another day

today was an ok day.  4 out of 5 of the 5th grade teachers went to mcdonalds for lunch AND had time to actually eat there!  becky couldn't go because she had recess duty, and she was nice enough to stay out there an extra couple of minutes because we didn't make it back by exactly 12:55.  it was 12:58.

tonight was skate night again.  i think colby spent more time wasting his hard-earned money in the crane machine than he did skating!  i took a bunch of papers to grade, and only managed to get one set done!  oh well!

i only took ONE picture today, so i guess it has to be my photo of the day!

photo of the day #90

hey, mom!

random quote of the day:“Before you criticize someone, you should walk a mile in their shoes. That way when you criticize them, you are a mile away from them and you have their shoes.”~Jack Handey

animals

this is the third time i've started blogging tonight. for some reason, i don't know how to say what i want to say, which is unusual for me.

today was better than i expected.  the day actually went by quickly!  the kids weren't great today, but they weren't terrible either.  two students are really on my heart, though.  i can't write about what's going on in their lives, but i can say it's something NO child should ever have to endure.  so please pray for my two students.  god knows what they need.

tonight i went to michaels to see if they had their new $1 stamps out yet.  score!  not only did they have their studio g clear stamps {which i didn't like because it was all fairies and butterflies! gag!} but they also had a line of farm animal wooden stamps!!!  i love farm animals. spencer's nursery was decorated in baby farm animals...super cute...and i have a thing for cows and pigs. i even sleep with a pig! {shame on you if you thought i was talking about daryl!}  i have  stuffed pig that my parents gave me when i was 10 or 12.  i can't go anywhere without him. he's my velveteen rabbit.  speaking of rabbits....did i just go chasing one, or what?  i started off talking about stamps and ended up talking about my pig!  wow!

so my photo of the day is the collection of farm animal stamps i just bought! i don't know how i'll incorporate them into scrapbooking yet, but i don't care!

photo of the day #89

farm animals

i wish they would have had a sheep stamp!  i would have gotten that, too!

quote of the day:  Who was the first guy that look at a cow and said, "I think that I'll drink whatever comes out of those things when I squeeze them?"  ~Bill Watterson

i'm back and in a much better mood!

well, i'm back from a wonderful weekend in the promised land!  two weekends in a row in TEXAS!!!  what am i going to do next weekend?

we decided to leave friday right after school so we could get  ahead of the snow storm. apparently, that was a good decision!  i hear that there was lots of snow everywhere, but it's amazing how quickly it melted! anyway.....

we took rocky-dog with us to texas because daryl thought he would freeze in the snow.  he's travelled with us many times before so it was no big deal.  it was funny, though.  this was the first time he actually explored the car.  he even discovered that he liked to ride on the dashboard.  he's certainly small enough to fit up there!  

we were just crossing lake eufala when the UNBELIEVABLE happened.  rocky was all perched on the dashboard looking cute, and then there was this horrible splat sound, like you hear in cartoons.  i looked up and rocky had POOPED on the dashboard!!!! in my car!!!!!!!  not only was he on the dashboard, he was right over the defrost vent!!!  AND this was not a solid poo, it was squishy and liquidy at the same time!!!  

photo of the day #86

oh no he didn't!

and if that wasn't bad enough, apparently colby is super-sensitive to the smell of doggie doo, and he puked everywhere!!!  i know, this all sounds too disgusting to be true, but i promise you i didn't make this up!  this is really my world! 

of course we didn't have any kind of wipes in the car, so daryl was cleaning up rocky's mess with used tissues and a few napkins i happened to have in the glove compartment.  thankfully colby just managed to get the puke all over his blanket and hands.  so i just used the dry parts to wipe him off.  i found a wal-mart sack and put his nasty blanket in that.  colby was crying because he had just puked and because he couldn't stand the smell.  then he pointed to the seat where

 there was a 'chunk' i missed in cleaning up.  i grabbed the first thing i saw on the floorboard to wipe up the chunk, and it just happened to be spencer's sock!  i didn't tell him until later though.  thank goodness i remembered to tell him before he put it back on!

poor, colby....

daryl wasn't able to get all of the poop out of the vent, and unfortunately we had to use the defrost.  so i kept spraying my coconut lime body spray in the car.  at first daryl griped, but it wasn't long until he grabbed the bottle and was spraying it in the vent!

we finally got to terrell, texas about 10:30 that night.  that was an exhausting trip down there!

saturday morning i got to go treasure hunting with my boys, daryl, matt and his girls.  judy was at the ladies' retreat, so she didn't get to go with us.  i was really surprised that matt and daryl wanted to go, but they were really nice about it.  the first store we went to was WEIRD.  they had all kids of big things and lots of reproductions of antiques.  they also had lots of mannequins and animals....like i said, WEIRD.

but i did find this cute little elephant!  he was even nice enough to let me try his glasses on!

after that we ate lunch at this yummy chinese place and then i got to go to another antique mall!  it was huge, and they had lots of cool stuff.  

i knew the rest of the crew was tired of treasure-hunting, so i didn't spend as much time in there as i could have.  i only bought one thing, and that was a set of colored pencils like i used to have when i was a kid.  i found this picture that we used to have in our house growing up.  i wonder what happened to it....

when we got back to matt and judy's house, i dropped the rest of the gang off and went to wal-mart.  my "instructions" were to just go to wal-mart and come back because judy was going to be home soon and i hadn't seen her yet.  daryl thought i would go find some more antique stores and be gone too long!  can you believe that????  i told him i also needed to go find some bluebonnets because i wanted some pictures of them.  he said that was ok, but not to take too long. ok, whatever!

photo of the day #87

texas bluebonnet

i found my bluebonnets, got what i needed at wal-mart, and then i headed straight back to matt and judy's..........not really.  i wanted that to be true, but i couldn't help myself.  i KNEW there were a couple of antique stores in terrell because i googled them before we left!  they were calling me, and i didn't spend that much time in the first one!!!  but the second one...was so COOL! there was not a lot of stuff, but what was there was right up my alley!  i took way too long in there!  sorry, judy!

for dinner we all went to one our favorite local restaurants, los hermanos! 
it was just like old times.  the harrells and the hayes having dinner at los.

juevos con papas, baby!!! yummers!

today was homecoming at rockwall and brin church of christ where daryl served as youth minister for 5 years.  they invited him back to speak during bible class.  it was nice to be back.  it felt normal to be sitting in that auditorium worshipping with all of our friends.

i have to be honest.  i wasn't really looking forward to going back to terrell.  i kept telling myself it was because it would take my whole weekend and because i've gained so much weight since we lived there.  but as i was driving around terrell by myself yesterday, i realized the REAL reason i didn't want to go back...it made me sad.  leaving terrell to move to arkansas was the hardest move i've ever made in my life, and i've made several.  my heart hurt when we left there to move to arkansas.  i think i cried most of the way to newport the day we left.  the people in terrell, particularly matt, judy and charis, were the closest friends i'd had in my adult life.  judy and charis are like sisters to me.  

photo of the day #88

judy, amy, charis

so going back to terrell just reminded me of all we left behind.  i didn't want to hurt again.  but you know what?  i'm not as sad as i thought i'd be.  god puts us just where he needs us, and i know there is a reason why we're here in oklahoma and not in terrell.  like the michael w. smith song says, "friends are friends forever if the lord is the lord of them."  i believe that with all my heart.  today was about homecoming, and this world isn't my home.  heaven is my home, and i will see my friends again in this life from time to time, but someday....i'll spend forever with ALL my brothers and sisters in christ when we all go home to be with our father.

quote of the day:  "There's no place like home." ~Dorothy, from the Wizard of Oz

bad day

today was a bad day.

i hate test scores. {among other things today...}

tomorrow will be better.

photo of the day #85

bad day, bad mood

quote of the day:  “Anyone can give up, it's the easiest thing in the world to do. But to hold it together when everyone else would understand if you fell apart, that's true strength.”  

i need to remember this.

big red

i know it's not good for me.  i know i should drink fewer cokes {i'm sorry, i just can't call it a pop!} than i do.  but i love BIG RED!!! and tonight lisa smor's awesome husband brought me one!!!  i went to a nearby gas station during my conference period today to get a big red, and they didn't have one!  they are usually one of the few stores that have it.  i was sad.

but now i have one for school tomorrow!  thanks, kim!

photo of the day #84

big red

i just finished watching american idol, and it was really good tonight.  my bottom 3 would be scott, megan and lil.  i didn't want to like him, but adam lambert was REALLY good tonight.  he was really creepy to me last week with his version of "ring of fire" but he redeemed himself tonight in my eyes!

random quote of the day: The early bird gets the worm, but the second mouse gets the cheese.  ~Author Unknown

not gonna do it

photo of the day #83

the pile

this massive pile of laundry is patiently waiting to be folded.  it will still be there tomorrow.  so i'm not gonna do it tonight.  i'm tired and i'm going to read for a little bit and then go to sleep.

quote of the day:  Behind every working woman is an enormous pile of unwashed{in my case unfolded} laundry. ~Barbara Dale

another monday

did you know that excessive wind makes 5th graders crazy?  it's amazing.  

today was another day in room 206.  i thought the nice week-long break would calm everyone down and they'd be bright-eyed and bushy-tailed ready to work.  wrong!  only 66 more days until school is out for summer! 

i really don't hate teaching even though sometimes i sound like i do.  it's just that some years are much harder than others.  a teacher gets discouraged when it seems like no matter what he/she does the students don't seem to care about learning.  it's even more discouraging when it seems like it's the majority of the class that doesn't care and then you have those few students who really DO CARE.  i feel like i let them down because i'm constantly having to deal with the majority.

i had an interesting time teaching the basics of algebra today! wow!  one student even asked me when in life would he use algebra.  thank goodness i was ready with an answer!

photo of the day #82

teacher hands {stains from overhead markers}

quote of the day: One good teacher in a lifetime may sometimes 

change a delinquent into a solid citizen. ~Philip Wylie

back to normal

sunday was back to normal.  church. nap. more church.  america's funniest home videos. bed.

i had great plans to do laundry and catch up on blogging, but my sunday afternoon nap was calling me.  i couldn't resist!  i slept all afternoon.  i guess it was because i hadn't slept well the past 2 nights.  oh well.

today's photo of the day made me giggle.  i looked up during the middle of worship yesterday morning, and there were bunny ears!  i started to take a picture, but gina grabbed my camera saying she had a better view!  {i got in trouble by the preacher for taking pictures. :( }  i know, i know. shame on me.  but it was still funny to see the bunny ears!  thanks for the giggle, bella!

photo of the day #81

bunny ears in church

quote of the day: “Think what a better world it would be if we all, the whole world, had cookies and milk about three o'clock every afternoon and then lay down on our blankets for a nap.” ~Robert Fulghum

back in god's country

saturday morning we got up even EARLIER and drove to the great state of texas for a family reunion.

just seeing that sign brings a tear to my eye...{sigh}

we had a blast at the reunion!  it wasn't because we spent a lot of time catching up with relatives, though.  it's because the reunion was at "the ranch" and we got to ride 4-wheelers and go fishing!!!  i was in redneck heaven!  this was the first time colby and spencer had ridden 4-wheelers, and they LOVED it!  colby didn't even lunch because he was having so much fun!  spencer enjoyed going up in the hills and exploring more than colby did.  

colby just liked to go FAST....................he even scared me a couple of times because we were flying down the trails!

at one point colby was singing at the top of his lungs, "i can't drive 55!"

after lunch i went fishing with the varmints, pappy, andy and marcus.  {yes, i was the only girl!} marcus caught the first fish just a few minutes after we got to the pond.  then i quickly caught the next one!  it was a little mud catfish.  andy took it off the hook for me, and then asked me if i wanted to kiss it!  of course i didn't want to kiss it, but i DID want a picture with it for my photo of the day.  it was hard to take the picture AND watch andy to make sure he didn't shove the thing in my mouth!

photo of the day #80

my fish

{for the record i caught 3 fish, pappy caught 1 and andy caught ZERO!}

i think it's funny i caught more fish than my dad or brother because they would NEVER let me go fishing with them when i was little.  they said if you couldn't pee over the side of the boat, then you couldn't go.

there was something about being outside all day in the texas country.....i was thinking all the way home that i would love to have a few acres of land with an iron gate over the drive. i'd name my little place peaceful valley.  {that was the name of our street growing up.} i'd have one of these in my yard:

and these would be flying in front of my house:

being in texas also got me in the mood for country music again!  it's been years since i've listened to it, but all the way home i listened to some CDs i have...george strait, trisha yearwood, garth brooks and alan jackson.  i guess i really am a country girl at heart.

quote of the day: Texas is a state of mind. Texas is an obsession. Above all, Texas is a nation in every sense of the word. –John Steinbeck

spring break day 5

friday morning, grammy {my mom}, the varmints and i got up early to do more treasure-hunting at garage sales!!!  i didn't find anything, but the varmints did!  the first place we stopped, i spotted a box of rocks so i pointed it out to spencer.  the sticker on top said 50 cents, but we weren't sure if that meant 50 cents each or 50 cents for the whole box.  spencer asked a man that was working there about it, and he said he wasn't really sure.  while he was asking other people about it, colby came along and was suddenly interested in this box

of rocks.  {spencer is the one who collects them.}  the man finally said to spencer, "how much will you give me for them?"  colby jumped right in holding his 2 quarters in the air and said, "i'll give you 50 cents!" and the man handed the box to colby!!!!  spencer was SO MAD!  of course colby ended up sharing the rocks with spencer, but there was a lot of silence in the car for a while after that!

after lunch, daryl arrived in edmond and our family went to guthrie.  my main goal was to treasure hunt at all the wonderful antique stores there!  since daryl spent part of his childhood in guthrie, he wanted to show us some special places {loved that!}.  this is the first house he lived in when they moved to guthrie:

and this is the second one:

after touring the town, we stopped and had some ice cream at this little store in downtown guthrie.  a man and a teenage boy were walking down the sidewalk with two little weenie dogs on leashes.  they stopped in front of the ice cream store, and tied their little doggies to the light post out front like they were horses!  colby loves dogs, so he stayed out there and talked to them while we ordered his ice cream.  after the men left with the dogs, colby came running up to me and said, "mom! guess what that little brown weenie dog's name was!!!  OSCAR!!!"  i thought he was kidding me since he had heard my comment several days ago about me naming a weenie dog oscar if i had one.  but he assured me that when the man untied him he said, "c'mon oscar, let's go!!"  HOW COOL IS THAT?!!  so guess what my picture of the day is for

 friday?  OSCAR!  i even managed to snap a picture while he was shaking his head so it looks like his ears are flying away!

photo of the day #79

oscar, the weenie dog!

quote of the day:  I have a dog so mean, he ate the neighbor's weenie dog. Now he's a bratweiler. ~Nick Arnette  {i guess this is more like a joke!}

spring break day 4

thursday i woke up and decided i wanted to go see my parents a day early.  so the varmints and i packed up and headed to edmond.  on the way there, we had to make a little detour because i was on a secret mission for the smors!

back in november 4 friends and i (a.k.a. smors) took a road trip from catoosa, ok to arcadia, ok along route 66.  we stopped in this antique store in kellyville.  the owner of the store was less than friendly to us, and when we were being silly and taking pictures of each other and of the cool stuff she had in her store she said, "you guys are really freaking me out with your cameras!" so she earned the nickname madge.  unfortunately in all of our picture-taking, NONE of us got a picture of madge!!!  

so i decided to take a little side trip thursday, and sneak a photo of madge.  when i explained to spencer why i was stopping at this store HE volunteered to take the picture for me!!!  she never even saw him take it!  so my picture of the day for thursday is dedicated to the smors!

photo of the day #78

madge

mom and i went treasure hunting in edmond at a couple of thrift stores and antique stores, while the boys hung out with my dad.  while pappy grilled burgers {he makes the BEST burgers, sorry daryl} the boys and i went exploring at the creek behind their house.  here are some pics from our little exploration:

i found this little squirrel when i was looking for the wood-pecker that was knocking on a nearby tree!

i love the bare toes, colby!

natural beauty

colby was fascinated with the ant colony and begged for the camera so he could take a picture of it!  of course i didn't say no!

this stump was actually a 20-foot tree until one night in january.  while my parents slept a beaver (or beavers) snuck into their yard and took the ENTIRE tree down and carried it off!

quote of the day:  And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair. ~Kahlil Gibran

 

not a real post

for all of you missing your daily dose of {ME}, i promise i'll catch you up on the adventures of my life tomorrow!  we've been in oklahoma city since thursday, so i haven't been able to post.  don't worry, i still took pictures so there will be a photo of the day for every day i haven't blogged!

i'd post more tonight, but i'm about to fall asleep as i type.  it's been a long, exhausting, awesome day!!!

spring break day 3

today was another beautiful day in tulsa, so we took advantage of this lovely weather and went to the tulsa zoo.  apparently most of tulsa had the same idea because the place was PACKED!  i couldn't believe it!  we actually had to wait in line to get in!

we met some other teachers and their girls there.  it was fun to watch colby because one of the girls is his "good friend" and the other little girl actually kissed him a few weeks ago! {of course he didn't think that was a good thing to do, and he punched her!}

all of the animals were very cooperative today and were out of their cages!  even the polar bear was back!  we also got to see a pig paint a picture with his snout!  they had a drawing for the picture, but i didn't win...bummer!  they also had a new animal i hadn't seen before.  apparently he was lost somewhere in the 80s because he was still wearing his leg-warmers!!

photo of the day #77

totally rad

after the zoo, the varmints and i had to buy the food for the wednesday night meal at church.  i signed up to cook tonight since it was spring break, and i wouldn't be stressed about having enough time to cook.  the last two times i've cooked i've burned something unintentionally.  i know how to cook!  last time some less-than-logical person put wooden spoons in the oven and i burned those.  anyway....

tonight i didn't burn anything!!!  if fact i had to get creative in order to get everything cooked!  so my creativity project today was cooking!  the stove would NOT work tonight, so i had to come up with a way to brown hamburger meat, cook rice and make queso without the use of the 6 burners that i desperately needed!  

talk about multi-tasking, i made the rice in the microwave {one boil-in-bag at a time every ten minutes} and melted the velveeta for the queso in two crock pots.  the biggest obstacle was how i was going to brown 10 pounds of hamburger meat in less than an hour without the use of a stove or an electric skillet!  i managed to find an electric griddle and just made do with that.  do you know how hard it is to brown meat on that flat surface?  pieces of meat kept falling off, and grease was all over the counter!  i was panicking!  

i was unsure that i could everything ready by 6:00, but thanks to carnita and her sweet boys' help, we got it all done with 2 minutes to spare!  woo hoo!!!  the next time i volunteer to prepare the wednesday night meal, we're having sandwiches!!!!

quote of the day:  "The zoo is a place for animals to study the behavior of human beings." ~author unknown

spring break day 2

today i...

-slept late

-bought soccer shoes for the varmints

-bought roller skates for colby

-went fishing and got 2 bites {stupid critter took my worm!}

-conducted a science experiment with spencer {he's growing his own crystals}

photo of the day #76

mad scientist

-made a new dish that was in the latest issue of kraft foods magazine {which was disgusting}

-watched american idol and voted for kris, danny, anoop and the last guy.

quote of the day: "The scientist is not a person who gives the right answers, he's one who asks the right questions."  ~Claude Lévi-Strauss, Le Cru et le cuit, 1964

if this quote is true, then spencer will be a great scientist because he asks A LOT of questions!

spring break day 1

today was officially the first day of spring break.  i slept until 10:30 in MY OWN BED!!! actually i was awakened around 8:30 by two varmints dressed in green, holding light sabers and shouting, "happy st. patrick's day!!!"  dorks!  they were a day early!  i wish i would have actually opened my eyes so i could have seen what they did to their faces!  colby told me later that they had colored their faces green with his markers!!!  maybe there will be a repeat performance in the morning!

today was also a special day because a torch was passed....daryl taught spencer how to mow the yard!  woo hoo!  now i won't feel sorry for daryl on 90 degree mornings and help him mow.  i can just send spencer out there to help him!

photo of the day #75

new lawn boy

this afternoon the varmints and i took our new fishing gear to the neighborhood ponds and tried to catch some fish.  no luck.  i got one bite in an hour.  then some strangers invaded our fishing spot so i was ready to leave.  maybe we'll catch something tomorrow.

i got some happy socks today!  i don't know why, but i ordered these from little missmatched! they are awesome!  they are color-coordinated socks, but they're not matching socks!!!  how fun is that?

something else that made me smile today were these beautiful strawberries!  i made some fruit dip to go with them...yummers!!!!

but the most happiest part of today was that daryl is feeling even better!!!  he actually spent most of the day outside working in the yard.  he took spencer to lunch, and he didn't have to lay down once!  that's such a ginormous improvement for him!  the poor guy has been out of commission for two weeks.  he's tired right now, but he said it's a good kind of tired from actually doing something today! {smile}

quote of the day:  "A joyful heart makes a cheerful face."  ~Proverbs 15:13

yay!

daryl is finally starting to feel a little better!!!  he didn't run any fever today, and that's a BIG improvement!  he even got outside for a little bit and worked in the yard.

i finally washed the dishes and folded some laundry.  i think washing dishes is one of my least favorite chores {not that i really like any of them!}.

photo of the day #74

empty sink

quote of the day:  A spotless house is a sign of a misspent life. ~anonymous 

i didn't do it...

today i didn't:

 - wash the dishes.

 - do any laundry.

 - cook a meal.

instead i:

 - had lunch with colby.

 - took a nap in MY bed.

 - scrapbooked!

photo of the day #73

creating in studio A

so now studio A is messy, just like the rest of my house, and that's ok.  i have all week to clean, but i had to create something using my scrapbook supplies today because gina and i challenged each other.  i couldn't show up to church tomorrow empty-handed!  i worked on my route 66 album!

while i was working on my scrapbooking, colby was busy creating as well.  he calls this piece of artwork "colorful artistic cheese." {he's already got it hanging on his wall!}

quote of the day: "Every child is an artist.  The problem is how to remain an artist once we grow up."  ~Pablo Picasso