Christmas Day!

Well, Christmas Day was another geteverythingtogetherandgo kind of day. We got up around 8am and then got dressed and headed for Ontario. We had a wonderful breakfast of Egg Puff Casserole, scrambled eggs for the kids, cinnamon rolls, scones, sausage (both reg and maple), coffee, juice and eggnog. We were all nice and full and ready to open more presents. Kaleigh and Cole received gifts from Carl's sister and his brother. They also received gifts from Scott's dad who they call Uncle Erwin (Carl's sister's husbands father). Kaleigh absolutely loved the really really soft elephant that she received from Uncle Erwin. Cole got a Crocodile that looks more like a green armadillo, but he liked it just fine. Christmas Day is also the time we take family photos. Each family, all of us together, the kids with Grandparents and so on. It is always difficult, especially with the littlest ones, that one being Will, Kaleigh and Cole's cousin (Carl's brother's little boy). As you can see by the photos (which I cannot seem to put in any kind of order) there is Grandma and Grandpa, Carl's sister and family(with dog), Carl's brother and family (with little Will) and our family. Merry Christmas!

All is Calm

After all is said and done, we take some time to reflect...or is it relax? Definitely relax. It has been a fun evening, but now the kids are in bed, and I am having a nice hot cider and dipping into my plate of cookies. And Carl? Well, he is playing with Cole's Transformer, which he thinks is pretty cool and very well put together (says the engineer in him). It is a nice time, this calm after the ripping of paper the laughter and the chaos. We relish it and then it is time for us to go to sleep too, another big day tomorrow!

The Aftermath

As you can see, the period of time between opening gifts and cleaning up the next day is rather chaotic! The kids play with the toys and open EVERYTHING! In this photo you can see some of the Chevron Cars, Capsters craft, Rescue Heroes, the movie Ant Bully etc. They barely touched their plates but that isn't too unusual, they get to that in the morning. Here Jackie is being shown most of the Chevron Cars. Jackie is Kaleigh's cousin, Carl's sisters daughter. She is great with the kids and was easy to buy for this year. She is into purses and music, so she got a gift card for ITunes. Her brothers received Best Buy gift cards because they want to buy a Playstation 3. Good luck guys! Our livingroom doesn't look like this anymore, we got everything put away. Every year we have the kids pick something they don't play with anymore and they put it away for next year to give to an Orphanage in Mexico. Our church makes gift boxes with new and used gifts and the young people take all the boxes of toys and clothes and some cookies down right before Christmas. The kids are so thankful and we get rid of good toys that the kids don't play with. This years choice for Kaleigh was her Barbies. She doesn't much play with them anymore and so she kept just a couple with some clothes and the rest, all 8 barbies and 2 Kens got put in separate baggies with clothes and accessories and they will go down next year to the Orphanage. A good way to clean out and make a child happy.

And then The Opening of the Presents!

This was a good year for the kids, they got a lot and they were very aware of who the gifts came from and were very thankful. That is important as they do get too many gifts, I admit that, but at least they are interested in getting gifts for others too. Kaleigh picked out a beautiful bookmark for me and a nice bird calendar and I love them both! They had a really good time opening, and would yell out every time they got something. Kaleigh is very excited when she receives money too. That is her in the photo getting a card from a great uncle that gave her $20.00. Kaleigh and Cole also pick out the spot for their presents and they usually like being right next to each other! It makes for an interesting photo opportunity. This year there was no rivalry and they received some similar gifts. For example, this year they both wanted a bunch of Chevron Cars (toys) and they received quite a few! Kaleigh also received some Magic Treehouse books, some Easy Bake Oven mixes, Littlest Petshop stuff , Polly Pocket and some modeling clay (she already used it to make Gumby and friends, photo will come when they are all done). Cole received Transformers, Rescue Heroes, Cars (the movie) die cast cars, and some cool little magnetic cars that will go up anything metal! They had a blast!

Sharing Their Gifts

This year we did something a little different. Usually Kaleigh reads the Christmas story, but this year she had something else in mind. She shared a little box that was a gift that told the story (abbreviated version). There was straw to signify the manger, a star to show what led the people to the stable where Jesus was born, a heart to show God's love for us, and a present to let us know Jesus is the greatest gift of all. It was neat and she did a great job. Helped her to memorize John 3:16 too! Cole was going to sing at first but then he changed his mind too. His class put on a play (same one Kaleigh did) where the kids talk about the Nativity and what happened that first Christmas. It went something like this, "What are you doing there? We are playing with the Nativity, what is the Nativity? Every figure tells a story. Will you tell me the story? Let's tell everyone the story! A long time ago in a town called Nazereth, there was a girl named Mary. Did she love God? Yes, with all her heart." And so the story continues..He remembered almost the whole thing! He stopped when Jesus was born. That was their gift to Jesus. It keeps the focus (at least somewhat) on what Christmas is all about.

Christmas Eve 2006

Christmas Eve was always a special time in our house growing up and I like to keep that tradition going. It actually makes it easier on family because whereas Carl's family celebrates on Christmas day, I do Christmas Eve. I have Carl's parents and his sister and family come to our house to celebrate the German way and then the next day we go to Carl's sister's house for a Christmas breakfast! It actually gives the kids two times to open presents! They really like that. I know at this age Kaleigh and Cole are more into the gifts but they really enjoy the atmosphere of Heilige Abend (Holy Night) Kaleigh has never bought into the man in the red suit, but Cole still thinks that someone (in his mind St. Nikolaus) comes and puts everything out. It is a very vague belief though. He is pretty certain that Mommy does it, but I think because of all the talk at school he wants to believe what his friends believe, sort of... Now when Tina and I were young we were banished into mom and dad's room to watch "A Christmas Carole" but both Tina and I have small houses and the kids would go nuts stuck in a room. So we send them out to look at lights, it is a nice tradition, although this year Cole was getting a bit impatient. "All I want to do is go home and open presents"! Pretty funny. So this is what the room looked like when everyone walked in...except a little dimmer.

My First "Teacher" Christmas Gift!

Well, this being my first year teaching, I have never received a Teacher-themed gift before. But this Christmas, one of my students gave me this beautiful bracelet with a Teacher's prayer on it that says, "Lord, let me be a teacher of knowledge who will guide our youth and grant them the necessary understanding." The apple charm simply says, " Teacher's Prayer." I love it and haven't taken it off since I got it this morning. Tomorrow my 6 little friends will be performing in their Christmas Program and I pray that it will go well! They are so cute and have been practicing very hard! So if you have a notion, keep them in your thoughts and remember when your kids (if you have any) when they were on stage the first time! They are sweet and cute and I couldn't have asked for a better first class!

I Guess I Take After My Dad!

Well, not to be outdone by my sister, with her yummy table full of goodies. I just had to get my two cents in too! I made 6+ varieties of cookies this year. One was a recipe from a 1978 cookbook that I had given my mom. Those are the Chocolate Gingerbread cookies on the lower left. Then I tried a couple of new cookies, Hazelnut stars (in the middle) and Lime Crescents (on the right). Some old favorites (namely mine) are the spritz cookies (upper right) and the Filbert Fingers (top). The tiny stars are just the hazelnut star cookies without sandwiching and without the jam. Instead I just drizzled with choc. Oh and not to forget my Candy Cane cookies that came out of a Canadian Cookie cookbook. In addition to these I also made some thumbprint cookies with jam that were made with Splenda for a couple of Diabetic friends and relatives. They were actually very yummy! So, as you can see, outside of teaching (only 2 days a week) I actually had some baking time. I worked last year everyday, so I was too pooped to bake! But I enjoyed it and Kaleigh and Cole helped a little. It got too hard for them at certain times so they kind of gave up on it. They did help with our tree a lot, they practically put up all the ornaments from the middle down. And Cole, as you saw earlier in my blog, got to put up the star. Other than the kids having a cold right now, things are good. The next update will probably be Christmas scenes, so enjoy!

Build-A-Bear = Big Business!

Well, last Sunday was Kaleigh's Build-a-Bear Birthday Party. These were the selected few who were lucky enough to get invited. No one usually turns down an invitation to a Build-a-Bear party, namely because you walk away with a $25.00 bear, bunny, monkey, dog, etc! Kaleigh had gone to one for her friend (the one with the black hair in the center of the shot) and she had about 12 girls there! Her parents of course can afford this. I told Kaleigh that 6 is the minimum and that is what she would have. We actually allowed 7 in case one child really couldn't make it, which happened. They were out of the state.

So you see, no one really wants to miss the opportunity. Well, it was a fun time for all and they truly did not notice the hundreds of people that were there! I mean the room above the main store is for parties only....usually. When they can't fit anymore people downstairs they allow them to come up as well. Well, that made for an interesting Birthday celebration! I was a little confused, but apparently everyone knew about it but me! So the "private" party room wasn't as private as I thought! They did however have a person with us the entire time, helping the girls (and guy, sorry Cole) pick out their animals, helping them get stuffed and doing all the normal party stuff. They even went so far as to take extra items for the parents that were there or extras the kids were paying for and instead of having to stand in a HUGE line, our helper went to an unused cash register and we did not have to wait at all. That was a biggie for us! I mean for a Sunday evening at 4pm, I did not expect that the place would be that bad! Wow, that place must really bring in the bucks. I mean each animal is anywhere from $10-$25 alone and then of course you buy the little outfits that range anywhere from $5-$35!

And then there are the accessories like cell phones or pom poms or even shoes! As you can see by the photo (that I tried to put here!) Cole is helping the lady stuff his dog, "Frank", she holds the dog on the machine and Cole pushes on a pedal with his foot. It is very interesting how they make it so interactive. The kids then put a little heart in it, but not before wishing on it, kissing it, hugging it, all sorts of things to make the animal their own.

Well, it was worth the money, for the most part, the kids love their animals, Kaleigh and Cole both got dogs and Kaleigh named hers Cocoa. Very fitting.

American Girl really has it good!

Well, Kaleigh had a really nice birthday, and the highlight of course was her gift from Omi and Opa, real theater chairs for her American Girl doll, Molly. Molly has a friend Chloe but she is not an American Girl doll, so Kaleigh felt it wasn't right for her to be in the photo. Along with the seats came tickets, popcorn and black licorice whips (you can see them if you look closely, except for the tickets they were too tiny). The outfit Molly is wearing is from the book that Kaleigh has.

I guess I should begin by saying Molly McIntyre is an American Girl doll, whose life takes place in the mid forties, during WWII. Her father is a doctor and is serving in England. Her mother works in a factory and she and Molly work hard for the war effort. One thing Molly's class does is put on a patriotic show at the local theater. She practices her tap dancing all summer and gets chosen to be "Little Miss Victory" in the show. The outfit she is wearing is the costume for the show. Kaleigh enjoys learning about history through the Molly stories and has a lot of questions. She would read more Molly books if more were out there! She has read them all! She has a lot of the accessories too, and just recently the American Girl Place in Los Angeles opened and we almost went there for her birthday, but she had already made up her mind to take some friends to the Build-a-Bear workshop, so that is tomorrow. Maybe next year, we will make the trip to LA.

But until then she is having a blast with her dolls and all her other toys! Whew, and a lot of toys there are!

Christmas Time! My favorite time of year!

Well, as you can see, our tree is up and Cole helped by putting the star on the tree! Last year he tried, but Kaleigh inevitably had to do it.

I think daddy's shoulders were getting tired! We are happy to be getting everything ready! Our lights are on the house, our big snowman and son are blown up in the front yard, and we have three mini lit trees in front of the house too. It all looks very festive. The month of course always goes by WAY too fast! Kaleigh's birthday falls in December and we do the party thing early then as soon as that is over, we get out the decorations and get our tree. Ain' it purdy?

Then all the Christmas gatherings, my ornament exchange with the teachers from school, Carl's company Christmas party and then of course Christmas cheer with friends at our house then Christmas Eve at our house and then, Christmas Day at Carl's sisters house....whew! Busy, busy, busy! I am tired just thinking about it...oh and in the middle of all that I have to bake 4 different types of cookies! Take after my dad of course!

Well, more later...

Pampered Chef...Again

Well, last night I had a Pampered Chef Party...yet again! I can't seem to get away from the stuff! Although this time some folks at my church had requested that someone have a party. I just volunteered. So I didn't really put too much effort into it and I still did a $700.00 show! So that means I get to pick out $140.00 in free products! Whew! I have my list and there is still more money left! I will probably buy a few Christmas gifts and whatnot. If anyone reads this and wants to order anything, the website to order off my show is, www.pamperedchef.biz/sharonmccrum. When you get to the website you just have to go to the "order products" section and then enter my first name on the next line. That way you can look at the entire catalog and order online! Of course if you live far away, then you would have to pay some additional shipping of course, but what the hey, it is such gooood stuff! So order...or don't I don't care either way, just sharing...

GOOPS

Well, here is a blast from the past! An old book Tina and I had a long long time ago had this little poem in it. Tina and I knew it by heart for a long time. I had forgotten about it! I actually told the poem to Kaleigh when she was still quite small, and it is kind of weird and appropriate for Halloween time. Although these Goops are a little creepier than I remember the Goops from a long time ago. Maybe my sister can clue me in on what our Goops looked like. Anyway, it is a fun poem to teach kids table manners. A good prelude to the "Manners Game". But that is for another time, perhaps? Just keep wondering....

BOO!
Well, here we are another Halloween and this year we did something a bit different.
We went to Disney's California Adventure for their Mickey's Halloween Treat! Cole went as a Dalmation and Kaleigh dressed up as a spider witch (her term) She was going to go as a witch but did not want to wear the hat. She also is doing the spider thing for the school funfest, since they are not allowed to have "evil" costumes, we decided to do the spider thing for that too. The kids really enjoyed the fun at the park and we went with friends and that made it even more fun! The best thing was when we walked into "A Bug's Land" area, there were scarecrows at the entrance. Real people, mind you, just like in the Wizard of Oz.
So Cole, who was dressed as Lucky from 101 Dalmations, walks up and the guy right aways says, "Hey Lucky, here boy!" Cole goes running up to the fence and then the guy starts giving commands, like speak, roll over and so on. Cole does them all! It was hilarious! Then on our way out, the guy says "hey it's Lucky! He is such a good dog!" Cole was in heaven let me tell you. Oddly enough we (the adults) thought it would be fun to go on Tower of Terror and we could take turns watching the kids. Well, the other dad did not want to go, neither did Kaleigh and her friend Joshua, but Cole did! We talked to him about it, but he really wanted to go on so we said ok. Well, it is really a pretty scary ride and Cole did NOT like it. But we were very proud of him. He stuck with it, and didn't cry or yell or anything, just simply stated, " I didn't like it, I don't want to go on that one again." I must say I was more nervous than he was. And quite honestly I don't think I have seen Carl that proud for a long time! He was pretty impressed! But then I was too. All in all it was a fun albeit a late night. More Halloween to come later! Have a Happy and Safe Halloween, all!

Well Howdeeeee Pardners!

Well today was Harvest Round-up at our school and the 3 yr olds had a good ol' time whoopin' it up and playing games. There were animals to pet, corn to chuck (yes I said chuck, not shuck, as in they threw the corn), pumpkin bowling, cow milkin'(not a real cow of course), elbow apple bobbin' and a lot of other fun stuff. We all dressed up in western gear, notice my cool cowgirl hat, bandana and fringy jacket! The kids were a little unsure of the whole thing, but once we went through the first round of games they were having a blast! We only had a half hour but it was pretty hot and we were all ready to get back to the air conditioning! Whew! Then we had our Harvest Party. Parents brought the food, and we got a nice table set up and the kids really enjoyed it!
Just thought I'd share a day in the life of a preschool teacher of three year olds! It was fun, but exhausting!

Addition to Last Post

Don't read this unless you have first read the post before it. About my kids. In the post I say, "of all the kids from wealthy homes..." This is not to imply that my kids are in any way shape or form from a wealthy family, heh heh, I meant to say that since a lot of kids are from wealthy families (the school is in Yorba Linda, Calif, for those of you who know the area) they feel they are entitled a lot of the time, and that does not include all, just a lot! Thank you.

The Cutest Kids in the School!

Well, here they are the cutest kids in the whole school! Of course I may be a bit biased but, then you haven't seen the kids at this school! Um, just kidding, of course!

I was extremely proud of my two kids who are so easy to get along with that the other kids all fight to sit with and play with them! At the end of September Kaleigh received the honor of Citizen of the Month! At our school they want to give each child a chance to be recognized so they have each student be Student of the Week or Citizen of the Month, you usually receive the honor once every other year. For instance, since Kaleigh got Student of the Week last year, this year was her year for Citizen. What I find interesting is that last year she was the FIRST Student of the Week, and this year, she was the FIRST Citizen of the Month! I know they have to recognize all the students, but Kaleigh is respectful and displays a lot of attributes that the teachers notice right off the bat! I know that she is honest and most of the time the teachers see that too. Cole is happy in Kindergarten and loves his teacher and his classmates. When I asked his teacher how he was doing, she said, "Oh, he's perfect!" Now, I know this is not quite true, but he is a pretty neat kid, with no bad habits or mannerisms. He is kind to all and helps his teacher whenever she asks. He has friends in his class that are begging their moms to have a playdate and we already have two scheduled for this week!

Now if you are thinking that I am bragging a bit about my kids....YOU'RE RIGHT!! I love my kids because I am their mommy, but I would like my kids a whole lot even if they weren't mine! And believe me, the whole staff at work, love to see my kids come in the office to visit! Out of all the kids from wealthy homes that come to our school, there are quite a few who know already that they should be getting whatever they want! It is hard to deal with that, because, quite frankly some are just plain bratty! I am very proud of my children, because they are truly unbiased when it comes to picking friends! It doesn't matter if the child is skinny, fat, rich, poor, good looking or plain, the only thing that will keep them away is a child who is mean or makes fun of others. Again, how could I not be proud?

So enough of me gushing about my kids. I know many of you all have great kids too! Let them know!!! I try to everyday! Really look them right in the eye, and say, " you know what? I am soo proud of you! What a great job you are doing!" They need to hear it and you need to see their faces when you say it!

My Classroom Tree

Well, now that I only have 5 kids in my class, I decided using up an entire wall for the Birthday wall was a bit much. I mean I had 5 little cupcakes with the kid's birthdates on them on this entire wall! It looked a bit pathetic. So instead I moved the cupcakes and decided to build a tree out of butcher paper. See the photo. Now the great thing with a tree in the room is you can put artwork on it. All the fall leaf crafts and animals (forest) that we are doing this month will go on the tree! Then when winter comes, we will do snow and snowflakes etc, on the tree. Then of course in spring the flowers and green leaves go on it. I haven't made a tree out of butcher paper in a very very long time. Hmmmm, as a matter of fact some of you reading this may actually have seen the last tree I made. Let's see, it would have been back in the 80's when my sis and I had a Halloween Party in our garage! We made an old gnarled tree in the corner of the garage and had spider webs and stuff on it. It looked pretty good, if I do say so myself! So from then to now, I think it went pretty well. So I hope you all enjoy my tree, I will take photos of each season so you can see what I mean about the changes.

So this is the big Friggin' bean!

Don't know why but I couldn't post this photo to my other post, so here it is ladies and gentlemen,
The Very Very Big Bean!

The Secret Message Bean Plant Turns into The Very Very Big Bean!

This is the start of the Bean Saga. A long Time ago in a galaxy far far - oh wait, wrong story, hehe.
Ok, a long while ago, approximately 5 months ago, I decided to get the kids this cool Secret Message Bean Plant. It comes in a can and you just add water and it grows a bean that has a message on it, see photo. Well, it grew, we saw, it was fun, and to be honest it was a pretty healthy plant. The kids decided we would plant it outside so we did. As you can see by the other photo, it liked to climb. Well, it got rather large and we thought, hmm, still a very healthy plant. Then one day Kaleigh said Mommy there is something weird on the bean plant. I said lets go look, and we did. Well, to our astonishment there were very large beans growing on the bean plant! I mean Big! See photo.
The coin next to it is a quarter, if you can't tell. So in other words the beans looked like flat green bananas! It was really weird and Kaleigh decided to bring it in for sharing at school, everyone thought it was really cool. Score one for the Secret Message Bean plant! It was fun and a cool science project too! We even dissected it (found large pink lima-type beans inside) Very weird!

My Own Kids in School
Unfortunately, I forgot to take photos of my kids in uniform the first day of school, but a friend loaned me her camera, so I did take some, I just don't have them yet. I will ask my friend to e mail them and you will see them soon! Kaleigh is doing good, after the initial disappointment of not having the teachers she wanted, she settled into her class. There are a few good things, apparently this teacher got most of the laid back or "easy" kids (like Kaleigh), and no trouble makers. Also, this teacher has a neat end of the day treat if the kids get all their work done on Fridays , they get to sit anywhere in class, on a desk, under the desk, on a counter, wherever they want, take off their shoes and then read for the last 15 minutes of class. Kaleigh thinks that is pretty cool. So she is doing fine. Cole adores his teacher and he is doing really well with his coloring and his reading. He is probably reading better than 85%-95% of his classmates. He might be the only one that reads well. We are very proud! He seems to be following Mommy's footsteps in that regard! I have always loved reading! Kaleigh can't wait to get started on this years fundraiser. Magazine sales (yuck) and cookie dough sales (yum!) Last year her sales were the highest in the first grade! She sold 50 orders! Mostly cookie dough of course but some mags too. The cookie dough is actually really tasty and a lot of our friends from church have been asking when she will be selling again, so this year will be good too! So all is good school-wise for the kids!

Second Week of School
Well, now that my room is done, the kids have had a full 3 days of school so far (the kids in my class that is), things are starting to be a little normal. We are still having trouble with our speech (and a bunch of other stuff) delay boy, I think I called him Trent in the last blog about my class. He hasn't said one word (our of his so called 20), but today he seemed a little happier to be there. His favorite thing to do is hold paper and wave it so that it makes a sound. He liked the soft blocks I brought in, but he still doesn't participate in any way. I am thinking it ain't gonna happen any time soon. He really likes one on one attention, that I cannot give, with 4-5 other kids in the class. I do my best to get him to participate and then I go about our day. Today was better than last Tuesday in that he didn't really throw any toys around. While I was reading a story, however, he pulled all the papers out of the cubbies and was waving the cubby liners around and dropping all the other paper on the floor. If he just wandered it wouldn't be so bad, but I end up picking up after every activity because I am busy with the other children and when we are starting something new, I have to go over to where he made the mess and pick it all up. The others in the class are getting used to his different behavior, but it isn't fair to keep taking away from them, just as it is unfair to Trent to not have the one on one attention he needs and wants. I am trying to work with the mom (who is really nice and grateful he can be there at all) on getting a college student or something to sit in the class and help with him. I will be talking to my director at the end of the week, with all my documentation.

FINALLY!
Well, as you can see my classroom is done! I won't write a lot, just to say, I am sooooo glad that it is finally done! Now it looks like a real classroom. I went in Saturday ready to drill into the wall myself, but it was all done!
Thankfully, because I wouldn't have done the job right anyway. Drilling into brick blocks and all.
So it is done. Big HUGE sigh of relief!

Kids in My Class

I have seven kids in my class, five of which showed up to "Meet the Teacher" today. I will not post names but will give them other names (just in case).
I have five little girls and 2 little boys. One little girl is sweet and smart I will call her-Lacey, another of the girls looks like she might be rather rambuncious, I will call her Maddie, another little girl is quite but not really shy, just a bit of a step backer, I will call her Elena. The fourth little girl is of Asian decent, with both parents speaking English (thank you), she is cute and funny, I will call her Alicia. The one boy that came today will be a bit of a challenge, not because he is active, but because his mom told me that he is "Verbal-delayed" He only has a vocabulary of approximately 20 words, and she said he may not talk at all until he is more comfortable. Sigh....I guess, that would be the least of the problems I could have. He is rather small, wears glasses and didn't really make much eye contact with me or pay much attention to me. I will call him Trent. His mom is really nice and I will most likely be working a lot with her on what he can and can't accomplish. The other two kids (one boy one girl) never showed. I know the girl, she was a sibling of a girl in Coles class, so I will call her Colette. : ) The little boy, well, I guess I will meet him on the first day of school if he comes. I will call him Quinn. So now that is my class and if I blog about them, I will use their aliases, to protect the innocent. Most likely the ones I right about will be not so innocent, hehe. But you may get a few laughs out of it.

Still Not Ready

Ok, this is just getting ridiculous! My room is still not ready for school! I have been over and over with the director about it and she says the maintenance people just have too much to do.
I don't believe it anymore. My kids came to meet me today and to see the room. It looked ok, other than the bulletin boards being propped up on the table and the cabinets not being hung. They didn't notice, although the parents probably did. I did mention to some that we were still in the process of putting things together. So, what it boils down to is this. If I go in on Saturday afternoon and the bulletin boards are not hung yet, Carl will come in and do it for me. The cabinets he cannot do but I will just have to keep bugging them I guess. It is really hard to get anything done with the school, because even the tiniest problem at the Elementary school is more important than an important one at the preschool. Silly huh? Oh well, I will take photos of my finished room, and will post by Monday at the latest! It doesn't look bad, just not quite done. Sigh....

Transition as yet .....Incomplete...sigh...

Well, it is Tuesday evening and my bulletin boards and cabinets are still not up. I got some more on the walls for decoration and organized my cabinets. I will be finishing up (hopefully) tomorrow sometime. The maintenance guy said he would devote all of tomorrow on hanging the stuff in my room. We shall see. I told Carl that if it is not done by tomorrow afternoon, he would have to come after work and do it. I am not having kids come and meet me with no bulletin boards up! Sheesh!
Talk about last minute!

Part Two of The Transition of my Classroom

Ok, not that there is much of a difference but the room was now painted and the old mini blinds taken off. We started moving a lot in and some stuff out. There was a play workbench that I refuse to have in my room. I can just see the little boys hammering up a storm inside! I chose to donate that to the playground outside. We are a little further along than this but this is what it looked like Friday and most of Saturday. I will be putting the finishing touches on either this afternoon or on Monday. So the last installment of the Classroom Transition will probably be posted on Tuesday or something like that. I am also painting a mural in the little bathroom, since there was nothing in there but a sink and then about 20 ft away was the little itty bitty potty. It was kind of creepy in there. Soon it will be a nice garden with flowers and butterflies, ladybugs and dragonflies. Photo will be forthcoming when finished. So something that normally takes someone 2 to 3 weeks to accomplish I get to do in less than a week, YIKES! I hope I get it done in time for "Meet your Teacher Day" on Thursday! Talk about stressed out!

My Classroom's Transition from Old Nursery to Three Year Old Preschool Garden room.

So at the end of the new school year I decided to take a teaching position. Two days a week teaching 3 year olds. A little scary. Then we found out that we would be getting new rooms that the church was using as nursery rooms. Pretty cool. But they would not be released for a while. Hmmm, another scary thing. Most teachers get a headstart on preparing their classrooms for the next year. We were allowed to look at the rooms to get ideas, but nothing more than that. So above is a photo of what my classroom looked like. So then over the summer I checked in often to see if they had done anything with the room. Everytime I came in the answer was no. So I then went on my vacations and we just enjoyed summer. Then on August 12th we came back from our last vacation and I checked in again. Well, they then gave me the date of August 22, approximately 2 weeks from when school started! Very scary. Then they decided that they couldn't match the paint with the paint on the ceiling so they decided to "shoot" the whole room! Which meant another delay. That brings us to Friday, August 25th. The day I could actually move some things in. I am like a racehorse stuck behind the starting gate, literally chomping on the bit to get started! So Friday I take the kids and we move a large load of toys and supplies into the classroom. Not everything is totally done, but enough to put a lot away. The kids did ok for 3 hours then we had to leave. I took them out to lunch and we called it a day. See part 2, next post.....

Pirates of the Caribbean with Jack Sparrow!

Well, it is now official. Capt. Jack Sparrow has been incorporated into the Pirates of the Caribbean ride at Disneyland. We saw it with the kids on Monday. It was very cool and he appears 3 times in the attraction. The photo of course is not great but you get the idea.
They also have a real life Capt. Sparrow character that works like all the other characters in the park. Shmoozing and doing photo ops. At first I thought they could have done better (looks-wise), but then he started walking around and he moved just like Johnny Depp! Pretty funny! Anyway, we had a blast! The kids actually stayed up until midnight! Whew! All in all we saw 4 pretty new attractions. Pirates was one, then Buzz Lightyear Astro Blasters (our second time), and then at Disney's California Adventure, Mike and Sully to the Rescue and Turtle Talk with Crush. Both of those were cute. The Monsters Inc one was kind of like Mr. Toad or Pinnochio and Turtle Talk with Crush was an interactive movie that was within the Animation Area. Cole got to talk to Crush as did Carl (that was a hoot!) He asked Cole if his parents were here and we raised our hands (we were sitting right behind Cole) and Crush says, "Whoa, tight leash, Dude!" It was really cute! The kids also surprised us by wanting to go on Star Tours! We went twice they enjoyed it so much! Well, that is it for now, so next time you go to Disneyland, make sure you see the new Pirates, it really is neat.

We Love Lake Tahoe!

This is our 3rd trip to Lake Tahoe and we enjoy it more and more everytime we go. The first year we went Cole was just 15 months old, so there were a few things we couldn't do. The second time was two years ago, two years after the first time, so Cole was 3 and Kaleigh was 5. This year the kids were 5 and 7, the perfect age for more activities. We went speedboating (of course-read below), and Mommy actually tried wakeboarding again after 8 years! The water was extremely choppy and the winds were blowing waves over us (when in the water) so I was only able to get up and stay up for a couple of minutes. It was still fun and I look forward to the next time (in smoother water preferably) Carl both wakeboarded and tubed (I won't do that again!) and Kaleigh even got in the tube with her daddy, unfortunately, the tube got front heavy and Carl had to throw Kaleigh to the side just so he wouldn't get pulled on top of her! She was scared but got over it. The water was pretty cold and that was probably the biggest shock! Cole didn't attempt anything after that! But there was plenty to watch with their cousins and Aunt and Uncle, tubing and wakeboarding (or attempting to wakeboard- hee hee) All and all it was a great trip! We went to the beach, mini golfed, boated, and just hung around with the family. It was a blast and we hope to do it again next year!

Canada Trip 2006

Well, this year was chock full of vacations! We managed to get in a few places and a couple of family reunions! Our first stop was to stop by Lee and Tina's to visit them. We stopped for lunch and picked up and dropped off various items. Then we continued up to Canada. The visit was very nice and we all had a good time. Dad was not doing great when we arrived (he had been in the hospital with 103 degree temp. But it went away pretty quickly and was home when we got there. He was tired but happy to see us. Then as the days went on, he improved a lot! Ate meals with us and even went shopping with Carl! I think he enjoyed the male company. : )

In any case we got to do some things with the kids that we hadn't done before (see next photo)

Not a Flock of Seagulls

Does this kid look like someone? No it isn't the lead singer from a Flock of Seagulls (younger and cuter?), but Cole, our youngest enjoying his first time in a speedboat! We rented a speed boat on the off chance the kids would enjoy it. We tried when Kaleigh was about 3 and she was scared stiff! So we waited and lo and behold it was a huge hit! The kids loved speeding around Lake Okanagan! Kaleigh kept yelling, "is that the best you can do, Daddy?" har har. Cole just sat there and let the wind practically push him around the boat. Carl of course loved every minute with driving and watching his children enjoy something he really enjoys too! I had a good time too! It was so fun, we decided to do the same thing again in Lake Tahoe! See the next post!

Hormones Gone Wild

Ok, so if you are a guy you can skip this entry if you want. It is about female stuff so no need to read on unless you want some insight about how your wife is or will act at some point in your lives. For the past 6 months or so I have been crying at nothing, yelling at nothing, feeling down in the dumps for no reason, feeling pains that I've never felt before, remembering partial bits of nothing and not remembering important things. Headaches I am used to are no longer. Now I have weird headaches that come and go but not all the way, and linger and make me especially irritable! What is going on? I mean I felt normal at some point, but now I am all out of whack!
So I go to the doctor and he says, "You are going through something very normal" Yeah right normal for Psycho lady! So he proceeds to tell me about something called PMDD - Premenstral Dysphoric Disorder. Yeah, I looked it up and it exists! Basically it means PMS gone horribly wild! Thus the title of this entry. So with hormones going all over the place, what is a woman to do? Well, lets see....something I did after Carl and I were married....NO, not that! Get your minds out of the gutter! For those of you who thought Birth Control pills, I apologize for the outburst, but some of you, you know who you are, were thinking something else! Anyway, we don't really need the BC pills but if it will even things out, well by golly it will be soooo worth it!
So, hopefully I won't be tearing up every time someone says "hello" to me! That was the most annoying symptom, I mean I am an emotional person, but this was ridiculous! So that is that.

Big Tooth from a Little Girl!

Today Kaleigh went to the dentist. We needed to go in because she had a loose tooth that had the new tooth below and beside it. I wasn't sure what the dentist would say but I wanted it taken care of before our next vacation. Well, as you can see there are two teeth in the photo and well the tooth I was talking about is the one on the left. Because these teeth don't normally come out until the age of 10 or higher, if you remove one, the other has to come out too, otherwise you have the teeth below growing in leaning toward the empty space. Kaleigh doesn't have that much room to begin with so this would be a major problem. She had already lost the four baby teeth on the bottom with only room for 3 to come in. So when he told me he was going to pull both today, I was somewhat relieved, but more worried. Kaleigh is a lot like me, very dramatic!
So I was expecting the worst. Of course if there is no fear of the dentist already, usually there isn't a problem, I found that out today. She did great! First he explained what was going to happen (he had told me if there is fear then he gives them a little "strawberry sniffer"), then she had some "strawberry sniffer" then the novacaine and then the extraction. She came out looking a little worse for wear, with gauze in her mouth, but ok. He told me she was a perfect patient and that it was a good thing we did it now, as her bottom teeth were collecting not only plaque, but also calcium deposits. At that point she showed me the teeth, holy cow! The one that wasn't loose was so long! Now I understand a little better why tooth get loose and come out so easily! They don't have that long thing keeping them in! Sheesh! So we will come back in about a month for the teeth cleaning.
Hopefully this will improve brushing and help with the sudden bad breath we have had to deal with lately! YUCK! Everybody Brush Your Teeth !!! I mean it!

PHASE 10

Now I don't know how new this game is but it is new to us. We played this card game with our friends in Colorado and really had a good time. When you are up late it is nice to play a game where there is not that much strategy but enough thinking to make you sit up and take notice.
phase 10 is like that. You have 10 phases that you have to get through to win. Each person works on the first phase and if you complete the phase before someone goes out(gets rid of all their cards) then you move on to the next phase. If you don't complete the phase, the next round (when others are on phase 2) you are still working on phase 1. It is interesting because each phase is different from the last. For example the first phase's goal is 2 sets of three of a kind. So 3 3's or 3 4's etc. You have to lay them all down at once. Then you try to get rid of the rest of your cards. The next phase is something like a set of 3 and a run of 4 (1,2,3,4) like that. There are also wild cards and skip cards where you skip whoever you want to (usually the person winning) or if someone skips you you skip them right back! : )
So we ended up purchasing the game so we can take it on our next trip to play with the families.
Should be fun, so look out!

The Summer of Travel


Well, this summer our time is pretty much spent on road trips. We went to Vegas (just Carl and I), we went to Colorado, driving thru California, Nevada, a bit of Arizona and Utah. And we will be leaving again soon on yet another road trip up to Canada, to visit with mom and dad and sister Connie. Dad has been feeling poorly and we hope he will be better when we get there. It will be difficult since we haven't seen him for a year and he has lost a lot of weight and has no hair anymore. But we will get to see everyone, including Tina and Fam on the way up and back and then we will be spending a week in Lake Tahoe with Carl's fam. We try and do the little family reunion thing every other year or so, but we see each other at least once a year, but not always all of us together. So this trip will be really neat, because the kids will see all of their cousins within two weeks of each other! Pretty cool.
For a change we will be staying with Lee and Tina on our trip home and I hope that works out!
My kids get up pretty early! I know it will be ok though. The nice thing about staying with someone is the visiting after hours, when the kids have gone to bed. We can play games and talk and laugh, which is the most fun of course! So Tina, and Lee, look out for some fun and good times! We are bringing a new game!

Last Interview....Done


Well, for those of you keeping up on my happenings, last word on the job front was that I had one more interview with the school board. Well, that was yesterday evening and it seemed to be fine. I was told that they deliberate and then 24 hours later I would hear. Well, it has been 24 hours and so far not a peep, but I didn't really expect them to call right away. I know I pretty much have the job unless I said something that was totally bad. Don't think I did. Oh well, I am definitely NOT on pins and needles waiting. Just updatin the old Bloggeroo. So I will most likely get a call tomorrow from my boss saying that I have the job. If not, well then that would be a surprise. Now, all I need after the call is to get my classroom in order. That will be interesting since they haven't yet moved anything out of the room from the previous occupants! Hmmmm, interesting indeed. Oh well, I will figure it out eventually. Hopefully before school starts? Let's hope.

< Our families on top of Rocky Mtn Natl Park

^
^ Our Friends Lovely Home



< Fireworks Over City Park











Really Fun Trip to Fort Collins, Colorado



Many moons ago (15 years I think) I worked at the Magic Kingdom Club. A Disney company that gave out discount cards. I worked there for about 4 years. Along with me was my friend Angie. We made friends right away and stayed in touch even after we both left Disney. I was engaged the day before Angie started work and she was engaged shortly afterward. We had a great time working together and after I had Kaleigh, 11 months later she had her son Jared. Then I had Cole and 3 months later she had Cambria. We stayed in touch when she was in Laguna Hills and then she decided to move to Colorado of all places! It was tough, but we still kept in touch through e mails and Christmas cards. For the past 3 years we have been talking about us visiting her, but with our annual trips to Canada and not enough time each vacation we have put it off. Well, this year was the first year Carl got 4 weeks vacation time so we finally did it! They live in a really nice area called Fort Collins, which is about an hour north of Denver. It has all the charm of a small town but with a lot of the things we have here in the bigger cities, (movie theaters, large grocery stores, plenty of businesses. ) There is however, something lacking....crime. So it is really a very nice place to live and they love it there. A few things we did while we were there:
There is a community swim/play park, which was great for my non-swimming kids. The pool is like a beach that only goes to about 2 feet in most part and then other areas that are roped off are deeper. There are play structures with hoses and valves to play with, and even a lazy river innertube ride. There are also two rather large water slides that the bigger kids were enjoying.
We also went up to Estes Park, a nice little resort town in the mountains, where we had a nice lunch and then we went for a drive up to the Rocky Mountain National Park. That is where this photo is taken. That is our two families together. We also saw a blue starling and a chipmunk, which was very exciting for the kids. That was on the fourth of July. We then came down the mountain and I guess everyone in Fort Collins watches the firework display at the City park, where they do the fireworks show over the lake. I mean everyone goes! It was really crowded but fun. We also did some shopping, Carl did a brewery tour and we played games after our kids went to bed until the wee hours. Definitely a fun time! So Thank you Angie and Chris for the wonderful time!

Creme Brulee - Vegas Trip Highlight

Ok, so no drooling please. Last thing I posted was my purdy toes, that was for our trip to Vegas that my hubby and I went on. We stayed at the Luxor a nice older (10 yrs +) hotel that uses low rates to keep the folks coming. I also booked online and got a few 2 for 1 deals. Nothing major, but we used the 2 for 1 buffet ticket for breakfast and that was pretty good. The photo is from our "Fancy Dinner" night. We choose one really good restaurant and splurge, right down to the dessert.
This time we actually ate really good twice. Once was a bit of an accident. We had decided to see Le Reve at the Wynn Resort. Very pricey place. We needed to get there early and we took a taxi to avoid traffic. Well, we hadn't had dinner because it was too early before we left. So we ended up looking at some of the bars to see if we could just do appetizers. Well, neither of us wanted to eat what was on most of the menu's and they don't have any non-smoking sections in the bars so...
To make a long story short, we checked out the restaurants and they were all very high end and pricey. I had seen one on the internet that was supposed to be really good Japanese, with Tempura and stuff. So deciding to bite the financial bullet we checked it out. It was pretty small and hardly anyone was there. But then it was only 5:30 at the time so no rush yet. We were seated right away and the first thing we noticed was that the prices were VERY reasonable. So we ordered vegetable Tempura and also something....ack, I forgot what it was called! Something like Robitiaki (in any case it was marinated meat that is grilled) We both tried some. Carl had Sea Bass and I got the filet) I also got one of the best tasting appletini's I have ever had! It was truly a wonderful dining experience! Anyone who goes to Vegas should check this place out. They also have a really good sushi bar (from what I have heard, Carl and I don't do Sushi) Very nice and quiet and wonderful service and food!
Ok, now for the picture....
The next night was our fancy dinner and we ended up "settling" for the Luxor Steakhouse. I had looked all over online for the different steakhouses in Vegas. They were either too high end with weird things food wise or they were just too far away for us to walk. We didn't really want to drive anywhere. So the Luxor Steakhouse was actually on some of the best of the best lists so I thought "fine, we will try it". Best decision I ever made. Apparently they had just changed their menu and chef, and the food and service was fantastic!
Carl and I both had the Filet Mignon and grilled asparagus, with Yukon mashed potatoes (which for a non mashed potato person )that were sublime! And of course last but not least was the dessert. I am a fanatic about Creme Brulee', I really like it if it is done well. And this was done....WELL! The presentation as you can see was very nice but the flavor was to die for!! YUMMY! So we really enjoyed our trip and we will go again next year. We have now tried a few restaurants and may return to one we have already been to. The Fiore Steakhouse at the RIO was a really good one too. So that was our trip and we had a blast.