Amazing Story!

Hello! I don't have a detailed post about my life ready. It's been a hard week. Sprained ankle, messy house, runny nose, loud class, etc. have all about done me in for today but I was so uplifted by this. Kelly had it on her blog today as she was talking about how special a "snail mail" note can be to someone. I think the thing that touched me most is the guy in the video looks a lot like Dr. Sargent and this is totally something that he would do. Am I right girls? The rest speaks for itself. B

Checking In

It feels good to be back on this side of a post being the writer and not just the reader. I had a great Christmas break and honestly was not wanting to get back at it last week but it turned out to be a fairly productive week. e. It didn't even cross my mind until I was out and about the Monday after Christmas that evWe had a couple of rough days with the kids (and me!) getting back into the swing of things but we're ready to power though and finish out the year. I'm so thankful for a job that allows plenty of personal timeryone else had to work. I'm very grateful.

My camera is missing so I'm disappointed that I don't have a lot of pictures to remember the last few months by and even more disappointed that I'm eventually going to have to get a new camera if it doesn't show up. I have no idea where it could be. I've looked all over my house, car and classroom. I'm checking craigs list all the time hoping to find a good used one for a decent price. Part of me wants to buy a bigger nicer camera that I know I will take care of and keep in a safe place but part of me also wants just another cheap point and shoot because I don't have the best track record when it comes to cameras. Oh decisions decisions.

It has been sooo cold this week! I don't think it got above freezing for 3 days. I spent a lot of evenings on the couch. Of course the night it rained it was nearly 40 so school went off without a hitch. I'm glad we didn't use a weather day though. I'll be thankful for those when they roll around. We still have a lot of winter left though so there's no telling what else we could have coming.

This weekend has been so lazy. Yesterday it was in the teens when I got up and I definitely didn't want to be out so I posted up in front of the tv and was so glad when Chelsea cooked breakfast. I didn't get up until about 2:30 and ran to Subway in my pajama pants and came home and took a nap while a True Life marathon was on. I finally got up and took a shower and Aaron, Trish and I went to Buffalo Wild Wings. It's hard sometimes to always be around couples but they are all so sweet to include me. I got straight in bed as soon as we came in and slept so good even after not doing anything all day. It was good to get out and go to church this morning and Janie and I had the best time teaching Sunday School. There is a little girl that I've had in VBS before and in my class when I interned at Elysian Fields who visited our class this morning. She is such a talker and we laughed the whole morning at all of the crazy things she had to say. She didn't know Janies name so she just said "Ms. Lynn" all morning long asking me questions and saying the wildest things. Her parents would probably be mortified at everything she told us. We were rolling! I'm going to eat with Mom and Dad and then head home. I might try to get some laundry done and folded but if it doesn't happen I'm not stressing.

Have a great week!

The Nester Tour

It's me again with another home tour! I love looking at everyone's decorations and so I'm going to share mine even though it might seem short because well my house is not very big. Keep in mind I took all of these pictures with my phone so the quality isn't great. Anyway, hope you enjoy!

Welcome to Burleson! Excuse the muddy boots on the porch. Our street doesn't go all out with outdoor decorations so we just did the berry wreath, small trees and of course we couldn't not wrap those columns. I think it's plenty for our little house and the trees are so cute lit up at night.
When you come in you'll see my favorite shelf. We don't have a mantle so the knobs on this shelf worked perfect for our stockings. I got these at Kohls for too cheap to pass up at the very beginning of the season. I dug and dug to find a Lee Ann L, an Aaron A and a Chelsea C. We keep the berry garland on this shelf all the time and it just happens to go with our berry theme. I love the deer and you can't see it good but they even have berries on their antlers. Gotta love the Hobby Lobby tree too!

This is our dining room. These old closet doors were a cheap and easy way to add something to the big bare room in the middle of the house. The berry garland matches the wreath on the door and I picked up the box and tree to go in here as well. Since I took this picture, I've started hanging our Christmas cards here too and it is sooo cute!

Christmas trees are hard to photograph but here's ours. I hope to get a lot of new ornaments and things at the end of the season to add a lot for next year. Hopefully I can keep this tree for a long time. I love it!
Of course we kept with the berries and added some poinsettias.


The kitchen doesn't have a lot but this sign is so fitting for a house of three teachers. It says "Please snow I'm a teacher." I found this at Canton after Christmas last year and forgot I had it until I came across it a few weeks ago. I was so excited! It's the cutest thing!

Thanks for stopping by! I'm so excited to see everyone's decorations! Merry Christmas!

Show us Your Tree!

At Kelly's Korner today she is doing a show us your Christmas tree. I was so excited to post mine! Our house has very high ceilings and so I knew as soon as I started thinking about Christmas I knew that a tall tree would look so great. I picked out a tree at the beginning of the season and even though I looked around some I ended up coming back to it and I love it!

I looked for a long time to try to decided on a theme and after Chelsea (my roommate for you newbies) got a berry wreath for the front door I decided to go with the berries all around and threw in a few poinsettas.

I hope to hit some sales after Christmas and get some cute fun stuff for next year.
I love our simple first grown up tree!

Oh and something a little extra. Can you believe we had snow in Marshall today? Of course it didn't stick but my little first grade babies were going nuts! We went to the playground and they ran around singing Jingle Bells the whole time. So sweet! I even had a few kids ask me if since it was snowing if that meant it was Christmas today. So funny!

Happenings

Ah it's been so long! I'm not even going to get into how I never post and blah blah blah because I feel like I do that every time I post.

Today we started back to school after Thanksgiving break. I spent the whole week at my parents house. I know they only live 20 minutes away and I could have just gone over there when I wanted but there's something about being in your own house that makes it hard to relax. I knew that if I stayed at home in town I would be constantly on the go cooking, cleaning, running around town, spending money, etc. so I decided it would be like a little vacation to just get out of here for a few days. The two times I did stop by my house I was so glad that I was away! Chelsea was home with her family and Aaron was staying here alone. Apparently all he did all week was go to football practice, eat out and play his new Playstation 3. My cute little house was a man cave for 6 solid days. I'm glad he enjoyed his break though.

I did a lot of relaxing but had a ton of fun while I was out of school too. One of my favorite things to do is shop alone. I love to shop with my friends and my mom but when I'm alone I can totally do what I want to do and take how ever long I want doing whatever I want. Monday I went to Hobby Lobby and the boardwalk but traffic in Shreveport was horrible for some reason Monday afternoon and I decided that I was not in the mood to be stressed over it so I came home early. I helped Mom get ready for our Thanksgiving company on Tuesday and Wednesday and we cooked and entertained on Thursday.

Now a lot of people have their own opinion about Black Friday but all I have to say is you can't dis it until you try it. We didn't go until just a few years ago and Mom and I have gone every year since. We've never gone after any big ticket electronic but have always gotten some smaller things (GPS, clothes, kitchen stuff, movies, etc.) for great prices. Not to mention there's just something invigorating about getting up before dawn and mingling with hundreds of fellow crazed shoppers. This year we did Wal-Mart and Pottery Tent and then seperated and Mom went to Bealls before she had to work and I went to Shreveport to GAP, Hobby Lobby, Target, Kirklands and back to Wal-Mart for some small topiary Christmas trees I had forgotten to grab that morning. It was a great day!

We had a late Thanksgiving celebration with my mom's side of the family Saturday night and after that I headed home. Aaron had done pretty good at cleaning up but between a little straightning up Saturday night and Sunday afternoon everything is back in order and we were ready for our routine to be back to normal today. Supper is in the oven, the Christmas tree is on, Modern Warfare is being played on the PS3. Everythig is right with the world here in Marshall.

13 1/2 school days until Christmas vacation!

Lasts

So I know I rarely post twice a month, much less twice a day, but today is an exception. A few minutes ago I got in bed and it's part of my nightly routine to check my facebook and blogs before I go to bed. Kelly's blog is kind of a starting off point for me and when I got on I saw she had posted a new post tonight and yall, it is good!

If you don't go over and read it (which you totally should) the gist is that though weaning Harper and the scare of her best friend being really sick today she started thinking about life and taking advantage of moments because you never know when that moment can be the last.

It's funny that came up today because just this weekend Chelsea and I had a very brief conversation with just those same feelings. It was homecoming weekend for ETBU so we went to the parade Saturday morning and she and Matt to the football game that night. At around 10:00 we all met up downtown to see friends that were in town. The boys played pool and the girls sat around and visited. It was a little strange because it all felt so familiar but isn't the part of our life that it used to be. We don't see those people every weekend anymore. We don't go to that restaurant every weekend anymore. We used to worry about papers and tests and now we worry about teaching and coaching.

As we came in the door at home in the wee hours of Sunday morning, we grumbled at how late it was and how tired we were and even laughed a little at how a few hours ago we felt like we were teenagers and now we just felt old. Chelsea said, "How long do you think we can keep this up?" I laughed and didn't really have an answer but the thought was a little scary.

Life takes us places. For me it hasn't taken me very far as far as physical miles are concerned but as far as maturity and experience I've been though a lot. Friends have changed, living arrangements have changed, and I've seen close friends hurt. I've lost the grandparents who partly raised me and seen my family hurt over that. All that said, I've also seen God give my family a peace and understanding. He's also given us the baby my grandma dreamed of.


I know I've rambled but what I really mean to say is that we all need to be reminded sometimes that we don't know God's plans. We don't know because we're not in charge. He gives us sweet moments that we should treasure because we don't know when hurt will come one day and the memories of those moments get us through.



Have a great week!

Simple Woman's Daybook

FOR TODAY Monday, October 26

Outside my window... Very wet and cold. When will the rain stop? Besides being an overall pain it makes it so hard to get up in the morning.

I am thinking...I'm tired of being congested and might not be far from some PM cold meds, a shower and watching tv in bed

I am thankful for... a warm dry home, my friends and my job

From the learning rooms...the /ng/ sound, simple fractions, plants, and family

From the kitchen...every man for himself tonight. I got home late and just had a few snacks, Chelsea did the same and Aaron had Sonic. Will attempt to cook tomorrow night.

I am wearing... jeans (paid $1 to United Way to wear them to work today) and long sleeved thermal striped shirt with a Monarch Crest, Colorado hoodie

I am creating... a well run organized classroom. We've had 40 some odd school days and I'm still working on it

I am going...to one day have all of my clothes and towels washed and put away all at once even if just for an hour. I have more clean clothes at the moment than I have in a while which has left me with a hanger shortage so most of them are in baskets stashed behind my closet door.

I am reading... Junie B. Jones Has a Monster Under the Bed to my kids.

I am hoping...this congestion goes away and doesn't turn into anything worse. Considering I missed two days of work a few weeks ago with fever, respiratory, sinus and ear infections I really can't afford anymore illness.

I am hearing...Legally Blonde on TV. Chelsea and Aaron are both for whatever reason silently enthralled in it as if they've never seen it before.

Around the house...Things are fairly clean. We usually clean up pretty well on the weekends and let things go a little bit during the week.

One of my favorite things...funny things my kids say. Today in a conversation about things we do at night, somehow things got out of hand quicker than I could gain control and one of my little girls said "My granny had a party and they must have been drunk or something because she was dancing and doing all kinds of stuff that she's way too old to be doing." I had to change the subject while I had this mental picture of drunk dancing granny. They're too much. Just too much.

A few plans for the rest of the week...a normal school week with the exception of a little fun for Halloween on Friday. CANTON IS SATURDAY! I'm so excited to go with my mom and aunts. Chelsea has opted to stay behind. Don't tell her but I think I hit The Arbors a little too hard and fast for her. She's scared she can't keep up.

A picture I want to share... This is probably my favorite fall picture ever! Two years ago Chelsea and Matt dressed up as pilgrims and came to my Trinity class. You'll notice that Henry is standing to the right. I asked him a while back if he remembered when the pilgrims came to our class. He looked at me really annoyed and said, "I know that was the girl in the blue car." Well then.