Lily and Maddie

The summer adventures of Lily, Maddie, and I

Lily and Maddie are the girls I am nannying (is that a word?) this summer. They are an absolute blast, and I am missing them today. I had a doc appt. this mng and Maddie one this afternoon, so I couldn't keep them. Lily is 8 and going into 3rd grade and Maddie is 11 and going into 6th grade, so they are pretty much up for anything and it's great. Yesterday Maddie had soccer camp, and afterwards we were going to go see a movie. Well there was only one issue, Maddie didn't want to take a shower after soccer camp, and said she didn't need one. (She's not a girly girl-wears soccer shorts and ponytails all the time.) After 10 mins. of asking her to shower and Lily telling her that yes she was stinky even when she does shower, just beacuse she is Maddie, we settled on washing off with dirt on her knees and arms with a washcloth. Then we were off to the movies...to see Kung Fu Panda...it was so cute! However, rather silly to talk about him being fat all the time...you would think with him working out that much to be a Kung Fu master, he'd loose some weight, but no.... Maddie and Lily ate an entire Med. bag of popcorn and a box of Buncha Crunch...they are bottomless pits I tell you! Then after a week of getting along I knew a big blow up was due to happen...between the two of them that is. So everyone is all happy after the movie, and we get home where Maddie decides she wants to just watch tv in her room, and Lily decides she wants to annoy her sister...anyone surprised? I wasn't being an older sister myself...Maddie yells at Lily to leave, Lily claims she is leaving, but Maddie keeps yelling that she will come right back in because Lily is literally only about an inch out of her room...I asked Lily to not go into Maddie's room if she doesn't want company, and Lily screams "I'm not in her room!" *while slamming the door to her own room* At this moment, I had a massive flashback/flashforward moment. Flashback-Always asking Caitlin to leave me alone b/c she always wanted to be doing something or next to me or by me, anything, and then I would eventually get frustrated enough and yell, followed by her storming off crying and *slamming her door*. Flashforward-These two beautiful blonde hair blue eyed girls arguing could easily be my children, and I can hear the many conversations that come with having a sister/or daughters in my own house in just a few years...maybe a good time to pray for boys???? Forget about boys or girls-children in general never hit so close to home in previous flashforward thoughts in life as this one did...does that mean I am getting old? Or that the amount of time from now until having kids is a shorter amount of time than when I was one? Now, now no one is saying that is tomorrow, but in the next few years, it's just that confrontation btw Maddie and Lily made me feel very momlike. (I think it was b/c Lily was yelling at me and slamming doors.) Ahhh the things to look forward too in life...luckily they are all cute, soft, and smell goodie before they start screaming at you and slamming doors.
I hope you enjoyed this installment of Lily and Maddie...I am sure there will be more to come this summer.

Crappy "Professional Development"

So Natalie and I spent the day (8:30-3) wasting away in a room at Fulton Learning Center...wish we'd been wasting away in margaritaville...no luck. It was a session described as ESL (English as a 2nd Lang.) Strategies...and was clearly a presentation for an ESL curriculum...because we have money for that...no, nor do I have enough ESL kids to have a totally seperate curriculum for them. I mean did I really want to spend one of my summer days listening to someone talk about how great their books are, and these activities would go great with our books, blah, blah, blah! How the hell am I suppose to use your damn activities if all you give me is one sample practice book or reader when I have more than one kid who needs it, or if I need three more pieces in your oh-so-fancy collection to complete the activities you have presented!? Had we known that the day would have been 80% of the new curriculum you can't afford presentation, 15% statistics we already knew, and 5% actual useful activities and/or developmentally appropriate things for our kidos...then WE WOULDN'T HAVE GONE! I mean holy-hell Mr. Superintendent no one and I MEAN NO ONE wants to spend their summer attending 12 hours of professional development, let alone prof. dev. that is not even useful! Someone should kick him in the ass right out the TPS door and not let him return...he's a total and utter moron! I am going to have to tell Blaze to blog about him so he will get fired...I am no good at harnessing super human strength these days. Thanks for letting me rant...I feel much better now...hopefully the rest of my day/evening will be fantastic-going out to McNellie's to celebrate Mere's big 2-5. At least I know the evening will be more productive than the day today-yeah for beer!

the randomness of SPAMALOT *&me*

My wonderful mom bought tickets for the fam to go see Spamalot this past wkend...and all I can say is it was sooo outrageously funny that Jeremy and I were both crying from laughing so hard! It took the best parts of Monty Python's Holy Grail, and pieced them together with hilarious songs. One song was just called "A Song like This" because it just kept repeating that at this point in the musical there should be a song like this *accompanied by music to evoke strong emotion* somewhat like a love song at a totally random time...sounds confusing, but really they just stuck songs in places. Another one came after the knights names Nei request a shurbbery, and then require a Broadway musical production...followed with Sir Robin singing about how they can't be successful on Broadway without a Jew in the musical. *followed by giant, and I mean giant, light up star of David* Absolutely frickin' hilarious! I highly recommend you see it if you ever have the opportunity.

Was a huge nerd today @ Barnes and Noble & preordered my copy of Breaking Dawn and reserved my spot to go to the "release party." Blame Natalie and Yenny...it's all their fault I am obsessed. I have delved further into The Host in the last few days, still hard to get into, but getting better. Lots of internal struggle right now...looking very promising...& I love the way Stephenie Meyer writes, so that makes it really easy to read.

*Soapbox moment*
I am also coaching soccer camp this week, and I have the 4-6 yr. old group. They make me tired... There is this one kid who's 4, and is so "pudgy" that she looks like she is packed in bubble wrap! It's ridiculous and surely she has some kind of medical something otherwise that's just not fair to feed your child so much they get to that point...she's 4 clearly she isn't fixing dinner! As a plus, she is getting exercise by coming to camp...but I am still in total shock about how large this child is for her age, she is the right height and talks in the sweetest voice and it totally 4...she asked me to stop the game we were playing to wait for her while she had to go to the bathroom because she didn't want to miss anything. All with super curly hair put into pigtails on the sides of her head...How adorable! So yes cute, but disturbing at the same time, makes me want to bring her home and feed her veggies and go for walks and ride bikes.

HAHA!

I just had a great laugh...Guiness was backwards with head hanging off the chair right? Well he just slid off the chair and fell onto the floor with a big plop and just laid there like "what the hell? how did I end up down here!" It was great...too bad it was just me who say it!

Guinness is 1!

My baby dog is 1! Can you believe it??? Tuesday was his birthday and we went to the park to see some of our dog friends and have pupcakes. Yeah I know I am a huge nerd, but he's my baby and Jeremy and I have so much fun with him. We need to get a can of Guinness and take his picture with it like we did when we got him, so we can compare sizes... =) When he is standing we can pet his back w/o any effort to bend our arm or bend over...lol...as for weight, I dunno, we need to go to PetsMart and weigh him again. I would guess in the 125-130 lb. range, but who knows. We've been trying to put some weight on him b/c he looks very skinny, and now that we have his allergies all figured out he is eating raw chicken...yum! (We had allergy testing done b/c he broke out in hives and pimple type things and was sick to his tummy about a month ago.) So he eats about 2 lbs. of chicken twice a day now, yes bone and all, and no it's only cooked bone that dogs can't have...raw is fine b/c it just crunches done. It's pretty ummm "african safari" to watch him eat, with all the crunching and tearing and whatnot, oh and now he has decided he needs to bark at the chicken before during and after eating it! Not so good at 7am for the neighbors b/c we feed him outside. I will try to post some pics of him eating, among other things. To wrap-up for those of you who have seen the chair in my living room, Guinness is now laying across is with his head hanging backwards of the front of the chair... lol!

Finally Done!

So i finally mailed my National Board of Teaching Standards portfolio yesterday...*sigh* I am so glad to be done with that part of the process, now I have to start studying for the 6 tests I will take on May 31st. Then and only then will I be "done" but have to wait till Nov. to see if I passed...total madness I tell you what do these people think I am made of patience???
On a lighter note, that means I have more time to spend with friends, and read books or watch tv. Oh yeah and of course there is always soccer that I have to get back to. I really need to start running again now that I have some free time, so I can play again soon...jeremy and I are going to look into a gym I think so we don't get any fatter... lol Speaking of soccer, I have to go coach...

Twilight Series

http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/

Click away and join my obsession...that and my friends should start reading it now! You know who you are...

Craziness of life

So, I found out yesterday from my friend Stephanie that Stephanie Meyer has a new book coming out called "The Host." Supposed to be kind of body snatcherish...and we can't wait till August for the 4th book to come out in the Twilight series...Also the movie of Twilight comes out in Oct, and on her website there are pictures of the characters and cars and whatnot and it looks totally awesome! My friends and I are just slightly obsessed... =)

On another note, I only have 5 pages left to write from scratch on my NBC portfolio, and 8 days till I have to mail it...so why am I on here you ask...because I've lost my mind and can't think of another stinkin' thing to write. I mean who wants to talk for 13 pages about two children's literacy development??? At any rate, I have to get it done because if I pass it means 5,000/year for 10 years...just a little incentive there.

On top of being stressed out about that...Guinness jumped out of the back of my car today when we got home from the dog park. (normal) He then proceeded to run into the neighbor's driveway and then back yard and then the two empty MUDDY lots next to them and then back to their backyard (not normal!) Jeremy and I were way stressed about it because we of course didn't want him to step on some construction something or worse continue to run away. We've also decided it's about time to get him fixed...we can't stand the craziness any longer but we don't want to do it too soon because we want him to grow to his full size. Despite the crazy puppy stuff he is still the cutest sweetest guy ever...and if you haven't met him in person yet, you definately should come over... =)

much needed girl time-

I went to dinner with some of my favorite girls tonite, and had a blast. I am so super stressed out about my NBC papers (one entry out of four to go), and it's due March 31st...yeah let the panic begin! So dinner out was just what I needed, and love my friends for talking about stuff ranging from books were are reading to issues with birth control and of course the cuteness of Parker. Anyway, I should move on to my paper again...so until later probably after the 31st. LOL!

It's been a while-

Well, I haven't posted in forever it seems like because after reading Twilight I then proceeded to procrastinate life even more by reading New Moon and Eclipse, the other two books in the series. They were just as wonderful as the first book and has definately confimed my obsession with the series. Natalie, Jennifer and I can't wait for the fourth book in Aug. and we have convinced Steph and our tech teacher to read them too...haha just more to join the "cult" of the vampires. haha =)

On other topics we had a full family wkend-Jeremy goes out of town again on Wed., he has to be gone over next wkend this time-man is that going to suck. I'll have to remind what it is like to be single on the wkends again...haha! Guinness has gotten absolutely ginormous. He weighs around 110lbs. now. We went to the dog park today and Guinness got to see all his dog friends-Dodger the St. Bernard, Fred the Great Pyrenees, Remi the pug, and of course cousin dogs Toby and Tapper. He ran like crazy for an hour and half, that's the most he's ever played, so needless to say he is totally zonked now.

Otherwise life is pretty normal and going great we're just one little happy family! =)