a TV person and I am definitely not a series person.  I just cannot accommodate my schedule around a certain TV show, it isn't convenient for me.  My life does not revolve around TV and it never will.  And I will not start watching a show randomly in the middle of a season unless I have seen the very first episode of the first season.
In fact, I am totally out of it regarding any prime time TV series that have come out in the past 5 years or more with the exceptions of  1. Grey's Anatomy, 2. Eli Stone.  These shows are the only ones I have gotten into and only because I either bought them on DVD or watched online.  Oh, and That 70's Show is another one I have watched! I almost forgot that one.

So that means I have never watched:

• LOST
• Desperate Housewives
• Will & Grace
• Seinfeld
• Frasier
• Sex in the City
• American Idol (with the exception of Prince's performance a couple of years ago)

Ummm, I am already at a loss....there are hundreds of shows I have never watched.   Including everything Reality related.  I am sure some of you hate me now, but too bad.  I'd rather read a book or be a computer geek :)

ETA:   I am ALL ABOUT cable programming....Discovery, History, Travel, etc.  This is what I will watch  if I am going to bother to watch TV! IMO They have much better shows :)

Birthday Data....

Visited this site to get some interesting data about the day I was born ( 2/11/77).  Thought it was interesting enough to post!

• Your date of conception was on or about 21 May 1976 which was a Friday. (I was born a month early, so I was actually conceived at the end of June)
• You were born on a Friday under the astrological sign Aquarius.

•  Your birthday falls into the Chinese year beginning 1/31/1976 and ending 2/17/1977. You were born in the Chinese year of the Dragon. ( I didn't know this! I always thought I was a snake!)
  
• Your Native American Zodiac sign is Otter; your plant is Fern.
• You were born in the Egyptian month of Parmuthy, the fourth month of the season of Poret (Emergence - Fertile soil).
• Your date of birth on the Hebrew calendar is 23 Shevat 5737. 
  
• The Mayan Calendar long count date of your birthday is 12.18.3.11.1 which is 12 baktun 18 katun 3 tun 11 uinal 1 kin
• The Hijra (Islamic Calendar) date of your birth is Friday, 21 Safar 1397 (1397-2-21).
• The date of Easter on your birth year was Sunday, 10 April 1977.
•  As of 5/28/2008 9:40:08 AM EDT You are 31 years old. You are 375 months old. You are 1,633 weeks old. You are 11,429 days old. You are 274,305 hours old. You are 16,458,340 minutes old. You are 987,500,408 seconds old.

• Celebrities who share your birthday: Kelly Rowland (1981) Matt Lawrence (1980) Brandy (1979) Mike Shinoda (1977) Jennifer Aniston (1969) Sheryl Crow (1963) Segio Mendes (1941) Bobby 'Boris' Pickett (1940) Burt Reynolds (1936) Tina Louise (1934) Leslie Nielsen (1926) Eva Gabor (1921) Sidney Sheldon (1917) Thomas Alva Edison (1847)

• Top songs of 1977: You Light Up My Life by Debby Boone Best of My Love by Emotions I Just Want to Be Your Everything by Andy Gibb How Deep Is Your Love by Bee Gees Evergreen (from 'A Star Is Born') by Barbra Streisand Sir Duke by Stevie Wonder Torn Between Two Lovers by Mary MacGregor Rich Girl by Daryl Hall & John Oates Star Wars Theme/Cantina Band by Meco Got to Give It Up by Marvin Gaye
• Your age is the equivalent of a dog that is 4.47318982387476 years old. (You're still chasing cats!)
•  Your lucky day is Saturday. Your lucky number is 4 & 8.
• Your ruling planet(s) is Saturn & Uranus. Your lucky dates are 1st, 10th, 19th, 28th. Your opposition sign is Leo. Your opposition number(s) is 1.
•  Today is not one of your lucky days!
• There are 259 days till your next birthday on which your cake will have 32 candles. Those 32 candles produce 32 BTUs, or 8,064 calories of heat (that's only 8.0640 food Calories!) . You can boil 3.66 US ounces of water with that many candles.
• In 1977 there were approximately 3.1 million births in the US. In 1977 the US population was approximately 203,302,031 people, 57.4 persons per square mile.
• In 1977 in the US there were approximately 2,152,662 marriages (10.1%) and 1,036,000 divorces (4.9%)
• In 1977 in the US there were approximately 1,921,000 deaths (9.5 per 1000) In the US a new person is born approximately every 8 seconds. In the US one person dies approximately every 12 seconds.
• Your birthstone is Amethyst-  Amethyst is used to increase spiritually Some lists consider these stones to be your birthstone. (Birthstone lists come from Jewelers, Tibet, Ayurvedic Indian medicine, and other sources) Bloodstone, Onyx, Moonstone
• Your birth tree is Cedar, the Confidence Of rare beauty, knows how to adapt, likes luxury, of good health not in the least shy, tends to look down on others, self-confident, determined, impatient, wants to impress others, many talents, industrious, healthy, optimism, waiting for the one true love, able to make quick decisions.
• There are 211 days till Christmas 2008!
• The moon's phase on the day you were born was in its last quarter.

Happy Feet :)

The weather is finally warming up and today is the first day of the year that I am wearing flip-flops! I doubt you'll catch me in anything but sandals for the next 6 months!

PS My feet are usually much more cute than this! LOL

My little so called "spring" break is over......

Back to work today.

Wuh wuh wuhhhhhhhhhhh.

(That wasn't me crying, just making sound effects like on a game-show!!)

It was great to have a week off!

We had beautiful weather on Saturday....warm enough that jackets weren't needed.  Had a cook-out with our neighbors, Darrell& Denise and Jere& Shannon. This is Jonah, Jere & Shannon's new baby who is now 6 months old!! Isn't he a doll?

We drank margaritas (pretty much the only alcohol besides beer that I will drink-and I rarely ever drink) and later played darts.  After that I went to Lanee and Roger's house for a late-night bonfire with my BFF.

Sunday it rained all day.

Today it is snowing again, at least for now.

I cannot wait for the weather to warm up again and for everything to get green again.

Its been a LOOOOOONNNGGGGG Winter....

Do you hear me, Spring?????

Peace OUT amigos.

Random Stuff for Wednesday

Boring alert!
Nothing too exciting to report today but I feel like blogging and because its been a LONG time since I've done a random post, gonna go for it today :)

** First of all, so happy that my nephew Bennett was finally able to go home with Brian and Michelle yesterday.  What a long week that was for them.  They are overjoyed to have him home and Annika and Bianca are so excited about having a little brother! Michelle has adorable pics on her blog if you haven't already seen them....

** I am now on lesson 5 on my LU literature class.  don't know how I am ever going to make it through 15 lessons, a midterm and a final.  This class is too much work!  My grades so far were A, A, C+ (stupid Huck Finn essay), A.  I am currently reading some non-fiction writings of a Dakota woman, Zitkala Sa who was forced to leave her camp as a child to go to one of the Indian Boarding Schools.  I have always felt so, so sad about what has happened to Native Americans and their culture.  Did you know that it is estimated that there were once 8-25 million Natives in North America in Pre-Columbian times?  In 1900 there were only 120,000. According to the US Census Bureau, in 2000 there were 1.8 million American Indians in the US

** Speaking of Native Americans, how cute is Olivia (Kara's baby) in her little Native outfit?!

** I am wearing an ugly striped shirt today. 

** I really wanted to go on vacation somewhere for spring break, but I waited too long and prices are either redonkulous or sold out.  Boo hoo.

** Working late this week for parent-teacher conferences.  Wish we had a better turnout.

** I have several thoughts for my TFT post tomorrow...not sure which I will go with.

** Boring post...I told ya!

My Winter/Spring Closet....

I am constantly rotating the clothes in my closet based on the current season, because there just isn't enough room for ALL my clothes.  Whatever doesn't fit in the closet goes into storage until I am ready for that season's wardrobe.  I go through everything at least 4-6 times a year and pack up several big bags of clothes to donate to one of the charities.

Who else arranges their clothes by color???!! Is that weird? Seems to me it is easier to find what I am looking for.  And isn't it pretty?!

One thing you might notice about my wardrobe...the lack of printed fabric.  I just don't care for it on me! I love patterns on my paper, but I definitely don't want to walk around dressed like a scrapbook page!

It also appears as though I don't own any yellow or green! I think there might be a few items in those colors in my summer wardrobe.  It'll be awhile before those things come out.....it is still sweater season around here!

PS. The fact that these clothes are actually hanging in my closet instead of in a pile on the bed (or piled up in the laundry) is a miracle :)

PPS  I am so glad its Friday!

Teachers paid as babysitters?!

**Got this from a co-worker and thought I'd share.....and also give my opinion in bold!!

AREN'T YOU ALL SICK OF THOSE HIGH PAID TEACHERS??

Their hefty salaries are driving up  taxes, and they only
work nine or ten months a year! It's time we put  things in
perspective and pay them for what they do... baby-sit! (Some days it does feel like we are only just babysitting, unfortunately.)

We can get that for less than minimum wage. That is right. I
would give them $3.00 dollars an hour and only the hours
they worked, not any of  that silly planning time.  That would be $19.50 a day (7:45 AM to  4:00 PM with 45 min. off for lunch- 45 minutes?! Ha! We're lucky to get 10-15 minutes!). Each parent should pay $19.50  a day for these teachers to baby-sit their children.

Now, how many do they teach in a day... maybe 30? (I service at least 50 per day) So, that's 19.5 X 30 = $585.00 a day.  However, remember they only work 180 days a year! I am not going to pay them for any vacations.  Let's see . . .. that's $585 x 180 =  $105,300 per year.  (Hold on! My calculator must need batteries!) I could sure live with that :)

What about those special teachers and the ones with master's  degrees? (That's me!) Well, we could pay them minimum wage just to be fair, round it off to $7.00 an hour. That would be $7 times 6-1/2 hours times 30 children times 180 days = $245,700.00 per year (I would definitely love this salary!)
Wait a minute, there is  something wrong here!

There sure is, duh!

(Average teacher salary $50,000/180 days = $277 per day/30 students = $9.23/6.5 hours =  $1.42 per hour per student.) After taxes that is about $0.75 an hour per student.

Very inexpensive babysitter and they even educate your
kids! Crazy!

Trying to cram 8 posts into one :)

I am trying to reduce the amount of time I spend blogging, so I am going to condense about 8 posts worth of goodies into just this one.

• Saw Queensryche at Myth on Saturday. Awesome, awesome, awesome. These guys have been around since 1981 and Geoff Tate still sounds as awesome as ever...

Had brunch at my brother Jeff's house on Sunday.  He wanted us to come check out the amazing new kitchen in his house that my BFF Mary professionally designed (and whose husband Troy did most of the labor).  I have to show you before and after pictures!

Here it is Before the remodel (when Jeff first moved in 3-4 years ago).  That 50's kitchen just wasn't too groovy.  He put the wood floor in when he first moved in, but almost everything else you see in the "after" pictures are  part of the recent remodel.

Here is the kitchen now, After the Remodel (everything finished except the crown molding):

You must check out his backsplash...it is so cool! The island is also way longer than it looks from these pics and contains a wine fridge in the middle. What a great kitchen to entertain in...or as Michelle and I thought when we saw it, "a good place to scrap!" Not the typical bachelor pad, that's for sure!!
I am so proud of Mary and I was very impressed to see her design and vision come to life. Isn't it gorgeous??? You can contact Mary and Troy at Revamp Remodeling

I have to give a couple of birthday shout-outs to my girls Mary and Danielle who both  celebrated their Golden 30th Birthdays on Wed.  Happy Birthday Danielle! Happy Birthday Mary Ellen! Excited to have the crew together for dinner on Friday! Soooo excited to see Kimmy!!!

Okay, so this didn't turn out to be more than just a couple of posts in one (I omitted my TFT), I guess I'll just have to blog again tomorrow! LOL

Wednesday thoughts: Questions I am asking myself lately.

I am wondering about my future of blogging. 

Should blogging be one of my top priorities when I have other things that are more important to focus on?

Should I be divulging so much of my personal life for the whole world to see?

Am I violating the privacy of my family and friends when I post pictures  and news about them?  Should I seek permission every single time?

Why is it so important for me to feel connected to other people I have never actually met IRL?

Do I need to blog to make my life feel complete?

Do those of you who read this truly care about me or what I write about? Or do you just read out of boredom?

Does anyone else struggle with this?

4 Days goes fast....

Especially when you sleep half of it away.  I have gotten much more sleep than usual this weekend, yet I still feel groggy.  I had high hopes of getting more of my final projects for school finished, but laid around most of the weekend instead.  My body always tells me when its had enough.  Getting sick this week was a big sign!

I watched more movies than usual the past few days:

• Mr. Brooks
• Ratatoille
• Closer
• Fantastic 4

Also read a couple of good memoirs the past few weeks.  Will review those sometime this week.

A friend made dinner tonight with some fresh venison of a young doe he caught with his bow & arrow.  He cooked up the tenderloins and the backstraps, seasoned with yellow onions, garlic and bacon.  It was the most tender and delicious steak I have ever had, (beef or otherwise!)  I never would have known it was deer if they hadn't told me. 

I know some people who wouldn't ever even try deer meat, or get grossed out at the thought of eating wild game.  Regardless, it seems much more gratifying to eat a meal that you caught yourself than one you had to pay a lot of money for!  I am not a hunter, though.  I have my own opinions about hunting and I want to explore it further.  I have had "hunting" as a topic on my Thought for Thursday list of ideas, so I am going to pick that one this week. I will refer back to this post when I do :)

It is now time for me to get to bed.  Waking up at 6am tomorrow and staying late for an important staff meeting might be kind of tough.  I am still not feeling great.

I hope everyone else enjoyed their long holiday weekend :)

Today I.....

• Coughed up a lung (but only in the morning after I had just gotten up and showered)
• Did 6 loads of laundry
• Wrote two papers
• Thought about scrapbooking but felt guilty so I started a third paper
• Ate the rest of the leftovers
• Got notice that my Macbook Pro should finally be here next week :)
• Avoided the Mall like the plague.  I am NOT all about Black Friday

How boring! Just what I needed :)

One monkey off my back.....

Finished and turned in my 15 page research paper this past Wednesday :) Boy does that feel grrrrrrrrrrrrrrreat!!!

Still have a HUGE math project to complete and a few other smaller assignments in both math and science.  Its going to be a busy month but.......

There IS a light at the end of the tunnel!

Its report card time at work so there is no school today to give teachers time to prepare for upcoming conferences.  Looking forward to lunching with Lori and Jen today....its our conference prep tradition :)

Happy Friday ya'll....

I want a Mac!

And I don't mean a Big Mac either!! LOL.

I am talking Mac as in Apple computer.  The Macbook Pro, to be exact.

I have hated Macs all my life, so what the heck spurred this sudden desire, you ask?

Well, iMovie, of course.  (I want to learn sooooo bad!) And the new Mac OS X Leopard operating system that debuts this week. Watch the video and you'll want one too!  OMG, and I thought the iPhone was cool....this blows everything I have seen yet away!!  I can easily access and network to my PC laptop.  Perfect :)

Only problem is, Macs are EXPENSIVE.  Like waaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyy more than a PC.  I can get a teacher discount of $200, but that is it.  I will also have to purchase a HD video camcorder (or why bother?).  Thats like a minimum of $3K.  Holy crap!!!

Not to mention my laptop is less than a year old and someone told me to buy a Mac last year when I was buying a new laptop but I didn't listen :(

Am I crazy? I don't even own an iPod (but I do use iTunes)

Who are my Mac people?????  Is it worth it???

The Boogeyman

Not much new to report, but I did get to watch a couple of movies yesterday...

Firewall with Harrison Ford and Boogeyman.

Now I just have to confess right here and now that when I was a child, I believed in the Boogeyman.  He lived in my basement!!!! (Which was very creepy and unfinished for the most part until I was a teenager.  Secret rooms and everything).

Why did I think the Boogeyman lived down there?

Because my dad told me so. Many, many times.

Why the heck would a parent tell something like that to their children????

It scared the heck out of me until I was probably 14 or so.  No kidding.

If I had to go to the basement for any reason, I would run as fast as I could to the top of the stairs because I was always afraid the Boogeyman was right behind me and was going to get me.

NEVER would I sleep down there until I was a teenager, and then only if I had friends sleeping over with me.

This movie last night was pretty scray, although the Boogeyman in the movie lived in the closet, not the basement.

I am going to buy my dad this movie and make him watch it!!! I want him to get the sh*t scared out of him so he knows a little about the trauma he caused in me. (PS I love my dad, but I still don't understand why he used to say that crap.)

Anyone else care to admit they were afraid of the Boogeyman or some other creey phenomena????

Anyone scare the crap out of their kids with horror stories like that????

Ghetto-Fabulous Names......

So by now it is no secret that I work at neighborhood schools in really tough, poor neighborhoods in the inner city.  I absolutely LOVE what I do, and wouldn't ever dream of trading my poor, needy, diverse students for the more well-off white kids in the suburbs.  This is my niche.

So that being said, I do have to tell you that I have come across some very interesting names throughout my career and have started to make a list of the ones I remember.  I wanted to share with you some of the unusual  "names" of students I have personally known.    (I am not even going to go there with some of the ethnic names I've come across!) The following names span all races....

Golden              Daisy

Foxy                  Charisma

Dream              Hope

Precious (I've known at least four girls with this name)

Faith                 Destiny

Diamond (again, 5-6 girls with this name)

Sparkle

Heaven             Unique

Star or Estrella

Lyric                    Darling

Honey                Modesty

Sunshine            Jersey

China                   Dakota

Carolina              Georgia

Green  (whose last name also happened to be a shade of green)

Sterling                 Seven

Prince                  Justice

Reality                  Irony

***************************************************************************************

Anyone care to share unusual names of people they have known?

Is it a full moon or what???!!!

Raise your hand if you can feel that its been a full moon this week.

Anyone?

Do you notice that things really do tend to get a tad bit crazier when the moon is at its fullest?

We teachers can always tell by how kids behave in school! No joke.

My cycles are also always N'sync with the full moon.

Doesn't help to be emotional when everyone else is kind of crazy too!

Took this picture of the moon early this am on my way to work

Happy season premiere of Grey's Anatomy tonight....I hope I get enough work done tonight to justify watching it :)

Piggin' Out at the Fair.....

I know I didn't eat much at the Fair last week when I went with Brian & Michelle, but I definitely made up for it on Saturday night when I went back with some friends.

What I ate/sampled during the 5 hours we were there:

*Footlong hot dog

*Cheese curds (Sorry Michelle, I didn''t get any to-go for you, since i knew you guys were at the Cabin this weekend)

*Apple & caramel malt from the Dairy Building

*Bacon-wrapped pork tenderloin (outside the Bazaar)- delicious!!

*Cinnamon roasted almonds in the Bazaar (3 large bags to take home!)

*Taco from Taco King (note to self: boring! try different tacos next time!)

*Roasted Corn on the Cob (I think this is my favorite!)

*London broil steak sandwich & lemonade

*Tom Thumb mini donuts for the long walk back to our car

We spent some time in the Midway.  Here are Rich & Angel on the Magnum PI ride....

Playing games in the Midway.....

Oh, and how many of you call milk "white" milk?  Such as on this sign at the Milk booth, which boasts white & chocolate milk.  That was really bugging Rich, let me tell ya! Doesn't one assume that milk is white, unless it specifies a flavor??!!

Since we are discussing fair food in this post, I wanted to ask your opinion about Dippin' Dots-Ice Cream of the Future.  I saw a special on the Travel or Food channel about this and thought I'd ask ya'll about it.  I know they are very popular, but I am not interested because I enjoy softer, creamier ice cream.  Please take my poll :)

Random Monday

I haven't done a random post in quite some time, have I?

Here goes:

**After nearly 2 1/2 years of blogging, I currently have 580 posts and 2,992 comments.  According to my calculations, that is an average of 5.16 comments per post.  Obviously not all posts are created equal; some get a ton and some get none.  I am going to follow my pal Nicole's Comment-Seeking Advice and ask more questions and opinions.  I am also going to recognize/reward those of you who already comment.  Such as ADRIENNE, who has to be the world's most faithful blog reader/commenter.  She reads probably 500 blogs a day and always leaves everyone  a comment!  Adrienne, you know I love you girl and each and every one of your comments is noticed :)  Other regular commenters that I wanted to give a shout-out to are Michelle, Kim, Nicole, Leslie, Greta, Simone, Andrea, Dana, Dana, Rolana, Sarah, Val, and Lesfitz.  I totally agree with this other post of Nic's where she talks about how one-sided blogging can be and everyone knows everything about you, but they don't share back of themselves (unless they are a fellow blogger).  I can't tell you how many of my real-life friends tell me they read this blog all the time, yet only a handful of you actually leave me comments.  I have turned the word verification off, so hopefully that will make it a little easier.

**Went back to work today.  Started the morning at my new school, didn't know a single soul.  I hate that! Good thing I make friends easily and people seemed pretty friendly...I hate being the new girl.  I went to my other school for the afternoon and it was great to be back! The new principal seems like a great guy and I am looking forward to the school year.  Setting up the classroom is kind of a PITA right now because all of my teaching stuff (2 schools worth) is at my old school, boxed up.  Apparently the building was painted over the summer but they have only gotten through half the rooms, and mine still needs to be done.  So it is pointless to unpack it until they finish it later this week.  My new school has absolutely nothing, so I have to decide what all I am going tot bring over there once I unpack all the goods and go through it.  Did I mention that there is no A/C in these buildings???????? Yucky humidity!!

**Have you ever wondered what goes through the mind of a mother of six? Wonder no more, check out this funny blog!!  She became famous after posting this item on eBay (I found the link on Christy's blog). Wow, 6 kids!

**Speaking of kids, I have so many pregnant friends right now!  First we have Cora due beginning of Sept, then  Aimee mid-Sept, Shannon Sept 30, Leslie Oct 4, Kara Nov 3rd, Laura Feb 18th, Michelle April 10th.  I probably forgot about a few, not to mention those I might not know about yet!  It seemed like there were so many 9-month-pregnant women at the Fair the other day too!

**Speaking of the Fair, check out these foods you might not find anywhere other than the Mn State Fair

And SPAM curds??!!

***I am effin TIRED right now!!!!!! I took a decongestant at 11pm last night and laid awake all night long (but I sure could breathe good!).

**I have a feeling that the worst of my headaches (the ones that last for 3 days straight) are hormone related.  They show up at the same time as other unpleasantries.  Does that happen to anyone else??

**Check out this presentation.  Really makes you think about the technological world and how it impacts the future....

*** Have ya'll heard that Jeff got his wish and Chipotle is coming to Roseville????  Its true!!  I think we all need to give Jeff some credit for making this happen.  His letters to Chipotle may have been the spark that was needed.

Alright, that is probably enough randomness for one post!

My Last Day of Summer Vacation.....

This is it.  The last day of my summer vacation.

How sad!!!!

I know I have said I am happy to be going back to work (I really am!), but I kind of feel like my summer was a waste :(

I did NOT do any of the home improvement projects I had planned to do.

I did NOT go on a fabulous vacation anywhere.

I did NOT get to see 75% of the people I wanted to see.

I did NOT work out religiously (or at all, in fact) or diet in any way.

BUT it was still a good summer.

I DID get to spend a lot of time with my man.

I DID get to sleep as late as I wanted every day.

I DID get to read many great books.

I DID eat out quite often and kept up the restaurant reviews.

I DID take a million photos.

I DID get many scrappies done.

I DID get to see some amazing concerts.

I DID take the next step toward the future of my career (more on that later).

I DID get to rest and relax.

I DID watch TV and movies.

Educators are encouraged to do many of things I was able to do this summer.

I truly DO feel refreshed and relaxed.

I AM ready for the upcoming school year.

I guess my summer wasn't much of a waste after all :)

A couple more things...

At the party on Saturday, one of my cousins shows me her "Bratz" doll.  The doll had blonde and red streaks in her hair and it was long and straight so I was like, "oh, her hair is super cool!" And then Payton and my aunt both said she looked like me! LMAO!!  The doll even has blue eyes!  So Michelle took a pic of me with it.  This is my new profile pic on MySpace and Facebook :)

I had to suffer taking pics with my old digi cam today(for student projects).  The batteries lasted not even 20 minutes after I had just charged them this morning before I left for work.  I will be bringing my current camera to Best Buy to see if they can fix it; I purchased the performance plan when I bought it less than two years ago so these effers better fix it or I'm going to be PO'd! Actually, it would probably work better in my favor if they can't fix it, because then they will have to give me the newer model and credit too, since my camera was more expensive two years ago!

Okay, so i am totally excited for tomorrow.  Why? I splurged last week and ordered Adobe Creative Suite 3 Design Premium (using my teacher discount saved me over $1,000) and it will be arriving at work  tomorrow. I cannot wait to check it out, especially the new Dreamweaver, InDesign and Photoshop!

I love short weeks at work, tomorrow is already Wednesday!! 10 more days of school and the countdown is ON!

Holla

A list for Friday....

The week flew by, trying to capture my thoughts and memories now :)

**Last Friday was the due date for all my student research projects.  Spent just about every minute of every work day this week either grading them or helping kids finish them. Over 100 in all between my two schools!  Most of them turned out just fabulous!!  Today they started presenting the projects to their classmates and that went great too, except for when my little camera fell out of my pocket.  Grrrrr! The flash no longer works, so I am only able to take pics in really bright light.  I am soooooooo bummed!!  I have to get a new camera now, just not sure if I am ready to step it up and buy an expensive Rebel, or buy another high-quality point and shoot.

**Spent Wednesday night with all my college girls....Kelly and Sally had me, the Lauras, and Lindsay over to their place for a taco feast :) Most of them see each other all the time, but I am a little bit out of the loop, so it was great to see them!!  Our college days were so much fun...we love to talk about the good ol' days, but also catch up with current stuff.  I need to see these girls more often!!  Everyone is a lot more camera-shy than they were back in the day, so I couldn't convince anyone to take pictures :(

**Bought some new rose bushes that I planted in cute little pots last night.   Look how pretty....

**The weather was rainy and crappy all week.  It is slightly sunny today, but is supposed to rain all this weekend.  Why does this happen almost every Memorial Day weekend????  I have family in town this weekend and we have plans for a BBQ and boating up at my parent's place.  Hoping we don't get rained out...is there such a thing as an anti-rain dance?????

I hope everyone has a safe, sunny holiday weekend!

Weekly Recap....

Ahhhh, its always amazing to me when Friday comes along and I have had so much going on that I haven't had a chance for a "real" post.  Sometimes its just easier to list it :)

**My DVD player took a shit last weekend so I bought a new DVD upconverter (to play HD quality) and spent two hours installing it Sunday night after technical difficulties.  Its the bomb!!  Now we just need the 60" Plasma flat screen and we're all set! LMAO

**Had dinner with Heather on Monday night at Market Bar-B-Que.  Looooove this place! Read my review.

** Planned to scrap on Tuesday but spent the entire time picking out papers to go with recent pics, and also writing some reviews for the TCRB.  Also worked on the TCRB MySpace page.  Add me as your friend and subscribe to the blog!

**It is teacher appreciation week.  They had a fabulous luncheon for us at work on Wed :) Its nice to be appreciated...I don't feel it enough :(

**Went out for gyros with  Lanee & Roger on Wed.  Later watched the Utah/Golden State playoff game...the crowd is a sea of whiteness in Utah.  Found it disturbing, I could never live there for that reason alone!  Where is the diversity??  Just out of curiosity, I had to look up the Census demographic statistics of Utah:

	White persons, percent, 2005 (a)  93.8% Black persons, percent, 2005 (a) 1.0%
	American Indian and Alaska Native persons, percent, 2005 (a) 1.3%
	Asian persons, percent, 2005 (a) 1.9%
	Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander, percent, 2005 (a) 0.7%
	Persons reporting two or more races, percent, 2005 1.3%
	Persons of Hispanic or Latino origin, percent, 2005 (b) 10.9%
	White persons not Hispanic, percent, 2005 83.5%

**Visited with my dentist on Thursday am.  Had my teeth cleaned and was happy to hear that after 30 years I am still cavity-free.  Not one in my entire life :)  BUT I do have major problems with my jaw/bite.  I had major surgery on my jaw 15 years ago, but my bite has moved slightly over time and is contributing to my major headaches.  I have seen a TMD specialist in addition to my dentist and they have different opinions about my problem/treatment, so I am doing a combination of both. I am going through physical therapy every week for my jaw muscles and I will be fitted for a split as soon as school is out.  Hope this works, we've tried just about everything else!

**Had dinner with Bradie and Dana last night at Matty B's.  Look for the review to come soon :)

**I also wanted to tell you guys that if you live in my area and you don't have plans for Saturday night, come out and see Fishbone at The Rock Nightclub.  I don't really know these guys, but they are a National Act and I have heard they are pretty awesome.  I'll be there, come join me!!!!  $18 at the door.

**I will respond to your questions from my last post sometime this weekend.  Great questions so far...feel free to keep askin' 'em!

Have a great weekend, Happy Mothers Day to all you wonderful mothers :)

Blogorama :)

Hey peeps :)

I am here and I've had a ton of things to blog about, but I've been super busy.  I figured I better post because I know how some of you get impatient waiting for me to post new material. LOL! To shorten this post somewhat, I am going to make a list of happenings, thoughts, etc.

**Its been a beautiful week, weather-wise.  Gotta love 70s and sunshine :)

**Just finished watching the 2-hour special of Grey's Anatomy.  I have to say I was disappointed.  It wasn't really Grey's, but a way to lead us off on Addison's new spin-off series.  I missed the first 30 minutes and when I turned it ona nd saw all these people I didn't know, i was like, "I thought Grey's was on tonight?" I seriously didn't even know it was my show!  It was like they spliced an episode with Grey's with the pilot of the other series or something.  The finale better not be that way!!  I am not saying I won't watch the spin-off either, just that I didn't like how they put them so close together!

**Went out to dinner both last night and tonight to restaurants in my neck of the woods.  I've been getting up early in the mornings to write my restaurant reviews and to catch up on Facebook & MySpace.  I love writing the reviews nd I think I've started to get a very small following, but it is somewhat time consuming.  I have also started a MySpace page for Twin Cities Restaurant Blog.  Gotta jazz it up a little bit with my Photoshop skillzzzzzz

** Oh, speaking of skills, I made another digital layout of me and Farrah, taken at work yesterday.  I will truly miss her after I leave....

And to answer Jessica's question about whether I will switch to digital scrapping, stick to paper, or do both, the answer is mostly paper.  Digi is fun for quick pages, but it isn't nearly as much my thing.  The whole process is totally different.  I love to touch all the goodies :) I do have to say though, that I wish many of the gorgeous digital papers I have seen just recently would be made into real papers!  I am astonded at how many designers there are out there, and how many give their products away FREE!!

**Saturday is Cinco de Mayo.  I usually do something in honor of the holiday, but this year my man Oscar de la Hoya has the boxing match fo his life against undefeated Floyd Mayweather.   I was talking to my neighbor about the fight last week sometime and he theorizes that there could be NO WAY that Oscar would lose a fight on Cinco de Mayo.  Oh, I hope he is right!  There better be a knock-out either way, because if it comes to a decision, you know there is always some controversial bullshit.  Do ya'll know how much I love Oscar?  So much that when i was in Vegas back in 1999 I bid in an auction for a shadow box with a autographed glove and ringpass from one of his fights in 1998 and I WON!!!  I won't tell ya how much I spent on that bad-boy, but it is still proudly displayed on my wall :)  GO OSCAR GO!!

 

** I can't remember everything else at the moment, but I hope everyone has a nice weekend :)

Happy 2nd Birthday, Blog!

This week marks the 2nd anniversary of this blog, Mi Vida Ocupada aka www.sweetsauer.com.

Wow, did that two years go fast!

Check out these stats...

Posts: 481 Hits: 56,622  Comments: 2511 

I've even had visitors from all over the world :)

Thank you to everyone who has supported this journey.  Thank you for reading, I truly appreciate the audience.  This blog has been an important outlet for so many different aspects of my life and it would be weird not to have it now.  What did I ever do before?!

Please help me celebrate this anniversary by leaving a comment telling me what you have enjoyed about this blog.

Is it all my pictures? Scrapbook layouts? My random thoughts? Book reviews?

Or just that it is a way to stay connected to me?

I'd love to hear from everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Lurkers come out!!!!  Friends. family, other bloggers.  Come out, come out, whoever and where ever you are!

Have an awesome weekend and enjoy today!!!!!!!

Old Battle Wound Stories.....

I had a nice, relaxing weekend (I think I already mentioned that in the last post?).   I went to dinner with my neighbors on Saturday night and then I sat on the sofa for the next 5 hours and watched Little Miss Sunshine and Walk the Line.  Both good movies!

*******************************************************************************************************

Since I don't have any great pictures or stories to share about my weekend, I thought I'd give ya some random battle wound stories about me.  This is a true testament of how accident prone I am.....

**When I was three years old, I put my tooth through my lip while jumping on the bed at the cabin.  I have an ugly scar on my lower lip now.

**Walked over hot bbq coals when I was 4 and burned the crap out of the bottoms of my feet

**Broke my arm at school while sledding in 3rd grade

**Tore my hamstring doing gymnastics moves without stretching when I was in 6th grade

**Got a major hemotoma the size of a baseball during a soccer game in 7th grade (some biotch kicked me right in the shin with the bottom of her cleats).  The bruise/lump lasted 6 months.

**Slammed my finger inside my mom's sewing machine in 7th grade.  Had to have a hole drilled into my nail to release the pressure

And I have REALLY BAD LUCK in recent years when it comes to stairs!!!

**Missed the bottom stair while going down into my basement in the dark and sprained my ankle Sept 2002

**Tripped over uneven pavement in the dark in Tucson and sprained my left wrist (nearly broke it) April 2003.  Sucked that it was my first night of vacation!!

**Turned around too fast in my garage while wearing high heels and started falling to the cement....instead of putting my wrist out to stop myself like I did in the incident above, I did a stunt roll and ended up busting my left elbow  Dec 2003

**Fell down the stairs at a Halloween party and majorly bruised my foot. Oct 2004.  This is the only one I have pictures of!

And these are just the ones that were preventable!!!! I'm not even going to get into all my other injuries that were sustained after I was hit by the drunk driver in 1994.  I'll save that list for another day. 

My Costa Rican dream....

Okay, so I am already sick of the snow and we are supposed to get 12-18" MORE in the next few days.

Spring break isn't for another 5 weeks or so, but I am already thinking tropical, as you could probably tell by my new banner :)

I'd be happy to go anywhere warm and sunny this year, but for over 12 years now the one place I have wanted to visit more than anywhere else is...... Costa Rica.

Why Costa Rica?  Well, back in 11th grade my Spanish class had a student teacher who had gone to SCSU and did a travel abroad program there.  She brought in many pictures from her trip and it all sounded so exciting, that I actually went to SCSU with the intentions of minoring in Spanish and doing the Costa Rica program.  So fall quarter of my freshman year I took Latin American Studies 250, the prerequisite for the program.  It was a terrible idea to take this class as a new college student!!!  I was just young and naive enought to think that the course would involve learning about the culture of latin america, similar to what we had learned throughout highschool.  I was very wrong...the class was all about the politics of Mexico, Costa Rica and Brazil.  I am not even into the politics of my own country ,let alone these ones.  the class was a terribel experience for me.  I remember a certain assignment I needed to complete and standing in the campus library for the first time, crying because I had no idea what I was doing and I was so frustrated. It is such a helpless feeling. Thank God my roommate (and still very dear friend) Bradie, was taking an orientation class and later helped me find what I needed.  The entire class was a total failure and I ended up getting the first and only C I have ever gotten in my life.  My dreams of going to Costa Rica were dashed when I realized that the professor of my class was the advisor for the whole Costa Rica program.  I gave up the idea of studying there in college.  I also could not get in to any of the Spanish classes because of my they were all full long before freshman werre able to register.  There went my dream of minoring in Spanish.

So to make a long story short, I still want to go to Costa Rica.  Colleen & Matt have been there.  So have Becky and Miles.  And Laura and Jeff.  I am extremely envious, but I know I will still make it there someday!

I cannot wait to see the jungle and all the exotic plants and animals, the mountains, the beaches, the people, the food.

Someday.

Soon, I hope!

Ps  Speaking of traveling, I thought I'd direct you to a cool post my brother Jeff recently wrote about his experience filming a documentary in Kenya, Africa while he was in college.  Glad both of my brothers studied abroad even though I didn't :(  Make sure to leave Jeff a comment!

Today you get a list....

Lots of random thoughts today, so this will be a list-type post :)

**Thank you sooooooo much for all the birthday wishes, cards, calls, Ims, e-mails, etc.  Birthdays are supposed to make you feel special, and I do, thanks to all of you :)  30 really doesn't feel as scary as it sounds!  LOL

**I had a really nice birthday.  I was taken out shopping on Sunday (tons of fun new stuff from Bath & Body) and then to dinner at Macaroni Grill.  I was really craving Italian...felt a little deprived after missing dinner on Friday night with my girls at Old Spaghetti Factory.  From the few pics I have seen of that night...looks like I missed out on a ton of fun :(

** Watched a new comedy DVD on Sunday night..... Mike Epps: Inappropriate Behavior.  Do you know him?  He is a comedian who was in all the Friday movies with Ice Cube (played Day-Day).  I was really disappointed in his act.  Every other word out of his mouth was the "N" word.  All of his stuff was really racist too.  So disrespectful!!!  I love comedy, but this wasn't funny to me at all.

**I tried my first Rachel Ray recipe for dinner last night.  Turkey Florentine Meatball Heroes.  Pretty good!  I am going to have to start using ground turkey in place of ground beef more often.  It was fun to try something new....we are totaslly sick of the same old stuff all the time.  Does anyone have any favorite recipes sites they'd like to share???

**Treated myself to some delicious dessert.  Is this eye-candy or what?!!

**Looks like the Anna Nicole drama is getting crazier by the day.....three "Baby's Daddys" now??  I wonder how many others will step out of the woodwork???  So many conspiracy theories all over the internet about how/why she died.  Apparently she was supposedly going to marry Howard K Stern on Feb 23rd.  Was he the one who killed her and her son??Her house was also ransacked following her death.  Who and why? The craziest story I had heard was that Anna and her son Daniel were a little "too close"...and he was the real father of her baby.  He killed himself and then Anna killed herself after paternity tests were ordered because all of this was about to be discovered.  Far-fetched, I know!!!  Who would have thought she'd be more popular in death????

**Reading this really good book.  Would love to have hours on end to read, read, read!  Did you know that if you click on any of the books I have in my sidebar, you will be directed to Amazon.com and you can buy that book?  I am in the Amazon associates program and I'd love to get some credit for showcasing these good books :)  Help a sister out and buy some books!

**Bloglines is making me mad....for some reason, my blog was deleted and is no longer getting subscribers. Hopefully those of you who like this blog will see this post and re-subscribe to it, or you will no longer get updates when I make posts :(  I have seen a slight drop in readers lately....now I know why!! Has this ever happened to anyone else?

Vacation Over :(

Yes, my vacation is over, but it was good while it lasted!  I have definitely been in relaxation mode since the holidays ended.  My entire mind, body and soul needed every minute of it.

Here is a rundown of the past week or so...

Sleep:  Got quite a bit during my time off. Stayed up late every night, slept in late every day.

Headaches: Too many to count, but more good days than bad.  Seeing the ENT Dr. next week about my sinuses and constant earache.

Books: Read the first book in Nora Roberts "Circle" Trilogy and now reading the second one as well.  Very different from her other books...this one is a battle against vampires.  Some romance.  Coming along slowly, but if I can read the entire Lord of the Rings trilogy, I can make it through anything!

Movies: Geez, I have seen more movies in the past few weeks then I thought possible.  Just shows how lazy I've been.

Fearless ( Jet Li).  Very good for a kung-fu movie.  It actually had a plot and was easy to follow with the subtitles. Awesome fight scenes.

The Break Up (Jennifer Aniston and Vince Vaughn).  Cute, but I hated the ending.

Superman Returns. This was decent, but they could've picked a cuter superman. 

Lady in The Water(M.Night Shamalan).  Not scary like some of his other movies, but good.

The Descent. Holy crapola! I couldn't even watch half this movie because I am so claustrophobic. Not too mention how stupid the women acted.

Night at the Museum (Ben Stiller). Very cute!

Lady of Vengeance. Korean movie with English subtitles.  Kinda gruesome and very confusing!

Friends: Didn't get to see nearly as many people as I had hoped since I generally wasn't feeling that good, but was still pretty busy the past week.  Didn't take pictures of any of it!? A true testament to how lazy I've been.

Hung out with Susan on Wed. afternoon.  Had lunch at Panera and then I drove her around White Bear Lake and out to Pinetree Apple Orchard and to see the huge mansions in Dellwood. Nice to hang out and talk :)

Lanee came over to hang out on Wed night.  Spent the night talking.  Its great that she lives less than 3 miles away :)

Brought lunch to Mary and Troy on Thurs.  I hadn't seen my BF in over two months and I've missed her so much but she is one busy lady.  Besides being a full-time mom of two and a full-time student, Mary and her husband are really busy getting their house ready to list on the MLS, hopefully this week.  You ever watch Flip the House? They totally flipped their house and it is really cute! Everything is brand new from top to bottom, inside and out. Located in Stillwater for a great price :) 

Dinner with Lanee & Roger on Thurs night.  Its awesome that they live so close...we often make last-minute dinner plans and it is always a lot of fun.  This time the four of us went to Washington Square and then hung out at their house.

Friday early evening with Jason & Ruth. Ordered takeout from Wild Ginger and hung out while the boys played a game of Madden.

Went to Cassie's late Friday night to help her celebrate her birthday.  Besides having a really nice time hanging out, I also discovered the new Hershey's Candy Cane Kisses.  My new favorite!!! 

Scrapped all day Saturday with Shannon, Sarah and Gina.  Gina makes the best breakfast dishes. I truly feel spoiled to be the recipient of her culinary talents.  Baked Caramel French Toast and egg-sausage-hashbrown-cheese bake.  Delish!  We accomplished more in the kitchen than we did with scrappin. I think! LOL

Jeff & Toni came over on Saturday afternoon...Jeff showed us his skills at Guitar Hero 2...keep rockin', Jeffy! That game is fun, but it totally bugs my eyes out from watching and makes me motion sick.  Can't watch it for too long.  We all went to Macaroni Grill for dinner.  I made up my own pasta combo, but chose the wrong sauce and was disappointed :(  The cheesecake that we shared for dessert totally made up or it, though!

Banners:

I had offered to make banners a few weeks ago and the lucky winner was Jessica. Here is her new banner.

While I was at it, I also designed this one for Raina.

This one for Val.

and this one for Greta the Great.

It was fun making them and the girls all loved them.   If you like what you see, stay tuned for a future banner give-away!

So that's a run-down on how I spent my time off.  Looking forward to getting back to work and seeing all my students!!

Mini Donuts, Madeline album, etc

Where do you suppose one gets fresh, hot mini donuts at this time of the year?? Fair donuts, the kind that are warm and sugary.  I missed out by not getting any at the Fair last year, I guess, but they sound incredible to me at the moment!

I scrapped all darn day on Saturday.  Like 12 hours straight, with just a few breaks here and there.  I was on a roll working on my Madeline Island mini-book, figured I might as well just keep truckin! Check out this slide show, I love it!!!!!  I plan to do just one more layout, of pics from inside our cottage.  Other than that, it is finished :)

Other randomness:

** Still no snow here in the Twin Cities.  It was very cold last week, but this week it is supposed to stay slightly above freezing.  There are already fisherman and shacks out on the thin ice!!!

**I watched Pirates of the Cariibbean last night and then watched a show on the Discovery channel about Giant Squid.  Any guesses about what I dreamt about all night ???? Yep, giant squid.  I must be the most suggestable dreamer out there! (Or do you think most women are like that?)

**I was soooooo craving Mexican yesterday (Susan, where are you??????)  and needed to get out of the house, so I went to La Casita for dinner. 

**Hoping to get started on my Christmas shopping tonight.  I still don't know what to get anyone!

**Ordered the wrong type of hard drive enclosure, so I still have not recovered any info from my old laptop.  I thought I needed SATA, but I really need IDE.  The IDE enclosure should be here in a few days :)

**My brother Jeff took a trip to LA last weekend and ended up in the Presidential Suite at the Hilton.  Read his story here.

**My poor Gramps just had several surgeries to remove skin cancer again.  He is having another big one right before Christmas.  Poor guy!  My Aunt Carol is also having major surgery again right before Christmas :(  I wish them both a speedy recovery!

** The stomach flu is running rampant around here.  Just about everyone I know has had it....including all but like 4 people that I work with (including me).  I have been washing my hands even more than usual, my poor skin!! Please, please, please don't let me get it...especially not at Christmas!

** I would like to see if there is any interest in getting a group of girls together to attend Scrap Mania at Archiver's in Roseville some Friday or Saturday night.

"Need time away to get your scrapbook pages done, and have some fun with friends? Scrap Mania is the answer! Now on both Friday and Saturday nights, we make our workshop available to you from 5pm–11pm.

Now you can enjoy food and drinks right at your table, and sign up as many friends as you want—reserve a table or even the whole room for your private mania, up to three months in advance! The $15 fee includes a free gift or coupon, dinner and a variety of snacks, prizes, and product demos."

This is open to anyone!!! If you are interested to do this sometime, let me know.  I am sure it would work best to plan something for January, but they have not put out their January calendar yet.  Stay tuned, I will mention this again soon!

**I haven't been the best about the birthday shout-outs lately :(

Happy belated birthday to:

Nicole B (Dec 10th)

Maria H (Dec 5th)

Amber Nichole (Dec 4th)

Meaghan B (Dec 1st)

Jules M (Nov 24th)

Have a nice week everyone, only two weeks until Christmas!

11/11

Ooooooooh, I love 11/11!  or 11:11.

Do any of you "make a wish" when you see 11:11 on the clock??? LOL

Does that mean we can make wishes all day today, because the date is 11/11??? That would be cool!

Anyway, today is actually the 8 year anniversary of having my Bessie-car.  I wrote about our anniversary last year.  God help me, we aren't going to make it to 9 years...it was hard enough to get to 8!! I would like to buy a newer car ASAP, but I just haven't had too much time to go out looking.

I've had quite a bit going on the past few days....

Thurday night I went out for dinner and drinks with Lanee and Rog.  Good Ol' Washington Square...one of the most expensive local establishments.  Has a nice time...realized I am not really a martini girl....don't really care for vodka....I am not much of a drinker anyway, but prefer tequila or rum.

Had the worst headache in the world on Friday.  Lasted from 10am until midnight when I went to bed.  Nothing helped. Grrrrr!!! Despite this, I met up with my girl Lori for lunch at Panera (they have the best smoked turkey artichoke panini sandwich!).  Our district didn't have school so that teachers could prepare for conferences.  Had a million report cards to work on and I am still not finished!

Friday night I also had plans to hook up with Shannon, Sarah, Gina and Mollie at Mollie's house (to see Mollie's new baby and have pizza).  A few days ago our location changed to a local hotel where Mollie was having a birthday party for her daughter.  We sat poolside where there were literally about 50 loud, splashing kids.  We decided NOT to do that again!!!!

Other things I learned the "hard way" in the past few days:

**Do NOT hold your carry out container while wearing gloves after drinking martinis.  The box might accidentally "jump" out of your hand and spill your food all over the floor!

**Make sure you take your garbage bin down to the street on garbage day BEFORE you are half-way to work and realize you have to go all the way back home to take care of it.

Postive Thoughts and Prayers needed!

I am asking anyone who reads this to send positive thoughts and prayers to a good friend of mine and her family whose father is undergoing surgery for cancer this morning (right now, as I type this). 

Thanks!  Every little prayer helps!!

I personally know what she and her family are going through and I hope and pray that they experience the same positive outcome as my dad.  Cancer can be very scary!

xoxoxoxxoxo 

Full Moon and Native Reflections...

Wow,  is it a full moon out or what???!!

I have been really irritated the past couple of days...the kids at work are seriously driving me loco! And I am not referring to my darling groups of GT kids.  I am talking about the 3rd grade regular-ed prep class of 30 students that I am teaching at each school.  I love the topics I am teaching....social studies at one school and enrichment/creativity at the other.  Its just that the groups are so big and there are a handful of naughty kids in both classes. 

I don't usually talk too much about what I do at work, but on Fridays I offer really cool special topic classes and open them to interested students who might get to see me Mon-Thurs.  The classes and the students who take them change each month.  This month my Friday class is poetry!!  I have been teaching poetry for about 5-6 years now, and I always have my students submit their original poems to the Anthology of Poetry competition and every year now I have had students who get published in this national publication.  Its pretty cool. I love to see how excited they are about poetry....this week I taught them how to write a limerick and another rhyming-patterned poem.  I can't wait to see some of the final drafts!

My class for next month is Ojibwe culture.  I have always had a fascination with native americans and think it is important to teach my students about the way of life and also the injustices.  Not that I am an expert or anything, but I used to live and teach on the Tohono O'Odham reservation in AZ and have always loved studying about the culture. My first real hands-on experience was in 4th grade when my elementary class stayed on the Mille Lacs Lake indian reservation.  We learned to weave, visited the wild rice patties, went to the sugar maple orchards to see the process from taping the trees to boiling the sap into syrup and then into sugar.  I have attended pow-wows and smoked the peace pipe.  All sorts of fun stuff.  Did tons of cool stuff while I lived in AZ that I will explain another time.  Anyway.......

I mentioned to you guys last week that I was reading a historical fiction book about the Ojibwe, set a few hundred years ago?  A few nights ago I dreamt that I was staying in an old-time Ojibwe camp, living the native way of life.  It was so natural and realistic, I could've sworn I was really there!!!  Is that weird? E thinks I am crazy, but I happen to have an ojibwe student in one of my classes and he made a comment about all the Ojibwe books I have displayed in my classroom about them being "his people".  I recounted my little dream to him and he says in all honesty that it wasn't a dream, it was a vision.  Whatever it was, it was pretty realistic.  Hopefully you don't think I am even more weird now!!!

I have a million more things to blog about, this post went in a different direction than I had planned! I'll be back again soon with lots of other stuff to talk about!

Have a good one!

Wednesday already.......yay!  That means just two work days before I head up north with the girls!

**So, we found out the gender of Brian and Michelle's baby yesterday......its a girl!!  Annika is going to have a baby sister in early February.  How fun! I hope the girls grow up to be wonderful friends :)

**I have now watched the first 9 episodes of Grey's Anatomy, Season 2.  It is impossible for me to watch the last 18 before tomorrow night, but hopefully I can watch a few more episodes tonight.  I am still going to watch the premiere tomorrow, and then try to get caught up with the rest of Season 2 next week.  I have the hardest time trying to revolve my busy life around TV, which is why I haven't committed to any new shows in YEARS.  Bradie convinced me last night that I have to upgrade to digital cable and order the DVR box.  That way I can record/store a whole season of shows and watch them when I can! Sounds fabulous!

**Things are going a little better at my afternoon school.  Remember when I said I have 1 1/2 classes of 2nd graders at one time for 50 minutes every day? And they were really naughty? Well one of the 2nd grade teachers quit last week.  They divided her class into the other 2nd/3rd grades, so now I have just one 2nd grade class for this rotation (which ends on Friday already!).  This is much more managable, but I will still have 1 1/2 classes of 3rd graders that start at that same time next week.  It ticks me off that I have to teach a prep at that school at all, but at least I have a job, right?

**Hung out with Bradie and her baby girls last night.  None of us were feeling very good, so we made it a relaxing night.  CFor once I did not take any pictures. Just wasn't feeling up to it, neither were the girls.

**Its pretty darn cold here right now.  Like 50 degrees.  Brrrr!  I have been wearing sweaters all week and we even turned the heat on last night.  Perfect weather for Bonfires up north this weekend!!

Alright, thats about all I had for today!

I have an Idea.......

........ for an additional blog.

I want to start up and dedicate a new blog to reviewing various restaurants around the Twin Cities.  Wouldn't that be cool????  I love to eat out, but I usually end up going to the same places.  This would allow me to expand our options :) Thanks to the Burrito Blog once again for putting the bug in my head!

I looked to see if there were other websites like this already out there.  I could only find one with this specific focus...but its not that great, IMO. I could probably do much better!

Twin Cities Restaurant Review

I would create a sample menu of offerings, take photos, price guide, atmosphere, and quality of food, etc.

I realize that I will not be able to update it as often as this blog (I just couldn't afford to eat out as often as I'd like), but it might also allow me to add additional authors to create reviews.  Anyone interested in helping?? Jeffrey????

Is this a good idea or what?? I'd love some feedback!

What should I name it???

A little of this, a little of that

Sometimes I hate coming up with a title for each post!

Random weekly facts:

**Picked Bessie up at the shop on Monday night.  $1165.  Ouchhhhhhhhhh.  Thank God for Mastercard! LOL.  Oh how I wish I could afford a NEW car.  Or at least a newer car.  Hoping Bessie makes it through the winter if I don't sell her first.  This relationship is no good if she ends up taking my life or costing me an arm and a leg!!  IF I had a spare $40-50k, the two vehicles that I would choose between are the Cadillac SRX and the Infinity FX45.  Both sleek and stylish, smaller SUVs.

**Discovering that the students at my new school need some major behavior interventions.  Crikey! I have a class and a half of the most squirrely 2nd graders I have ever seen.  Lord, help me get through that 50 minutes a day!

**Went to a really great training for work Tuesday afternoon to learn about a fabulous internet-based program for gifted kids.  It is called Renzulli Learning and is based out of the University of Connecticut.  Here is a description of the program that I stole from the Renzulli website I referenced above.

"The Renzulli Learning System is an exciting new on-line program that matches students' interests and learning styles to many different opportunities designed to provide enriched, challenging learning. All of the activities and options in the Renzulli Learning System are based on The Enrichment Triad Model, which has been cited as the most widely used plan for enrichment and talent development in the world.

In the Renzulli Learning System, the Renzulli Profiler^TM generates an individual profile for each student. Click here to read a sample profile. Then an individualized Enrichment Differentiation collection of Internet and downloadable resources are made available that matches student interests, learning styles, and preferred modes of expression. "
Super cool! I hope to discover several cool websites to use with my students.  I might share a few here too....here is the first!

Has anybody ever heard of a droodle? Droodles are riddles within a picture.  The object is to look at a picture and guess what it might be. There is not necessarily a correct answer for each puzzle.  Different people may see different things!  For example:

Any guesses before I tell you the answers suggested on the Droodles website?

Left- Charlie Brown snorkeling  Right- A pig lookly closely at book titles

Two sites that offer these type of puzzles are Droodles.com and Archimedes' Lab.

**Did a search for "Mexican food blogs" and found the Burrito Blog.  This is my type of guy! His blog is devoted to writing reviews about the different burrito restaurants he eats!!!  Fabulous idea! Check it out ya'll.  There are also a couple of links to some yummy cupcake blogs in my right sidebar. Hmmmm, maybe I should start a food/restaurant review blog???  Could I save the receipts and write it all off, I wonder??? This idea sounds better and better!!

** Where has the time gone??  I cannot believe we are already half-way through September!!! That means less than 6 months to go before I turn the big 3-0!!!!!!  That number used to sound soooooo old.  Now it sounds young!!  I guess it is all relative :)