Another Day in the Life

Counting My Blessings

2011-03-20T17:45:00.003-04:00

As you may or may not be aware, Ohio's governor is attempting to get a bill through that will do away with collective bargaining. For some reason, he feels the need to aim his focus on police officers, firefighters, teachers and all other state employees. Unfortunately, the bill has gone through the Ohio Senate (it passed 17-16) and is now in committee in the Ohio House of Representatives.

If this bill (Senate Bill 5) passes, as it is currently written, teachers' salaries will be reduced to $17,000 to $32,000 a year. This is a DRASTIC cut for many teachers who have moved up the pay scale to the $55,000 level. Our district tops out at around $62,000 a year for teachers with a masters degree plus 32 additional credit hours.

(Do not EVEN start on the bit about being paid during the summer and having 3 months off. If you've done your homework, you know that argument is ridiculous.)

We currently pay $20 a month toward our health insurance. I can't tell you enough how fortunate we are to have such good health insurance. So far my cancer episode has cost almost $200,000 and I've only had to pay about $5,000 out of pocket.

SB 5 states that we will pay 20% of our insurance. I know what it costs the district to insure me and my family (a little over $17,000 a year), so I've done the math. Instead of paying $20 a month, I'll be paying close to $300 a month.

I'm still not sure of the correct interpretation, but I may also lose my seniority AND my continuing contract.

Of course we'll also lose the ability to strike (I don't think the teachers' union in our district has EVER gone on strike, and I doubt they would, so quite frankly, this is the least of my worries).

So, if SB 5 passes as it is written, I will have my pay cut by over 40% AND pay 15 times more than I am currently paying for my health insurance.

As you can imagine, morale in schools throughout the state of Ohio is pretty much at an all-time LOW.

And this is just how it will affect me and my family. And we have two kids in college right now.

I have not checked out the issues that law enforcement personnel and firefighters will face. The people who think nothing of putting themselves "in the line of fire" so to speak, will also have to take cuts, as will ALL state employees, because the governor wants to balance the budget. (I wonder if he'll be taking a cut in pay and paying more for his benefits too? I'm not EVEN going to get started on that!)

We are making cuts in our family budget, in case SB 5 passes as is. We usually order pizza every Saturday night (the pizza shop knows who we are as soon as I place the order...yes, we're regular customers), and we haven't done that for a few weeks. We usually eat out once (or occasionally twice) during the week, and we haven't done that for several weeks. On pay days at my school (every other Friday) we get to wear jeans. On the opposite Fridays we also get to wear jeans, but we have to pay $5 to do so, and the money is donated to a good cause. I'm sorry about not always contributing to the cause, but I'm not spending $5 to wear jeans. I haven't done that for the last two "pay-to-wear" jeans days. We were talking about going to Myrtle Beach this summer, as we haven't been there since 2006, but we're not going now. We'd also been sort of kicking around the idea of maybe thinking about beginning to look at a new vehicle. Hahaha...NOT GOING TO HAPPEN NOW! There are other ways we're trying to cut back, but I won't bore you with the details.

Even with all this going on, I know that I am truly blessed:

I have my family, and for the most part, everyone is healthy right now. (Ted is dealing with some knee/back issues but we hope to get them resolved soon.)

Our sons are doing well in college and learning about "life," in addition to academics.

We have vehicles that run well and are NOT in need of repair (*knock on wood*) at this moment.

Our cats bring us so much joy and laughter, that we can't imagine what we ever did before we adopted them.

Things will work out, one way or another. If the worst possible scenario comes to fruition, then at least we know we won't be going through it alone.

As I've said all along in my adult life...things could always be worse. That's why I'm counting my blessings.

Skip This Post if You Don't Like Pictures

2011-01-12T18:52:00.005-05:00

The Christmas season has come and gone, but of course I feel the need to share some photos with all of you.

Pepina was just lying around Christmas morning, waiting for the festivities to begin.

Oliver was getting impatient and kept jumping up on the coffee table, then down, then repeating.

Pepina finally expressed a little interest when someone opened up a gift.

Marina was not about to get up off the packages, NO MATTER WHAT.

Pepina liked watching Joe open up his gifts.

Cousin-to-be Cathy, Cousin Damon, and my mom enjoying a deep conversation on how to create the world's most perfect wine slushie.

Cathy is holding Cousin Davene and Rick's newest family member, Rafiki. He's a very sweet kitty.

Once dinner was over, Alex and Joe continued their Christmas break hobby of catching up on their sleep while my dad talks to Ted (out of the picture).

Damon decided that the kitchen towel Cathy received could be better used as a loin cloth!

Davene and Joe, just chilling out.

Christmas is always fun, but it's even more entertaining when there are children involved! Sister-in-law Patty and Niece Holly are getting presents ready to pass out, while Jamie watches daughter Kaylee, and Niece Kelly plays with Great Nephew Michael.

Michael is looking at his various gifts.

Sister-in-law Patty, brother-in-law Tim, and Niece Holly enjoying the holidays.

Sister-in-law Peg is wondering where the crayons are so she can start coloring in Michael's coloring book.

Alex is holding Holly's kitty Sophie while Joe watches.

Then Joe took his turn with Sophie. Isn't she a beautiful cat?

And that pretty much sums up our various Christmas celebrations! How was your holiday season?

Since I Last Posted...

2010-12-23T13:55:00.014-05:00

...we celebrated Thanksgiving with Ted's family,

Our great nephew Michael, sitting next to his mom, our niece Kelly.

Our other niece Holly, her mom (Aunt Patty), and Joe, who was taking the opportunity to catch a few winks.

Our brother-in-law Mac, and Alex, who is giving me a "look" about who knows what.

Joe, my other brother-in-law (aka Uncle Tim) and my other sister-in-law Aunt Peg buttering another roll.

After dinner Alex passed out various copies of his college newspaper so that we could all read some of the articles he has written. What a way to entertain guests! Fortunately, he's a good writer, so it was okay.

...celebrated Thanksgiving with my family,

My Aunt Dolores, cousin Davene, and her husband Rick, getting everything ready on the table.

My cousin Damon, his fiancee Cathy, and Davene, watching my mom take another drink of her wine.

Davene, Rick, and Alex...we're all too STUFFED to move!

My dad, my mom (telling another story), and Damon.

put up the tree and decorated it (but now the lights don't work and I'm in the midst of a Plan B, but wish I had a little more time to implement it),

made some holiday candy,

went to our school Christmas program (which was held at our high school gym and there were LOTS of people there!),

finished Christmas shopping,

Gift bags for my Reading Mastery students, in front of the pink tree they decorated AND the static cling they put up.

did a snowman craft with my Reading Mastery students,

Believe me, this was a "fly by the seat of your pants" type project. Even though I had it all thought out in my head, I'd never done it before and learned a LOT if I ever do it again!

attended Ted's work Christmas party (and had a very nice time),

This Turtle Cheesecake dessert was nothing less than absolutely FABULOUS!

got our annual Christmas letter written, cards addressed, and sent,

began baking,

and wrapped almost all of the gifts (just about 5 things to go!).

Whew!

Later today I'll finish baking and wrapping, then maybe even clean the house a little. I've been letting that go, as I just haven't had the time to take care of it. Joe and Alex are both home from college and although I just LOVE having them home, I've gone from cleaning the kitchen a couple times a week, to cleaning it about twice a day.

I understand that Christmas is coming in two days, whether I'm ready or not.

I'm really looking forward to spending time with the family....that's all I need to make Christmas special.

Merry Christmas everyone!

It's Been a While

2010-10-31T17:47:00.004-04:00

Yes, I'm still around.

Life has sort of gotten a little busy at times, and I've not been blogging. I hope to get back to it soon, and be much more consistent about my posts.

School is going okay. It could be better, but I'm trying not to get all stressed out about things I have no control over. I've been trying to leave work "stuff" at work and enjoy my time at home. I'm also not staying after school nearly as much this year. Those days of staying until 6 or 7 pm, are OVER. It's not that I don't love what I do, because I DO! It's just that the more of myself that I give to my job, the more that's expected of me. I don't mind giving 150% all the time, but it gets discouraging when it's not noticed or appreciated, and then expected.

Like I said, I absolutely love what I do...it's so rewarding to see the sparkle in a child's eye, and a huge smile when they "get" something. It's like they've just discovered a new world! I work with some second graders on a computer program called "Math Facts in a Flash." It breaks basic addition, subtraction, multiplication, and division facts into levels, and a student needs to complete 40 facts correctly in 2 minutes or less in order to go on to the next level. Even though I work with them on their facts, their regular classroom teacher also schedules time for them to work independently on this computer program. When I see these kids in the cafeteria when I have duty, they just love to tell me that they passed a certain level. I try to make them feel like they've won the lottery, because many of them don't get much recognition at home. I love seeing their reactions when I gush over them passing levels. That's what makes my job so great.

So anyway, it's not the kids that make me frustrated, it's the other factors.

Alex turned 20 last weekend, so we told him that we would take him and a couple of his friends to dinner in a city near his college.

Megan, Tino, and Alex...The guys decided to wear ties. Something about watching "Breakfast at Tiffany's" a few days earlier. Yes, I realize his hair is VERY long. I'm trying to pick my battles. And for the record, he's scheduled for a TRIM the day before Thanksgiving.

A few days after we told him this, he said that he invited EIGHT of his friends!

John, Dan, and Emily...they agree that Alex needs a haircut!

Alex has made some excellent choices with friends. These young people are all very ambitious and I was impressed with their selections of majors and minors.

Apparently I didn't make it clear what was meant by a couple. Alex wanted to go to Olive Garden, and as it turned out, only five were able to make it, but we had a very nice time. Joe was able to join us too.

Joe returned to college for an additional Bachelors Degree (this time in Journalism), and it's going quite well for him. This has been a whole new experience for him, as he got his first degree (in Business) while living at home. Now he's living in a dorm on the campus of the second largest university in Ohio. He's actually adjusting quite well.

When they both come home for the same weekend, it's really entertaining. I've walked in from school on a Friday and have seen them both at the kitchen table, with their laptops open, sitting across from each other, discussing music and radio. They both have weekly radio shows at their perspective campuses. Joe has his own 2 hour show on Monday mornings, and Alex co-hosts a 2 hour show on Tuesday evenings. It's as though they can finally have actual discussions about things and not get into a big altercation.

So...life is going okay right now. I'm going to try to be more diligent about updating here. That's my personal goal for the rest of 2010!

Family

2010-09-19T17:42:00.010-04:00

My cousin Damon (and his fiancee Cathy) hosted a family gathering yesterday. It was absolutely WONDERFUL to get together with everyone, including the extended family!

Dean, Davene, Aunt Sandie, and Damon

It also gave us the opportunity to talk about my Uncle Medie's passing last spring. Uncle Medie is my mom's brother, and he and his wife, my Aunt Sandie, moved to California in the 90s. Their older son, Dean, moved there even earlier than that. They are definitely transplanted Ohioans! Dean and his wife Mara, along with Aunt Sandie are visiting Ohio. They even brought a friend of Dean's with them.

My mom, Aunt Dolores (my mom's sister), and Cousin Patty

Dean and Cathy (Damon's fiancee) looking at old photo albums

The day was gorgeous! Sunny, but not too hot. The food was excellent! Would you expect anything less from a bunch of italians?

This is just a part of all the wonderful goodies we had!

The beverages flowed,

There was plenty of water, pop, wine, and beer to go around!

games were played, pictures were taken,

Cousin Damon, Ted, me, Cousin Matt

a birthday celebrated (my mom),

and we all got caught up on each other's lives,

Patty is trying to tell a story, and being italian, she has a glass of wine in one hand, while using her other hand to convey her thoughts.

She's still working the story, the wine, and the hand.

As the story winds down, it's important to note that not a single drop of wine spilled. She doesn't like to waste important things like that.

in addition to talking about Uncle Medie.

Damon has a plaque in his backyard, in memory of his dad. Uncle Medie was a very special man. He's missed and thought of every day.

It was such a great day...we don't get together often, but when we do, it's like we haven't missed a beat!

Me, my mom, and my dad

It's all about the family.

Well, it's Just About Over

2010-08-18T20:12:00.009-04:00

Summer break.

As of next Monday morning, it will be over.

Let's see....what have I done all summer?

Read a few good books? Check

Spent time in the pool? Check

Stayed up late? Check

Slept in? Check

Spent WAY too much time on Facebook? Double Check

Cooked dinner every night? Um....not EVERY night, but ~~most~~ some nights

Thoroughly cleaned the house once a week? I thought about it. Does that count?

Organized all the photographs around the house and categorized them by when they were taken? I'm about 5% finished

Worked on all the school things I brought home for the summer? Hmmm...where did I put that stuff?

Sorted through all the Christmas decorations and got rid of the things we don't use? Are you kidding?

Had a great time when a group of teachers and our coordinator came over for lunch yesterday? Check

This is only some of the food that everyone brought to share. Everything was SOOOOOOOO good!

Our wonderful coordinator, lovingly referred to as King Richard. Check out those baby blue eyes! (Yes ladies, he's single, and quite a catch!)

Diane and Ashlee are discussing the future of education in Ohio...or was it the latest Kohl's ad they were talking about?

Jill is quietly wondering to herself, "when can I get out of here and get back home to my wonderful husband?" (Jill's still a newlywed!)

Shannon is shooting Diane a look because Diane asked me if I was taking yet ANOTHER picture! (Shannon's good at giving looks. Her 5 year old daughter has taught her well.)

Ashlee will probably never forgive me, as I took a photo of her back. But hey, I was just trying to share an example of wonderful posture! (King Richard looks happy, as usual. I think he was talking about his dog or some other exciting subject.)

Jill, Staci, and Lexy, hanging onto every word that's being said. It must not all have been good, because Staci is looking a little concerned. Lexy was attempting to look interested, but she just got ENGAGED, so her thoughts may be drifting to wedding plans. (Hey Lexy, do you watch "Say Yes to the Dress?" How about a roadtrip to NYC????)

Staci's feeling a little better, but King Richard is saying, "Are you about done taking pictures Cindi??"

Kris is thinking about the baklava that Shannon brought (it was absolutely DELICIOUS). Kris and I have shared a classroom for the last 15 years!! Fortunately we get along extremely well, and I've learned so much from her. She has the patience of a saint, and the kindest heart.

Shannon is trying to tell King Richard how things are going to work this year, and he's having none of it. He's telling her that she WILL be doing after-school tutoring 3 days a week, ALL YEAR LONG. She's plotting her revenge at this very minute.

I know it's only August, but I hope all of you have had a wonderful summer!

A Trip To Remember

2010-07-21T18:31:00.015-04:00

The summer after I graduated from high school, I was fortunate enough to go on a trip to southern California. My parents gave me the trip as a graduation gift, and I would be staying with my mom's sister, my Aunt D.

I've mentioned Aunt D here before. She is quite the traveler of the family, having been to almost every continent (except Antarctica) several times, and since she lived in the Long Beach, CA area, was an EXCELLENT hostess!

My friend Mary, who has also been a subject here a few times and was pictured in my last blog entry, also lived in southern California by this time and I was able to spend some time with her on the trip.

Aunt D made sure I had the WHOLE SoCal experience! Our days were filled with activities from early morning until late at night, and it was SO much fun!

We started off with a trip up the coast. We stopped at the Santa Barbara Mission and it was really something. There are a fair amount of missions up and down the coast, and throughout my stay, we also went to the Mission de San Luis Obispo.

Santa Barbara Mission

We went on to spend the night in Morro Bay, where the fog was rolling in and left the Morro Rock looking quite interesting.

The next day we went on to San Simeon, where we visited the Hearst Castle. That was amazing! At that time the 3rd floor of the castle was private and still used by the family occasionally. We all kept looking at the windows, hoping for a glimpse of "someone" but saw nothing.

This was one of the outdoor pools at the Hearst Castle. It was GORGEOUS!

Aunt D was taking a little break while touring the Hearst Castle.

We also stopped in a small Dutch town called Solvang. It was so sweet and quaint.

Over the next few weeks, we toured the Queen Mary (a famous ocean liner),

stopped by Grauman's Chinese Theatre,

I don't even remember whose hand print I put my hand in!

shopped on Olvera Street (the birthplace of Los Angeles and home of many Mexican shops),

went to the Hollywood Bowl (over 100 steps to the top...yes, I counted them),

rode bikes along the Long Beach Marina,

Aunt D wanted me to tell people that this was the boat she was buying!

Can't you just hear the theme of Gilligan's Island?

attended a taping of One Day at a Time (with Valerie Bertinelli)

went to Knott's Berry Farm (an amusement park),

took Mary along as we went to San Diego and visited Sea World

and the San Diego Zoo.

We went to the Hollywood Wax Museum,

Universal Studios,

This is Bruce, the mechanical shark, who starred in the movie Jaws.

and of course....

DISNEYLAND!

*Cue music: It's a Small World

We did a lot of other things, went to a lot more places, and had loads of fun! It was a fantastic graduation gift and I had a blast!

It was quite a trip...but as Dorothy said, "There's no place like home!"

A Swing Set

2010-07-09T15:10:00.005-04:00

When I was a little girl, we lived in out in the country. It was nice living out there, at least from a child's point of view. We had a big yard, a field behind us, and one on either side of us. We also had a ditch near the road where I could put in a stick and go "fishing." We had neighbors across the road, and that was nice...not only did they have a big yard too, but they also had woods behind their house. They also had a daughter my age, and a son that was my brother's age. We became good friends, and Mary was even the maid of honor in our wedding.

Tim, Mary's brother (on the left), Mary, and my younger brother (with the ornery look), in our kitchen. Notice the portable TV in the background.

I missed out on bringing cupcakes to school for my birthday because I was born in July. I never had the opportunity to hear my entire class sing "Happy Birthday" to me, but one summer my parents made up for it by getting me a swing set for my birthday. It came in a HUGE box.

My dad is a wonderful man. He can tell stories better than almost anyone I know. He has a sense of humor and played some good practical jokes on people over the years. He's intelligent too.

However, my dad is NOT handy with tools, and in his mind the idea of trying to put together a swing set was probably right up there with having major surgery without anesthetic. I did not know that way back when, but I eventually learned it over the years.

After an early dinner this particular hot, summer night, people started showing up at our house. I thought we were just having a fun-filled evening with a bunch of people over. Of course, I realized as I got older, that dad was just in dire need of some assistance in completing this project for his favorite daughter.

My grandparents showed up. My Aunt Tillie and Uncle Paul showed up. Mary's parents came over too, as did some other friends.

We had an enclosed porch along the back of our house, and the "women folk" and children stayed in there and watched the entertainment. The MEN were taking all the pieces and parts out of the box and organizing the construction process.

Not too long after the box was opened, the beer began to flow...slowly at first, because they had a goal. But as the evening went on and a little frustration began to set in, the empty beer bottles became more frequent.

My Aunt Tillie brought cookies, but wouldn't let the men have any until the swing set was up, hahaha. Aunt Tillie was a real treat. She tried to give the men a few hints from her perch in the enclosed porch, but they didn't listen to her...poor thing. I still laugh whenever I think about it.

My Uncle Paul and my grandpa were brothers and it was funny to watch them work on a project like that together. My grandpa didn't always say a whole lot, but liked to let his facial expressions speak for him. Uncle Paul, on the other hand, always had an opinion on things.

As the sun began to set, the sky was turning a beautiful shade of red, and my Grandma told me the poem:

Red sky at night,

Sailors' delight.

Red sky at morn,

Sailors take warn.

To this day, I have no idea if they completed the swing set that night or if it needed a little more work the next day. What I enjoyed the most was being around so many people I loved and watching these men work so hard on something for me. That's what family and friends do for one another.

That swing set project is still one of my favorite childhood memories and I think about it often. Several years later we moved over an hour away, and that same swing set made the move with us. My brother and I continued to use it until it pretty much fell apart.

I don't think we know what are favorite childhood things are until we've grown up and looked back, and I definitely know that was one of mine!

Baked Beans

2010-07-06T18:00:00.000-04:00

We recently attended a holiday celebration and I made baked beans to take along.

In case you haven't noticed, I like things that are simply and easily made, and this recipe is no exception!

Because this was going to be for a crowd, I doubled the recipe. Of course, you can cut it down however much you need to.

There are only FOUR ingredients: Campbell's Pork & Beans, ketchup, light brown sugar, and ground (or dry) mustard. (Those of you who happen to know my tastes well, know that I do NOT like mustard at all, but I really cannot taste this in the beans, and because it's not the yellow mustard that you put on a hot dog or a hamburger, I can handle it in a recipe.)

Preheat the oven at 325 degrees, then open up 6 - 11 oz. cans of pork & beans, and put them in a big bowl.

Add one and a half (1 1/2) cups of brown sugar.

Then add 1 cup of ketchup, and make it look like a face. That's just to add a little excitement to your day.

Lastly, add 2 teaspoons of ground mustard. Now it looks like the face is saying, "OH NO!!"

Ruin the face by mixing the ingredients well.

Now comes the hardest part of all...spray Pam in your cake pan. I used a disposable pan since we were going to take it somewhere and it would be easy to dispose of.

Pour the bean mixture into the pan.

Cover it with foil.

Bake it for an hour and 45 minutes at 325.

Take the foil off. Stir a little.

(Don't pay any attention to my dirty oven. Yes, I am fully aware of the fact that it needs cleaned. Did you know that a dirty oven can add flavor to anything that is baked in it?)

Bake for another 45 minutes uncovered.

Serve.

How easy is that???

I must give credit where credit is due. I got this recipe from my mom. I have no idea where she got it though. For all I know, she made it up. Maybe she got it from one of her old cookbooks that she has had for over 50 years. I don't really know. But what I DO know is that this is the only baked bean recipe she ever fixed and it's the only one that I fix!

Of course I live with three males, so their poem of the day every time I make this recipe is:

Beans, beans,

The musical fruit.

The more you eat,

The more you toot!

A Fun-Filled Holiday Celebration

2010-07-04T19:02:00.008-04:00

We had a very nice time yesterday over at AP and UT's. There was plenty of food, family, friends, and fun.

Cornhole was a big hit. I've never played before, but I learned a little bit about it, and of course asked the most brilliant question of all: What do they put in the little bags they throw? Beans? Small stones? NO.........CORN. Hence the name, CORNHOLE. I swear, sometimes I can be really ditzy.

My brother-in-law loves a good beer, and there was plenty of it to go around yesterday!

Yes, Ted was studying the label of the beer he was drinking.

We did a lot of chatting too...it's always fun to just take the time to catch up on things with friends.

As the sun went a little lower in the sky, it was time to get a fire going. John really enjoyed getting it started. He took his job VERY seriously...and was VERY successful!

He and Allison watched it carefully, making sure that it didn't go out.

Patty and BJ were giving John moral support by cheering him on.

Our niece Holly, along with her friend Sharon, and UT were having a great time as the evening wore on.

Okay, this was the part that I just didn't get...I don't know who came up with the idea of bringing an electric guitar and amp outside at 10:30 pm, but many of them took turns playing it. Tim is playing with Joe, Alex, Ted, and John looking on. Unfortunately they didn't take requests.

When Tim decides to wear a cup as a hat, it's time to call it a night!

I hope all of you had a great holiday weekend!

A REALLY Easy Meal

2010-06-28T17:49:00.005-04:00

Pasta alfredo is one of the EASIEST meals to fix! It doesn't take long, and the clean-up is simple too.

Now, I do take a lot of shortcuts with this, using purchased things instead of home-made, but we'll just keep that our little secret. I could go the home-made route...but who has time?

Start with a box of pasta of your choice. I tend to use penne pasta for this dish, but sometimes live on the wild side and use rotini. A bag of frozen broccoli is a must, but I suppose that you could substitute mixed vegetables if you really wanted to. Although I don't like spicy stuff (that's where my italian heritage steps back), I have found the Chicken Breast Meat for Fajitas from Schwan's to be really good. There's just a wee little bit of a kick to them, but not too much. Occasionally I've taken boneless skinless chicken breasts and grilled them on the George (Foreman), then cut them up.

I begin by boiling the pasta. (I always add a little bit of oil when I boil pasta, just to keep it from sticking to the bottom of the pot.)

About halfway through the recommended time, I slowly add the frozen broccoli.

While that's returning to a boil, I take out the amount of chicken I want to use. That can be however chickeny you want your dish to be. Sometimes I add a lot. Sometimes I add a LOT. It's all a matter of personal preference. I put it on a paper plate, then put it in the microwave to thaw it and warm it up. Once it comes out of the microwave, I cut the larger pieces up, so that they aren't too large.

I also preheat the oven, then put the garlic bread on a foil lined cookie sheet. It only takes about 6 or 7 minutes to bake, so I put it in when I'm getting ready to mix everything together.

When the pasta/broccoli is finished, I drain it in a colander, then return it to the pot. I put the pot in the kitchen sink because it's just easier to maneuver and mix that way.

This is where I add the warmed, cut-up chicken, and mix a little.

Now comes the really hard part.

Open up both jars of alfredo sauce, pour them into the pasta/broccoli/chicken mixture.

Mix the sauce in. I used a rubber spatula because I had just used it to get all the sauce out of the jar. Why dirty another utensil? (Yes I have a dishwasher, but it's just as easy to use the spatula as it is to open the drawer and get out a large spoon.)

If you're really energetic, and have the various ingredients in the fridge, you can put together a salad too.

And there you go...a very SIMPLE meal, start to finish in about 20 minutes. Fortunately, Ted really likes this, so it's a win-win for us!

"You Boys Are Going to College!"

2010-06-26T19:30:00.001-04:00

When our sons were younger, Ted would come home from work, more often than not, sore. His knees hurt. His legs hurt. His arms and back hurt. Occasionally, depending on what he'd done at work, he'd have a headache too.

Don't get me wrong...he really enjoys plumbing. Anymore, very little of what he does involves working on toilets, so the "gross" factor barely exists these days. He repairs and changes various gas lines and water lines. Sometimes, when the economy was better, he would work on new houses. He works on remodeling projects, changes water heaters, replaces gas and water services. The job is quite varied.

There isn't a thing wrong with being a plumber, trust me. He's extremely handy to have around. When we built our new home, he saved us thousands of dollars by doing all the plumbing himself. When something went wrong with the pipes in our old house, he was always able to fix them. He's been a real help to my parents with their various plumbing needs. In fact, sometime this weekend, he'll be going there to change a laundry tub faucet.

However, it can take a toll on a person's body, and he's had his shares of cuts, bruises, a trip to the E.R., time at the local orthopaedic office, and of course, many trips to the chiropractor.

He used to come home, occasionally moaning from the pain, and would look at the boys and say, "This is why you boys are going to COLLEGE."

They both heeded his advice.

One of his latest plumbing related issues was a fluid filled area below his left knee cap. The doctor entered the exam room, glanced at Ted's leg and said, "Holy sh*t, Ted, what did you do?"

It almost looks like an extra knee cap. His "real" knee cap is at the top, and the bursa is down a little bit. The doctor said it was "baseball sized."

The x-rays came out fine, thank goodness.

After checking it all out and having some x-rays taken, the doctor said that this came from kneeling so much with his job. Then he said he wanted to try an anti-inflammatory medication before anything else. That didn't help. In fact, the bursa was a little larger, so we went back to the doctor several days later.

It was a little larger by this time.

On the second visit, the doctor came in, and said it was indeed larger and that he was going to drain it.

Ted was laughing because I was taking pictures of the doctor's tools.

All cleaned up and ready to be STABBED and drained.

I thought it was quite interesting to see how the doctor inserted the needle into the bursa along the side, and sucked all that gunk out. He got out a fair amount.

After we left the office, we had to stop over at the hospital because Ted had to drop off the fluid that was drained, so it could be checked by the lab.

Fortunately, it was all okay.

This was the FOURTH time he's had a bursa drained near a knee.

And the boys are looking forward to returning to college in the fall.

An Unwelcome Visitor

2010-06-24T15:06:00.004-04:00

A few nights ago, around 11 pm, I was sitting in the recliner in our bedroom, reading a book. Ted was lying on the bed with his eyes closed, "listening" the Cleveland Indians game on TV. Joe and Alex were somewhere around the house.

Suddenly I heard the gate to the fence around the pool SLAM, then a HUGE splash. Being the brave person I am, I immediately woke up Ted and said, "Someone's in the pool!"

He sat up quickly and wasn't too sure where he was or what was going on. (Yeah, he was awake with his eyes closed...right). I called for Alex, to see if it had been him getting in the pool. He was in the kitchen. I called for Joe. He was in the bathroom. That pretty much led me to believe that it was someone other than the immediate family.

This picture is from a few years ago (pre-landscaping), showing how close the fence is to our bedroom. Never mind Marina, who thought she was a direct descendent of SpiderMan, and climbing the screen.

Ted got up, and instead of going out the door in our bedroom, went to the kitchen, then outside. He didn't see anything, so he came back in and got a flashlight. He went out, shone the flashlight all around the pool and saw nothing. Then he went inside the fence, and turned on the light in the pool.

Nothing.

I told him to look for water on the concrete and he saw a big splash mark by the deep end, then another, slightly smaller one, by the shallow end. By this time, Joe and Alex had gone outside to investigate too. Of course, I stood by the bedroom door to the outside and tried to stay out of the way, hahaha.

I said to Ted that I thought it was a deer. He concurred. We decided that the deer must have jumped the fence, but hit it with her hoof making the gate shake, then jumped in, swam across the pool, jumped out, and hopped over the fence again. They looked on the outside of the fence to see if perhaps there was an animal of some kind lying around, but there was nothing.

Case closed.

Or so we thought.

The next day, my folks came to use the pool and Ted relayed the whole story to them. I commented that the water level seemed really low. Ted said he had added water that morning. I said that something just wasn't right. He thought that the sun was really evaporating the water, but I disagreed. There was no way that the water level would go down 4-5" in a few hours.

As I went around the pool using the screen thing to get out a few bugs, I noticed something.

There was an upside down "V" shaped tear in the liner, near the top of the pool. We were losing water through the tear. There were also some hairs around the tear, that seemed to be consistent with those of an animal....probably a deer. Her hoof must have scraped along the edge as she went into the water.

The tear...and of course it was at the deep end, making it just a little more challenging for us to patch.

Ted went in and called the company that installed our pool, and talked to them about it, then went there to purchase a couple patch kits. They said that they've heard of this happening before, and we were fortunate that the deer got in, and then got out.

You can barely see the water line, along the lower half of the blue diamonds on the liner. The water had been up around the top of the brownish squares above the diamond.

Joe helped me patch the tear, but it's not pretty. Because the tear was in the rounded corner, I didn't have a flat surface to work on. I also couldn't stretch it enough so that all the edges met. However, it's patched, and we're not losing anymore water, and that's all that counts.

We don't mind people coming over and using our pool...but when it comes to wildlife, I just wish they'd wait until they were invited!

Three Things...

2010-06-12T22:06:00.004-04:00

I was just reading posts at a teachers site I go to fairly often and one of them was quite interesting. The original poster asked readers to list at least three things they are horrible at. As I read through them, I realized that limiting myself to only three would be tough!

I thought about it, however, and these are what I feel are the top three things that I am NOT good at:

1. Housecleaning - I am a terrible housekeeper. I tend to let things go for as long as possible, then spend WAY too much time trying to get it all done. I don't think that our house has ever been all clean at the same time. Right this moment, the bathroom in our bedroom is very clean...but that's about it. Other rooms aren't necessarily dirty, just cluttered.

2. Doing things in a timely manner - This is a bad one for me. I'm the Queen of Procrastination. I put things off as long as I can, then put them off even longer. I'm absolutely TERRIBLE at getting cards sent out. I have several sympathy cards to send out to people I know, and their loved ones passed away as long ago as last November! I'm horrendous with birthday cards. I'm lucky if they get sent out within 6 months of the person's birthday. I put off doing laundry until I absolutely have to. I suppose procrastination is why our house is never clean. It's just one continuous cycle.

3. Being "girly" - I rarely wear makeup, jewelry, or fuss with my hair. I know I should make an attempt to look my best, but I guess it's just not important enough to me. I begin each school year by doing the makeup thing, toss on a little jewelry, and even mess around with my hair a little. But by the beginning of October, it's too much trouble. I don't get new clothes very often because I don't like to shop. Having to pick out an outfit to wear to work is NOT the highlight of my day. One of our teachers always looks so "pulled together" down to her nail polish matching her purse and jewelry. She can take things and match them up with other stuff and come off looking like a million bucks...must be as gift.

So, now that I've put it "out there" for the world to see, anyone else care to join me??

We Rarely Go Out

2010-05-03T20:40:00.005-04:00

Many years ago, we used to go out quite often, but we had children and settled into a routine. It became very comfortable to stay in and just go out to an early dinner once in a while, then come home, relax, then go to bed. As the kids got older and became adults (ACK! How did THAT happen?!?!) we found ourselves with a lot of free evenings, and nothing to do. So being the old f*rts we are, we continued to just stay home, relax in the evenings, then go to bed and repeat.

However...a little over a week ago, we ventured out into the world and had a FABULOUS time! Our local Italian American Festival Foundation held their annual spring gathering and not only did the four of us attend, but my parents went too!

The food was catered by a local italian restaurant and it was very good...they had a nice variety of pasta, among other things. They had punch, water, beer, and wine to drink, and we ended up sitting right next to the bar area. It was quite convenient, hahaha! Not only was it easy to get our drinks, but we saw a lot of people we hadn't seen for a long time, as they made their way to the beverage center.

We had a great time, and I want to give a shout out to my sister-in-law Patty (also known as A.P. for frequent readers of this blog) for organizing everything. She did a GREAT job!!

Tim (known here as U.T.) and John were happily taking care of the bar area.

Joe was trying to get his point across during a very important discussion.

Alex was being goofy with my mom.

Ted and I had a very nice time!

as did my parents!

Alex (again being silly) and Joe with their cousin Holly.

Prediction

2010-04-17T19:48:00.004-04:00

Yes, I'm an American Idol junkie. And I'm about to make a prediction.

Before I actually tell you who I think is going to win, let me tell you why.

The Cleveland, Ohio area is very loyal to their own. Although those of us who live in the northern half of Ohio have known this since birth, the rest of the country found out about it back in 1996 when Cleveland Browns owner Art Modell decided to move the Browns to Baltimore.

Even though Modell had spent DECADES in Cleveland, he sorely underestimated the loyalty of the blue collar city.

The Browns were not the first team to be relocated by their owner, and have not been the last. However, Cleveland is the ONLY city to go to court to retain the team's name and colors for a future expansion team.

Clevelanders (and northern Ohioans) are very proud and loyal.

The old Municipal stadium, sitting on the shore of Lake Erie, could easily boast a wind chill of ZERO degrees or below during a December or January football game. However, there would still be 80,000 fans in the stands. Even if the Browns had a losing record, the stands would still be filled.

Their loyalty persevered. That's why when the Browns came back in 1999, they were still called the Cleveland Browns AND wore the brown, orange, and white.

So....on to American Idol.

Back in 2005, there was a contestant from the Cleveland area. Scott Savol was a pretty good singer. He finished 5th in the competition that year. Was he good enough to end up in 5th place? Many would say probably not...he was a top 10 contestant for sure, but maybe 8th or 9th was more realistic.

However, Scott finished 5th and that was more than likely due to the fact that northern Ohioans showed their loyalty once again and voted for him enough so that he made it as far as he did.

That loyalty is something that can always be counted on, and that is why I predict that.....

the winner of American Idol this year will be.....

CRYSTAL BOWERSOX.

Crystal is from a northern Ohio town called Elliston. It's a small town of approximately 1509 residents. Although the town is almost 2 hours west of Cleveland, it's still in northern Ohio.

Please don't get me wrong. I think that Crystal is extremely talented, and would probably finish in the top 2 or 3 regardless of where she is from. But you just can't rule out that northern Ohio loyalty factor.

If you haven't watched Crystal on American Idol, you may want to give her a listen. She really is a great singer.

That's my prediction, and I'm sticking with it.

Happy Easter

2010-04-02T12:05:00.003-04:00

When I was young, the upcoming Easter celebration always involved a new dress. Not only did I get an Easter dress, but Easter shoes, an Easter hat (or other hair decoration), an Easter coat if the holiday came early in spring, an Easter purse, Easter gloves, and a new slip and under garments.

After Ted and I had been married for a year or so (and before we were thinking about children!) I happened to run across the most GORGEOUS fancy little girl's dress and coat set. It was frilly and pink and absolutely adorable. I was at a sidewalk sale at a local department store and it was on the end of the rack next to a table of clothes I was looking at for myself. I immediately thought that it would make a wonderful Easter outfit!

It was a size 2T and I held it up and looked at it. I put it back, then returned to it, studying it again. I wanted this set. I don't recall how much it was originally, but it was on sale for $20, and I remember that being a HUGE discount. I tried to rationalize this possible purchase.

Although we weren't currently considering having children, someday we would. We knew we would have more than one child, so there was a chance (at least 50/50) that at least one of our kids would be a girl. No matter what time of year this potential little girl would be born, more than likely she could wear a size 2T at Easter at least one year in her life.

I must have picked that dress/coat set up at least four times, considering purchasing it. Finally, I decided that even though there was a drastic discount, $20 was a lot of money to spend on a dream at this point in my life, and I put it down for the last time. I walked away that day, having purchased nothing.

I still think of that dress and coat occasionally, and am thankful that common sense took over, because we never had a daughter. However, I wonder if anyone bought the outfit, and how it looked on a little girl.

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

When I was young, my mom would always make sure that she and I had a corsage for Easter. They were always so pretty and smelled so wonderful. To this day, when I smell carnations, I think of Easter. The church would be full of that sweet scent. If I turned my head, the side of my face would brush against the soft flowers. What a comforting feeling. Sometimes my mom would let me wear my corsage to school the next day.

We would always go to my grandparents' for Easter. My uncle and aunt, along with their children (my cousins) would be there too. We all arrived in our Easter finest, then after dinner, we could change into "play" clothes if we wanted. I would wait a while, continuing to get in touch with my feminine side.

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

Although the traditional dinner of Easter consists of ham, my Grandma switched things up a bit. We usually had homemade ravioli. OH MY. If you've never had homemade ravioli, then you haven't experienced italian food.

Grandma made meat ravioli and cheese ravioli. I never liked the cheese ravioli, but my mom would make me eat one. I was allowed to have a meat ravioli, but then I had to have a cheese ravioli before I could have another meat one.

Grandma let me "help" her make the ravioli once in a while (on a non-Easter Sunday) when I was young. The pasta dough was the same as when she made spaghetti, but when pushing it through the pasta machine, it wasn't cut. Grandma would put a spoonful of the filling on the dough every few inches along one side. Then she would fold the other side over top and press down with her hand in between the bumps of the underlying meat or cheese. Once she felt the edges were sealed well enough, she would cut them with a small roller that made zig-zag edges. She would let me use the roller tool, showing me exactly where to cut. I felt so special when she let me do that.

She never told me how long to cook them. She always just put them in boiling water, then when they rose to the top of the pot, they were done. Sometimes it took longer than others, based on the current weather.

Such fond Easter memories!

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I hope you all have a very happy Easter!

The Kindle

2010-03-29T12:20:00.006-04:00

I've been tossing around the idea of getting a Kindle for a while now. I was actually going to buy myself one for Christmas, then decided to wait it out, sort of hoping it would go down in price. (It hasn't.)

I sent out an email to people in my building, asking if anyone had one and what the pros and cons were. One person (Christa) has one. She even brought it in for me to look at.

WOW. She said it could be dangerous. After about half an hour with it, I totally and completely agree. You can download a FREE excerpt from a book, then if you like it, purchase the entire thing. NY Times best sellers and new releases start at $9.99. Other books can be purchased too, and many for less than that.

The regular Kindle can hold 1,500 books. Amazing!

You can get newspaper and magazine subscriptions. USA Today is $11.99 a month. Other newspapers are comparable. Newsweek Magazine is $2.99 a month.

I just mentioned this Kindle thing again the other day and Ted suggested that I get an iPad instead. I haven't done any research on the iPad, so I have no idea what all it has on it. I may have to check it out.

BUT...that might not be necessary. You see, I entered a contest at another blogger's site today. She is giving away THREE, count them THREE Kindles, each with a $75 Amazon gift card. Never mind that after only two and a half hours I was "contestant" number 4 thousand and something. I still have a chance to win!

(And no, I'm not going to tell you which blog it is because I don't want to decrease my chances of winning! Most of you already know anyway, sigh.)

Wish me luck!

Dear Mother Nature

2010-03-26T08:13:00.004-04:00

Dear Mother Nature,

Today is March 26. I do not currently appreciate your sense of humor.

Measurable snow is totally and completely acceptable from December 1 through February 28. Any snow before or after those dates must be approved by a majority vote of all those who would be affected by your sudden burst of independence.

I have yet to find anyone in our area who approves of your latest move. Did someone or something upset you? Did you perhaps push the wrong button on the weather computer? Or are you just trying to show us that you can basically do what you want, when you want?

Don't get me wrong...I thoroughly enjoy the snow accumulations you have given us this year, as they were between the pre-approved dates (see above) and resulted in a few extra days off from school. I didn't even complain when you caused us to go over our limit of five calamity days, thus requiring us to make up two days in June. That's okay. I can deal with that.

There must be almost 2" of snow outside. The grass is not visible through the snow. I do, however, find a little satisfaction in the fact that Ted was considering taking the snow plow off the lawn tractor and I told him I thought that would be a mistake. He listened to me.

So, my dear friend Mother Nature, please take note of the date the next time you decide to shower us with the white stuff. It would be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,

Well...

2010-03-21T18:39:00.006-04:00

We had a very nice day yesterday. Alex came home from college for the day, the weather was gorgeous (and that has such an impact on everything at this time of year), and we attended a family party to celebrate our great-nephew Michael's third birthday.

Oh, and did I mention that Alex brought his girlfriend home with him???

Ah yes...the boy went off to college and got himself one of those girlfriends.

My little baby has ventured into territory I wasn't sure I'd be comfortable with. The child who purposely put mud inside the car when he was about 5 years old, and smeared it all around. The little boy who tried to ride his toy tractor beyond his sidewalk boundaries, and when I told him to turn around, he called me Cruella De Ville. The sweet little thing who would look at me and say "But I love you Mommy" whenever he'd throw up. The angel who couldn't go to sleep without Doggie Doggie every night...

has a girlfriend.

Here's the best part though....

we like her.

We really do. Natalie's not only sweet and kind, but she's charming, intelligent, and beautiful!

She scored BIG brownie points with Ted when she arrived with a box of Anthony Thomas candy. Her mom works there, and Natalie does too during the summer. I'd include a picture of the candy, but it's, ahem, almost gone. Ted let me have a few pieces though. Wasn't that nice of him?

We went to our favorite restaurant for lunch....Bravo. Of course I had to take some pictures. Maybe when Alex sees this he'll realize that his hair is too long. It practically pokes out Natalie's eye. He has an appointment to get a haircut when he comes home for Easter weekend.

We spent the evening at Peg and Mac's celebrating Michael's birthday and we all had a great time.

Check out Peg's Barbie collection in the background. She specializes in "I Love Lucy" and "The Wizard of Oz."

Natalie was great...we had given her a rundown on who was who before we went and she just went with the flow.

Our niece Holly was busy on her phone throughout the evening, sending and receiving texts, as she and her friends made plans to go to the Kentucky Derby in May. She's also going to Scottsdale, AZ in May, then Tybee Island in September. She loves to travel, and does so whenever she can. Good for her!

Alex even played with one of Michael's toys and it didn't phase Natalie. Wow, that's impressive.

Alex was very busy with the remote control because Peg and Mac have DishNetwork and he was checking out all the music channels. Aunt Patty (also his godmother) tried to distract him, but you can see the death grip he has on it.

I'm so glad that he feels he can be himself around her and be as goofy as he is normally. Heck, I think she even "gets" his sense of humor.

Michael was relaxing in this chair, as his mom Kelly (our niece), looked on. He liked it so much, he took a little break from opening his gifts!

Michael got a tricycle and was trying to figure out the pedal thing. He also got a John Deere tractor and was ready to take it out and start mowing.

What a nice day!

Snow Days Can Be Very Busy

2010-02-17T14:54:00.003-05:00

So we had Monday off for Presidents' Day. We were off yesterday because of snow. We are off today because of snow, too.

Let me tell you, I've gotten SO much done this week!

Let's see...Monday, I spent way too much time perusing the internet and Facebook. Then I made dinner and watched the Olympics.

Yesterday, I cleaned out my purse, and then thought about all the things I could be doing. After that, I spent some time on the computer again, and watched TV.

Today, I sorted some dirty laundry and actually washed a load. I also answered the phone a couple of times. I love caller ID...when I see it's someone I know really well, instead of saying "Hello," I like to say "Front Desk." The first time I do it to someone, there's usually silence. Then laughter. But I can't take full credit for this; Alex did this to me once and I laughed like crazy.

I'm thinking about what to make for dinner tonight too.

I might even cross a few things off my "To Do" list....not because I actually DID them, but I'm just tired of looking at how long the list is.

I guess you could say that I'm lacking motivation.

I hope we get to go back to school tomorrow.

Let it Snow!

2010-02-15T10:54:00.005-05:00

We've had a LOT of snow here in east central Ohio lately. Last week we missed three days of school due to the snow.

I saw my oncologist last week (another post in itself) and he lives in the "big city" just north of here. He just couldn't seem to understand why school was cancelled. I told him that our county is rural and if he took a snowy day ride on the county and township roads that our school district encompassed, he would NEVER put his kids on the bus. He seemed to understand the situation a little more once I put it in perspective for him.

The snow is beautiful, but it can definitely cause some issues for people getting around and living their normal every day life. Unfortunately, the world does not come to a standstill because of snow. Even though we didn't have school, I still had some doctors' appointments and errands to run.

Here in Ohio school districts may choose to start the day with a 2 hour delay (mostly due to weather, but occasionally for meetings). They may also choose to dismiss 2 hours early (again mostly due to weather, but occasionally for meetings). However, they cannot do both, or the day will not count toward the 180 day minimum requirement. Also, here in Ohio, we are allotted five calamity days before we need to make missed days up. Next year that will change to three (bad move, in my opinion).

A district may choose to implement a 2 hour delay in hopes that the weather will calm down or the temperature will rise a little, and the day will then count. Once in a while, we begin with a 2 hour delay, then the decision is made to cancel school altogether for the day. Safety of the students and staff is the top concern, and I'm glad that I'm not involved in making the decision as to what to do as far as a delay or cancellation.

This is how our recent school attendance has gone:

Friday, February 5 - 2 hour early dismissal
Monday, February 8 - 2 hour delay
Tuesday, February 9 - No school
Wednesday, February 10 - No school
Thursday, February 11-No school

We also had a snow day in January, so we are now at 4 days off, with only 1 to go before having to add days at the end of the year.

Yet another snow "event" is due to come through the area today. We are off school because of Presidents' Day, but hopefully we'll be able to make it in tomorrow. I don't recall the last time we've had so much snow. Usually the snow will almost completely melt off before the next snow comes, but this year, we're just getting them one right after the other.

But it is pretty, you have to admit.

A Blog Change

2010-02-15T10:50:00.002-05:00

Unfortunately I've had to enable the word verification step to the comment section of this blog. I was hoping that I wouldn't have to do that, but given that I've had SO many spam comments, I don't have a choice. For me, approval of comments before they are posted, will just not work, so this is my only option.

I appreciate your cooperation with this and hope that it doesn't keep you from commenting.

My Italian Heritage is Showing

2010-01-28T20:13:00.003-05:00

Last night I was on Facebook for a little while and came across a quiz I wanted to take. I tend to avoid those quizzes, but this one sort of "spoke" to me, so I thought I would give it a shot.

"How Italian Are You?"

It really wasn't that difficult and I scored well enough to earn this ranking: EXTREMELY ITALIAN!!

Okay, so not a big surprise, but what I really wanted to know is if I got any questions wrong. Unfortunately, they don't tell you that. And if you're a good guesser, you could probably do well on any of those Facebook quizzes because they're multiple choice, but I was still proud of the ranking I earned.

Fast forward to this morning. We had a 2 hour delay to the start of school, because it snowed a little last night, and there is still some ice under the snow. I didn't leave for work until about 8:45, and as I left I noticed that my sister-in-law's garage door was open and her car was still there. I thought that was a little odd, as she usually leaves for work around 7.

As I continued down the road, I gave her a call on the car phone.

(We have OnStar and I absolutely LOVE it! The hands-free calling is so much safer than trying to drive while punching little buttons on a cell phone. And for the record, I don't use my cell phone while driving. I think it's way too dangerous.)

So when Patty answered, I asked if everything was okay because I saw that she hadn't gone to work. She explained that one of her cats was having some issues, so she was taking her to the vet and would go to work after that. We were talking as I was driving to work, and about half way there I noticed that my hands and arms were moving all around. At one point, I even took both hands off the steering wheel! Other people on the roads probably thought I was crazy.

I tried to stop using my hands while I talked.

I couldn't. It was impossible.

I talk with my hands. And I'm extremely italian.

Yep, that's me.

A Productive Evening

2010-01-26T11:03:00.003-05:00

Last night ended up being rather productive for me. That's rare anymore. I usually feel as though I'm spinning my wheels and getting nowhere fast. However, last night was different.

I actually cooked dinner. Lately it's been "fend for yourself" so this was definitely something different.

After dinner, I disappeared into the laundry room and folded four loads of laundry, washed another load, then hung it up to dry.

Upon leaving the laundry room, I picked up the 2 week stack of mail that has been accumulating in our mail basket. Hey, at least we bring it in from the mailbox. We just never seem to go through it. Of course there was much more junk mail than "real" mail, but that's typical. I went through several catalogs we got and found some interesting items I may have to consider ordering.

In the mail, I also found a couple of bills that I pay out of my checking account, as opposed to our joint account. I didn't want to write out the checks until I recorded and balanced my checkbook, so that was the next thing I did. I hadn't recorded the last 30 checks I wrote (thank goodness for duplicate checks!) so that took a little while. Then I wanted to make sure I had money in my checking account, so I went to the computer and brought up my account for the last three months. I'm extremely proud to say that my checkbook was perfect down to the penny!

Of course I noticed my purse was a mess when I got my checkbook out, so I cleaned out my purse a little.

After that, I took a shower, settled into a nice long talk with Joe, then went to sleep.

All in all, a very productive evening!

It Sure Has Been a While

2010-01-24T15:23:00.005-05:00

I've really missed blogging, and am hopefully back to it now, on a regular basis. Life sort of got in the way.

Since I last had a regular post:

* Joe finished got his Bachelor's degree in Business Management and is now trying to find a job

* Christmas has come and gone

* Alex hosted a small New Year's Eve dinner party for a few friends (and really didn't want his picture taken while he was putting the salad together)

* School began again for me, then a week later, for Alex

* Our afternoon custodian returned to work after having been hospitalized for 6 days with cellulitis, and then passed away

* One of our best friends, Mark, became ill, then had a heart attack, and passed away

(Ted and Mark on their first day of Kindergarten)

* Our very good friends from Texas came up for Mark's funeral

* I had my annual CT scan...and the results are great. No cancer!

* We spent an evening celebrating the wonderful life of our friend Mark with his family and friends, and enjoyed a FABULOUS meal prepared by another friend.

(I forgot to take a picture of my plate, but still got a shot of someone else's. The beef was SUPERB!)

My goal is to get back to commenting this week, in addition to updating my blog.

I've missed you all!

Well

2009-12-31T11:57:00.003-05:00

It's been a long time since I've posted, and I plan on getting back to it on a regular basis very soon.

Not only am I going to get back to posting, but I'm also going to get back to commenting very soon. To those of you with blogs that I have commented on in the past, I apologize.

Happy New Year!

GREAT Customer Service!

2009-12-11T20:25:00.004-05:00

This holiday season I've done approximately 99% of my Christmas shopping online. And I have almost enjoyed it. Somewhat.

I do NOT like shopping, but this hasn't been too awfully bad.

About a month or so ago I ordered a pair of red salt and pepper shakers. (Okay, so they were sort of a gift for me, but that's beside the point.) They reminded me of the green salt and pepper shakers that my grandma used to keep on her stove when I was younger. Except these are smaller...and red, instead of green. But I really like them. I wanted salt and pepper shakers to keep on the island for when I needed a quick dash of salt and/or pepper, so that I didn't have to go to the cooktop or over to the table just to get a little flavor enhancer.

Anyway, they arrived and I was pleased as punch! Instead of running them through the dishwasher first, I washed them by hand. After drying them, I left them on a towel on the countertop so that they would COMPLETELY dry, because we all know that salt and pepper get clumpy and sticky when they go into a wet shaker.

About an hour or so after I put them there, I was in the living room, watching TV. I heard a little scraping noise, then silence, another scraping noise, then silence again. I looked up just in time to see MARINA knocking the red GLASS pepper shaker onto the tile floor.

Yes, it shattered...into hundreds of teeny tiny pieces. Marina looked at me, then looked at the red glass stretching over a 100 square foot or more area. I moved her to a safe location, then began to clean up the mess.

I swept the floor with a regular old-fashioned broom and dustpan. I swept it with an electric broom. I swept it again with the traditional broom, then once again with the electric broom. Then I mopped, hoping that I would pick up any remaining teensy weensy shards of glass.

Once I was pretty satisfied with the clean up, I began to think about what I was going to do with a salt shaker.

Finally, last Monday I called Gooseberry Patch, from where I had ordered these shakers. I explained the situation to them and asked if I could buy the pepper shaker only. The wonderful woman I spoke with said that her computer showed that they had 200 sets in stock and she would check with the warehouse manager and get back to me.

A couple of days later I had a message on the answering machine from Gooseberry Patch. Regina, the gal I spoke with, told me that they had a red pepper shaker for me and it would only cost me shipping. They were NOT CHARGING ME FOR THE PEPPER SHAKER.

I called her back and asked her if I heard right. She indicated that I did. I would just need to pay the shipping charge ($3.23). Period.

I thanked her profusely and told her how much I appreciated their customer service, and that it was rare in this day and age.

Did I mention that the salt and pepper shakers were part of my very first order from Gooseberry Patch???

I will definitely be ordering from them again!

Snowflakes!

2009-11-29T13:29:00.012-05:00

Last December I made snowflakes with two groups of my students. They turned out really nice, and a few of you asked me for directions.

Well...Miss Procrastinator here has finally gotten her act together and I just spent a little bit of time making a snowflake and taking pictures so that you could see how easy it really is.

First, you need to have paper (I just used regular printer paper), a ruler, a pencil, scissors, and a glue stick (or glue...or even a stapler if that's all you have). Marina insisted on getting in the picture, and the flowers were from Patty, Tim, and Holly when my grandma passed away recently.

The next thing you need to do is make the paper square. When I did this with the kids, we used 4" x 4" squares, but for demonstration here, I cut them to 8 1/2" squares. You will need a total of six square sheets per snowflake.

Take one sheet, and fold it in half diagonally. (For those of you who are teachers, this can tie in several state math standards...at least it does here in Ohio!)

Then you will fold the triangle in half again.

Now you need to get ready to cut. It is extremely important that you cut in the right place, or it won't work out right. I put notes where each edge is supposed to be.

I also used a ruler to draw lines for the kids. The lines are parallel to the 4 edged side AND you cut from the folded side. DO NOT CUT ALL THE WAY TO THE END. You need to get fairly close. It is important that you make THREE cuts. This will all make sense in a minute.

After making the three cuts, open up the paper. It needs to look like this. If, for some reason, it doesn't, then you will need to try again, making sure that you cut from the proper edge (the fold), and parallel to the correct side (the 4 edged side).

Okay, here is where it can start to get tricky. You will take the center most pair of cuts and roll them into the center, gluing them. I use a pencil or something else round so that I don't press too hard and flatten this section. When doing this with 4" x 4" squares, a pencil fits in there just right. In this example, it's obviously too big, but at least I was able to apply pressure for a few seconds while the glue set up, without flattening the roll.

This is how it will look when you are finished:

Now, turn the paper over, so that the roll is underneath.

You will need to pull the next pair of cut sections together and glue them.

Once that second pair is glued together, turn the paper back over, so that the first curl is facing up.

Now you will glue together the third pair of cuts to make another curl.

Turn the paper over yet again, then glue the fourth and final curl together.

If you've done everything properly, this is what your paper will look like. It doesn't look much like a snowflake yet, but it will, so don't worry!

NOW....comes the fun part! Make five more.

Yes, that's right. You need a total of six of these. Remember, snowflakes have six sides!

**************************************************************************
Okay, now that you have SIX of these made, we're going to work with three at a time. It is extremely important that you line them up facing the same direction. In this photo, the one on the far right is backwards. If you look closely, you can see that the outermost curl is on the left side, whereas with the other two, the outermost curl is on the right side. (Also it may be noted that Marina vacated her position on the table and Pepina is now taking her turn at watching me.)

In this shot, I simply turned the sheet on the far right over, so that it is now facing the proper way. Now we're ready to start putting things together.

Pull the tips all together and glue them. They will look like this:

Gluing them at the bottom points will not provide enough stability, so you will also need to glue them together at their midpoint. At first it will seem as though they are pulling, but that is what makes the snowflake hold its shape.

Now you'll have half of the snowflake put together and it will look like this:

It's time to do the same thing with the other three pieces.

Now you'll have two halves.

Now you'll glue the two halves together attaching them at the mid-point of each half.

We're almost finished...

Glue the two halves together at the other end, using the midpoints again.

NOW, you'll see how the middle of the snowflake just sort of meets, and you will need to glue the two halves together at the center.

And when you're finished....this is what you'll have!

This makes a fairly large snowflake. If you're doing it at school, it would be difficult for the kids to get this home without it getting crushed.

By using the 4" x 4" pieces, the snowflakes we made last year just barely fit into a gallon size Ziploc bag. Once we got the snowflakes in, I blew into the bags so that each one was sort of like a pillow. I told the kids that they had to be very careful and they all told me the next day that their snowflakes made it home just fine.

Another thing we did with them was to spray glitter on them. I punched a hole in the top and put an opened paperclip through it. Then I put a box on its side and made a little hole in the top so that the paperclip could go up and through. That way, as I sprayed the glitter on, the mess was contained to the inside of the box.

This year I may just use either gold or silver spray paint instead of glitter. The glitter seemed to come off rather easy.

So there you have it...from start to finish with this sample, it probably took me 12-15 minutes. Of course I've had a lot of experience, and that makes a huge difference. With a group of kids it took a LOT longer, because I didn't want to go on with the next step until everyone was caught up.

If you decide to make the snowflakes, please let me know how they turn out and take pictures if you can!

Holidays, Part One

2009-11-28T18:21:00.007-05:00

As most people, I enjoy the holiday season. Thanksgiving is my favorite, though, because it's mostly about family...well, food too, of course...but for me, I enjoy the family aspect most of all. Christmas creates a lot of pressure, but I've already delved into that subject in Christmases past (and probably will again, sigh).

We have always spent Thanksgiving Day with "my" family, but several years ago I decided that we needed to celebrate this holiday with Ted's family, and thus began our new tradition of gathering together the Sunday before Thanksgiving.

We've hosted the festivities here, but this year, because I'd spent so much of the previous four weeks or so SICK, I bowed out. Fortunately, and unbeknownst to me, Ted's sister, Peg, was planning on hosting this year's gathering. Peg and Mac just recently moved into their beautiful new home right next door to us, so at least we didn't have to travel far.

(note to self: Peg really needs to look at her end table situation, hehehe)

Mac makes a wonderful, tasty turkey!

And Peg sets a very nice table. Heck, I don't bother getting out the china...maybe because I don't have any?

Holly, our niece, Patty and Tim, our sister-in-law and Ted's brother, are ready for dinner!

Peg is like me...after eating, I just can't deal with clearing off the table, so we just sit there and talk for a while.

We had a wonderful meal and an even more wonderful time.

Our niece Kelly and her son Michael "share" a piece of pie. I think Kelly got about 2 bites and that was it!

Our niece Holly lives and works in the Cleveland area, but was able to make it down to help us celebrate the holiday.

See this GORGEOUS cabinet??? Isn't Christmas coming up soon? Ted...TED...do you see this Ted??? (hint, hint)

We all spent the day together, but one of our family was absent... Alex was away at college. We missed him, but still had a great time.

Michael is two and a half, and definitely provided the entertainment for the day! He has more energy in his little finger than I have altogether!

On Thanksgiving Day, my family was here. We had a nice time, although I really seemed to struggle in the cooking department.

Most years I'm totally "ON" with my cooking, but this year, I was definitely "OFF." I couldn't get the dressing to taste quite right, and ended up adding too much liquid. Then I added too much salt to soak up the broth and butter. It was okay, but definitely not fantastic.

Then I struggled with trying to get a pot of chicken broth to come to a boil, so that I could cook the noodles. After 20 minutes of frustration and repeatedly saying "a watched pot never boils," I gave up. Everything else was ready to be served and the broth hadn't even come to a boil yet, and then we would have to wait an additional 20 minutes while the noodles cooked. I had simply had enough and made the executive decision to cross noodles off the menu.

Everything else went pretty well. The mashed potatoes always seem to be a hit (for which I am very grateful) and they consist of only three ingredients: potatoes, butter, and whipping cream. There were NO leftover mashed potatoes, so I take that as a good sign.

My Aunt D, the world traveler, was there.

Aunt D was recently diagnosed with stomach cancer and, due to that, had to cancel a three week long trip to Argentina. Fortunately she had trip insurance and will be able to get her money back.

She has been through her first chemo treatment and has another one coming up next week. She will have somewhere in the neighborhood of 4-6, then a month or so off to build her strength back up, then surgery to remove the tumor, followed by more chemo.

Aunt D is trying to get her point across in a discussion. I think she succeeded!

She is absolutely AMAZING! She has a fabulous attitude, and is taking this all in stride. She has had minor side effects to the chemo so far, and is really doing well.

Aunt D and my mom are sisters, but I don't think they look at all alike.

My cousin Damon and his fiancee Cathy make such a darling couple. Damon has an ornery streak though, so don't be charmed by his good looks. During dinner he kept refilling my mom's glass with Asti Spumante when she wasn't looking...and she just kept drinking it. But that's okay, in addition to celebrating Thanksgiving, we were also celebrating my parents' 54th wedding anniversary.

Aren't they adorable? And Cathy has the most beautiful eyes.

My cousin Davene and her husband Rick were also here. Rick and I trade barbs back and forth all the time, but I really do like him. I guess. Since he's part of the family, I don't have much of a choice, but to get along with him. He's just lucky that Davene puts up with him, hahaha!

Hey Rick...looks like a little Grecian Formula may be in your near future.

Just as my parents were getting ready to leave, I told them I wanted to take a picture. My father, the impatient man that he can be, basically said that if I was going to take a picture, I'd better hurry up because he was heading out the door. I had Joe and Alex get in the shot with him and my mom. Alex always has to add a little something to the mix when he's in a photo, as you can see by his facial expression. Apparently my dad and Joe didn't get the memo about smiling for the camera. My dad has gloves on....and not because he was cold. He'd been playing with Pepina and didn't want his hands to get all scratched up, so he wore protective gear...I still get a chuckle out of that.

Sure wish I could get everyone to smile at the same time.

All in all, it was a great beginning to the holiday season. Family and food...does it get much better?

Sad News

2009-11-28T12:19:00.002-05:00

About a month ago I posted about my grandmother turning 99.

A couple of weeks ago, she fell while trying to get out of bed, even though she knew she wasn't supposed to even attempt that without anyone there to help her. She ended up in the hospital for a short overnight stay, then when she returned home, she just wasn't quite the same.

She had trouble communicating and was a little bit disoriented. Very quickly that turned into not recognizing my dad, and then calling out to her family members who had already passed on.

A week ago, my aunt and cousin happened to be with her as she passed away quietly and peacefully.

This has been extremely difficult for my aunt, as she was my grandma's caregiver for many years. Now my aunt is all alone in her home. I'm sure she'll adjust in time, but it will never be the same.

Rest in peace Grandma.

2009-11-12T23:12:00.003-05:00

This afternoon I was working with a second grader. Joshua was having some trouble understanding the math concept of adding two two digit numbers with regrouping.

(That's "carrying" for those of us in the 40+ age group.)

I worked with him for about 15 minutes, and it was hit and miss. He wasn't consistent and my gut feeling was that he was doing a lot of guessing.

Suddenly he looked at the dry erase board he was doing the problems on, then looked at me.

I saw it in his eyes. They sparkled. He smiled really big.

"Josh, did something just click for you?"

"YES!"

He got it. We did five more problems and he breezed through them with no issues at all.

That smile and sparkle was so exciting to see.

And THAT is why I became a teacher. I wanted to see that.

I didn't become a teacher to do constant paperwork (but I know we have to do it). I didn't become a teacher to teach to "the test" (but again, I know we really don't have much of a choice). I didn't become a teacher so I could spend all day at work, then some evenings until 8:00 pm, or later (even though it's sometimes necessary).

I became a teacher because I wanted to see that "a-HA" and gleam in a child's eyes and a big grin when they "get it."

I love what I do.

Time For New Chairs

2009-11-09T19:06:00.004-05:00

The recliners in our living room are three and a half years old.

However, it's time to replace them.

We ordered them, along with a bunch of other new furniture, when we were building the house. All the new furniture was delivered two days before we officially moved in.

A couple months after that move, we got Pepina. A year later we got Marina. A year after that, Oliver showed up.

Our cats absolutely love to claw on our chairs.

And we let them.

It's a trade-off...the pleasure that our felines have brought us is well worth them scratching at the chairs a little bit.

The other night Ted said, "Have you looked at these chairs??? We can't have people here for Thanksgiving with chairs looking like this!"

Well. That was all I needed to plan a trip to the furniture store.

We have a certain furniture store that we just love. It took four trips there to select and order our new furniture during the winter of 2005-2006. We ended up getting new bedroom furniture for both of our sons (bed, dresser, desk/bookshelf, and nightstand), bedroom furniture for us (we were still using the furniture that my parents bought for me when I was in 6th grade), two new couches, a chair, two recliners, three end tables and a coffee table....not to mention three new mattresses and springs.

Our salesman is so fabulous that he even came here when it was all delivered, and told the deliverymen which room each item went into. AND...he ran the sweeper over the new carpet in the boys' bedrooms. He even brought coffee and doughnuts for me and the deliverymen!

Anyway, our chairs are in rather sad shape.

We spent a couple of hours at the furniture store this past weekend and selected two chairs. One is in stock, and the other one was ordered. I've done a little research and hope I've figured out a plan to prevent the cats from scratching the new chairs.

We'll see how it goes.

Ride 'Em Cowboy

2009-11-07T18:54:00.006-05:00

Is this not the CUTEST cowboy you've ever seen??

Our great nephew Michael came trick or treating. As his great aunt and uncle, it is our DUTY (and privilege) to give him candy and sugar and get him all wound up!

We did a pretty good job, if I do say so myself!

Feeling Better

2009-11-02T20:18:00.004-05:00

I've had a pretty nasty case of bronchitis and missed 6 days of school. One evening in particular was pretty rough. My fever went up almost 6 degrees above normal and then I had hallucinations. The coughing has been continuous and nasty. The body aches were lousy too.

Anyway, today, on my first day back, I was greeted with hugs from the kids, and "We missed you!"

Even though I still don't feel that great physically, those children sure made my day.

I really do love being a teacher.

99

2009-10-27T13:26:00.006-04:00

My paternal grandmother just recently turned 99 years old.

That's almost a century!

She has a few health issues, but that's to be expected after 99 years of wear and tear on her body and organs. However, she lives with my aunt (her daughter) who takes excellent care of her. They have some outside help for a few hours each day, but Grandma prefers Aunt M to take care of her.

Her mind is still pretty darn good. Sure she has a few episodes of slight confusion, but for the most part, is right on top of things. She is still strong willed and determined and will let you know without a doubt if she disagrees with your thoughts or opinions.

She enjoys watching and listening to political programs on TV and is completely dedicated to following the Cleveland Cavaliers.

Her absolute favorite player is....LeBron James. She knows everything there is to know about him, and then some!

Grandma was the third of seven children, having been born in a small town along the Ohio River.

As a child Grandma and her friends would swim across the Ohio River. One of her brothers would row across with them in his canoe, so if they were tired, they could get a ride back. Her mother would stand at the edge of the river yelling at her for swimming across, telling her how dangerous it was…and the next day she would be back again, doing the same thing! (And I used to wonder where Joe and Alex got that trait...)

She and my Granddad fell in love and married pretty young, when they were only 17. My dad was born when she was 19, then my aunt when she was 20.

Of my Grandma's six siblings, five eventually married. Uncle Raymond had a girlfriend named Mabel, but they never got married.

Out of the five that got married, NONE of them had children.

Once, many years ago, I asked her why none of the others had children. Without skipping a beat she said that they all saw how bad her two were (my dad and my aunt) and decided they wanted nothing to do with it!

Grandma never got a drivers license. She tried to drive one time, got in an accident, then said she'd never get behind the wheel again. Apparently, she meant it!

When my Granddad was only 44, he was killed in an industrial accident. This happened before my parents were even married. I never had the chance to meet him. I'm sorry I never got to know him.

After that, Grandma lived with my Aunt M, and helped her out in her beauty shop for decades. Grandma was the official greeter and coffee lady. When I was young and would stay with them for a few weeks each summer, I would "help out" too, hahaha.

When we visited her for her birthday I asked her about all the changes she's seen over the years. She immediately stated that not all of them were for the better! (That's the opinionated side of her showing through again!)

She's the only one of the seven children in her family still living...I told her it was because she has always been taken care of AND because she was the only one who had children.

We know that having children can sometimes bring you gray hair a little sooner than you thought necessary, or add to the wrinkles on your face, but there's also a chance that having children can prolong your life.

Happy 99th Birthday Grandma!

A Leisurely Ride

2009-10-14T18:20:00.008-04:00

Last Saturday morning Ted and I went for a ride through Amish country. It only takes us about 15 minutes to get to the "Gateway to Amish Country" from here, but it's not something we do very often. The area has a large Amish population, but there are also quite a few "English" that live out that way. The further you go into Amish country, the more Amish you see, naturally.

Unfortunately there are those that take advantage of that and try to sell all kinds of Amish things from dolls to furniture and everything in between. Ted has worked around a few Amish carpenters and they really get upset when merchants take advantage of the unknowing public by claiming that they are selling Amish goods. With most (but not all) items, the only thing Amish about those things is that they are being SOLD in Amish country.

Anyway, we knew that it would be fairly busy out that way because it was a nice autumn day, but still decided to go.

Our first stop was a grocery store that specializes in cheese, baked goods and bulk products. Their bakery is excellent and, luckily for them, we were hungry. We got way too many things from the bakery (cinnamon rolls, sour dough bread, cookies, fry pies, etc.) and then got some bulk things too, in addition to some pumpkins.

We continued on into a small community and stopped at an apple orchard. The term "apple orchard" is misleading in this case, as the apples and other products are all in a warehouse type facility, having already been picked. We didn't get any apples, but did pick up a few more pumpkins and a couple potted mums. They had something interesting and I'm still not sure if I like it or not. I didn't purchase any of these particular items, but I did take a picture of them. They had some pumpkins that had the top cut almost all the way off with a mum inside. My initial thought was that I liked them, then I wasn't so sure. Now I'm on the fence.

The parking lot at the orchard was filled to capacity and two chartered busses pulled up and began unloading. That's when I said that we needed to leave. I got the distinct impression that the busses came from inner city Akron or Cleveland. I overheard a few of them talking and they had the northern Ohio accent. Although it's a slight accent, I can still detect it. It seems as though people from "the big city" just go crazy over Amish country, so I was going to let them enjoy it without hearing me mumble under my breath.

The day was gorgeous, and the clouds were really moving fast. I got a little carried away taking pictures of the sky, and you're the lucky people who get to see them!

One of the roads took us right by a cemetery and I saw a small area that had an angel in it. For some reason it struck me as very touching. I took quite a few pictures of it.

We were only gone for a few hours, but we had a nice time.

I like the contrast of the buggies and the cars in this shot. I was careful to not get the man's face in this picture, as the Amish do NOT want their photos taken.

Yes, the Amish and English share the road. The Amish community also pay taxes toward the upkeep of the state and county roads.

We also came across a stone fence that really intrigued me. I wonder how old it is and what the upkeep is like for it.

Another Amish buggy, waiting for its owners to finish up their errands.

It was a beautiful autumn day!

Is it Me? Or is it the Book?

2009-10-08T21:12:00.006-04:00

I just finished reading "Swimsuit" by James Patterson and Maxine Paetro. I usually like Patterson's books, except for his Alex Cross series, however, I'm not sure about this one.

Either I'm getting old (don't anybody say a word about my age...I'm warning you) and just don't need graphic scenes to entertain me, or his work is becoming more...I can't quite come up with the word...maybe intense?

Whichever way it is, I found the beginning of this book disturbing. That's about the only way I can describe it. Once I got into it and wanted to see how it turned out, several more disturbing scenes played out.

When I got about two thirds of the way through the book, I just HAD to read the last few pages to see how it turned out. Otherwise, I was going to have to stop reading it.

I chose to finish the book and I still can't get the gruesome parts out of my head.

So...I'm wondering...is it ME who's changed? Or is it his writing? I know he collaborates with other authors, but surely he has the final say. This was definitely one of my least favorite books of his.

It might be a while before I read another Patterson book.

A Productive Weekend

2009-10-06T20:07:00.002-04:00

For the past few years Ted and Alex would go away over Labor Day weekend. (Yes I know that was a month ago, but so what?)

This year they didn't because Alex was in college and even had classes on Labor Day.

Anyway, for the past few years I took advantage of that weekend to clean out my closet. I would have a bag for things that were going to go to Good Will and another bag for things that were in too bad of shape to go anywhere but the trash.

This year was no exception.

OH MY....

I wish I would have thought to take before and after pictures of my closet. It was SO bad. I had just enough space to step into the closet and stand in front of the rods. I had put boxes with "things" in them on the floor.

I think you have to be in the right frame of mind to clean anything out. Otherwise you really don't accomplish all that much. Fortunately, I was in the right frame of mind that weekend.

At one point I just sat on the floor and threw stuff out of my closet. I figured I'd go through it later. The only problem was that when later came, I wasn't able to get out of the closet without climbing a mountain of stuff.

I got rid of stuff I'd been holding onto for years. I got rid of things that I wore two sizes ago (yeah, like I'll ever fit into THAT again). I got rid of clothes that I didn't like anymore.

I found boxes with Christmas gifts from two years ago. I gave the couple baby things I found to a teacher at school who is expecting a baby this winter. I got those things when our niece was pregnant with our great nephew Michael...who is two and a half years old now.

I came across bags with stuffed animals. (There's a story for a future post there.) I put them all together in one box. I found a shirt on the floor that I had totally forgotten I had. I don't think I've even had it on since we moved into this house in March of 2006.

When it was all said and done, I had FOUR big trash bags for the trash.

And....

there were bags for Good Will.

How many, you may be asking?

1
2
3
4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
12
13
14

15!

Yes, 15 bags, stuffed to the gills, that went to Good Will. Joe took them one day while I was at school, and it took him two trips.

It was such a refreshing feeling to look in my closet and know how much I got rid of...I know for a fact that I got rid of 35 dresses alone. I didn't bother to count the skirts, jeans, dress pants, shirts, blouses, t-shirts, sweatpants, sweaters, shorts, capris, etc.

Now my goal for this month is to tackle my shoes! I have at least 40 pairs of shoes, but only wear about 5 pair. The rest are heading OUT!

So Sweet

2009-10-03T18:49:00.006-04:00

One recent morning at school, I witnessed the sweetest thing.

I walked out of our room, heading toward the office. It was early, about 15 minutes or so before the tardy bell rang.

I saw a little girl who is in first grade, facing a little boy, both of her hands holding his. I heard her say, "It'll be okay. I'll see you at recess."

Then she kissed him on the cheek, he smiled, and she told him he needed to go to his classroom. He turned to leave and she watched him walk down the hall.

I said, "Molly, is that your little brother?"

"Yes it is."

"Is he in kindergarten?"

"Yes, he's in Miss Fisher's room. He knows his way there."

"You are such a nice big sister, making sure that he gets there okay, and telling him you'll see him at recess."

She smiled at me, glanced toward him to make sure he turned down the hallway, turned around herself, and headed off to her room.

It was the sweetest thing to see this little girl taking care of her brother like that.

Molly isn't her real name, but she reminds me so much of Molly, the American Girl doll. She has glasses and long hair that she wears in braids sometimes, and her hair is the most gorgeous shade of red....not obnoxious red, just sort of a light brown red.

And she's obviously a very caring sister.

Dear SRA

2009-09-30T21:59:00.001-04:00

Your set up for Reading Mastery Plus, Levels 1 and 2 are a nightmare.

I stayed late at work recently, trying to get a set of Reading Mastery plans done. I'm the only one in my building who has to adapt the lessons from the original layout (there are about 7 or 8 people who teach it), but for me, it's a necessary thing. You have Presentation Books with both the letters and words that the students need to look at, mixed with the text that I am supposed to read, along with each move I need to make AND how the students are to respond.

(Yes, I'm shaking my head here. How "they" are to respond? And if they don't respond how they are SUPPOSED to? I need to "lead" them in the right direction. Can you tell I'm not a huge Reading Mastery fan yet?)

You also mix fonts, size of text, color of text, italics, and bold. Talk about confusing. It's no problem for most people, but I think I must have a type of learning disability that makes it extremely difficult for me to follow all of this without getting confused. PLUS, totally scripted lessons are challenging for me. And, I think it's distracting for the kids to be looking at the big letters and words, AND all the stuff that I'm supposed to say and do, etc.

Anyway, I make copies of things, cut them out, tape them on a blank sheet of paper, then copy them again. I also copy each lesson's story from the reading book that goes with the program and cut out each page, tape them to another blank sheet of paper, cut out the questions I'm supposed to ask, along with the answers that they HAVE to give me and tape them onto the sheet where I'm supposed to ask them. Then I recopy all of this. I also have make a copy of the actual lesson and highlight what I'm supposed to SAY in one color, what I'm supposed to DO in another color, and what the children are supposed to say in yet another color. So, YES, I go through a lot of paper for each lesson.

If you're still with me, just know that it's totally confusing and takes me about 45 minutes or so to prepare for each 45 minute lesson, and I teach one lesson per day. You do the math.

Surely I'm not the only teacher out there in the USA who struggles with the way you have the program set up. I sure wish you'd ask for feedback from the teachers who use Reading Mastery on a day to day basis, because I'd give you an earful.

How late did I stay to work on my Reading Mastery lessons? Well, teachers normally leave around 3:00. I left at 8:45. And I really didn't get as far as I needed to get in preparing the lessons. Thursday is the day I choose to stay late because I certainly don't want to stay on Friday. Since I work on plans for the following week, staying late to work on Reading Mastery earlier in the week just doesn't quite work out for me.

Sincerely,

I Hate Being Sick

2009-09-28T19:44:00.016-04:00

When something doesn't go according to plan, my comment is usually, "It could always be worse."

Well, I've been sick, BUT....it could have been worse.

Last Thursday I stayed late at work to get some things done. I left there around 8:45 pm, came home, took a shower, ate a little something, talked to Ted, then got ready for bed. As I walked into the bathroom (the older you get, the more quality time you spend in the bathroom), I suddenly felt a huge chill come over me. When I came back to the bedroom, my teeth were chattering and I had goosebumps all over me. I went to bed with two extra blankets on me and eventually fell asleep.

I woke up at some point and Pepina was asleep on my shoulder. I was also suddenly very hot. Then I started really feeling crappy. I took my temp and it was 101.7, which is pretty high for me. I rarely run a temp, and my normal is anywhere from the upper 95s to the lower 96s, so I was about 5.5 to 6 degrees above normal.

I went to the recliner in our bedroom and just laid back and moaned (now I think it's funny, but it sure wasn't then). When Ted got up I asked him if he could get me a glass of ice and a can of Cherry 7 Up. I needed something cold, but something with a little flavor. I took my temp again and it was down to 101.5. I alternated between freezing and burning up.

By then it was 5:30. Ted said that I was NOT going to school. Duh, I knew that. I could barely move because I was so achy and sore and with a high temp, they'd turn me away at the door. Ted told me that I looked awful. I can always count on him to make me feel better.

He said he was going to call my principal and tell her I wasn't going to be in. Last spring she moved and got a new landline phone number, in addition to a new cell number. Her cell number was in my purse, so I told him where it was and he called. He had to leave a message, but I told him he had to talk to her in person.

The problem? My phone tree sheet was sitting on my desk at work. I'd planned on making some copies of it on Friday so that I could put one by every phone in our house. Little did I know that I would need it that morning.

Ted called Kris, the other reading intervention teacher, to get our principal's phone number. Fortunately we're good friends, so she didn't mind a call from Ted at 5:35 am...at least not too much, hahaha.

Thank goodness she had the number and Ted was able to make the call to my principal. He got ready for work and left. I just continued to moan and groan and try to get comfortable. (FYI, you can't get comfortable when you don't feel well.)

A few hours later my temp was down to 101.2, but then I got a terrible headache. And dizziness set in. I was a mess. I was finally able to doze off for a while and when I woke up the dizziness wasn't as bad, but I still had the headache. Finally I felt like I could tolerate taking acetaminophen and that helped my temp go down.

The rest of the day was pretty much a blur, except that Pepina would not leave me. She either slept on me, or sat on the bed and stared at me all day long.

Saturday wasn't much better. In fact, when Ted got up Saturday morning, I felt him reach down and hold my wrist to check for a pulse. He said, "What would the neighbors think if I just got up and went to work and left you dead in bed?" Gee thanks. I never thought of it that way.

Saturday night I didn't sleep more than about 2 hours total and that was rough. The fever was still coming and going. Sunday started off a little better, but by the afternoon it was all downhill again. I called off for Monday because I knew I still had a fever. We are to be 24 hours fever-free without Tylenol before coming back.

The last time I took Tylenol was late Sunday night, and I've had no fever today, sooooooooo, tomorrow I get to back to school! I still don't have many sick days accumulated since I used them all up for my cancer stint, then in the past few years I've had a serious bout of bronchitis, threw my back out, and a few other illnesses that required me to take time off. I don't like to use sick days unless I absolutely HAVE to, so I'm glad to be able to go back to work.

The REAL downside to being sick the whole weekend? Alex was home and I really couldn't do anything with him and only talk to him from a distance. I sure don't want him getting sick.

So how could it have been worse? I could have had vomiting and "bathroom issues," if you know what I mean, AND I DIDN'T!

Hopefully this will be my one and only sickness for the school year....from my keyboard to God's ears!

Can Guys and Girls be Best Friends?

2009-09-23T16:31:00.003-04:00

Alex and Erica are best friends. They refer to each other as such. They graduated from high school together and spent a lot of time together this past summer.

We had planned on taking Alex to dinner the night before we took him to college. Totally and completely unbeknownst to him, I'd spoken to Erica and asked her if she would like to go with us. We were going to Bravo (our current favorite restaurant) about half an hour away.

Erica lives pretty close to us, so when Ted, Alex and I left, Ted nonchalantly asked Alex where exactly Erica lived. He told us which street it was on, and Ted turned down the street. I asked which house, and Alex pointed it out.

As Ted turned into Erica's driveway, Alex went CRAZY!

"You can't just pull in here!"

"She's not even home! She's at work!"

"Her parents are going to think I'm stalking her!"

"Dad, what are you DOING??"

It was quite humorous to hear Alex go off on his little tirade.

Then Ted told Alex that Erica was going with us. Alex replied, "She can't go! She's working tonight!"

The look on his face as Erica walked around from the back of the house was absolutely priceless. He was shocked, but so happy. They were both grinning, ear to ear.

Then he said, "If I'd have known she was coming along, I would have gotten dressed up."

We laughed like crazy then, because Alex takes longer to get ready to go anywhere than anyone else in the house. And he already looked just fine, as you can see.

If you look closely, you can see that they both have on orange "friendship" bracelets.

Usually Alex is the one complaining as I say I'm going to take a picture, but not this time. He happily sat down and smiled at the camera, as did Erica.

I think it's so sweet that they say they are each others' best friends.

Joe's Thoughts

2009-09-21T15:19:00.004-04:00

By this own choice, Joe opted to attend college at our local branch of a major Ohio university and not leave home.

By now you all know that Alex did, in fact, chose to attend a college almost an hour away and stay in the dorm.

On "move-in" day in late August, Joe helped us. He sat on one of the beds to rest for a minute, and I took his picture.

His thoughts? "Since Alex is gone, at least now our bathroom will be clean."

Joe doesn't pull any punches, and tells it like it is.

Aren't Weddings Great?

2009-09-19T13:29:00.008-04:00

I enjoy weddings and wedding receptions. They tend to remind me that no marriage is perfect and that it takes work and commitment to make it a successful union. I think that most marriages have their good times AND their bad times.

We went to a wedding reception recently and had a nice time. The wedding was at noon and it was an hour away. The reception was at 6:00 pm. Since we would have had nothing to do in between the two events (and remember, I am NOT a shopper), we opted to go to just the reception. One of my male cousins was getting married to a very sweet, beautiful girl with the most gorgeous smile.

You may recall that my mom and I went to a shower for Carrie in July. It was very classy (given by two of my classy cousins, so what else would you expect?) and the reception was very nice too.

Patty, above, was one of the "classy cousins" who threw the shower for Carrie. Isn't she pretty?

I only took a few pictures, but I'm still going to share them with you.

These next two are definitely for Kris, the other reading intervention teacher. Kris is a food connoisseur. She might weigh 100 lbs, soaking wet, but she loves food...especially good food. In fact, when I showed her these pictures, her first comment was "You took those for me, didn't you?" And we laughed.

The salad was served to us and was very good. The italian dressing wasn't too tangy or bitter, but just right. I loved the mix of the greens.

The meal was buffet style and I chose to get roast beef, chicken, potatoes, and pasta. They also had some vegetable combination, and although I liked veggies in general, I don't like cauliflower or zucchini and they were both in the medley.

Unfortunately, I forgot to take pictures of the rolls and cake, hahaha. They also had cookies in the "pre-event" room (what italian wedding doesn't have cookies???) but I didn't take a picture of them either.

I have so many pictures of my mom and dad together, however in at least 90% of them, my dad looks as though he's in pain. He's really not, but I just don't think he likes having his picture taken. So once again, I told my folks that they needed to get their heads close together because I was going to take their picture. I expected to get a hard time about it from my dad, but I didn't.

It didn't come out too bad, if I do say so myself!

Then I asked Rick (a cousin) to take a picture of Ted and me together. I really do NOT like having my picture taken, but I'm willing to go through the trauma of it so that we can have a few pictures of the two of us.

Then Ted took the camera and pointed it toward us to take another shot. He didn't do too bad!

Matt and Carrie had a wonderful reception and we had a very nice time. Carrie was a beautiful bride and Matt was a handsome groom. (Too bad I didn't get pictures of them together.)

We wish them the best as they begin their life together as husband and wife!

Just Apologize and It'll be Okay

2009-09-14T17:34:00.004-04:00

So all we have to do is apologize and all is forgiven??

This is not a political blog, and I have never shared my views here. Regardless, I have something to say, and what better place to say it? Last week Ted and I watched what our president had to say in regards to healthcare. By now, most of you have heard about the outburst that republican Representative Joe Wilson of South Carolina shouted out "You lie!" when President Obama mentioned illegal immigrants in his speech.

Of course emotions can get the best of all of us. HOWEVER, it is my opinion that one should absolutely NOT disgrace one's self or one's family. I completely understand that he got caught up in the moment, but he should not have shouted out at the President of the United States (or anyone else in public, for that matter).

Rep. Wilson has issued an apology: This evening I let my emotions get the best of me when listening to the President's remarks regarding the coverage of illegal immigrants in the health care bill. While I disagree with the President's statement, my comments were inappropriate and regrettable. I extend sincere apologies to the President for this lack of civility.

And now all should be forgiven because he apologized. Heck, what he said is already "out there" and can't be taken back. We can't turn the clock back to before his outburst. Even though he's apologized, people won't forget about it.

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I'm not a big tennis fan, but I know who Venus and Serena Williams are. Apparently Serena had an outburst of emotion at the U.S. Open the other day. It seems as though a line judge called a foot-fault and Serena disagreed. Loudly. Meanly. Soon after the incident, Serena issued an apology: (Saturday) night everyone could truly see the passion I have for my job. Now that I have had time to gain my composure, I can see that while I don't agree with the unfair line call, in the heat of battle I let my passion and emotion get the better of me and as a result handled the situation poorly.

She was fined $10,000, which is a drop in the bucket compared to her net worth. Again, her outburst is "out there" and can't be removed. People won't forget about it. She's in the public eye and everything she does comes under scrutiny.

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Last night Kanye West jumped on the "just let me apologize and all will be forgiven" bandwagon with his comments as Taylor Swift received a VMA (Video Music Awards) for Best Female Music Video. As Taylor was accepting her honor, Kanye got right into the microphone and cameras and said, “Yo Taylor. I’m really happy for you. I’m gonna let you finish [which didn't happen] but Beyonce had one of the best videos of all time. One of the best videos of all time!”

How rude.

Of course, Kanye later issued an apology on his blog, ON HIS BLOG (talk about a lack of guts): “I’m sooooo sorry to Taylor Swift and her fans and her mom [Andrea]. I spoke to her mother right after and she said the same thing my mother would’ve said. She is very talented! I like the lyrics about being a cheerleader and she’s in the bleachers! …………………… I’m in the wrong for going on stage and taking away from her moment!…………….. Beyonce’s video was the best of this decade!!! I’m sorry to my fans if I let you guys down!!!!! I’m sorry to my friends at MTV. I will apologize to Taylor 2mrw. Welcome to the real world!!!! Everybody wanna booooo me but I’m a fan of real pop culture!!! No disrespect but we watchin’ the show at the cribe right now cause…. Well you know!!!! I’m still happy for Taylor!!!! Boooyaawww!!!! You are very talented!!!!! I gave my awards to Outkast when they deserved it over me… That’s what it is!!!! I’m not crazy yall, I’m just real. Sorry for that!!! I really feel bad for Taylor and I’m sincerely sorry!!! Much Respect!!!!!”

My personal respect for Beyonce' went up about 500%, and I'm not even a fan of hers, when she later won an award and asked Taylor to come up on stage and give her acceptance speech.

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I don't know about you, but I know that I'm sick and tired of people making idiots of themselves and being so disrespectful to others, then thinking all they need to do is apologize and all is well with the world. IT DOESN'T WORK THAT WAY...at least not in my book.

The only way we'll ever really know if someone is sorry for what they've done is if they never do it again. And that takes a LONG, LONG time to happen.

It All Comes Down to Time

2009-09-13T16:03:00.002-04:00

Time.

Such a simple word.

But its meaning? Intense.

There's not enough time at home. I just spent an hour and a half cleaning off the kitchen countertops, the cooktop, the microwave, the front of all the other appliances, and emptying the dishwasher. I'll give it half an hour before the countertops become cluttered and a little dirty. I finished up all the laundry Thursday night. There's a lot more in there now. When am I going to do it? I need to clean the bathrooms. Maybe that will get done yet today. Maybe not. (If I were a betting woman, I'd say probably not.)

I have sooooooo many magazines to read. I subscribe to a few and they are in a stack next to the recliner in the bedroom. Will I ever get them read? Hmmmm...I should probably read the ones from late 2007 first, then go from there.

The living room needs straightened up, as does the den. Maybe I'll do that tomorrow.

OH YEAH....I HAVE TO GO TO WORK TOMORROW.

Yes, work sort of gets in the way.

Speaking of work...part of my job is to administer several different types of tests throughout the school year. We (the other reading intervention teacher and I) spent the first two days of school testing kindergarten students. Then we spent the next week doing a computerized reading assessment test on every child in the building. Last week, we tested most first graders, second graders, and a few third graders on yet another test. We still have to do more third graders and a small number of fourth graders.

AND....

The computerized test we administered during the first full week of school? Well, as the system was backing up last weekend, it crashed. YES, IT CRASHED. As in, all the data was lost. They tried to recover it, but to no avail.

We have to test all the kids in the building with this computerized test again, as soon as our tech coordinator gets every child in the district re-entered into the system.

When are we supposed to do this? I can't wait to actually start TEACHING this year.

Time, more specifically, the lack thereof, frustrates me greatly.

And on a personal note, just as we were getting ready to go to a wedding reception (about an hour away) yesterday late afternoon, Alex came home for the first time since he left for college. We got to spend a wee little bit of time with him, then we had to get ready. After we got home last night, he and his best friend Erica came back to our house and we all spent time together then. Today he's off "doing his thing" and we'll take him back to school this evening. I wish we could spend more time together, but he'll be home again in a couple of weeks. Hopefully then we can schedule some time.

I still want 36 hours in my day. Or Alice from the Brady Bunch.

I'm Baaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaack!

2009-09-09T18:00:00.004-04:00

Yes, I'm finally back to the blogging world! Throughout the last few weeks, "life" has somehow taken over my....well....LIFE.

We got Alex settled into his dorm room at college. It is sooooo tiny! I knew that no matter what I did to organize his stuff, he would change it the minute I walked out the door. So, I made a decision NOT to organize it at all. I am well aware that I can be a controlling person sometimes, but this was one time I tried my hardest to put that aspect of my personality on the back burner. I think it worked. At least a little!

I did pretty well with things until about a week into the process. After a day of meltdown after meltdown, I think I got it out of my system. And things are SO much easier these days than they were way back when I was in college. We text, we facebook, we IM, and we call each other. Surprisingly, he calls home more often than we call him. He seems to be very happy there and I'm thankful of that. At the end of his first week of classes he was asked to write for the college newspaper, so he was excited about that, especially since he's a journalism major.

Joe started his final semester of college here at home. I've tried to back off as much as possible from this "mothering" gig and not pester him about getting his books, working on assignments, studying for tests, etc. He's an adult and it's time for me to let him actually BE one. I'm just hoping that come December, he'll be in the midst of interviews for some kind of a job. With the current state of the economy, especially our local economy, it's going to be rough, but we'll just have to see how things go.

School started for me, and it was totally and completely BUSY from the first second. We've barely had time to take a breath along the way. The other reading intervention teacher and I have done nothing but test, test, and test since school started. We were hoping to be finished by the end of this week, but it's not looking so good right now. I can't wait to start working with kids on a regular basis.

Ted has been working a lot lately, and although it limits his time at home, it's okay. It just means that the plumbing shop is really busy right now, and that's something to be thankful for. Since he's been so busy at work, however, a lot of things are being neglected here at home. We'll get back to them soon though!

I made an executive decision to have our pool closed in the next week or so. I was in this past weekend a few times, and even though the pool is heated, the air temperature just wasn't warm enough to make it comfortable. It's not been a great summer weather-wise around here, and it's time to just let things go until next spring. I just need to call the pool people and make the arrangements.

Our wonderful kitties are doing great, but Marina and Pepina seem to think that since Alex is gone, they need to sleep or walk on me during the night. A few times we've closed our bedroom door at night, but it's hard to just shove them out, then slam the door in their pathetic little faces. For some reason, they don't bother Ted, just me. I guess I should feel honored, hahaha!

I'll be back to commenting on posts very, VERY soon...I promise!

We're Up for Family of the Year (and lots of pictures)

2009-08-19T14:41:00.006-04:00

Our precious son Alex recently asked if we could have a small family cookout to celebrate his leaving for college. In a weak moment, we agreed. He said it would just be the grandparents, local aunts and uncles and his cousins, along with some of his friends. No big deal.

Upon looking at the calendar and using some common sense, we came up with a date. He leaves this Friday, so we did not want it the night before, as it will be absolutely crazy around here, I'm sure. In fact, we didn't want it on a weeknight at all. Sunday really wasn't going to be an option because chances are people would stay late and Ted likes to have very quiet, peaceful Sunday evenings. That left this past Saturday.

That worked out fine for everyone...except for one little minor detail. Alex was leaving Friday afternoon to go to a concert event with his aunt, uncle, and a friend, and would be meeting his cousin Holly there. Afterwards, they would go to Holly's (near Cleveland) and spend the night. They'd get back sometime Saturday afternoon, just about when Alex's "cookout/party" would be starting.

So, in other words, he would not be around to help late Friday afternoon or evening OR Saturday morning.

Then we found out that other people were invited, via word of mouth. The more the merrier, but it would just be nice to have an idea of numbers for food, drink, etc.

Joe was a HUGE help. He worked like crazy around here. Of course he also said that he never wants to have another function here again, but he still helped a LOT. Ted, when he was home and not at work, was a help too.

I spent Friday doing as much cooking and prepping as possible, so things would be easier on Saturday. That went pretty well, until late Friday afternoon when, after scrubbing and cubing 10 lbs of potatoes, my hands and knuckles began throbbing from arthritis. I have arthritis in my knees, and in the past couple of years it's also ventured to my hands. Although it doesn't flare up that often, when it does, it can be more than a little uncomfortable.

Anyway, we were planning on eating around 6:00 pm, but people could come anytime after 2:00 to use the pool.

Alex got home close to 2:00, then took a shower, so he could be "fresh" when he received guests.

(All I'm gonna say is that just ONCE I'd like to show up at a party given for me and have everything already done and totally under control. There. I said it. Now I feel better.)

I think everyone had a great time!

Pepina even got in on things. She laid in the bedroom window and supervised the pool activities.

Eventually I got some pictures of Alex and a few of his friends. I even got them to form the famous O-H-I-O. If you're not from Ohio, you may not understand, but in Buckeye country, it's a big deal.

There was plenty of pool, sun, food, and drink!

Alex has been whining about how I've been taking pictures of different things, but I think that deep down inside, he's glad.

So, we should be awarded the "Family of the Year" prize for getting everything ready for HIS cookout/party while HE wasn't even around.

Somehow, I doubt that'll happen, but I think he appreciated it. At least he told us he did.

Postage Update and More

2009-08-17T14:27:00.003-04:00

As far as my last post about postage is concerned, we have been purchasing the Forever stamps for a while, but had these stamps. I thought that perhaps they were Forever stamps, but just didn't say FOREVER on them because we all know how the postal system doesn't think like the rest of us.

I have NOT received any of the things I mailed back. I know for a fact that the invitations I sent out did NOT arrive postage due. As far as the other things, I have no idea. No one has contacted me about it, if they did. I had a return address label on everything I sent out, so things could have been easily returned.

I still think that the situation shows that the USPS is, at the very least, incompetent.

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My calendar shows that today is Monday, August 17.

This is not at all possible, as it has only recently become hot and humid. Additionally, I still have the list of books I want to read this summer and it is not yet completed. I also have an even L O N G E R list of things to accomplish around the house this summer. That, too, is not ~~started~~ finished.

Rumor has it that our younger son is leaving for college in four days and his things are not only still not packed, BUT still not completely purchased.

Have I ever mentioned that August is my absolutely favorite month???

No?

Maybe that's because it's NOT.

And They Wonder Why They're Losing Money

2009-08-12T20:52:00.004-04:00

Over the past week and a half I've had to mail a bunch of things. Ted takes care of the bills, so I don't pay a lot of attention to return address labels or stamps. I know where they are (in a small basket on one of the counters) and use them when I need them.

I've sent out a variety of things to different departments at the university Alex will be attending. I'm part of a group of people who meet for breakfast a couple of times each summer, and occasionally during the school year. Sunday night I sent out 9 invitations to breakfast. In addition to these things, I had to send a couple of payments for different things (I don't pay ALL my bills online, just some of them) and a few other miscellaneous items too.

This evening I was getting ready to send out some belated birthday cards (I've mentioned many times that I'm a severe procrastinator), I noticed that the stamp roll was getting low. I asked Ted if we had more stamps anywhere. He told me that he keeps all the stamps in a basket with the bills. I told him that the smaller basket had the stamps and return address labels. Then he said that those were OLD stamps and he had no idea what their value was, but they certainly weren't current. I told him he must be mistaken because I'd been using them. He said he was sure they were old.

So...I got online and finally found out that the stamps that I've been using for the past week and a half are only worth 39 cents. It now costs 44 cents to mail a letter.

I've not received a single mailed item back, and to the best of my knowledge, nothing arrived at its destination postage due. I know that the invitations were received because I had a few calls about them.

I did NOT purposely deceive the United States Postal System. However, is it not their responsibility to notice if the wrong postage has been attached? Everything had a return address label, so they could have returned everything to me. But they didn't.

Had the cost been printed on the stamps, I would have known their value. After a 10 minute search online, I discovered that I needed to look on the flagpole on the stamp. At the bottom of the flagpole "2007" is imprinted. Now I was just at the eye doctor's Saturday morning for an exam and my near vision is 20/20, HOWEVER, I was not able to see the "2007" without a magnifying glass.

Do I feel bad about this? Nope.

To me, this situation reinforces the ineptitude of the USPS. And they wonder why they're losing money.

Four Years

2009-08-09T12:22:00.002-04:00

Today I reach the four year mark of a cancer diagnosis.

WOW.

It was a challenging time for all of us. We had just broken ground on our new home about a month before. I was getting things ready to start the school year for me. Alex and I were back-to-school shopping for him. Joe was about to begin his first year of college.

BOOM!

Out of nowhere appears a five day horrendous stomachache, a trip to the ER, testing all night long, then being admitted, more testing, discovering a tumor in my colon, then surgery to remove it.

Then there was a hospital stay of almost a week, adjusting to a colostomy, relying on the visiting nurse to teach us how to change the colostomy appliance, then thanking GOD for such a fantastic husband.

After that I dealt with not being able to start the school year, seeing our oldest son start college at a local university branch, then a fall outside the orthodontist's office, in which I cracked a couple of ribs.

Throughout which time I had begun meeting with oncologists, and discussing chemo.

Yes, it was a busy time. I can remember saying, "I just wish I could fast forward a few years and have this all behind me."

Now it's definitely a few years later and things are going extremely well. I'm ready to start the countdown to the almighty five year mark.

No matter how old you are, please consider having a colonoscopy!

The Dorm Room

2009-08-07T14:20:00.000-04:00

Several times this summer I've told Alex that there will be two single beds, two desks, and two dressers all in a room the size of his bedroom when he's at school. He kept telling me that he understood, but I really don't think he did until he actually saw his dorm room.

At least he has a nice view out of his window.

Apparently the desks are fixed to the wall and attached to each other. I'm not crazy about that, but there's nothing I can do about it.

This "closet" is about 27" wide and the dresser is 24" wide. Hello??? Have they not seen what my son plans on bringing? (I have a strong suspicion that he'll be adjusting his list of items.)

The janitor told Alex and his dad that the boys can take the beds apart or keep them as bunks. It's up to them. I told Alex that it would be a great idea to be especially nice to the janitor, as she is in a position to be a BIG help at some point this year.

Alex and Danny (his roommate) have no idea what they're going to do with the room yet, but I'm not going to worry about it. This is no longer my concern. I've had to relinquish control of this situation because no matter what I do on "move in" day or suggest, they're going to do what they want in the end.

It'll be a very interesting year.

Marina

2009-08-05T14:47:00.004-04:00

If you're not a pet lover, then just skip this post and check back in a couple of days.

If you ARE a pet lover, you'll totally understand this.

The other day I was cleaning out the refrigerator. When I opened up the drawer where we keep deli items Marina just about went crazy. See, she likes turkey breast. I mean she REALLY LIKES turkey breast. She will sit on the tile floor in front of the refrigerator, waiting for someone to open the door, hoping that they will toss a small piece of turkey her way. Afterall, she's withering away to nothing, as you can plainly see. She jumped up on the counter across from the fridge and leaned toward it so much I thought she was going to fall off. (Yes, I gave her a little piece of turkey.)

After her little belly was satisfied, she jumped up on the other counter, then on top of the fridge, then on top of the cabinets to her perch. When she gets up there, she likes to watch what's going on around the house, and she can do so without being bothered. We wouldn't bother her if she weren't so darn cute and cuddly though. That's what she gets for being adorable and loving.

While I was cleaning out the fridge, I noticed that we had some Pillsbury Crescent rolls that were about to expire, so I decided to add them to the evening menu.

I fixed dinner at the normal time, but Ted was working late. Alex and I were ready to eat, so I began to get things out on the table. After I put the crescent rolls out (you can see just how fancy we truly are here...I baked them on a foil covered cookie sheet and didn't even bother to put them in a bread basket) I turned to take the chicken out of the oven. When I turned back around, a little head popped up in Ted's seat. Now the cats had already eaten, but Marina just likes to be socialable. No, she did NOT get a crescent roll and was moved to the floor after I took the picture.

As Alex and I finished eating, Mimi (Marina's nickname) decided that she wanted to eat with us. I hadn't finished my risotto and just moved my plate aside as Alex and I were talking. Mimi must have really liked how it smelled because she was ready to climb into my plate. I put a little bit down on the table and she went to town with it. Somehow I was able to get a shot of her as her tongue was sticking out.

(**disclaimer** Our table and countertops are washed off several times throughout the day as we prefer NOT to have cat hair in our food. We use kitchen cleaner spray, along with soap and water, and as soon as Mimi was done with the risotto, I thoroughly cleaned off the entire table, especially the area where she was licking.)

Is she not just the cutest thing?

A Picture is Worth a Thousand Words

2009-08-03T14:04:00.001-04:00

But you know how I am, and I just can't let it go. I have to "say something."

Last Friday Alex went to his college to see his dorm room and meet his roommate. They set aside a special day for that and I think it's a great idea.

I was going to go, but I had gotten pretty sick the day before and after a discussion it was determined that I would be a detriment rather than an asset, so I stayed home. However, I was able to give explicit instructions as to what I wanted pictures of (the dorm room from all angles and a shot of the view outside the window) and various measurements.

When they got home I uploaded the pictures and really studied each and every one. Then this one came up and I had to catch my breath.

My little boy has grown up.

He's in that picture all alone, with no parents to guide him. We just have to hope that we've done all we can to develop a strong sense of values and morals.

His dorm is right behind him, the place where he will be living for the next four years. Have we prepared him to live without our daily reminders of various things? I sure hope so.

Deep down, I know he'll be fine. But he's the baby, and I reserve the right to worry about him.

Another thing that went through my mind when I saw this picture...."Alex! Stand up straight! And get a hair cut!"

Yep, he'll be fine.

I Don't Get Out Much

2009-08-02T11:50:00.008-04:00

A week ago my mother and I attended a bridal shower, about an hour or so away. One of my cousins is marrying a wonderful woman, and his aunts hosted a shower for her. The aunts happen to also be my cousins.

JoMarie and Patty, my "classy" cousins

Confused yet?

If you're not, then you must be italian. That's all I can say. We use the term "cousin" to refer to first cousin, second cousin, third cousin, once removed, twice removed, hundred times removed. We're pretty much ALL just family.

The "aunts," aka my cousins Patty and JoMarie, are classy ladies. They don't do anything half-way. When I received the invitation for the shower, I knew it wasn't going to just be a gathering at someone's house where we have sandwiches, chips, and cake. They like to do things with grace and style, and believe me, they did.

The shower was held in a little place that does special events and catering. The setting was intimate, yet not too crowded. There were around 32 people there and we all fit just fine, with room to walk around the tables.

There were two bottles of wine on each table...a bottle of red and a bottle of white. Not being a wine connoisseur myself, I stuck with ice water. Besides, I was driving. My mom, however, enjoys a good glass of wine or two...or three. I didn't want to cut into her supply. (she's gonna yell at me for saying that)

The italian genes skipped me when it came to wine and spicy food. I've had a rough time dealing with the feeling of being overlooked, but with continued therapy, I may come to terms with it eventually, sigh.

So, back to the shower. This was no buffet, let me tell you. We were actually served each course. Before the salad was placed before us, we had huge cloth napkins in pewter napkin rings. Oh MY...very classy indeed. The salad had several varieties of lettuce, tomato, a cube of cheese, slivered almonds and cranberries, with italian dressing. I was amazed at the flavor the cranberries gave the salad! The rolls were fabulous too.

Then came the entrees...OH.MY.

We had a side of tortellini with a parmesan sauce, along with baked chicken breast with capers, and green beans. I'm not a huge capers fan, but each and every bite of everything else was absolutely delicious. I could go on and on about each thing, but it would only make you cry because you weren't there to share in the feast, so I'll be thoughtful and considerate and just leave the entree at that.

My mom, and her sister, my Aunt D, and if you look closely enough, you can see the crumbs of the wonderful food.

After eating, we watched Carrie open her gifts. She received so many nice things, and they were useful too. She didn't get things that will be shoved in the back of the closet, only to be seen when the closet gets cleaned out.

Carrie received really nice gifts!

As she was finishing up with the gifts, the dessert came out.

If you're hungry right now, you probably should just stop reading and check back another day, because it's about to get intense.

The cheesecake was honestly the BEST cheesecake I've ever had. It was light and fluffy and had such a wonderful flavor. In the middle of it was just a dot of raspberry something or other. (I also missed out on the "classy" gene and therefore, have no idea what it was, but it tasted like raspberry) AND on the side of the plate was the most delicate, juicy, robust chocolate covered strawberry! Honestly, the dessert was almost indescribable.

Assolutamente delizioso!

The nice thing about events like this (other than the obvious) is that generations of women get together and talk, getting caught up with each other, sharing laughs, and there were some real laughs going on that day.

Dinah is on the left. She's 91 years old! She used to have a restaurant and told me that every time we went there when I was little, all I wanted was chicken. And I distinctly remember that too. Chicken, and Salem potato chips. Patty, one of the "classy" hosts is in the center, along with another cousin Anna. Doesn't Anna have the prettiest smile?

My cousin Davene had just finished telling me about her upcoming trip to South America. She's been to Africa twice. I keep telling her that when I go on vacation, I want HOT and COLD running water, flush toilets, a shower, air conditioning, maid service, and restaurants. She insisted that they had all those things in Africa.

Yeah, right.

Here is Anna again, with Carrie, the bride-to-be, and Carrie's mom.

We really had a nice time at the shower and I'm so glad that I went.

I'll let you in on a little secret now...I usually avoid baby and bridal showers at all costs. They are definitely not my thing. However, when Patty and JoMarie are involved, count me in!

Those ladies know how to throw a great party! I think they should get into this line of work when they retire from their real jobs. Apparentlt, they especially do a great job at picking out wine. Of course it took quite a while to find just the right wines. They worked really hard at taste testing each and every flavor...multiple times. But being the perfectionists they are, they stuck with the task until they found something that met their expectations.

This was my "big" excursion for the summer, believe it or not. Keep in mind, that is by choice. I don't like to go places while I'm off work. I prefer to stay home, in my own little world, with everything else going on around me.

BUT, I'm so glad I went...I had a great time and enjoyed seeing everyone.

The wedding is in September, and it will be yet another opportunity to get together with all the cousins and have a wonderful time!

The Best Gift Ever

2009-07-22T00:18:00.005-04:00

We broke ground for our new home on July 11, 2005. It was a day long in coming, as we had spent months talking to our builder, making plans, etc.

That particular morning, my sister-in-law (known as AP, for Aunt Patty) called as she was leaving for work. She and Ted's brother live behind us. It was around 7:05 am, and she asked if I knew that there was activity on our lot and people there. I had no idea!

I thanked her, then jumped out of bed, got dressed, grabbed my camera and headed to the lot. Our builder, Mario, was surprised to see me, and said that he had wanted to surprise me and was going to call me in a little while. I told him that I had "people" keeping an eye on things for me, hahaha.

They had to scrape the topsoil off and move it to the back of the lot before doing anything else. That's when I first realized that I was thankful that lawn mowing is NOT in my job description. The lot seemed really deep. Of course, it's not as deep as it looks, but it seemed to go waaaaaaaaaaaaayyyyyyyyyyyyyyyyy back.

There were different people there that day...Mario, the excavator, several of Mario's guys, and Ted stopped by for a little while too.

It was like watching a well choreographed ballet, seeing how they did all their stuff and never got in each others' way.

Soon, we had a hole dug.

That's Tim and Patty's house in the background, and that's corn growing in the field. Our new home was going to be in the middle of a corn field. 2005 was the last year for the corn. Since then alfalfa has been growing in the fields. It doesn't look like it in this picture, but the basement is pretty deep. Apparently the depth is measured by blocks, and it's at least one block deeper than normal. That wasn't my call. In fact, I had nothing to do with that decision.

The one thing that Ted was looking forward to most of all was getting a John Deere riding lawn tractor. He was so excited about that. In fact, a mere 11 days after the ground was broken, he asked me to go to the local John Deere dealership and check on the lawn tractors.

Now everything I knew, or needed to know, about riding mowers, excuse me lawn tractors, can fit in a thimble. I was pretty much at their mercy.

But off I went, and spent a good bit of time talking to a salesman. I told him we weren't in any rush, as all we had was a hole in the ground and the footer poured. He chuckled a little when I explained that my husband just felt that we absolutely HAD to get this NOW because there was always a chance that the house could be completed in the next few weeks! (Note the sarcasm.)

So after we went inside and I was sitting at his desk and he was explaining the differences in the models to me, my cell phone rang. I excused myself to see who it was. It was Ted, so I knew I had to answer it. He asked where I was and I told him.

"So you're there right now?"

"Yep."

"How do they look?"

"Like riding mowers."

"Cindi, they're LAWN TRACTORS, not mowers."

"Okay...what do you want me to do here?"

"Well BUY one!"

"Which one??"

"Whichever one you think is best."

At this point I'm just wondering if he has any clue that I am pretty much out of my element.

"So you want me to actually purchase this today?"

"Heck yes! Happy Birthday honey!"

That's right...I got a John Deere riding lawn tractor for my birthday. And I've yet to use it. And I plan on keeping it that way.

But as a little side note, it was delivered to Tim's, and kept in one of the sheds. He was so excited to finally have a John Deere, that he mowed Tim's grass for the rest of the summer and into the fall of 2005.

We moved into our new home in March of 2006 and the yard wasn't put in until late April, so it was late May before he finally got to use MY birthday gift on OUR yard...but that's okay. It keeps him out of trouble!

College Roommate

2009-07-20T12:50:00.000-04:00

Several days ago in the mail, Alex received the name of his college roommate. He can be such a dillweed at times.

(Dillweed is a word we use in our family, indicating that someone isn't thinking straight, or perhaps isn't thinking the way the rest of us think they should.)

He got his name, his home address, and his college email address. I suggested he email him. His response?

"I'll wait until he gets his information and then he can contact me."

"And there's a problem with YOU contacting HIM first?"

"Well, he won't get his letter until tomorrow at least."

(The college is 50 minutes away from us, but his roommate is from Rockville, Maryland.)

Whatever...

"You know that's going to make you look like a stuck up brat, right?"

"No, it's not."

Whatever...

Of course, this didn't stop him from doing an immediate Facebook/MySpace search for the guy. He came up empty, and then a little while later, I did some checking.

Amateurs.

It took me all of 30 seconds to get an aerial view of the guy's house (thank you google maps), then about 45 seconds to find out where he graduated from high school, another 10 seconds to see pictures from his high school graduation and prom. Within another minute or so, I knew the guy's nickname, and 10 seconds after that, found him on Facebook.

Alex was jealous that I found that all out so quickly and he had gotten nowhere, hahaha.

The next day, as Alex was getting ready to leave for work, he came into the den and told me that the guy must have gotten his letter because he added Alex as a friend on Facebook. Of course, being the "concerned" mother I am (also known as nosy by my sons) I waited until Alex left, then thoroughly studied the roommate's pictures and profile on Facebook.

Late that night, the two of them had a short Facebook conversation. When Alex told me about it the next day, I asked what they talked about. (Don't you just love 18 year old males???)

"I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know? You talked, right?"

"Yeah, but only for about 5 minutes."

"Did you happen to ask him why he chose ********* for college since he lives so far away?"

"No."

"What's his major?"

"I don't know."

"Does he have any brothers or sisters?"

"I have no idea."

"What did you TALK about??"

"Just stuff."

Okay, WHATEVER...

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out. The students get to see their dorm room and meet their roommate on July 31. I don't know if the roommate will come all the way from Maryland or not, but we'll definitely be there, just to see the room and stuff. It should be interesting, to say the least.
The room is small and Alex will have to adjust to sleeping in a twin bed as opposed to the queen size bed he's used to. The closet is pretty small, and he has more clothes than the rest of the family put together. He has already accepted the fact that he will not be able to take all of his clothes with him.

Oh yeah, they're on the THIRD floor in a building with NO air conditioning and NO elevator. Better him than me.

Summer?

2009-07-19T12:39:00.003-04:00

Okay, people who really know me will absolutely NOT believe I'm saying this, but here goes...

We need a few HOT, HUMID days! The weather has been warm, at best, and I'm ready for some heat and humidity.

(Yes, it's really me talking, for real!)

Highs in the low 70s just isn't cutting it right now.

I'm just hoping that it doesn't suddenly become miserable at the end of August, just as teachers and kids are going back to school. That wouldn't be good.

Yes, it could be worse. The highs could be in the 60s or we could be having constant rain right now, so I shouldn't complain.

A Fashion Statement

2009-07-14T11:52:00.004-04:00

This morning I went to breakfast with a group of school friends. Although we are not all in the same building right now, at one time or another we all spent time at the same place. A few have retired, a few have gone to different buildings in the district, and a few have gone to another district.

We try to do this at least once a summer, and occasionally throughout the school year, although that hasn't happened too often the last few years.

Unfortunately, not everyone was able to make it today, but there ended up being six of us and it was really nice to get caught up on each other's lives.

As I was driving home, thinking about things we talked about, and basically being thankful to have friends like this, my attention was quickly diverted to something I saw on the sidewalk.

There was a male, walking in the same direction I was driving, on the same side of the street as I was. I saw his backside.

This person appeared to be an adult, or at the very least in his late teens. He had on black shorts and gray boxers.

How do I know the color of his boxers, you may be thinking?

WELL...the shorts were only pulled up to the bottom of his butt cheeks. His entire butt (thank goodness for the boxers) was hanging out over the shorts. And he didn't have a shirt on either, so there was no mistaking what I saw.

Once I pulled my jaw up from the floor of the car, I almost pressed the window down and yelled, "Pull up your pants!" but thought better of it.

What I should have done was drive around the block and take a picture of him to post here, but I didn't think of it.

Now I've seen guys walking around with the top of their boxers showing, but this was a little ridiculous. His entire rear end was hanging out!

I don't like seeing sagging shorts, or pants, for that matter. I guess I should be thankful that he had on boxers, but the whole thing is just a bit too much, in my opinion.

I'm beginning to sound like my mother, yikes!

Twittering?

2009-07-13T13:58:00.003-04:00

Am I missing the big picture here?

What is so special about Twitter? I got a twitter account and the whole thing seems pretty lame to me. I'm probably going to delete it.

I don't need to know every little thing that goes on in people's lives. I don't need to share every little thing that goes on in my life.

So what am I missing here? What's the big deal about Twitter?

I've spent most of my twitter time deleting people from my list. All these "people" want to follow me and I don't know them, nor am I interested in their products, so I dump them.

If anyone has a Twitter account out there and can tell me why it would be beneficial to keep it, please do so, because I'm just not getting it.

I Need a New Phone

2009-07-11T14:24:00.005-04:00

I need a new cell phone. Mine is two years old and it doesn't even hold a charge for more than about an hour. I don't use it very often, but I have a feeling that I'll be using it much more often this fall when Alex is away at college.

(I use the term "away" very loosely because he'll be about 50 minutes down the road.)

Lucky for him, I discovered that I can send him text messages via my Yahoo Messenger. I prefer using the keyboard with the desktop computer over my cell phone. Trying to type using only the number pads is a long, painful process on my phone.

I'm thinking of getting a Blackberry Curve. It has a full keyboard, and that's what I'll need if I have to text from my phone. Anyone have any experience with them?

I sure hope it comes in red.

I'm Such a Mean Mother

2009-07-09T23:41:00.004-04:00

At dinner the other night, I told Alex to put his phone away.

"But Mom, someone's sending me a text."

"That doesn't mean you need to read it right away. I don't think it's necessary to have your phone at the table."

"But Mom...."

"Put it away. NOW."

Ted interjected here. "Your mom's right. You shouldn't have your phone at the dinner table."

He barely ate anything because he wanted some private one-on-one time with his phone.

Honestly.

Imagine me expecting him to eat dinner with us without his phone. I'm so mean.

I'm Like the Godfather

2009-07-06T12:13:00.005-04:00

I've practically become a recluse this summer. I go as few places as possible. When the kids were younger, I'd be on the go constantly. In fact, there was rarely a day in which we didn't go at least two places. I'm older now, and those days are far behind me.

Normally we have a family cookout on the 4th of July, but this year we didn't. Ted's brother and sister-in-law (UT and AP for short) had been planning on a mini-vacation for the weekend. Since they wouldn't be able to be here, I decided that it was a good time to break with tradition, and we didn't organize a cookout.

Then my friend Terre (a frequent commenter here), her husband, one of her daughters and this daughter's fiance' were spending the weekend in Ohio, seeing her dad and a very dear friend. They asked if they could stop for a visit on the 4th.

OF COURSE YOU CAN STOP!!!

Then, toward the end of last week, I found out that AP and UT's plans had changed and they weren't going on their weekend get-away. Instead, they were planning a big cookout for the 4th, and we were invited. Ted told them that we had visitors coming from out of state and we wouldn't be able to make it until later on, if at all.

In the meantime, remember when we went to Sam's Club back in March and I found a patio set that I really liked? Well, it went on sale! So Friday night Ted and Joe went to go get it. It was sort of an "involved" situation, but the bottom line is that the patio set that I really wanted is now on our pack porch and I'm very pleased with it.

So Saturday afternoon, Terre and her entourage arrived. She and her husband are great people. They have so many life experiences because of his years in the military and the fact that they live fairly close to Washington, DC. She's a middle school special ed teacher too. I have so much respect for her. I don't handle the middle schoolers very well. They can drive me crazy.

Terre and Rus have four kids and we'd met two of them before. This time they brought their younger daughter Alyse, and her fiance' David. We had a very nice time talking for a few hours. It was great to see them again.

While they were here, some people from AP and UT's cookout came over to see Ted's sister and brother-in-law's new home next door to us. (Just a reminder...once Peg and Mac actually move in next door, we'll all be living together on the "compound"...UT is a Kennedy fan, and likes to refer to the area where our houses are as such.)

Our niece Kelly came over to us while we were on the back porch, with her son Michael for a few minutes, while Terre and Rus were here. We don't get to see Michael very often, so that was really nice. As people were leaving from going through the new house next door, they shouted over a little so we had a "brief" conversation.

After Terre and her family left, another group went to see the house next door, led by our other niece Holly. After they came out, Holly and her friends came over and sat with us for a while and we all talked.

The day reminded me of the movie, The Godfather, when everyone went to see Don Corleone, instead of him going to see them.

I sort of like it. Like I said, I'm becoming a recluse this summer, and it's working out for me. I'm sure it's driving others crazy, and maybe that's not so good, but for right now, I'm enjoying it.

So if you want to see me, you know where I am...and if you call and I don't answer the phone, don't be offended. Recluses sometimes don't even want to be bothered with phone calls, hahaha!

I Love Evenings Like This

2009-07-03T09:41:00.004-04:00

Last Saturday evening we went to dinner with friends that live about 35-40 minutes away. They came here and we went to a small, local restaurant and had a wonderful meal. They have the best salad and garlic bread. I could easily fill up on just that. They also serve wonderful strawberry daiquiris. (I only have one...apparently I tend to get a little goofy when I have more than that, and we definitely don't want that to happen! At least that's what Ted says.)

After dinner we came back to our house and Joe and Alex had started a fire in our small fire pit on the patio.

It was so relaxing.

We sat there and talked for several hours.

"K" and I have been friends since she moved to our community for our 6th grade year. Her family moved to another town about 40 miles away when we were juniors in high school. We've remained friends ever since. We got married a month apart. Their wedding was smaller than ours. They basically eloped and got married on their way to the Carolinas.

We've gone through a lot together over the years, and her husband "J" is a great guy. She had to do a little training with him early on, but he adapted well, hahaha!

They had their first child about a year after they got married (they have three) and about nine months after they had their last one, we had our first, Joe.

I love evenings like this...

A Survey

2009-06-30T12:40:00.004-04:00

I found this at TeacherMom and thought it might be sort of fun to do. I rarely do these kinds of things, but since I lead such a boring life during the summer, I'll give it a shot. Consider doing it yourself. If you do, let me know in the comments section so I can go check out your answers!

1. summer television: waste of time or guilty pleasure?
mostly a waste of time, in my opinion

2. baked potatoes: butter, sour cream, bacon bits, chives, cheese? any or all?
butter, most definitely; NO sour cream or chives; bacon bits and cheese, all depending on my mood at the time

3. Facebook: must-do or proud resister?
I'm a facebook member and have enjoyed getting back in touch with old friends; I don't get it with Alex's facebook account though...he has people on his "friends" list that he doesn't even really know. I told him to just delete them. There's no prize for the most facebook friends.

4. coupon clipping: yes or no?
occasionally, when the mood hits me just right OR when the checkbook balance is l o w

5. babyback ribs or key lime pie?
definitely babyback ribs, as I don't care for key lime pie

6. Jeopardy or Wheel of Fortune?
Now this is a tough one...I like Wheel because I'm pretty good at figuring out the answers before anyone else in my family; I like Jeopardy because there are more individual "things" to answer (or ask, if you're playing by the rules).

I actually called Wheel of Fortune back in 1983, hoping to be a contestant. We were going to California on vacation and I thought it was a perfect opportunity. Unfortunately they were not taking applications for contestants at that time.

7. ocean waves or lazy river?
It would have to be a lazy river, even though I've never been on one. I'm not crazy about being in the ocean past knees, with all the different "things" floating around. But I do just LOVE being right by the ocean....feeling the waves wash up against my feet, the sand squishing between my toes, and seeing the vastness of it all.

8. pickles: dill or sweet?
definitely bread and butter

9. the economy: still ick or rebounding?
I'm thinking that it's still "ick" but starting to bottom out

10. eBay or Craigslist?
neither one...I've never bought or sold anything with either one

11. Mexican food or sushi?
neither one, yuck

12. Edward, Jacob, or who cares?
Who are Edward and Jacob?

13. pregnancy dreams: annoying or humorous?
I didn't have any weird dreams while pregnant, but when I've taken a vicodin in the past, definitely ANNOYING! I try to avoid vicodin as long as possible, because those are really goofy dreams.

14. summer thunderstorms: music to your ears or pain in the rear?
I like thunderstorms.

15. online games: good way to pass the time at work on a Friday or who has the time?
I don't play them at work, but at home, I love to play.

16. So You Think You Can Dance: addicting entertainment or yawn?
a big yawn

17. beach or mountains?
definitely the BEACH!

18. hardback or paperback?
Either one is fine with me, but if I'm pushed to come up with an answer, I guess it would be hardback.

19. Pepsi or Coke?
Definitely PEPSI! There's something in Coke that makes me sick to my stomach, but I'll drink Sprite. That doesn't bother me in the least.

20. Ellie or Josh? any bets?
Who?

And that, my dear friends, is my life in a nutshell.

Remember, if you do it, let me know!

No Trip

2009-06-30T03:36:00.003-04:00

The Cedar Point trip didn't work out. There were too many schedules to coordinate so it has been postponed indefinitely.

Okay, so secretly, I'm glad. Even though Alex agreed to all of the things we mentioned, I would still have worried like crazy.

When you have 10 people involved, it gets difficult to find a common day for everyone.

Yippeee!

(But you didn't hear that from me!)

Opinions Needed

2009-06-25T09:55:00.004-04:00

First of all, let me start off with addressing my older son Joe. He does not like to have his "life" splattered on your monitor, and has made that very clear to me. Therefore, I rarely speak of him on my blog. That doesn't mean that I love him any less; I simply try to honor his wishes. However, he knows that once in a while, his name will come up here.

Now for the current "issue" of the house, and the reason I am requesting opinions.

Alex and eight of his friends (ages 16-19) want to go to Cedar Point Amusement Park on Monday. The park is three hours away and they would need to take two vehicles.

They're just not thinking ahead and that is driving me nuts. Admission price at the gate is $43.99, but you can get discounted tickets at various places, like AAA. But there are NO discounts available at the gate. Have they thought about getting their tickets here first?? Have they thought about looking at a map of the place and sort of planning their day? I told Alex that when we went to Cedar Point back in the early 1990s, we followed someone's advice of going straight to the back of the park first because the lines for the "big" rides were very short, if there was any line at all. Then work your way forward. This helped us out tremendously. These kids really just sort of want to fly by the seat of their pants on this trip, sigh.

After much discussion, Ted and I have decided to let him go, but with some guidelines. This is where I need some unbiased thoughts.

First of all, I'm a little concerned because none of these kids have ever driven three hours straight. I know the time will fly by because they'll all be talking and having fun, but I'm worried about distractions for the driver.
I told Alex that I want all of their cell phone numbers and a list with their parents' names and home phone numbers, just in case something were to happen.
When I asked him who would be driving which cars, he said that they probably wouldn't decide until they were ready to walk out the door. That's a BIG NO, in my opinion. Whichever vehicles are going to be taken need to be reliable and filled with gas. This should be done ahead of time.
I think it's important that one person be designated to ride up front and be in charge of communication with the other vehicle. The drivers should NOT be messing around with cell phones AT ALL.
To be fair, everyone in each vehicle (except the driver) should financially contribute about $8 to "the kitty." This money will be used for turnpike charges, parking fee ($10 to park!), and gas.
The park opens at 10:00 am, so if they want to be there then, they will need to leave here around 7. The park closes at 10:00 pm, and if they stay until closing, everyone will be a little tired. The person riding up front will need to promise to stay awake, to basically make sure the driver stays awake, on the way home. They should also stop for a few minutes about halfway home, just to stretch and get some fresh air.
I want a phone call when they get to the park, and another phone call when they leave to come home.
We want Alex to be one of the drivers and take my car (a Chevy Trailblazer) because it has OnStar and it's newer and pretty safe.
The vehicles should stay fairly close together on the trip up and the trip back, just in case something were to go wrong somewhere along the line.

Now...am I being unreasonable? I admit that most of this is my doing and Ted just agreed to it.

Alex thinks I am and put a rather nasty bulletin on his MySpace page last night. This morning, however, it was gone, so he obviously deleted it after some thought.

We haven't spent 18 and a half years raising this young man for him to be hurt or killed on a trip to an amusement park. Yet, he'll be away at college starting this fall and I won't know most of what is going on with him.

So there it is...please give me your opinions.

Button, Button, Who Has the Button? (ME)

2009-06-20T11:56:00.006-04:00

The other night I was all comfy in the recliner and an episode of Seinfeld came on. I enjoy the show, but I'm not a HUGE fan or anything like that. I'll watch it if there's nothing else on. (My sons, however, have each and every episode practically memorized.) I was just winding down, getting ready to go to bed and it happened to come on after the news. I was going to turn the TV off in a few minutes anyway.

At the beginning of this particular episode, Jerry was doing his stand-up routine, as usual, and he began to talk about buttons. He mentioned the extra buttons you get with shirts, jackets, etc. Then he asked if it was really that difficult to find a brown button in a store, or something to that effect. He even commented about people who have all those buttons stashed in a drawer somewhere.

I almost raised my hand.

My nightstand drawer is my "junk" drawer. But, believe it or not, I know what's in there and where it is.

If you look carefully in this picture, you can see the laser pointer that we use to play with the cats, my ever present Lip Dew, a pair of toenail clippers, tweezers, a clothespin, eyedrops, Vicks inhaler, one of many hospital bracelets I've accumulated over the past few years, a pair of scissors, an orange shoestring (again, a toy for the cats), a random Q-tip, and of course....BUTTONS.

It's always nice to know that I fit into a category that Jerry Seinfeld addresses.

And for the record, this is only ONE corner of ONE drawer in my nightstand, and this is no way indicative of how I run my life. At least not in every way. But don't ask my family about that.

Go Ahead...Tell Me I Over-react

2009-06-18T13:13:00.003-04:00

Yesterday afternoon I was starting dinner. The weather had been a little goofy all day, rain on and off, mostly sprinkling. It seemed a little humid, but never hot.

Shortly after 3:30, I thought I heard a siren outside. I opened up the door and listened, and it was the tornado siren. Joe and Alex were both back in their bedrooms, so I went back there and told them that we were going to the basement. I told them to gather up the cats and get downstairs. I needed to go turn off the burners on the stove and put a few things back in the refrigerator.

Suddenly, I felt my "teacher-mode" kick in. I stood at the door to the basement, telling them to get moving, making sure that I would be the last one down there.

(Our basement is not an "ordinary" basement. We have 10 rooms of varying size down there and all the amenities of the main floor, except for a computer, so it's not like we were heading to a dungeon or anything.)

Joe couldn't find Marina. Oliver and Pepina were down there with Alex. We tried to get her out of hiding by opening up the refrigerator and pulling out the drawer where we keep lunch meat. She begs for turkey on an hourly basis, and whenever she hears that drawer open, she comes running. However, this time, she stayed hidden. I just told Joe that it was doubtful that anything would happen, so we were going down without her.

After we get down there, I turned on the TV on to watch the Weather Channel. They said that we were under a tornado warning until 4:00. So we stayed there until 4:00, even though we could see out the windows and there was no rain or wind.

When Ted got home from work, shortly after we came upstairs, I asked him where he was during the sirens. "Heading back to the shop."

So was I the only one taking this seriously?

A little after 6:00, the weather was getting nasty, and the sirens started again. Alex was over at Aunt Patty and Uncle Tim's house with some other people. I texted him and asked if they were inside. He said that they were all in the garage with the garage door closed. I strongly suggested that they at least go inside. He texted back, "I'm fine."

I mentioned to Ted that maybe we should go downstairs...he said we were okay on the main floor. They kept breaking in for emergency messages on TV. The Weather Channel even mentioned us by name (I just love Jim Cantore.)

So again, was I the only one taking this seriously?

Or was I over-reacting?

My mom called later on and asked me, in a teasing way, if we had come up from the basement yet.

Our local newspaper does a poll every day. I wish they would poll their readers, asking how many went to their basements during yesterday's tornado warnings.

And for the record, when we came back upstairs earlier, Marina came out of hiding and was sitting on the kitchen floor.

Happy Anniversary

2009-06-16T10:46:00.005-04:00

This past Sunday was our anniversary. For the most part, the time has just flown by. We were young when we got married...we were both 21. We had to do a lot of growing up during those first few years, but I wouldn't change it for anything. At the time, we thought we knew what life was all about.

We did a lot of planning for the wedding and reception, but realized very soon after, that a wedding does not a marriage make.

Like almost every couple out there, we were faced with a variety of issues, but we always got through them. We dealt with the minor things (like a car breaking down, trying to pick out furniture together) and the major things (Ted's dad's illness and death, my cancer), but each of those events made us, as a couple, stronger. They have contributed to who and where we are today.

Although this picture was taken last summer at Bravo, it's one of the most current of just the two of us together.

Saturday night we went to Bravo again and had a very nice time and a great meal. Ted had redskin potatoes that came with his crab cakes and he wanted me to taste one. They were fantastic! I always order the same thing when I go there. I look at the menu, but end up getting pasta bolognese, and it's always very good. We even decided to order dessert to go. We ordered tre dolce, which is a smaller portion of three different desserts. We were too stuffed to eat it there. In fact, I ended up bringing home about 2/3 of my pasta bolognese because I was stuffed with wedding soup, salad, and bread.

Anyway, I asked the waitress about the potatoes and she really couldn't answer my questions, but a moment later, the sous chef came out to talk to us. He was very personable and told me how they make the potatoes. It doesn't sound too difficult...I may give it a try sometime. He asked what I usually order and I told him, so he told me how they made the bolognese sauce. He said that it takes all day to make it right, and I wasn't surprised in the least. Ted mentioned that we visit the restaurant every few months and we were there for our anniversary. The chef asked if we ordered dessert and I told him that we ordered the tre dolce to go because we were so full.

Then he said that in honor of our anniversary, he was taking the dessert off our bill! What a pleasant surprise!

We had a nice evening, celebrating our marriage. And considering that the national divorce rate is close to 50%, a marriage that's lasted as long as ours should be celebrated.

I Am SOOOOOOOOOOO Boring

2009-06-11T11:36:00.003-04:00

Sorry folks, but I have very little for you these days.

Once school is out, my life becomes mundane. However, it's a good mundane, if there is such a thing.

Take yesterday, for instance.

I woke up around 7:30 or so...put the TV on in the bedroom. Heck, I don't even remember if I had on the Today Show or Good Morning America. It really doesn't make a difference because by then I was in the recliner in the bedroom, dozing on and off. Around 9:00 I turned on the laptop to check email and entertainment news, and then watched a little bit of Regis and Kelly. I eventually got dressed, made the bed, etc. and left the suite just before The View came on at 11:00. I watched that in the den, while I perused various blogs I like to check in on.

Eventually I made my way to the laundry room and did a couple loads. I also got out the cards that I am SOOOOOOOOO behind in sending. I began getting them organized. Yes, when you're as behind as I am, you need to get organized first. I realized that I needed to get a couple of addresses, so back to the den I went to get them from the computer.

(How did we survive without the world at our fingertips??)

And for the record, I did NOT get the cards finished.

Of course it was time to check email again and see if anyone else had any additional announcements on people.com, then I looked at the college website where Alex will be going this fall. Then I checked the college website where Joe attends.

By this time I needed to start dinner, so I worked on that for a little while, waited for the menfolk to come home, then we ate dinner and did the normal after dinner stuff. Last night I watched three episodes of The Deadliest Catch I had DVRed. Eventually I took a shower, played some computer games, then went to sleep.

See?

I'm the most boring person ever in the summer.

And I love it.

(for now, hahaha...in about 6 weeks I'll be ready to pull my hair out!)

It Could Always Be Worse

2009-06-09T11:20:00.004-04:00

The end of last week, we had some air conditioning issues. The fan would run, but the air conditioning itself would not. I called the heating/cooling people. The technician discovered that the breaker was off. He turned it back on, checked everything out, and couldn't find any other issues.

On Saturday we again noticed that it was NOT cool in the house. Ted went down to the basement to investigate and discovered, once again, that the breaker had tripped. He turned it back on. Throughout the day, he had to turn it back on at least 5 times.

Sunday, it was worse. First thing yesterday morning he called the heating/cooling people. The tech was here at 10:00. He discovered that the compressor with the air conditioning unit was not working properly...something about the coils.

The compressor needs to be replaced.

We got the rest of the information later on in the day.

(When it comes to good news/bad news, I like to hear the bad news first, so we have nowhere to go but UP.)

So....the bad news is that none of the suppliers around here have the compressor we need and it will arrive from the factory in THREE to FIVE DAYS! That's up to FIVE days without air conditioning. And let me tell you, last night was absolutely miserable. Even with the ceiling fans running full tilt and the windows open, it was HOT in here. Right now, at 11:25 am, it's already up to 80 degrees in the house. I can't even imagine how challenging it will be to sleep tonight since today is going to be hotter than yesterday.

Now, for the good news...the original compressor is still covered by warranty, so we will only have to pay for labor! Apparently a new compressor for our unit costs around $800 or so, and we will NOT need to pay that.

Let me just say, that when I get hot, I become cranky and mean. I think I'm going to go run some errands, then come back and get in the pool. Unfortunately, I'll have to use the oven and cooktop to fix dinner, so that will heat up the kitchen.

Now we're at the point that turning the breaker back on only lasts for a couple of minutes before it trips again.

But....it could always be worse. And that's what I'm keeping in mind right now.

On a totally different subject, I'm tracking the behavior of our felines. I'll have an interesting report very soon.

Let Vacation Time Begin!

2009-06-04T19:12:00.006-04:00

Our air conditioning was working quite right Tuesday night. Although we had it set at 73 degrees, it was up to 80 degrees in the house. Of course, outside it was about 55, so we opened the windows and turned on the ceiling fans. The house didn't cool down overnight as much as we'd hoped, so when Ted left for work on Wednesday, he said, "since you're off now, I'll let you take care of calling someone to take care of the A/C. Just make sure you call ********* Heating and Cooling."

Why is it that people assume that teachers have absolutely NOTHING to do all summer??

But, I did call the place around 8:00 am, shortly after they opened. We know the family that owns the business, so the man that answered the phone and I had a little chat after I told him what the problem was. He said that he'd try to get someone here yesterday, but he couldn't make any promises because they only had one service man in for the day.

Around 3:oo, the gentleman called back and said that they wouldn't be able to make it, but would have someone here first thing today. I asked him what time he thought that might be.

That's when he started having fun with me. Knowing that I had just begun summer break, he quickly responded with 6:30 am. I said, "mmmmm....NO."

He laughed. Then he suggested 6:45. I told him then that I would still be sound asleep at that time. Then I said that 9:00 would work out just fine and he told me that they had half a day in by then. I told him that I usually do too, but now that school's out, my hours have changed!

We had a good laugh and he said that he could make it 10:00 if that would be better. I told him that 9:00 would be fine. What I didn't tell him was that knowing I would have to get up to be available by 9 would be good for me, so that I didn't lounge the day away.

Fast forward to this morning...I woke up at 6:05 am.

And then I was wide awake. I knew that if I went back to sleep, it would be trouble. So, I got dressed and ready for the day, and was in the laundry room sorting dirty clothes by 6:15. I did about 6 loads of laundry, folded them, and put them in the appropriate baskets, AND cleaned the kitchen all up before they called around 10 to tell me that the service man was on his way.

It was actually sort of nice getting up and getting all that stuff done early, but that will be our secret, because I certainly do NOT intend to make a habit of it!

As a little side note, when Ted got home from work, I was sound asleep in the recliner in our bedroom. (I'd only been asleep about half an hour.) He accused me of sleeping the day away, hahaha! Of course when he saw all his clean clothes, he knew that I'd been busy!

Whew! (Part 2)

2009-06-02T05:11:00.005-04:00

The graduation ceremony was at our high school stadium Saturday night. It was a gorgeous night.

However, I should have told Alex that he needed to be somewhat cooperative with the pictures, like his brother was four years ago. It really just slipped my mind. I guess I thought he would do okay with the whole picture taking issue.

Hahaha.

This is Joe. He graduated in 2005, and his ceremony was in the afternoon. Notice how he paused and looked at the camera. Good job Joe!

This is Alex...totally uncool.

After his ceremony, Joe took a few minutes to find us, then made it extremely clear that he would be posing for very few pictures. Period.

Alex, who finally came to his senses, decided to pose. Multiple times. Willingly. Wow. Here he is with Joe. Joe looks like he's been on a binge of some kind, but I just happened to click when he was part way into a blink. Just my luck. I didn't check the photo before continuing to take other shots. Totally my fault.

Here we have the "Epic" seniors. The rest of the "Epic Friends" are underclassmen. These three look so happy. I hope they remember this day for the rest of their lives.

This is Alex with A.P. and U.T. They are his godparents. Years ago the boys abbreviated Aunt Patty to A.P. and Uncle Tim to U.T. That's pretty much what they call them now. They have been a HUGE part of the boys' lives and played a big part in making them the men they are today.

This is Alex with Uncle Mac and Aunt Peg. They've also been a big influence on both of the boys. They've been so fortunate to have such loving aunts and uncles playing a big role in their lives. We are thankful for that each and every day.

A little over a month ago, Alex played bass guitar in a talent show at school. These guys with him in this picture played drums and lead guitar. There was another guy who sang. They did "Sharp Dressed Man" by ZZ Top. They got second place...not too bad for their first showing. Alex occasionally goes golfing with the guy on the left. (Alex is NOT a golfer, but he's learning!)

My parents were also at the graduation ceremony, but opted to leave as soon as they could so they wouldn't have to fight traffic. That's why they are not in any photos. And yes, there is a shot of Ted and me with Alex, but I don't have it "ready" yet. When I do, I'll post that one too.

After the ceremony, the four of us, along with the aunts and uncles, decided to go out to eat. We were all starved, as no one had eaten dinner and it was almost 10 pm. We ended up at Red Lobster and Alex sat next to A.P. I told him to take off his sunglasses and he told me he wanted to look like Roy Orbison.

And that's how I've been spending my time lately. Things will calm down now, especially since the school year is about to end for me. Then I'll have more time to read and comment on blogs, as well as write in my own.

Whew! (Part 1)

2009-05-31T14:42:00.005-04:00

So, where have I been lately? Helping an 18 year old through his final days and events of high school.

This is where I really need to mention that I absolutely ADORE the technology that has come about in the past 10 years or so. Without it, I wouldn't be taking so many pictures. Of course, my sons aren't thrilled that they are the subjects in these photos, but oh well, such is life!

This is Alex, as he's leaving for his last day of high school. Yes, he's thrilled, but it was 6:35 am and he just wanted to get out the door without any extra "fluff."

Party time...as you can see, he's absolutely THRILLED that I had my camera in hand. In fact, his words were something along the line of, "Mom, enough already!" And I have to add that I learned my lesson after Joe's graduation party. CATERING IS THE WAY TO GO. You get to the point that money is no longer the object. It's all about convenience and ease.

The cake was extremely good...half chocolate and half white. It had the best icing too, mmmmmmmmm! And the ladies that were here from the catering place took care of cutting and serving the cake. Another HUGE help!

Some of the kids decided to use the pool. This was their first go-around. After they went to attend other parties, they all came back around 7 pm and swam until after midnight. Only there were about 10 more by then. We're just glad that they all had a great time.

So this is how part of my time has been spent lately. And it would only make sense that the day before the party I came down with a sore throat and some kind of infection. I really felt rotten this entire day. Anyway, it took about a week to get over it, but now I'm almost back to normal...whatever that is!

More to come, very soon!

I Miss Blogging

2009-05-27T19:43:00.001-04:00

I will be back to blogging again SOON!

Life has sort of taken priority and I still haven't been approved for a 36 hour day yet!

I Need Your Help

2009-05-11T18:22:00.006-04:00

Years ago, when my Grandma was trying to downsize her belongings, she told me that she was going to throw out a box of old photos. I begged her not to, so she told me to take them. Every few years I look at them and wonder about them.

There are a few of them that have me SOOOOOOOO curious. Like this one...

Check out all these people in this river or lagoon. Why were so many people gathered there? Was it a really hot day? Was it a holiday, like the 4th of July, or Memorial Day, or Labor Day? Were they there to celebrate another occasion? Obviously the water isn't that deep, but if you look at the top of the photo, there's someone in the tree, possibly getting ready to jump in! Don't jump! Don't you realize that you could break your neck?? Check out the bathing suits and bathing caps.

Now look at this one. These people are obvioulsy having a good time.

Now for the cars...wow. I know absolutely nothing about old cars, but I would love to know the year of these models. That would help me date these photos.

So here is where I need YOUR help.

The photos say "Wallace Beach." I have searched and searched for a Wallace Beach, both online and in my Grandma's things and have found nothing. I was thinking that perhaps it was in either northeast Ohio or western Pennsylvania, but I don't know for sure.

I want to know if Wallace Beach is familiar to anyone out there.

I also would love to know if anyone could give an approximate date as to when these photos might have been taken, based on the fashion or the vehicles.

So, my dear blog readers, I was hoping that you could help me...I was hoping that perhaps you could possibly post a tiny, short, little blurb on your blog about this posting?

The more people that see this, the more likely that I may get answers to my questions.

If you mention this posting on your own blog, I would be SO grateful!

Thank you so very much!

It's So Nice To Be Appreciated!

2009-05-09T12:00:00.004-04:00

This past week has been Teacher Appreciation Week. In our building, it's actually Staff Appreciation Week because we all know that a school absolutely can NOT be run without each and every member of the staff doing their part.

And of course, when you deal with a bunch of people, the best way to show them that they are appreciated is to .... FEED THEM!

We were treated to so much food this past week!

On Monday, we had two trays of homemade cookies in the lounge. Although there was no note attached, I think they were from our principal and secretary. Our classroom is next to the lounge and we heard the door opening and closing all morning long, so the cookies were a definite hit.

On Tuesday our teachers' union provided quite an assortment of doughnuts from a great local donut shop, in addition to a huge fruit tray AND dip, along with orange juice. YUMMY! Our central office also sent over 15, yes, that's FIFTEEN, pizzas for lunch! They were from a local family owned pizza and spaghetti shop, and the pizza was excellent, as usual.

Wednesday, our PTO put on a fabulous lunch for us! Several weeks ago we were given a survey in which we had to check off our three favorite toppings to put on a baked potato. From that, we sort of figured they would be having a baked potato bar for us. Great idea!

HOWEVER, there was much more to it! Even though the main theme was potatoes, the secondary theme was "keeping it green." The luncheon was catered by a nearby restaurant and they reinforced the green theme by using some edible plates. We had deep fried dough type bowls that they put our salad in. We had our choice of ranch dressing or italian. (I chose italian.) Then they had bread bowls for the soup. They had broccoli cheese and tortilla soup. (I chose broccoli cheese.) I've never had a bread bowl before. I always thought that the bowl would become really soggy.

It didn't! It was actually wonderful!

Then they had baked potatoes for us, with a whole bunch of toppings. I chose butter, cheese and bacon bits. They also had pop and water for us, along with cookies and brownies.

We had our lunch in the music and art room, so we had plenty of space. Our lounge only holds about 10 people comfortably, so not everyone eats in there (I'm one of them), but we were able to all be in the music/art room with lots of room to spare. At our seats we found a reusable shopping bag, a "going green" magnet, and a sheet with different ideas about going green.

The PTO also had about 10 door prizes that we could register for. We each got to register for two specific prizes. I didn't win anything, but that's okay, the luncheon was gift enough.

Although Friday's celebration didn't involve Teacher Appreciation Week, we did have a very nice lunch. We've had a student teacher since January and yesterday was her last day. Her cooperating teacher had a lunch in her honor. We again had pizza (yum!), salad, Amish casserole, and hoho cake.

Like I said, school staff members love being fed, and this was a great week for it. We have a wonderful staff in our building and we are so fortunate that others thought of us so much this past week.

'Til the Cows Come Home

2009-05-07T18:14:00.006-04:00

This evening, Ted came home from work and announced that he wanted to go to a restaurant at the edge of Amish country for dinner. This is rare, trust me. Twice in the last month or so, he's come home and said that we're going out for dinner. That's about double the number of times he's done it in the 5 years previous. Anyway, Alex wanted to go, and Joe didn't, so just three of us headed out.

On the way, we had to stop so that some cows could cross the road.

They were obviously ready to be milked, and even Alex exclaimed how big their udders were.

(That was his line. I know that the udders are the part that you squeeze to get the milk out, but he was really referring to the part that the feeds into the udders. Not being one who knows anything about cows, I have no idea what this part of a cow's anatomy is called.)

There was a man in the road trying to get the cows to hurry and cross. Some of them chose to listen and actually ran. I can honestly saw that I've NEVER seen a cow run before. It was quite a sight, that's for sure! There were even a couple dogs trying to herd them in the right direction. I grabbed my camera out of my purse and took a few pictures.

After the cows got home, we went on our way, ate dinner, then started back home. On the way, I saw some horses off in the distance, at the top of a hill. It looked so pretty, seeing their silhouette against the blue sky. I knew I would have about a second and a half to take a picture, (Ted doesn't like to stop on or near the road for me to take pictures) so I was going to have to work quick. I got ONE shot. I've included the original and the cropped version.

So there you have it...some animal photos and not a single one of Pepina, Marina, or Oliver!

I am SUCH a Procrastinator

2009-05-05T15:45:00.004-04:00

Why do I think I am such a procrastinator, you may ask? Well, please...have a seat, and let me tell you.

The daughter of one of my friends had a birthday in early April. Her card is still sitting here.
Another friend sent me a very nice letter in the mail, I might add, and I have yet to respond to her. Oh yeah, that letter arrived before Easter. I've yet to even thank her for it.
The same friend who sent the letter also sent me an email dated 4/12, with some pertinent questions. Yep, you guessed it. I haven't answered her yet.
Another friend has emailed me several times over the last few months. I have yet to answer her. This is especially bad because they've just been smacked with the trickle effect of the downturn in the economy.
My sister-in-law's birthday was March 29. That's right...the card is still sitting here, and I don't even have it signed yet. Here's the kicker...they live within shouting distance and we've seen them several times since her birthday.
My brother in law's (sister-in-law's husband and Ted's brother) birthday was April 3. SEE LAST BULLET.
Their daughter, our beautiful niece Holly, had a birthday on April 16. Again, SEE ABOVE.
Another friend who lives in town said for me to call her sometime, and I said I would. Let's see...that was in February of 2008 I believe.

So basically, not only am I procrastinator, but I'm a lousy friend too.

It's not that I don't WANT to take care of these things, but that I just never get around to it.

I definitely need to get my act together.

Please tell me I'm not the only one who does this....

And on that note, I'm going to leave you with a picture of Joe when he was five years old. One afternoon we went to a small field near my parents' house and flew kites. We both had a great time that day!