More Russia

So Kathy and I decided to create a blog for our trip to Russia, and that way we can document everything we are doing in real time to later use in our classrooms and keep our coworkers up to date. In addition, we are adding the blog to our media release through Fund for Teachers so they can keep up with what we did with our trip and how effective our research was and whether it was a good donation of their monies. I would love it if you all followed that blog as well...although I will of course blog my own unedited thoughts on here...but all the pics and whatnot will be posted to the russia blog. My friend Kathy and I will both be posting...super excited about it!

F-R-I-D-A-Y!

It's finally Friday! Can I get an AMEN!? It has been the longest week for some reason...not really sure why as I have had a million things to complete and not enough time to complete them, yet days drag on....
We are going to Edmond this weekend for my cousin Sarah's wedding shower, so excited because the hostesses are fabulous! (It's me and my sister lol) Going to head home, pack the bags, load up the ENORMOUS dog crate, load the bags, load the ENORMOUS dog, and be on our way. I really hopes it doesn't rain while we drive or tomorrow during the shower...I really just hope it doesn't rain at all actually. Maybe I should send an email to God, think he receives those? (Dear God, Please don't send rain. I have a wedding shower planned in a sunroom & outdoor patio. It would really suck to get wet, plus my dress wouldn't look so good. Let me know what you can do. Thanks, yours always- Jessie) What it might work? Or maybe he reads my blog...I dunno. Anyways, here's hoping it's a fantastic weekend no matter what!!!

From Russia with Love...

Ok so I am just now getting time to sit down and type that I am GOING TO RUSSIA THIS SUMMER! It's been crazy busy since I found out...it's a trip through a Fund for Teachers Grant that a couple of co-workers applied for, sadly (for them) one of them can't go, so I get to go instead (happy for me!) It is a whirl wind to get the paperwork in for the grant people and to pick what kind of tours or cities we want to visit and for how long. Right now it is looking like 7 days in Mosow and St. Petersburg with my wonderful co-worker Kathy D!!! We are going to study Russian composers and the influence that the culture and oppression has had on the music and dance of Russia. (So it kinda goes with my previous trip to San Fran for Keeping Score with the San Fransico Symphony.) Anyways, I AM SUPER EXCITED AND CAN'T WAIT! (Sad that I'm going without Jeremy though....) I will post more details later...

Latest Creative Memories News

So I am super excited about the party I had on the 6th. I sold well over $300 in products! (self praise time) Way to go me! I am also so excited that because my party's sales were over $250 and being the host, I then received 15% of the party's sales in free products. I now have $59 to spend, and I so can't decide...there are so many options, but I most definitely will wait for the new products on March 1st. I got a preview of the catalog at Becky's and there is some cute stuff!
I was totally going to get going on making the invites for Jeremy and Tim's bday bash today, but alas Jeremy didn't put a cd-rom in when he got us a new computer case. Now I'll have to wait till he gets home to load my new digital software. Also, on my list of scrapbook to-dos is create an invite for Sarah's bridal shower, but I guess that will wait for a few more days as it's not till April. I'm just so excited to get going on my new software...anyways I am really just procrastinating working on my scrapbook pages from Italy. I have reached the point where I don't want to look at them any longer...might have to move on with the digital stuff before I can be motivated about Italy again.
I also put together the super cute Valentine's themed paper book I got a few weeks ago, just put random pics of Jeremy and I and Guinness from the last year or so. Not really a present for Jeremy, just something we can both enjoy around the house. Showed Jeremy and he LOVED it, so that made me super happy, and it is now on our bar for all to enjoy! =) All in all I am really enjoying being a Creative Memories consultant, you know how much I love to be creative and make things from scratch! Just wishing more people would realize they need to, and not in an over the top super creative way, just in a take care of your pictures so your kids can tell its you in the pictures kind of way. Also, I think often about what it would be like for a family to have no story to go along with the pictures, like if I sadly had Alzheimer's like my great grandpa, I wouldn't know when or where our pictures were taken. But since I basically write about entire life story alongside our pictures (I'm over the top i know)then I don't worry that my kids, grandkids, and great grandkids will totally know who we both are. Sorry, just my two cents for today on the topic of scrapbooking. Off to Italy!

The Office & Pantry

Jeremy and I tackled the office this past wkend. It had gotten a bit out of control. Random crap stacking up in front of the bookcase, unused/broken dog toys on top of the dvd shelf, National Board stuff everywhere. So we decided to pull it ALL out and start again...Thought it was going to be a huge undertaking, but it wasn't so bad. We went and had pieces of wood cut as "braces" for our bookcase shelves b/c we have sooo many books the shelves bow. So we emptied the bookcase and stained the "braces" to match. This went really well, but they didn't dry as quickly as we'd have liked. So after a wkend of having an empty office and piles (and I mean piles) of books in my living room the "braces" dried and we put the office back into working order Tuesday nite. It looks awesome!
So in the mood of cleaning/redoing things, we also discussed tackling the pantry. With it being under the stairs it had kind of become the catch-all for, you guessed it, more crap at the back of the pantry. And as I had a "snow" day today, I decided to do the tackling myself. I pulled everything off the floor of the pantry, and the back shelves, IE. the crap. I then proceeded to vacuum the floor on the pantry and wipe down all shelves. If you've seen my pantry, you are realizing the massive undertaking of today. I went through every little thing, and it went in either the trash, salvation army pile, or back on the shelf of that category. (yes they are categorized, are you surprised?) Needless to say, after about 4 hours, I emerged from a clean, crap free, more categorized pantry. And I am sooo happy about it. I really feel like today was a wonderfully productive day, and that my house is in better condition than before the Christmas fairy came and left. Go me!!!!
The pics aren't great b/c they were taken with the ever trusty super-cute white iPhone.

Pet peeve #1

A little ranting:
indecision
I really dislike it when people can't make a decision. Also if someone shows interest in something and then doesn't ever act on it- really annoying. Maybe I just don't get it because if something interests me or it is something I want to do then I do it. Indecision bothers me.
Sorry if this doesn't make sense, just really frustrated lately with lots of people in my life due to indecision.

Great Sunday!

I have had the best, relaxing Sunday. Did I lay around and do nothing? No but it was awesome. I got to sleep till 10- fantastic! Jeremy and I cleaned up the office, updated our contacts, and I got things situated for my open house Thursday- super productive! Then I coached my wonderful girls at the indoor game- so fun! And from there we finished up Christmas shopping to bring our total to 90% complete- wahoo! And last but not least, chatting at Starbucks over coffee- the best! In a few we're off to dinner w/ his family where I will consume several beverages, so as not to be annoyed w/ the company- perfect!
Main idea of today- I love spending time with my husband- no matter what we r doing. Love it!

My NBC

Well it's official, I am now a National Board Certified teacher! I found out this mng that I had past my certfication. I swear I closed the browser and reopened it to log in again at least three times before I believed what it said! So after 2 years of hard work and the re-entry of one entry, I feel so calm. It's been a while since I haven't had to think about what lessons would videotape well, or which unit to write about, or the spending 7 months- TWICE- just waiting for my scores and wondering if I should start preparing more lessons... I am so excited and relived, I can't really keep my thoughts straight here. The main point is I passed, on my own at the age of 27, with 4 & 5 years of teaching experience when I started this journey! I am SOOOOO excited! I also could not have kept my sanity without the help of my wonderful husband Jeremy, my collegues, my family & friends, and my sopranos telling me I could do it and how awesome I was as a teacher the whole way through this! Thank you! Love u all dearly!

"Step-sister's" wedding shower

I went to Edmond today with my aunt Suzy for my dad's wife's daughter's wedding shower. Aka the "stepsister". I say "stepsister" b/c we are adults and neither of us live at home, etc. therefore she's dad's wife's daughter. I enjoy her, and I think she is a very nice person- but how totally akward today was- having only really spend 6-12 hours of "quality time" with her over the past 9 months. And I have to assume it's weird for her too, but maybe not, we aren't close enough for us to discuss our weirdnesses with each other lol. As Jeremy says my other stepsister (mom's husband's daughter), who lives in England, has more in common with us and we have seen more than the "stepsister" who lives in Edmond. This is a very true statement, but I don't really know how to be friends with the "stepsister". It's like a person you meet and think you could be friends, but then you have one convo and you realize you've just discussed everything you possibly could with that person. Anyways, she had a lovely shower, although far too many shower games lol. Looking forward to the wedding in December though, I think she will be a beautiful bride. And her fiancé is a great guy, and he's named Jeremy to boot. Now I'm only stumped as to what to get them for Christmas...?!

Teaching Jessie to blog on her iPhone

So I'm sitting here at Mandy's party and Bethany and Blaze are complaining that I don't blog anymore...
So here I am blogging on my iPhone, since they told me how to blog from my iPhone. I really have nothing exciting to blog other than what has already been said.