Anniversary Blog

So apparently I am going to do this anniversary blog, which is great and all except it wouldn't quite be great unless a little honest humor came into play. It has been a wonderful two years with the Mrs. and I look forward to finding new and creative ways to annoy her and make her question taking vows with me in the first place. No, seriously! For example, blowing my nose into my hand without a tissue just excites her beyond belief followed by rolling it up and throwing it into the trash can, wiping my goatee full of toothpaste on the towel, the traditional urination on the bathroom floor (guys, you know what i'm talkin' about in the a.m.), and the endless farting without notice in bed and in the car followed by that oh so familiar giggle. I love my wife and I love her beyond belief. She is the one person I can go to for anything and there is nothing in the world I would do to change that...Honest. I lOVE YOU WHIT!!!!!!!!!!!!!

field trippin

Museum of Tolerance. Los Angeles, CA. 300...YES, three huuuundred 8th graders. 6 charter buses. 22 chaperones. 5+ hours of driving (2 movies) and a 3-hour tour. Great kids who mostly behaved themselves. One tired, tired teacher who organized it all (that's me).

A message of TOLERANCE and HUMAN RIGHTS.

this sums up my day nicely.

Chao.

www.museumoftolerance.com

remember how i said i was done coaching?

i lied.

sorry, but i did.

i kinda thought i was done coaching, but then had the opportunity to coach the girls team at Roosevelt MS and i kinda couldn't pass it up. plus, i think of it as a weening process...this team is waaaaaaaaay less of a commitment than club. i train them once per week (at RMS...no driving 25 minutes to the field!) and we play in a middle school league, 8 or 10 saturday games from today through may. and nothing over the summer is the important part.

so, i have been drinking my coffee sitting in my jammies putting together a line-up and strategizing in my head...what all good coaches do right? :)

so, i am off to go pick up a player (who's our neighbor) to go to the game with my loving husband with his pom poms in tow (just kidding, due to previous posts about cheerleading and matthew, maybe i shouldn't joke about pom poms.) he is coming to watch and support me and the kids in our first game!

p.s. i kinda miss my club team. ok, not kinda...a lot. but don't tell anyone. then i think about how much more free time i will have aaaaaaaall summer and next fall through spring, and i am happy again i am not coaching all-consuming club.

GOOO ROUGHRIDERS! (yes, that's our RMS mascot)

the weekend

Matthew was out of town in San Jose at a PE conference last weekend and I had lots of events to attend! Aside from getting sick with a yucky head cold and feeling generally like crap most the weekend, I had a great time. Our good friend Alisa and her man, Philip, came into town from SF for the weekend of events as well.

We celebrated Deed's birthday on Friday night at the Spaghetti Factory (it's back!) downtown. Here's the ladies:


Saturday was our good friend, Rachel's wedding, at a beach house in Oceanside! It was a gorgeous day, couldn't have been more perfect! Rach was beautiful and wore an amazing dress. It was fun to see her and Rob so happy on their day :)

the back of her dress was HOT!

rach and her dad :)

kim, lis, me

the girls

me, evan, and melissa getting our groove on :)


is it only wednesday today? it can't be.

trip to Colorado: photo blog

the girls in front of our cherry bomb mini we rented for the weekend

me and cam, hanging out. he is sooo sweet, i love him.

landon. big boy! i love him too.

just landon hangin with the girls

this picture is funny because we are all looking elsewhere and landon is the only one paying attention to the camera. doing his "one arm trick!!"

deed, kim, crystal [camden], me, lynds [landon]

deed and landon sharing a moment :)

camden has the best facial expressions!

deed and kim with a cat on the sidewalk. they hate cats and are really allergic so we thought it appropriate to stop for a photo opp.

lyndsy and landon at ice cream

the girls [and landon!] after some shopping and lunch

landon was hot apparently. he doesn't like his car seat very much :)

little cam man...so serious. and so cute!

camden's little feet

uum, landon...that's not very nice. (lyns loves this one! i was cracking up!!!)

girls night out, downtown denver! thanks jonathan for staying home with the boys :)

out to dinner at lime. me, cp, deed

on the dance floor. just like old times :)


Happy 30th birthday, LYNS! Chris wanted to send lyns on a girls trip for her 30th birthday present (lyns and cp have the same bday!) we all decided to go with her and i am so glad! it was so much fun to spend time with these girls, see cp and jonathan's new house and most importantly, meet their new little man! Camden is already 5.5 months! We traveled with Lyns and Landon (8.5 months) which was quite an experience but so much fun!!! (lots of laughs) Both babies are so good and so much fun. Thank you CP for being a fabulous hostess :) miss you already. xo

lessons i've learned from my dog(s)

number 7, 8, 9, 10, and 11:
-love the outdoors!
-give lots and lots of love. unconditional love.
-a short memory (helps with the unconditional love part)
-be ready for adventure always and enjoy spontaneity
-snuggle

i was ready to finish those up and move on to something else! while i am sure i will continue learning things from the hounds, because you can learn something from anyone if you try and are open.

that's all for now.

stay tuned for this last weekend colorado visit recap post***coming soon with lots of photos.

lessons i've learned from my dog(s)

lesson number six:

when enough is enough, let 'em have it!

tolerate...tolerate...ignore what you can...especially when it isn't that important. pick your battles...and pick them carefully....

and then when you have had enough and the little yappy dog next door still won't shut the hell up...bite it!

okay, so i made up the last part about biting, but eventually these pups of ours vocally let "peekie" know they are sick of her. either one of ours will let our a deep, loud bark or four.

our dogs don't bark much so they have had it up to here when they finally bark!

lessons i've learned from my dog(s)

lesson number 5:

when you're hot, lay on the tile. *

*courtesy of matthew

lessons i've learned from my dog(s)

lesson number four:

enjoy good company.

both our dogs just loOoOoVe to be with people. anyone really. even if we had a 4 bedroom house with 2,000 square feet and a gigantic yard [maybe someday]...our dogs would still choose to be right where we are. i guess that makes us good company :)

lessons i've learned from my dog(s)

Lesson number three:

Go barefoot

Be low maintenance.

:)

lesson number two

Go after the prize. If it is worth it, and you want it badly enough.

This lesson comes courtesy of Zoe and her faker-ness! She acts like she is about to DIE on a run because she is so tired and seriously lagging.

aaaaaaaaand then she sees a cat up ahead.

in a half a seconds time max, she is no longer behind but quite the opposite. SPRINTING, I mean she turns it on full force ahead. I no longer ever feel sorry for zoe when she is tired because she is such a faker! It just takes a prize worth going after.

meow.

lessons i've learned from my dog(s)

.......:::::buddy:::::.......

........:::::zoe:::::........


So i am starting a new series on my blog...because it's my blog, and I can! I went for a run this evening and had an inspirational breakthrough from my dogs. I started thinking about how much man's best friend can teach a person, and my list is already 11 things long (yes, I got home from my run and started writing a list).

This thought process began when Zoe was lagging significantly behind. We were only about halfway out and she was a leash-length behind. Well, shorter than a full leash, because we have a double leash and Buddy was trying to be as far ahead as possible. Anyway, she was lagging. After about 3 or 4 minutes of her lagging, I started talking to her: "come on Zoe, you can do it! come on girl!" and she immediately quickened her pace and caught up. for a minute or two. so as she fell behind again, I started talking to her again and she caught up. SO, now you have the background on the origin of thought for this series. Only lesson number one came out out of this run.

Lesson numero uno...sometimes all it takes is a little encouragement. Whether you are on the giving end or the receiving, encouragement can go a long way!

I have decided to post one life lesson learned from my dogs each day (until I run out of ideas, and then this series will conclude abruptly and with no warning). No guarantees or promises on the depth or profoundness of the lessons.

i am lovin' today!

it is a BEAUTIFUL day in san diego. sunny and warm, but not hot. perfect. my students collectively are amazing and have been on task all day, and my teaching feels good and effective. the periods are flying by and it seems like their isn't enough time in each class. euphoric. it is days like today that i am pretty positive i have the best job in the world. i am sitting here at lunch...blogging (never blogged at school before!) and actually looking forward to my 4th period coming in 15 minutes!

i hope you are enjoying your day as well. maybe it is just a regular ol' wednesday for you, because i have a lot of regular-ol'-boring-can't go by fast enough-wednesdays too. but if you look hard, maybe there is something fantastic about your day too! and maybe not. either way, it will go by. the days are going by SO fast (it is March? really?) and i don't want to wish them all away in hopes of summer getting here faster. i actually miss a lot of my students when they go to high school and i don't get these days back with them. other times, i couldn't be happier about not getting these days back...and my foot meets their booties on the way out the door. the ups and downs of teaching, i guess :)

i am going to savor these feelings right now, because i love them!! maybe i will have to come back and re-read this post next week when i want to pull all my hair out and wonder if i was smoking some good crack when i wrote this.

i'm not smoking crack by the way. just to clear that up.

they didn't teach me this...

so i get a call from a student tonight (VERY few students have my cell number) who's mom asked her to call me. mom (and family) need some advice and decide to call me. i am so glad my student feels comfortable enough to come to me, but feel awful the mom is this desperate for help.

my student's older sister (16) has run away...again. they haven't seen her since saturday and she took all her stuff. the mom has no control over the older girl and my sweet wonderful student is scared and mad, because her mom is crying so much. do they call the police to report her run-away? of course, that seems like the obvious right thing to do, if only it were that easy. the run-away sister is undocumented (no papers...no social security card) and will be sent to TJ if she is causing problems involving the police.

yes i have my MA degree in Education and no, i don't know how to handle something like this. i talked with matt about it, and then gave mom lots of options including suggesting she go to San Diego High tomorrow and see if her daughter is showing up at school. I told her to go to the school police to report the run away and seek additional help. Kids around here "run away" and return home from time to time, and it doesn't really get anyone worked up. I also told her she should probably just call the police and the daughter will have to learn the hard way that children don't decide whether or not they are coming home at night.

my student, now the oldest in the house with her sister gone for now, is left at home to take care of 3 younger siblings while mom is busting her chops working like crazy.

i can't imagine. sorry to be debbie downer but it's real life for me today!

that piece of paper

My heart started beating fast when I got home today and saw this:


I started squealing like a little girl and came inside as fast as I could to open it up V-E-R-Y carefully.

a little closer now:

Needless to say, I am very excited and super proud of myself! I worked my ARSE off for this fancy piece of paper!! (I thought the certificate would be the size of a BA degree...but OH NO, it is WAAY bigger-yippeeee!) :) I knew I was done with my program at the end of the summer, but it is so much sweeter to have the paper in hand!


thanks for sharing in my joy!

xxoo