Controlling My Chaos

Apparently I'm Not Busy Enough

2012-01-26T19:47:00.000-07:00

Last month Laura Parker contacted me about becoming a monthly contributor on her website, Inspired Teacher. I have to admit that it stressed me out a little bit because I've been feeling like my brain is going to implode thinking about all of the deadlines and commitments I have to meet before Spring Break.

Then I thought about it again and I said "What the heck! It's just once a month. I should be able to manage that."

So I did it, and I'm just hoping I don't embarrass myself. I'd love it if you would pop over and visit me, read my introduction post, and even leave a comment if you're feeling somewhat social. If not, I'd even be happy if you snuck in and out, like a creature of the night. Do you ever feel like that when you're blog hopping? Like you just don't have the energy to type, and you just want to click around in sweet, lethargic anonymity? It sounds dreamy, doesn't it?

Magnetic Menu Plan Magnet Storage

2012-01-23T21:28:00.000-07:00

I know I'm beating a dead horse here with this topic, but I promise this is going to be the last time.

I think.

It's just that sometimes things need to be tweaked when they aren't just perfect. And the magnetic menu plan, perfect as I thought it was at first, is not perfect.

The problem for me was all the extra menu choices. Having all of them on the fridge was making me twitchy because it was too cluttered.

That, and I like to menu plan sitting down, not standing at my fridge. Again with the enormous problems that must be solved.

Thankfully this one was an easy problem to solve. Check it out.

Baseball card protectors.

I know. Doy. You can find these at Wal Mart with the Pokemon cards. Or whatever it is that kids are trading these days. I'm so out of touch, I really couldn't say.

As a general rule I'm always at least a decade behind the current trends. The beauty is that most of the time I don't know what it is that I'm behind on.

What? What's wrong with my perm? People don't wear perms anymore?

What? What's wrong with my Ray Bans? What do you mean I have bug eyes?

What? What's wrong with my tiny spectacles? People are wearing frisbees for sunglasses now? No way!

What are mom jeans? What about them makes them mom jeans?

Seriously, I could go on and on here. It's so sad.

Anyway, I don't know how I got here really, but back to the enormous problem that must be solved.

Baseball card protectors. They're way cheap. Get some, cut some cardstock for the pockets, slide your menu magnets in, and you're in business. You don't have to put cardstock in the pockets, but I found that it makes the menu magnets easier to view.

I put all my beef menu items on one page, chicken on another, pasta, and so on. Now it's even easier to menu plan, and I can sit at the kitchen table and deal out menu combos. Then when I have what I want, I get up off my bum and stick them on the fridge. Voila!

Valentine Banner Winner

2012-01-22T13:07:00.001-07:00

Hello Peeps! I loved reading all your comments about your over due "To Do" list items. It's always nice to know that I'm not alone. Thank you to everyone who participated.

I know you just want me to cut to the chase, so here goes. Congratulations go to Jacy Rogers for winning the Valentine banner! Send me an e-mail with your mailing address and I'll pop that in the mail for you this week.

Valentine Banner

2012-01-15T15:12:00.000-07:00

This is very likely the very last banner I will ever make. On account of the eyelets have all gone.

I can't say I'm super disappointed because the banners don't go together all that quickly. I started this one over a year ago.

I'm using a new list app though and I have to say that I've been cranking through my "To Do" list like a madwoman. And yes, I am a madwoman, but I'm speaking relatively here.

Never mind that there are still 125 things on my list, and I keep adding new ones.

I know you want to know what my app is, right? I'll get back to the banner in a minute. The new app that I absolutely love is called Toodledo. Mattie Cake hooked me up with it, and it runs on Apple devices, Droids, and even the Crackberry.

I like it because I have the ability to categorize my tasks in multiple ways and the app prioritizes them for me based on the due date I input, the priority level, and whether or not I star it.

The part that has been super convenient for me is the ability to have things recur as a To Do item based on completion date, due date, or just a specific day or date. It's incredibly versatile. I've only just begun to scratch the surface of what this app can do.

Anyway, I seriously love it and I credit it for lighting a fire under my bum thereby forcing me to get things done this year.

Yesterday I even scraped all the old caulk from around my windows and re-caulked them, just so I could check it off my list.

Well that and it was way overdue. We had some serious drafts whistling through our house.

But my point is that it was on my list for at least two years before I got around to it. The app made me do it.

Back to the banner. Even though it took me over a year to get this done, you know I made two so I could give one away to one of my lucky Peeps, right?

So here's what I want you to do if you want to win this. I want you to leave a comment telling me three things that have been on your list for an embarrassingly long time, and what motivates you to get things on your list done. I can't wait to read your comments. Good luck!

Oh yeah, you have until 3:00 p.m. Friday, Siberia time. Whatever that is.

Winter Wreath

2012-01-08T16:21:00.001-07:00

I finally tackled a crafty project that has been on my list for several years. Every year I take down my Christmas wreath and I have nothing to put up in its place. Well this year when I took down my wreath, I looked at my bare door and vowed that I wasn't going to go through another winter without a wreath on my door.

Again, my enormous problems.

I don't know why I put this off for so long because I've known all along what I wanted my winter wreath to look like, and I was able to bust this out in fifteen minutes last night.

Fifteen minutes. Yeah, and it's been taking up valuable space in my brain for all that time. Crazy.

I started with a bleak and barren, prickly stick-twig wreath that I picked up at Jo Ann's. Then I cut apart a pine cone Christmas garland that I've never been able to figure out how to drape right because it was so sharp and prickly, it may as well have been a garland made of knives.

I used lots of hot glue, and I only burned myself once. The best part is that I didn't glue the wreath to the table this time. Yay!

Look closely at those little red berries though, because they are evil. I would only ever put these on a winter wreath because I had a bad experience with them once. They are made of a squishy foam-like material that melts when it gets hot. In the summer and fall when the sun is beating down on our door, it gets dang hot. I once had a beautiful wreath made of purple berries that melted right off its wreath hanger and onto my door. It left a snail trail of snot running down my front door that had to be scraped off, and the door had to be repainted, it was so nasty.

So beware of the snot berries on wreaths.

Mission Organization - Mail Station

2012-01-02T22:31:00.000-07:00

Happy New Year! I hope everyone is pumped for a new year. I think it's going to be a good one.

Like many people at this time of year, I'm super psyched to make 2012 the year that I get my ducks in a row. A girl can dream, right?

I've been really struggling with trying to keep my house organized with kids and a full-time job, and I feel like my house is constantly in chaos. I know it doesn't have to be that way though, so this year I'm working towards making my house less chaotic and putting some FOCUS on my goals.

That's my word for 2012. FOCUS. If you've been visiting me for any length of time, you know I need that. I tend to multitask like a rabid Chihuahua, and it's proving to be counterproductive.

I hate that.

I started using a new List app though, thanks to Mattie Cake, and it's called Toodledo. It allows me to prioritize, subdivide, compartmentalize, and any other -ize I want to do with my lists. It's FAB. Anyway, I've spent the last three days doing a big 'ol brain dump into Toodledo, so every single thing I need to do is in there and prioritized, so I can FOCUS on one thing at a time without having to remind myself about fifty other things that also need to be done right now.

The first thing I'm focusing on for Mission Organization this year is mail. I know. It's a four letter word of the highest magnitude, and I'm going to whip it into shape.

With this.

Isn't it pretty? It's my new mail processing station.

I needed something upstairs, where we come in the door, because I don't have the time or the motivation to deal with the mail from start to finish when it comes into the house during the work week.

I will open and sort the mail when it comes into the house, and file things according to how I need to deal with them, downstairs, at the end of the week, when I have time. Not today. Generally it's a Friday night task for me.

Here's a peek at my hanging file sections.

My sections are BILLS, RECYCLE, TO SHRED, CATALOGUES, MAGAZINES, ZOE, ANNIKA, MISC., and STORE COUPONS.

I absolutely love it, and now I don't have mail cluttering up my kitchen table, my kitchen counter, and at the top of my stairs.

I had a lot of fun CUTE-ifying my new mail station. As you probably noticed, it's just a wire hanging file jobber thingie. I added some ugly olive colored hanging file folders that I plastered with pretty scrapbook paper. I just stapled the paper onto the folders because I wasn't in a picky mood like someone else I know.

I even had these way cute red flower brads to further extend the cute.

Then I got the brilliant idea to hot glue flowers and buttons right onto the wire. It worked great because the little holes allowed the hot glue to seep in and really grab onto the file unit. I even messed up a couple times, and the hot glue came right off with a little motivation and a pair of pliers. And don't worry, it didn't hurt the mesh file thingie one little bit, although I did pinch myself with the pliers.

Smashley saw me making my Mail Station and she decided that she wanted one too. Except she doesn't like the same colors that I like. She's all about the pastels, all the time. It's like Easter in her house, all the time.

Her sections are different too, but that's because it's for her and she has different needs than I do.

Plus, she's really picky and she did not like the fact that I was stapling the scrapbook paper onto the folders. Not one little bit. So I exercised my not-used-very-often nice gene, and I used tape runner for her folders because she's so high maintenance.

I do like her flowers too.

This button came off a blouse I used to wear. I can't wear button up shirts on account of my bazooms are unwieldy.

This button was a victim.

Top Ten for 2011

2011-12-31T00:00:00.000-07:00

All over the Blogosphere people are doing their 2011 post recaps for the year. I've never done one before, so I thought it would be fun to give it a try this year.

My top ten posts are the ten most viewed posts from 2011 that were posted in 2011. I decided to disregard posts prior to 2011 because my sidebar does a nice job of keeping my overall posts ranked and current. That, and I'm just dang tired of looking at those posts. I'm even a little tempted to delete them. But I won't, because they're my top ten and they generate a lot of traffic.

Ho hum. With no further ado, here are my 2011 top ten:

#1, by a landslide, was Menu Planning Redo

#2 - Flexible Chore Charts

#3 - You Asked For It . . . Thoughts in Vinyl

#4 - Digital Scrapbooking with sbcStudio for Mac

I feel like I should wash my mouth out with soap for this one. I finally gave up on the Mac software and made the switch to Photoshop Elements. I've said it before, and I'll say it again, if you have a PC, the Creative Memories StoryBook Creator Plus software is awesome, but if you have a Mac, don't waste your time.

#5 - Band-Aid Boxes for Teachers

#6 - I Was Going To . . .

#7 - Water Chestnuts Wrapped in Bacon

All I had to do here was to say "bacon" and everyone came running. Knocked me right over.

#8 - Backpack ID Tags Round Three

I'm happy to report that the third time's a charm. This round of ID tags is holding up very nicely.

#9 - You Stress Me Out

#10 - Turkey Salami Wraps

Now, let's just pretend that Google Analytics doesn't exist and I get to pick my own favorite posts for 2011. This is how it would all shake out.

#1 - The Life Cycle of a Spider and Other Zen-Like Ponderings

#2 - If My Kids Scream in the Forest and I'm Not Around to Hear Them, Do They Make a Sound?

#3 - Annie Get Your Gun . . . The Peace and the Love Continues

#4 - Death in the Family

#5 - The Adventures of Compass Man and Perpetually Lost Girl

Oopsie, that's all I have. No top ten because I don't even think I posted ten times this year. My bad.

Clearly I'm not doing that SEO thing and clearly Google doesn't think the post titles I'm choosing for my favorites are worthy of being ranked by the SEO thingamajig. I'd promise to do better, but the truth is, I like making obscure post titles.

It's not me, Google, it's you.

Thank You Note Etiquette (or Lack Thereof)

2011-12-30T00:00:00.000-07:00

I torture my kids by making them write thank you notes for the gifts they receive for their birthdays and Christmas. It's great fun.

Not. If I'm going to be perfectly honest, it's like pulling teeth. Without anesthesia.

What has been fun though is to see their thank you notes evolve from very simple "Thank you for the blah, blah," into more elaborate notes that do not always stick to proper etiquette.

This thank you note to The Barefoot Contessa from Stinkerbell is my case in point. In case you find it difficult to read, I shall recount it for you.

Dear Grandma Louie-Ann,

This year you got me and Zoe millions of toys and clothes. Since you got me 1,000 dollars in my collage account and all that stuff you got me for Christmas I think you're RICH! But mom says you just spend your money wisely. But that is true. Thank you for the Puzzle Roll, Clothes (my favorite is the Diary of a Wimpy Kid shirt!), Pony Care Set, MORE clothes, Jasmine, Black Sparkly Sweater, and the Biffy Puzzle. They're great!

Love,

Annie

This thank you note makes me laugh. I have questions though. Is a collage account a place to store cut out pictures until you're in the mood to paste them onto a piece of poster board? And do you get the feeling that the Stink is alarmed by the amount of clothes she got for Christmas?

A Quick Note About Pinterest

2011-12-28T16:18:00.001-07:00

I received a comment today from a reader, scrapbookmomx5, and she asked me if she could Pin things from my blog onto Pinterest. She was worried that my copyright blah blah on my sidebar forbade such activity.

I quickly crafted my reply, only to realize that scrapbookmomx5 does not have her e-mail address attached to her Blogger profile, so my e-mail was simply going to be sent into the abyss that is known as noreply-comment@blogger.com. It's a dark and dismal place.

So, in case anyone else is also wondering, here is where I stand. Absolutely YES, you can pin any ding dang thing on my blog that you want. The copyright blah blah is to discourage people from posting my pictures and my content on their own blogs. Believe me, it has happened, and it does happen. It's very awkward.

My copyright blah blah is not intended to apply to Pinterest. Pin away, if you so choose. I would be hard pressed to find a blogger that didn't allow pinning from their blog, and really, how can we stop it? The reality is that Pinterest brings a lot of traffic to blogs. I get almost as much traffic from Pinterest as I get from Google, and I would be crazy to turn people away from Pinterest. Well, I am crazy, but you know what I mean. CrazyER.

Pin away, Peeps, and thank you for all your pins! They are much appreciated by me.

Doing Whatever I Want

2011-12-27T19:32:00.001-07:00

The end of the year is fast approaching, and I keep thinking of things that I want to share with you, but I've been too lazy to get up and do something about it. I'm going to attempt to do a little of that in this post.

The first of those things is, at first glance, possibly a little boring. It's our 2011 Christmas ornaments from my Mother-in-Law, The Barefoot Contessa.

Every year, the BFC gets every single person in her extended family an ornament that is appropriate to the year they've had. Quite often the ornament makes light of a comical event in the person's year. My ornament this year is the cruise ship, and it is appropriate, although not comical, because Peanut Head and I went on a cruise for our 20th anniversary.

Stinkerbell's ornament, however, is a knee slapper.

The Stink's comical even for 2011 was the fact that she was assigned a mule at Girl Scouts Horse Camp. It's appropriate, it's ironic, and it's hysterical. The BFC gets extra points for this one.

Peanut Head's ornament had us all stumped until we asked The BFC about it. I had to slap my forehead, it was so appropriate and I had let it slip my mind.

His ornament makes light of this unfortunate event. I have to hand it to The BFC, she's good.

Zoe Bug's ornament was a horse, just because in her world it's horse, horse, horse, horse. I took a picture of it, but it was blurry so I left it out. I could retake it, but then I'd have to move. Not happening.

The BFC has a knack for finding the perfect ornament. She frequently procures her ornaments at Bronner's Christmas Wonderland, just in case you need to know.

On another note, I'm on break from school this week and I am thoroughly enjoying myself. We don't have enough snow to play in and it's too cold to go outside just for the sake of getting fresh air, so we're hanging out inside. I'm not complaining either. I love being inside, in my sweat pants, doing whatever the heck I feel like, because I'm not constrained by any deadlines. It's pure bliss.

I'm taking advantage of the extra time by working through some Photoshop tutorials and learning how to use my new program. I've been staying up super late, and when I go to bed I dream about digi scrapping in Photoshop. It's awesome.

So I tapped into a bunch of tutorials over at JessicaSprague.com and there's so much great stuff there, that I'm going to be busy learning for a long time. Sadly, the tutorials aren't free, but the one that I've been working through has four complete lessons with five or six tasks within each lesson. I'm averaging about one lesson every other day. The lessons come with all the supplies you need to do each of the layouts too, so that's pretty nifty.

I figure I'll wait a few months before I buy another lesson because I need to give myself time to process all the new information and get comfortable using my new skillz.

I found the Jessica Sprague site in connection with Becky Higgins' Digital Project Life. One of my New Year's resolutions for 2012 is to make progress towards getting caught up on my backlog. Notice I didn't say I was going to get caught up, but instead make progress.

I don't want to psyche myself out with the stress of another unattainable goal. Not that it's unattainable, but I like to play head games with myself and set myself up for failure. This is how I outsmart myself and work around my self inflicted obstacles.

Project Life is going to help me with that, by enabling me to focus on the story and not spend so much time on the creative layouts. I'll still do layouts like the one above, but they will be scattered throughout my albums and not stressing me out with the pressure of needing a fabulous layout for every ding dang picture.

Or stressing me out because I only have one or two pictures for an event and I don't want to waste a whole page on a one-photo layout. I hate that.

The last thing I want to share with you today is the Christmas gift I gave to my students this year. I had good intentions of getting these up earlier this month, but I ran out of time. I you like the idea, you can pin it for next year. You are pinning, right?

If you aren't and you want to, e-mail me and I'll send you an invite. You must start today. Trust me.

I got this great idea that I was going to give my kids water bottles for the classroom. They drive me crazy with their up and down to get a drink every ding dang minute. I knew I couldn't afford really nice water bottles for the whole class, but I was able to score some pretty decent ones at the dollar store. I bought every last one and I was able to get exactly the number I needed. I was crawling around, digging behind plastic containers to come up with 27 cups, 27 lids, and 27 straws to make a complete set. I really lucked out.

I cut the names out of vinyl on my Cricut and they went together surprisingly fast. Then I stuffed them with a candy cane, an Airhead, and a mint and left them on their desks for them in the morning. The best part was that my kids loved them and they were very surprised that I personalized the cups for them. That made me feel all tingly and lovey dovey inside.

I heart their sweet little hearts.

And I miss them, but I do not want my vacation to end.

Did you hear that, Father Time? Slow the bus down, will ya?

Not Even Google Can Help Me Help My Stupid Self

2011-12-19T23:21:00.001-07:00

I'm happy to report that since I added "Move the Ding Dang Elf" to my To Do List, I have not missed moving Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater once.

If only that were the end of the story. It. Never. Is.

Remember how I told you that I turned to Google to help me? Well, about that. I, uh [cough] forgot to erase the search window wherein I typed "What do I do when I forget to move the Elf?"

Technically I didn't forget, because really I don't even know how to do that, but I certainly did forget to connect the dots and realize that my eight year old was going to see my query the next time she picked up my BFF to Google something.

Doy.

Yes, she saw it and then she got that knowing little smirk on her face that screams "Parent! I know you're Santa Claus, so just stop with the fantasies and lies."

That one.

Thankfully she's smart enough to keep it to herself, because she knows that Santa brings underwear to Unbelievers. Ugly underwear that fit too tight and bind in unfortunate places.

I've been having a little too much fun with Peter and naughty behavior. It's right up my alley.

I even have a maniacal laugh to accompany my antics. I bet you wish you could hear it.

Peter Potomus showed up on the kitchen table one day with a little surprise.

What's that?

A note? Oh goody! I love notes.

That's what I exclaim in class every time I intercept what I hope is a love note. Spring is coming and it does not disappoint.

We have a bit of a history in our house with fictitious characters leaving threatening notes to our children.

My bad.

Let's read this one, shall we?

I'll read it to you, just in case you can't make out my little Elf's teensy tiny writing.

Dear Annika and Zoe,

Zoe, stop making such a big mess with your horses. Also, stop whining so much, it's really annoying. You should also try to be nicer to people. Annika, you have to stop being so grouchy in the mornings. You should stop playing so many video games. To both of you, stop arguing and fighting so much. If you girls don't follow my rules you'll be on the naughty list. I'll be reporting to Santa again.

Sincerely,

Peter

P.S. Don't make your mom mad.

Word.

Disclaimer for Copyright Infringement: One of my sweet, angelic sixth graders wrote the above note for me. Although she retains artistic license, I paid her with an Air Head.

2011 Christmas Card

2011-12-10T18:51:00.000-07:00

I just finished our 2011 Christmas card, WHOO HOO! I've been pretty neglectful about sending out Christmas cards since I went back to work, and I am determined to get them out this year.

My goal today was to sit down and put together our Christmas card. My Creative Memories sbcStudio software for the Mac is STILL not working, and I decided that I am finished waiting for them to fix the stoooooooopid program. I bit the bullet and downloaded the newest version of Photoshop Elements, went through some tutorials, and bumbled around to come up with this card. It's pretty simple, but my PSE skills are limited, so I'm good with it.

I would love some tips about how to organize and access paper and embellishments from those of you who are PSE pros. School me, please.

I never got around to getting our family portraits taken (because I'm fat), so I went with pictures from this year. Of course our cruise portrait made it in there, and the highlight of the girls' year, Horse Camp. You know my Christmas letter is going to mention Stinkerbell's mule. I cannot wait for that.

How about you? Are you doing a photo Christmas card this year?

Merry Winners!

2011-12-10T18:31:00.001-07:00

Congratulations to Elsa and Stephanette! Please e-mail me at Jillderbeast@me.com to claim your banners.

I had a blast reading through the comments and I laughed hysterically at Livin' in Duckville's comment. She informed me that she saw a sign on Pinterest that said "Glitter is the Herpes of Craft Supplies."

Yippee! My first CTD (Craft Transmitted Disease).

Where Have All the Eyelets Gone?

2011-12-05T20:20:00.000-07:00

I've been hard at work making another holiday banner. You may remember the "Merry & Bright" banners I made last year. I loved the one I kept, but for some reason I couldn't get past the color scheme. It didn't really go with my holiday decor, so I gave it to Smashley. I have a lot of reds and greens in my Christmas decor, so I set out to make myself a new banner with more traditional colors this year.

Apparently it's a little late to be looking for Christmas paper and stickers because the selection was pretty horrid. And eyelets? Forget about it. It seems eyelets have gone out of style. I scrimped and scrounged through my eyelets to put this thing together.

I ended up finding enough paper that I liked, so I spent a large part of a day cutting out letters and backgrounds on my Cricut. Since I was making one banner already, why not make four?

So that's what I did. I made one for me to keep, one for my Student Teacher, Natalie, and two to give away to two of my lucky readers.

I heart Natalie. She started the school year with me back in August, and she just finished her student teaching. Natalie has made my life so much easier this fall. She's scary smart, quick, motivated, and she has an amazing work ethic.

I'm going to miss her.

I need an emoticon.

Who can give me an emoticon for my sad face?

Changing the subject so I don't cry.

You know how I like to glitter my letters, right? Well, I asked the Renaissance Woman to help me decide what color of glitter to use on this banner, since she is the Renaissance Woman, and she suggested that I use several colors.

What? More than one color of glitter? What about matchy-matchy?

I had a hard time with that suggestion. I just wasn't seeing her vision initially, but she explained to me why I should do it. Some blah blah about complementary colors and making the colors pop, so I did it.

I figured she was the one with the art background and she knew what she was talking about. I'm just some Josephine who likes pretty things that sparkle.

I'm so glad I listened to her.

I didn't use any glitter on Natalie's banner because she's allergic to glitter.

THE HORROR!!!

I'd be a walking hive if I was allergic to glitter. It's very nearly my middle name.

I needed something to make Natalie's letters pop though, so I tried this stuff that I got from Melanie-Who-I-Almost-Killed-With-Pie. It's supposed to give your paper a raised epoxy look. I really like how it turned out.

If you could possibly squeeze this banner into your color scheme, leave me a comment telling me the one gift you are giving this year that you cannot wait for the recipient to open and why.

Please make sure your e-mail is attached to your Blogger profile, or leave your e-mail address in your comment, so I can contact you to tell you that you've won.

The contest ends on Thursday, December 8th, at midnight in Siberia. May the Force be with You.

Elf Trouble

2011-11-26T22:25:00.002-07:00

I hope you all had a nice, relaxing Thanksgiving. I had a pretty awesome week since we had the whole week off from school. I overslept, and I wore sweat pants every day. Talk about bliss. I sure hope my pants fit on Monday.

I love weeks like this because they recharge my batteries and I end up being a lot more productive. I'm not rushing Monday or anything, but I'm ready to face it when it gets here. Bring it.

Whatever, take your time Monday, I'm only messing with you.

As a result of being on vacation all week, Peanut Head and I managed to get our tree up and our Christmas decorations out. Normally we go pick out a live tree after Thanksgiving, but this year we decided to go with an artificial tree. Artificial trees have come a long way since I was a kid and you had to match the color of the branch insert to the color of the hole on the broom stick tree skeleton. In the new millennium the trees are pre-lit, and that, my friends, is a beautiful thing. I'm not going to miss any of the cranky rumblings from Peanut Head wrestling with the lights while I pointedly avoid the vicinity of the tree.

Would you look at the size of this tree. I'm telling you, it was not this big in the store. We got it home, set it up, and we exclaimed "Holy Huge Christmas Tree!" It's gigantic. When I stand off to the right, I can't even see my hallway. It's like it doesn't even exist.

Geezo, I'm just a few paragraphs in and already I'm off topic. I came here to tell you about our elf trouble.

This Elf. Perhaps you've seen him? I picked this creepy little guy up at Barnes & Noble last year, but I've seen him at lots of different stores as well. The idea is that the Elf watches the kids and flies back to the North Pole to report back to Santa. A little Christmas intimidation and threat to go with your Egg Nog. Right up my alley, I say. I'm all about messing with my kids. My parents did it with me, and I'm passing it along to my kids. It's tradition.

Except that I kind of suck at this particular job. As with our loser Easter Bunny and Tooth Fairy, the problem is that I keep forgetting to do my part to keep the magic alive.

Our elf, Peter, has been here since Thanksgiving and he hasn't moved. As I mentioned he is supposed to report back to Santa. Every night. And come back and be sitting in a new spot each morning. Therein lies the problem. I don't just have to remember to do my job on one night, but every ding dang night between now and Christmas. What the heck was I thinking?

Yesterday Zoe casually mentioned to me as I sauntered out of bed at 10:00 a.m., "Mom, Peter didn't move last night. We woke up and we looked all over for him and he was in the same place. Why didn't he go to the North Pole last night?"

I get the feeling she is questioning the magic. Can it be?

"I . . . Uh . . . uhhhhhh. . . . hmmmm," I begin. "You might remember from last year, Peter doesn't leave every day. Sometimes he doesn't have anything to report, so he stays."

You see, I have a history here. And I lie.

Well, you would think that after being busted and silently reminding myself fifty times last night, I might have remembered to send Peter Peter Pumpkin Eater to the North Pole.

I did not.

Freaking out girls woke up this morning and again, Peter had not moved a hair.

"Uh . . . uh . . . uh . . . . "

Nothin'. I got nothin' here.

Thinking, thinking, thinking. "Hmmmmm?"

I was just as perplexed as my offspring. Why did the ding dang elf not make the trek to see the Santa Man?!!!

Throwing me a bone, Zoe says "Mom, I think Garrett and Colleen touched Peter and that's why he won't leave." Garrett and Colleen are Smashley's kids and they were here for Thanksgiving.

"Nooooooo!" I exclaim. "That's probably exactly what happened. I'm going to look into this and get back to you. We'll get Peter fixed, don't worry."

I went straight to Google to find out how to fix my stupid self. I couldn't find a long-term solution, but I came up with this one myself, that I think will at least buy me another day. I went to the girls to share my findings.

"Girls?" I said.

"Yes, Mama." Blink blink went their pretty eyes and on went their trusting smiles.

"I think Peter hasn't been working because we haven't activated him yet. We have to talk to him and tell him whether we've been good this year and also give him a message to give to Santa," I misrepresent.

Honestly, I don't even know where I get this stuff. It's like a disease. The Lying Disease.

So today Zoe pulled a stool up to where Peter is sitting collecting dust, and she had quite the conversation with him. It was long, and it was pointed.

Stinkerbell couldn't be bothered with basic friendly conversation. She likes to cut to the chase and get things done.

She left a note for him to give to Santa. Would you like a closer look?

I think I need to talk to her about her list. A couple of those things are pretty pricey.

I told Annika that she needed to fold her note up so Peter would have an easier time carrying it. The way it is now, it would create a lot of wind drag.

She went one step further. She made him a little carry sack made out of toilet paper and staples. The note is inside. I'm tempted to tell her that toilet paper disintegrates in precipitation.

So now in my Zenbe Lists app, the one I check every night before I go to bed, my little OCD ritual where I arrange and rearrange my To Do List for the next day, I have marked as a Highest Priority Item, "Move the Ding Dang Elf!"

No lie.

I'll let you know how it goes.

If I remember.

I'm so glad Peanut Head is in charge of the Santa Magic. He's much better at magic than I.

School Me

2011-11-16T20:21:00.001-07:00

I don't know if I have any readers left out there on account of my intermittent posting, but I hope some of you are still out there, because I need some input. Technology input. That request will eventually come after the following long winded narrative, so feel free to scroll down to the bottom if you aren't in a patient mood today.

I understand.

I'm not the kind of person who technology comes easy to, I have to really work at it and take notes. Whenever I get a new gadget or thing, I hand it to Peanut Head to set up, figure out, and tutor me. I have the attention span of a gnat, so he has the added chore of having to spoon feed me over many tortuous sessions.

Some might say he's enabling me, but if they did, they would run the risk of me indelicately tackling them and telling them to shut up and mind their own business.

Our technology relationship is an arrangement that works quite well for us.

The married us.

Me.

Anyway, shortly after the iPad came out, Peanut Head was telling me how I should get an iPad, it would be perfect for me and my alarmingly out of control e-mail situation, my blog surfing, and my general computer addiction. What I heard was "Spend $800, blah blah blah, don't actually accomplish anything productive on an $800 gadget, blah blah blah, $800, blah blah, portable, blah blah, $800, blah blah."

Actually, I don't think he ever quoted a price, that was just the stubborn and pushy automatic rejection response from my Man Giving Advice Listening Filter app.

Peanut Head does not find my cool app the least bit amusing.

In fact, if he were to ever incite divorce proceedings, this app, er . . . character trait would be at the tippy top of his Irreconcilable Annoyances List.

Flash forward six months and I'm on the Apple website working my way through all the commercials, enjoying myself because it's good entertainment, and I actually watch an iPad commercial.

So picture this, figurative tail between my legs I approach Peanut Head and meekly announce "I think I might want one of them iPad thingies." He knows he has won so he just smiles and shakes his head a little bit which, according to my Body Language Translation Dictionary, means "I know you better than you know yourself. Bazing!"

"Heh, heh. Funny, isn't it?" is my reply. It's true and I hate that it's true, but because I want the iPad thingy, I have to admit it. It hurts so bad.

This took place about this time last year, before the iPad 2 came out. Since Peanut Head is so conservative and patient, he suggested that I wait for the iPad 2 to come out because it was going to have a camera, a USB port, and all the other rumors that were going around about the magical new iPad.

According to the rumors, the launch of the new iPad was always just around the corner. It would come out for Christmas, it would come out after Christmas, the new year, with the new iPhone, etc. It was torture, I tell you.

I have to be honest with you, I don't wait patiently. I waited in agony, whining all the time, stalking the Apple website, Googling for the newest and most promising rumor. I was a druggie looking for my fix.

While I was waiting in agony, I had plenty of time to save up for my new BFF. I passed on a Christmas gift from Peanut Head, and then a birthday gift in February. I scrimped and saved, waiting for my one true love.

Finally the fated day came back in March, and I was joined with my BFF. We haven't been apart since, and I love my iPad more than my dog, but less than my children and Peanut Head. Okay, maybe I love the Bunnery Sergeant a little more, but not much more. The point is, I might possibly take a bullet for my iPad.

Not in an important organ or anything, but for sure in one of my extra fleshy bits.

So I've had my BFF for a little over seven months or so, and I've learned a thing or two about it. I'm pretty comfortable with it, but I don't navigate around it quite as well as my fellow sixth grade teacher who has had his iPad for about two weeks and can dance circles around me, on his tippy toes, with one hand behind his back and only using his pinkie finger. For illustrative purposes, that pinkie finger is in a splint.

Because I'm bitter and passive aggressive, let's just refer to him as Robo Techbot from here on out. Not in person, of course. Just on the blog. He'll never know.

I feel a tangent coming on, so I'm going to hit my force redirect key and attempt to get to my point.

A couple weeks ago Peanut Head and I got our Christmas presents early.

BFF #2, the companion to BFF #1.

And I have this to say. What the heck was I doing with a Crackberry when this Bounty of Efficiency and OCD Enabling Tool existed?!!!!

No, really. And I have exponentially fewer apps than Robo Techbot, but I don't even know how I can live now without the apps I have and use.

And since as a rule I'm always ten years behind on all trends, I need some schooling. What are all the cool apps and what can they do for me?

Please, I'm begging you, one junkie to another, what are all your favorite apps?

Idioms, Kittehs, and Ninjas

2011-11-02T23:28:00.001-06:00

I want to know who in our district decided to schedule Halloween and Parent-Teacher conferences in the same ding dang week. And school. What's with the school?!!

It's chaos, I tell you. The kids are all hopped up on sugar, I'm all hopped up on sugar, and no one can concentrate.

Okay, I can't concentrate. There's so much talking, talking, talking, and no quiet.

That's one of the hazards of working with children. Incessant talking.

Incessant talking at school, incessant talking at home, incessant talking in my dreams for crying out loud.

Stinkerbell is eight right now, and I've dubbed eight as The Year of Incessant Talking. I was reminded of The Year Zoe Bug Didn't Shut Up this evening when The Stink was recounting a very long story about an art project she had done in her class today, with step-by-step excruciatingly detailed instructions. Her description was so detailed that I wanted to whip out my camera and document it as a tutorial that I could post on U-Tube.

Except that I would have to listen to the whole thing a second time. And as much as I love her, it was a taxing story.

I persevered by imaginary brain slapping myself to remain conscious, quietly reminding myself that I love and care for this person who is taking the time to share part of her day with me. Something I will be begging for in another five years or so when she will come home with her no-eye-contact look, reply in one word sentences usually only containing the word "fine" and probably always accompanied by the My-Mom-is-So-Lame acrobatic eye roll.

The thought just sent shivers down my spine so I'm going to go upstairs and ask The Stink to tell it to me again.

Dang it. She's asleep.

I think it's ironic that I became a teacher so I could boss people around and make them listen to me talk.

The irony is killing me.

So . . . idioms.

This was my Halloween costume this year. Man, I look tired. It's the talking . . . it's wearing me down. The chef's hat looking thing is really a light bulb. Not a Bright Idea light bulb, but like my shirt says, The Light at the End of the Tunnel.

I thought it would be hysterical to have Girl Genius make me a t-shirt that said this:

DUE TO RECENT CUTBACKS,

THE LIGHT AT THE END OF THE

TUNNEL HAS BEEN TURNED OFF

Perhaps it is in poor taste, but it makes me giggle.

It was also the perfect opportunity to turn an idiom into a nice visual for the kids. Idioms are hard to teach. It's a little like teaching people how to get a punch line. It's an acquired skill.

It's a joke . . . . Get it? The light? It was turned off. It's the light at the end of the tunnel. The beacon in the night. Somebody turned it off to save money. Ha. Ha Ha. Ha. Get it?

Never mind.

Sometimes you have to beat people over the head with a punchline, so in keeping with that potentially sad outcome, we made Idiom Cootie Catchers. They're all the rage in the sixth grade.

So what if they usually predict who you will marry, how many kids you will have, and whether you will drive a minivan or a skateboard.

Here's the kitteh my title refers to. Zoe Bug wanted to be a cat for Halloween this year. It's so fitting for her personality. My sweet little kitty cat.

Stinkerbell went as a Ninja with many pointy knives. She wanted to get a big swoopy looking knife, but Peanut Head put his foot down and told her that Ninjas don't have Broadswords, they have Katanas.

I had to run upstairs to get the technical blah, blah about the knives. Swords. Whatever.

And I know that Sheryl Crow sings about the guns you can buy at Walmart, but I'm here to tell you that they don't sell Katanas.

And please forgive me here, but why for the love of Peter Pan does it really matter? It's just a Halloween costume. She's not going to be slaying any dragons or anything like that.

The best she could hope for is to sever Zoe Bug's tail from her bum. And that would totally be cheating because it was a Velcro-attached tail.

Not that Stinkerbell didn't do it anyway. Again, Peanut Head is so proud.

Fall is in the Air

2011-10-23T20:21:00.000-06:00

I love fall in Idaho. The weather is awesome and the scenery is gorgeous.

Late Monday afternoon was no exception. The girls and I found ourselves home by 5:00 and nothing was on the agenda for the evening, so we headed over to a local pumpkin patch to select our pumpkins for the year.

We hadn't been to the pumpkin patch since I went back to work, so this was a big treat for us.

The only thing I could have asked for was two girls to not be acting like total dorks.

They make it very difficult for me to get frame worthy pictures.

The light was perfect for fall pictures. Too bad it wouldn't last long.

The pumpkins were four for $20, so we picked the biggest ones we could find.

And there were a lot to choose from.

I took this picture of Stinkerbell four years ago at the pumpkin patch.

And this one of Zoe Bug.

I was crossing-my-fingers-hoping to get some similar shots this year, but they just weren't feelin' it.

Stinkerbell liked this pumpkin with the warts on it, so I told her she should kiss it. She wasn't interested.

I love that the pumpkin patch has wagons for us to borrow, because there was no way we were going to be able to carry our behemoth pumpkins to the car.

Just pulling the wagon was a chore in itself.

I'm afraid to see the quantity of pumpkin guts inside these babies. We're saving that chore for next weekend.

This here is our little Bunnery Sergeant. The girls have buried him in leaves.

I'd like to say that he was a good sport about it, but if you look closely you can see that they've tied him to the tree to keep him from running.

I'd scold them, but it's totally something I would do myself.

Poor little Bunny Man.

Don't worry, he didn't stay there long. As soon as I snapped these pictures he stood up and gave us all a leaf bath.

It was pretty impressive the way he scattered the leaves hither and tither.

Lunch Box ID Tags Take Two

2011-10-16T12:15:00.001-06:00

This is another one of those projects that has been on my To Do list forever. Since it's been two weeks since I last posted, I figured I'd better light a fire under my butt and get something done. So I picked this because it was relatively easy and didn't require too many decisions.

Sometimes decisions paralyze me.

I can't tell you how many projects I have going that just have the undesirable task of making an unimportant decision in order to wrap it up. Like, "I can't hang those pictures because I want to get a new couch someday and I don't know how big it will be, or where I will position it, or if it will match," blah, blah, blah.

Really, who cares? It's ridiculous the head games I play with myself.

Yes, I do have some pictures in my dumpster of a guest room, waiting to be hung up. Don't harass me.

Sometimes it's not the decisions, but instead the act of finishing a project. I don't know the psychology behind it, and really I probably don't care, but starting projects is great fun. Finishing projects is a drag. Especially if it's something that you haven't had time to touch for over a year and so you have the added task of having to figure out where you left off before you can start again. Blah! My Guest Dumpster has a lot of those babies piled atop the bed.

Lucky for me, Aunt Marcia is visiting for Thanksgiving so I have to get in there and deal with it.

Oh yes, I'm supposed to be talking about lunch box ID tags. How easily I babble off into a tangent.

Just in case you are wondering why lunch boxes need ID tags, I'm going to tell you about my kids. Zoe Bug has never lost her lunch box. She is my responsible, conscientious, compliant child. Stinkerbell loses her lunch box at least once a week. And she has the attitude that it's not her problem. The nerve of that child. Last year she had a Star Wars lunch box--and so did every boy in her class. This year she got a Plain Jane, or John, black lunch box. And I'm thinking about beribboning it with sparkly ribbons and doodads. Because I'm a little bit passive aggressive.

So the ID tags are required in order to keep that vein in my temple from bulging, giving me an embolism, and thus ending my life. It's for my health. And possibly Stinkerbell's.

These tags are made out of the same wood I used to make the backpack ID tags, except they are half the size. Peanut Head cut one of the wood pieces in half for me, and I just gave them a couple sloppy coats of acrylic paint. I probably should have sanded the wood first, but I didn't see the point in making them beautiful when potentially they will be subjected to rotting food and violence in the classroom lunch crate.

The lunch crate is a scary place. I came back from summer vacation to discover two rotting lunch boxes had been left in my lunch crate, and one of them had a yogurt in it. Blech!

Anyway, two coats of paint, another coat of MOD Podge (I have to force myself to say it that way because I'm so bitter about the Mod Podge scandal) to keep the paint from bleeding onto the picture, slap a not-so-attractive school picture atop that mess, and hit it with another coat of MOD Podge, allowing time to dry between each coat. I repeated that scenario for the back of the tags where I wrote the girls' names, teachers, and room numbers on a sticker.

There's nothing fancy about these tags. They are pure function. But you can make yours cute if you want. I just can't since I know what happens in the lunch crate. It's spooky.

Holding Hands

2011-10-02T22:50:00.000-06:00

I just finished a project that I started eight and a half years ago, right after Stinkerbell was born. We knew The Stink was going to be our last baby, so that knowledge is what prompted me to trace all of our hands. Stinkerbell was a bruiser and I wanted to get her hand traced while she was still little.

On Mother's Day of the same year, Peanut Head gave me the sweetest card ever. It said "Sometimes just holding hands is holding on to everything."

I'm not normally a sappy person, but that just melted my heart and I knew the sentiment had to go with our hand outlines.

I only wish it hadn't taken me eight years to put it all together.

Basil Pesto

2011-09-28T00:01:00.001-06:00

With the weather turning cooler, I recently picked all my basil and turned it into pesto for the winter. It turns out that I only had about 8 cups worth of basil, which translated to about a cup and a half of pesto.

Next year I'll start making the pesto earlier, before my basil starts going to seed.

I follow a pretty basic recipe for my pesto, with pine nuts being my nut of choice. Sadly the pine nuts are around $18 a pound, so walnuts might be a better choice. I googled "why are pine nuts so dang expensive," and I learned that it's because they are a very labor intensive nut to produce. It takes a lot of time to separate the nuts from the pine cone. That, and demand for them has increased, so the price has too.

Somehow it doesn't make me feel better about buying them, so I think I'll use walnuts next time.

I couldn't find my back up ice cube trays, so I used this pan intended for brownies. It worked out great and left me with cute little 2 T pesto hearts. How cute is that?

This is the recipe I use. It's not difficult at all, and so worth it. I put the pesto on pasta, fish, and even as a spread for sandwiches. Yummy!

Don't forget to click on the recipe for the best resolution before saving it to your computer. Enjoy!

Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs

2011-09-21T00:01:00.002-06:00

It has been forever since I posted a recipe on here, but I'm sort of making peace with my for now inadequate digi software. Life must go on and all that.

This recipe for meatballs is another of the many recipes given to me by my mother-in-law, the Barefoot Contessa. It's super easy to make, and it makes plenty to freeze for future meals. I love that part.

All you need to make it is: ground beef, onion, garlic, parmesan cheese (the cheap stuff in the green can is fine), dried bread crumbs, eggs, parsley, oregano, salt and pepper.

The first step is to simply combine all the ingredients. I like to use food prep gloves because squishing raw meat together creeps me out.

Keeping the gloves on, the next step is to form the meatballs into 1-1/2 inch balls. I don't measure them or anything, but I make them into a size that seems good to me. When Peanut Head helps he makes them a little smaller so they go farther.

I will not make a joke about that. Actually, I just did but then I deleted it because it wasn't appropriate.

The Barefoot Contessa browns her meatballs in oil, but I'm lazy so I just pop mine in the oven on a cookie sheet for 30 minutes or so, and they turn out great.

In fact, I dare you to not sample them when they come out of the oven. The smell will make you whimper, I promise.

We always have spaghetti and meatballs the night we make these. Usually we spoil our dinner because we overindulge when sampling the meatballs.

There's always plenty to freeze several baggies full of meatballs for future spaghetti nights in a flash. They make good meatball subs too.

Here's the recipe card. Remember to click on it before saving it to your computer so you get the best resolution. Trust me.

Annie Get Your Gun . . . The Peace and the Love Continues

2011-09-18T13:24:00.002-06:00

Peanut Head teaches a Gun Safety course for the local Boy Scouts, and he recruited the girls to take the class right along with the Scouts. I'm not a gun lover myself, but you know me, I'm not going to pass up an opportunity to be Alone In My House while the girls are off struggling to remain awake while Peanut Head teaches them the ins and outs of gun safety.

I suppose it's not a bad skill to have.

Stinkerbell here enjoys herself quite a lot out on the range.

She seems to have commandeered Peanut Head's grunt field cap and Princess Leah ear muffs. She knows how to work it, doesn't she?

My favorite part is the way she holds her cute little footsies when she's in her sniper pose.

And the way she squints one eye when she's getting ready to blast the target to Kingdom Come.

It makes my heart swell with pride.

Zoe Bug, on the other hand, is more about technique and careful attention to detail.

She always has been. I love the little freckles on her sweet little hand. She's my little Freckle-Puss.

Since Peanut Head has been taking the girls to the range, there's a lot of talk around here about target groupings. Of which, Peanut Head informs me, this is a horrible example. Not one of their better ones.

He just instructed Stinkerbell to get a better example for me to scan. I pooh-poohed him and told him I would include a disclaimer.

Like you're going to really care, right?

I love it when they come home and Peanut Head has to rebuild a target stand because one of the girls shoots the leg clean off.

It makes me giggle. Secretly, I think he's proud that his babies destroy things most excellently.

This day that I accompanied my little family to the range, there was a Cowboy Shoot going on. It was a bunch of grown men, and a woman or two, dressed up in chaps and dusters, competing against each other and displaying their superb marksmanship. And markswomanship.

I looked and looked for The Renaissance Woman, but she wasn't there. I figured with all those Gunslinger dusters, she had to be there somewhere.

No such luck though.

I did some visiting with the Gunslingers' horses. As I was bumbling around shooting pictures of their cute little Gunslinger carts, I kept stepping onto the wrong side of the reloading area, and I was scolded several times to "Git Back Woman!"

Okay, they might not have used those exact words, but I don't like to be called "Ma'am," so I'm changing the facts to my liking.

I made friends with Idaho here too. On second thought, is that Idaho, or is it a tipped gun?

I must ponder this while I refer to my maps.

This is one part of the Cowboy Shoot that I just don't get.

Some of the targets flip clay pigeons up into the air for them to shoot at.

Can you see it?

Me neither, but it's there.

Perhaps if it actually looked like a pigeon instead of a Chernobyl Breathsaver, we could more easily spot it.

Could the Clay Pigeon people not trouble themselves enough to actually make it look like a pigeon?

It's basically a rat with wings. How hard can that be to make a mold and reproduce it in a more believable color?

Peanut Head also has the girls practicing with this cute little bow. Stinkerbell has been begging for a bow for months, ever since she read The Ranger's Apprentice. She's just dying to kill something with it.

I did not pick Stinkerbell's outfit. These days I don't have the energy to wrestle her into what I want her to wear, so I just let her dress herself and make sure to tell everyone that I did not pick out her clothes.

I'm sure people wonder about that.

Stinkerbell marches to the beat of her own drummer, and she tells him what to play. The poor guy lives in fear, I'm telling you.

Peanut Head is so proud of his girls. He made this little poster and put it on the door to his office.

He delights in warning the world of the Scary Threat of What's to Come.

Vinyl Crazy

2011-09-10T23:28:00.002-06:00

I've been going a little crazy with the vinyl lately. Lately being the last two years or so.

Before school started, I ordered some custom vinyl from Janae, and I still don't have all of it up. It's been on my monster To Do list, so today I went into my classroom and I got a couple more things put up.

This Work Hard sign is my favorite. Well, my favorite next to the Grandpa punctuation piece I showed you a couple posts ago. Janae is selling this one for $22.00 here, and let me tell you, it's ginormous. It really sends the message I'm looking to send.

None of my students will get this one because they weren't even born when Sir Mix-A-Lot was kickin' it. I don't think I'll tell them about him either. He's not really PG-13. I'll just quietly enjoy this myself and hope that during parent teacher conferences their parents will at least get it. If you love this as much as I do, it's $8.50, and you can get it here.

This is the other quote I ordered, but I haven't put it up yet. My goal is to get it up this week, even if I have to do it in stages. Janae is selling this one for $24.00 and you can find it here. It doesn't have the web address on it though, that's just because this isn't the actual vinyl, but a web example instead.

Janae also made this Christopher Robin quote for me, and I have it at home and at school. It's one of my favorite quotes. Janae sells this one here for $24.50.

The prices are based on the size of the sheet of vinyl used. In my opinion, it is not cheaper to cut it yourself. Especially if you consider the cost of the vinyl and the transfer paper. Not to mention factoring in the time it takes to cut it, pull away the excess, adhere it to the transfer paper, etc. It takes me for-EVER, so I only do the small stuff myself and let Janae do everything else. It's totally worth it to me.

If you order any of the quotes I've linked to, please click the "Thoughts in Vinyl Only" shipping option when you check out. That way your shipping will be a flat $6.00.

This is an example of something I did myself with my Cricut. Small jobs like this are doable for me. I found this idea on Pinterest, and it's where I keep materials for each day's lessons at school. So far it's working very well.

I also did this. I really like how the white vinyl stands out on the black trays.

This is where I post missing assignments for the current week. It's very helpful for keeping the kids on top of their assignments. I put "No Name" papers in a Homeless File, so if a student sees his number up here and he knows he turned the assignment in, then he knows he needs to check the Homeless File.

At the end of the week, any assignments still on the board get transferred to a spiral notebook and the board gets erased for a new week.

Janae pretty much did all of my white board vinyl. I had some that I had done myself, but last year I had a projector installed in my classroom midyear, and I had to move all my vinyl. Time is very precious during the school year, so I called on Janae to help me out. She is really good about working up different plans and giving proofs with prices before cutting. I really appreciate that because sometimes my ideas are bigger than my wallet.

Of all the vinyl on my white boards, this is the section I love the most. It saves me a lot of time every day, and it looks clean and tidy. I tend to be really OCD about my white boards. They have to be super clean at the end of every day, or I get twitchy. I buy a lot of Expo cleaner.

This is where I post homework and reminders for the kids to put in their planners.

Janae did this for me too. I used to have magnets for the jobs, but I love having the vinyl because I can clean the white board without moving the jobs off.

Yes, Anne, I know the Neat Police job is not aligned with the rest of the jobs. It's sort of ironic, isn't it? I was so focused on making sure it was level, no lie, that I forgot to check the horizontal alignment as well. Doy. I am not having Janae cut this one again.

Well, at least I'm not having her cut it today. The next time I need something from her, I'm totally putting this one on my order again. It mocks me.

I might not have to wait too long because I've been coveting some vinyl she cut for another teacher in my hall. It's the teacher's name outside her door, with the cutest red apple with a little green stem. I die every time I walk by it, I'm so in love with it.

Library Guides

2011-09-03T22:02:00.000-06:00

This is going to be a quick post for those of you that requested the library guides. As I mentioned, this was one of those projects with a lot of trial and a lot of error.

Hopefully I can save you from some of that error.

I started out by buying long, flat rectangles of wood from Michael's. The wood pieces were about 3 feet long. My first mistake was that some of the wood pieces were made from Balsa wood. Michael's didn't have enough of the sturdier wood pieces, and I was in a hurry, so I just grabbed the few Balsa pieces so I could get her done. I need to work on my patience, but I'm not ready to commit to it full-time.

I should have just waited patiently because the Balsa wood is a sad, sad alternative. When you paint Balsa wood, it sucks the moisture up and then bows the wood. Waste of time.

When I got the wood pieces home, Peanut Head cut each piece into three pieces so that each piece was about a foot long. It turns out that they were a little too long for my bookcases, so Peanut Head cut them a second time so that they were right sized. He's so good to me.

My second mistake was using craft paint to paint the wood pieces. It took for-EVER, and it sucked up a lot of paint.

My third mistake was not putting one coat of Mod Podge on my guides before Mod Podging the letters on. I ended up having the red paint bleed onto my letters, so I had to sand them all off and then basically start over.

It took me for-EVER to sand the library guides, something I should have done in the first place anyway, but since I messed up so bad, in order to fix it, I had to sand the letters off and a few layers of Mod Podge.

After I sanded my waste of time off, I got a brain and spray painted just one coat of paint on the library guides. After the paint dried, I lightly sanded them. I think I'm supposed to, but I don't know why, so I just did it.

Then I put just one coat of Mod Podge on them and let it dry. Then I put on another coat of Mod Podge to adhere the letters, and finally one last coat to protect it all.

Whew! I'm so tired now.

I love the way they turned out after all that trial and error.

Oh yes, I think I should mention that I printed two copies of all the alphabet guides because I put letters on both sides of my library guides so that they could be seen from both directions.

What I love most about them is that I can move the guides as my library expands and contracts. It did a lot of contracting this week when my students started checking books out.

I used the same style of cards for my cabinets. I've mentioned before that I number my cabinets and drawers to speed up the process of sending students to fetch things. It's so much quicker than playing the whole hot/cold game.

Anyway, I put two letters and two numbers on every 4 x 6 print. Then I cut them in half so that they are 4 x 3 inches.

After cutting the numbers apart, I mounted them on red card stock and them laminated the whole shebang. Then I stuck them to my cabinets with double-sided adhesive. I'm still experimenting with the adhesive, because they aren't all sticking perfectly. Every couple of days I'll find one slipping and trying to make a break for it. I would love any suggestions you might have for a good adhesive.

Does all that make sense? If not, ask questions, please.

Click on the images below first, to get the best resolution, then save them to your desktop. The cabinet numbers only go up to 22, so let me know if you need them to go a little higher, and I'd be happy to add more.

Back to School and a Classroom Tour

2011-08-30T22:40:00.002-06:00

All the kids went Back to School this week, and I barely managed to pull my room together in time. Honestly, I don't know where the time goes.

Pinterest is where I found the idea for the signs the girlies are holding. That ding dang website is giving me more ideas than I can ever hope to implement. It would be frustrating if it weren't so blinking inspiring. Now I have Inspiration Induced Frustration.

Just what I needed. Another condition to suffer from.

I found this idea on Pinterest too. It's my sort of hideous, but super fun Back to School manicure.

Some people couldn't tell what my nails are actually supposed to be, although I'm sure you know. I've received a lot of pained smiles with the question "Are those your school colors or something?" Humph. In the tone of voice which implies "I'm so sorry."

Okay, fine. They are supposed to be pencils. Get it? The tips of my fingers are the erasers. The silver is the clampy part that joins the eraser to the pencil.

I think my manicurist really outdid herself. I took my Pinterest picture in to her, and she very graciously humored me.

I've had quite a few requests to do a classroom tour post, and since I've been working on my classroom for the past two weeks, I figured it's only going to look worse as the year goes on, so I'd better take some pictures now. Ready or not.

These are the built-in cubbies as you walk into my room. The cubbies are great because the student desks don't have enough room for all their books and their stuff.

These cupboards and drawers are right next to the cubbies. I love all the storage I have in this classroom. Peanut Head loves it too, because that means the stuff isn't stored in our garage anymore.

More room for Christmas decorations, whoo hoo!

I'm sorry this picture is so dark. We can thank the windows for that. This is my classroom library.

I've posted about this magnetic board before. It's where my students make their lunch choice every day by putting their number magnet in the box for their choice. Any numbers that are left on the grid represent absent students. This gives me the lunch count and the attendance all in one tool. I also post the students who have Hall Monitor duty and Peer Tutoring, and it serves as my behavior management tool as well. If a student receives a warning, they move their magnet into the yellow zone. If they get in trouble again, they move their magnet into the Red Zone of Consequences and then have to fill out a Pink Slip and take it home to be signed by a parent. I've been using this board for the past two years, and it is my absolute favorite classroom management tool.

The red rectangles sticking out of my bookcases are my new library guides. I love them now, but it was one of those projects that involved some trial and error. Okay, a lot of trial and a lot of error.

If you want to make some library guides like these, you can find the instructions and digi graphics here. I know a lot of teachers group their books by level and/or subject, but I group mine by author, so this works great for me.

I also have number images in the same style that I used for numbering my cupboards, and you can find those in the same post.

This is my desk area, and I have to say it's not at its tidiest here. I literally ran out of time and ended up taking some considerably large piles and shoving them under my desk. I have impressive problem solving skillz.

Oh looky. I see a pile oozing out of that corner on the floor too. Perhaps I'll tend to it over the Thanksgiving break. Or not. It's good to have goals even if they are unrealistic.

Janae, the Vinyl Magician did all my white board vinyl for me. It's a huge time saver to have that stuff on the board. I love it.

I have plenty of bulletin boards too. I'm not a big fan of changing my bulletin boards. I like them to be functional, and I don't like the time involved in changing them. Therefore, I tend to put them up and keep them up.

I did make some changes this year though, because they were starting to make me twitchy. That, and change is fun, isn't it?

I love monsters, so I had to add some new monster borders that I bought a year ago and never had the time to put up. Since I was changing the borders anyway, I decided to put up some Cookie Monster blue butcher paper too. Cookie is my favorite monster.

I've been wanting to do a math bulletin board for a long time. I'm always harping on the kids about their units, as Harrison so eloquently illustrated in his cartoon. I even put pictures above the bulletin board of the Mars Climate Orbiter and its intended trajectory as compared to its "Oops, my bad because my disagreeing units made me crash the gazillion dollar satellite" picture.

I just love beating dead horses like that.

The only reason the calendar ended up where it is, is because I didn't want to go to the trouble of moving the Six Traits of Good Writing board over a few feet.

You can't even tell that I cheated on that one, can you?

If you can, please just lie. I choose denial.

The yellow bulletin board says "Fancy Words," and it was lifted right off of Pinterest.

I mean it was inspired by Pinterest.

Janae has been cutting a lot of vinyl for me lately, and this one is my favorite. I'll do another post to show you the rest, but I haven't gotten it all put up yet. If you want this one, Janae can hook you up with it for $21.50 here.

By the way, this idea came from Pinterest too.

My name is Jill and I'm a Pintaholic.

Do you remember these hall passes I made last year? Well duh, I didn't think to make a general hall pass for the times when a student needs to go to the office. Or another classroom, or whatever.

So I had to make another little bonus hall pass.

This one is a little sign that the kids get to wear around their necks.

It was inspired by this cartoon.

Believe or not, it is the most popular hall pass. Students choose to wear it instead of take one of the other cutesy passes, because they like the attention they get when they wear it. It's not the Potty Prancers, but we like it just fine.

Death in the Family

2011-08-21T00:40:00.002-06:00

Now don't start freaking out about my post title, a person in my family did not die. However, I did want to share a little . . . hmmmm, let's just call it an unfortunate event that took place while the girls and I were in California, and Peanut Head was left behind to hold down the fort. Well, that, and work. Someone has to bring home the bacon around here.

Glad it's not me.

Anyway, a couple days into our trip, I received this little e-mail message from Peanut Head.

Hi,

I'm going to go grocery shopping tonight. Is there any money for allowance around here, or should I get some at the store?

On a sadder note, probably shouldn't let on to the girls just yet. We've had an issue . . . well . . . with one of the animals.

Nothing much can be done now.

But I don't think you should show the following to Zoe and Annie.

Before I show the picture to you, I need to explain something. I know you are distracted by it already, because I am distracted by it. The "allowance" that Peanut Head is referring to, well, I just want you to know that I don't monitor everything he spends or anything like that.

Well, actually I do, but what I feel I should explain is that since we got married twenty years ago, we have always had a weekly allowance of $20 to spend on whatever we want. That's what he is referring to.

So, back to our regularly scheduled execution, I mean loss . . .

I scrolled down and down and down and down to this picture. This picture that made me smile.

On the other hand, it was a nice day at the range today.

Write back soon. :)

Peanut Head is so naughty. Of course I immediately read the e-mail to the girls and showed them the picture. Then I told them to call their Daddy chop, chop, and give him a piece of their minds.

Which they did.

And it was very high pitched with lots of squealing, and overall, very entertaining to listen to.

We're making memories here. Little nuggets of life that I can relive again and again when I'm in the old folks home.

It's Really Over

2011-08-17T01:10:00.001-06:00

It's really over. Summer, that is. Tomorrow I can get into my classroom to start setting up, and I'm going to be spending every spare minute getting ready for the new school year.

That's tomorrow though. I made a little deal with myself that I have to get this post up before I disappear into the abyss of classroom prep. Let's just call it my little end of summer recap.

The picture above is Zoe Bug wearing her new, wearing on my nerves, attitude. I believe I snapped this picture and grumble-whisper-scolded her, "You give me a smile or there will be no ice cream."

Correct me if I'm wrong here, but isn't 10 a little young to enter the grouchiness of puberty? I'm always getting eye rolls from Girlfriend here, and if she chicken necks me one more time, I'm going to turn her into a Bobble Head and put her on my dashboard. At the very least, I'm going to get a crick in my own neck from exaggeratedly mimicking her.

In this picture, we were at the San Diego Zoo, having a good time. It would be nice if you could tell that we were having a good time, Zoe Bug.

I'm happy to say that at least this put a smile on Zoe's face. Isn't it the cutest little paw you ever did see?

It belongs to Mr. Taking a Nap Polar Bear. I just wanted to climb in there and snuggle up with him. Except that he would probably eat me for lunch.

The glare of the glass makes it look like he's holding a water bottle, but I promise that is not the case.

As I mentioned a couple posts ago, I went to BlogHer '11 while in San Diego. This is an Ivory soap sculpture from the conference. I think that means Ivory was one of the sponsors. There were a lot of sponsors, and let me tell you, they treated us well.

They were feeding us every time we turned around, and it was good food. I think I gained eight pounds in two days.

I'm talented like that.

This is my new BFF, Erin, at the Dove chocolate booth.

The only reason I remembered her name is because she's wearing a name tag, and I was able to zoom in on it when I was editing these pictures. I guess that means that technically I didn't remember her name.

I love her though. She fresh dipped a Dove bar just for me.

I've always had a special place in my heart for Dove chocolate.

And special padding elsewhere that is always happy to rent space. I don't love that part.

After eating lunch and the Dove bar, I stumbled into this Hershey's S'more Bar. I was in a sugar stupor.

Then I came across these Truffles on a stick at the Red Envelope booth. Seriously. I am a chocolate junkie, and I was surrounded by pushers. Since I was already hopped up on chocolate, I was able to leave the convention center with the entire truffle completely intact. I had plans to bestow it upon my prepubescent offspring.

I got all the way back to my mom's house with it too, and as I was pulling it out of my bag to bestow the gift, I snarfed it down.

I have no idea what came over me, it was an involuntary reaction to the raising of the truffle next to my head.

The next day I went back and got another one, and I'm happy to say that I delivered it to my babies untouched.

All of this stuff, and then some, was free. Apparently it's called swag. Swhat? I know. That's what I said. I had to Google it. It stands for Stuff We All Get. Please tell me I'm not the only one that has never heard this term.

I mean I've heard of swagger. Kesha's got it, and I think I have it. The Minivan Swagger anyway. But swag? I must live under a rock.

Guess. What. This. Is. You won't believe it. Of course it's Lady Liberty, but can you believe that she is made entirely out of Twizzlers?!!!!

Get. Out.

Seriously, who has this kind of time?

Somebody needs a more productive, useful hobby because they even made the Space Needle.

It looks kind of creepy up close, doesn't it?

Try not to think about it. Just try to appreciate the art for what it is.

A waste of some dang good Twizzlers if you ask me, but nobody cares about my opinion here.

I never got to see the Pioneer Woman because she left before I even got there. That was messed up. I did, however, get to attend a session by these two fabulous bloggers. That's the Nap Warden on the left and Scary Mommy on the right.

I learned about a lot of things that I didn't even know I didn't know. Does that make any sense? It's like my ignorance is so . . . ignorant. That's the only way I can think to describe it.

One of the many things I learned is that my sidebar was a train wreck. Did you notice that I cleaned it up? It was too distracting and cluttered. Not at all the image I wanted to project.

Also, I have been loading my pictures way too large. I always edit my photos and save them in Photo Shop at the maximum resolution, when all this time I should have been selecting medium, or 72 dpi. Apparently the pictures don't look any better on the web at the higher resolution, but they make my page load slower than a snail excreting concrete.

That's S-L-O-W. So I apologize for wasting your precious time with my lethargic page loads. From here on out my pictures will always be 72 dpi, and hopefully my pages will start loading faster as I make the transition.

I am not going back and reloading all of my pictures though. Life is too short for that mess.

And guess who this is?

Bob Harper from The Biggest Loser.

My favorite show on the planet.

The show that I plan my life around.

And no, before you ask because I know you will, he was not at the conference as a blogger.

Quaker, another sponsor, brought him in to do a group workout, eat breakfast with a group of bloggers, and sign autographs and take pictures with us.

And I'm still upset, but I didn't even know that he was going to be there.

I didn't get the memo, it was not in the program, there were no announcements, and blah, blah, blah, I am disgruntled.

The only reason I saw him is because I just happened to walk in on the breakfast in progress.

Yep, I crashed the party and stumbled around trying to get a picture in the horrid lighting of the conference room. None of the pictures turned out, but later he was in the Quaker booth which had glorious natural light streaming in from above. I couldn't get him to look at me because he was doing an interview, and I was a chicken butt, so I settled on this one. I was too impatient to wait 20 minutes for his interview to finish so I could get a proper picture with him.

But I was close enough to see the dangly unraveling thread on his shorts. That's pretty cool, eh?

So that was BlogHer. I don't know if I'd ever do it again, but it was a good experience.

While in San Diego, we went to the beach a few times. That's always fun, except that somewhere along the way I've lost my ability to catch a wave on a Boogie Board. My Internet Friend, Anne, very snarkily asked me "Can't you just flag one down?" As if it's a taxi or something. Hardy, har, har, Anne.

The girls and I fell in love with this German Shepard my mom is fostering. Her name is Stella, but we like to call her Stellaluna and Stella Bella. She's scary smart, she loves kids (obviously), and she has a very gentle nature.

So if you are in Oceanside, CA, and you want this dog, I can hook you up. I almost kidnapped Stellaluna myself. The only thing that kept me from snatching her is the knowledge that two dogs equal way too much poop, and the extra floaties of dog hair poufs around the house would cause me to jump off a bridge.

I took Stellaluna on several runs while I was visiting, and she is an amazing running partner. She was always right next to me and never pulled on the leash, so it felt like I was running with an invisible dog. Now, I realize that I'm not exactly built for speed, so she didn't have to exert herself while running with me, but my point is really that she didn't drag me or make me drag her.

There was one point where we were running up a hill, and I was huffing and puffing with exertion. It was kind of like one of those nightmares where you are running as fast as you can to get away from the monster, but really that is only slow motion like the Bionic Man, but without the hot bod. Then I looked to my right and Stella Bella was walking in a very untaxed manner. It was difficult not to be offended, but at least she had the people skills to roll her tongue out at the end of the run and flop it around like a tired insole.

Stella likes to play with my mom's dog, Cleo, aka Naomi Campbell, on account of her popping eyes and fabulous bone structure. Cleopatra, however, is a bit of a box of rocks. She and Stellaluna play tug-o-war, and Cleo gets all agitated and growly. Stella Bella keeps her cool and just waits for the mistake.

The mistake comes when Cleo fumbles with her end of the rope, and Stella doesn't miss a beat when she casually drops a paw on Cleo's rope end and then "Game Over, Sister Girl."

Cleo then becomes discombobulated and wants to know "Where did it all go wrong?!"

It's a comedy, I tell you.

This is my little brother, Pickle.

He never cooperates for pictures, so I write mean things about him to exact my revenge.

This is Uncle Billy Flop giving Zoe a ride on a Boogie Board. I just this very minute bestowed that name upon him. His name is Billy and he does belly flops in the pool so it shall be known.

I know he's going to love it.

I didn't include any belly flop pictures because there was some crackage showing, and this is a family blog.

And crack is illegal.

Uncle Billy Flop is a big kid and the girls looooooooove him.

That was our trip to San Diego in a nutshell.

This picture has nothing to do with our trip, but I need to tell you about it anyway. We went to Yellowstone with Zoe's Girl Scout troop last weekend, and this bison statue was on the lawn outside the Visitor's Center. Peanut Head walked Gunny over to it and our little Bunnery Sergeant went berserk. He started stalking the statue and growling real low in his throat. He dang near wet himself, he was so intimidated by this obvious statue. Doy.

That Gunny Bunny, he has the brain cells to maintain life support and we're not sure what else.

His pretty face, I guess.

Backpack ID Tags Round Three

2011-08-08T00:01:00.002-06:00

Every year I make new backpack ID tags for the girlies, and every year I try to come up with a way to make them more durable. I sure hope I have it this time.

Two years ago I used ID badges, but they got pretty beat up by the end of the year.

Last year I created them myself digitally, then laminated them with my laminator. They still got pretty beat up.

This year, I bought some little rectangular wood pieces at Michael's and turned them into the new and improved backpack ID tags for 2011-12.

First I painted the wood, then I Mod Podged my pictures right onto the wood. I added some ABC stickers for the names, and then Mod Podged the whole thing quite a few more times.

More Mod Podge means more strength, right? That's my theory.

Although I didn't take a picture of the backs, I put my contact information there in case the backpacks are lost.

Finally I used my trusty Crop-A-Dile to punch holes along the top for cute-ifying with ribbon. I put a 1-1/4" split key ring through the hole in the middle for attaching the tags onto the backpacks.

I'm really hoping that the third time's the charm, and that the Mod Podge did the trick.

Guess Where I'm Going . . .

2011-08-03T00:01:00.004-06:00

It's hard to believe it, but I've been doing this blogging thing for three years now. When I started, I wanted to see how long I could keep it going with all the ideas I had swirling around in my head. There are times when I think "What on Earth am I going to post about to keep this going?" It's funny how it works out because something always comes up that I find I want to post about.

I told myself in the beginning that I was doing this for fun, and that I didn't want it to become another stress in my life. And that has been mostly true. When it's not fun anymore, when it becomes a chore, then I will know I am done.

And I am done.

I appreciate each and every one of you, and I thank you for stopping by and reading my yackity yack these past several years.

Just kidding. I'm really not done. I don't think I'll ever run out of yackity yack as long as people want to read it. What I really came on the internet for today is not to irritate you, but to tell you that I'm going to BlogHer 2011 in San Diego. Whoo hoo!

Why am I always the excited one here? You could at least fake it.

Never mind.

It's not like I'm that great or anything, going to the big blogging conference. I had to pay the full $203.94 conference fee to get in, and I promise you, nobody has a clue who I am. I'm like the little fish in the big pond. No forget the pond, the ocean.

Regardless, I designed these cutesy business cards to take with me. Aren't they yummy? Hopefully I'll get to rub elbows with some important people and maybe even give them one of my cards.

Heck, I'd be satisfied just to be in the same room with the Pioneer Woman and breathe her recycled air.

This is a once in a lifetime chance for me to go to BlogHer, because the conferences are always in places that I would have to travel very far to get to. And that costs money. Money that is better spent on crafting.

Of course that's true this time as well, but this time it's in San Diego. And my Mama Llama lives in San Diego. So I have free room and board and a free babysitter. Score!

I feel like I'm just rationalizing here.

Anyway, I'm off to find out what all this professional blogging business is about. If you're there and you see me looking dorky with my business cards, throw me a life jacket, will ya? I'll be your BFF.

Recycled Cans Turned Pencil Containers for School

2011-08-01T00:01:00.001-06:00

I think I've mentioned before that I like to troll through other teachers' classrooms and lift their brilliant ideas. This is yet another example of that. I've seen a lot of teachers with two pencil cups, one with pencils needing to be sharpened, and one with pencils that are sharp.

This is a big deal in my world because I like my pencils sharp, and I don't like digging through my pencil cup trying to find the perfect pencil with the perfect point. Again, I have such enormous problems.

I have also seen cutesy decorated soup cans to house the writing utensils, and I'm in love with the idea.

So you know I had to make some for myself.

Of course.

I'm in love.

I spray painted my cans black, decorated them with pretty paper, Mod Podged them to within an inch of sanity. Okay, insanity.

I put a lot of Mod Podge on to protect them from the hazards of teaching. The kids. Then I hot-glued some buttons on and used my Crop-A-Dile to cute-ify them some more.

Oh yes I did. The eyelets serve absolutely no purpose other than to cute-ify the cans. The Crop-A-Dile is A-MAZE-ING. I could gauge my own ears with pretty eyelets if I wanted.

I don't want.

Okay, school can start now. I'm ready.

No I'm not. I'm not ready! I take that back! I have more things on Pinterest I must make.

Peace out.

Band-Aid Boxes for Teachers

2011-07-24T21:25:00.000-06:00

During the Great Decrapification of the Summer of 2011, I found these nifty little boxes. Oh yeah, I was going to make Band-Aid boxes for the girlies' teachers two years ago! Oopsie.

Sometimes I procrastinate. I might have told you that. It doesn't matter, now I have a newly organized craft space and I can make things. Yippee!

I found some super cute paper in my drawer labeled "School" so I plastered it all over the boxes.

I just used photo tape and tape runner, a lot of it, to adhere the paper. As a final step, I gave it one coat of Mod Podge to protect it from blood.

Whaaaaat? It is a Band-Aid box. Bleeding students will be opening it, otherwise why get in it, right? I have one in my own classroom, and I tell my students to help themselves, just be careful to not get blood on my cute box.

They think I'm crazy.

Did you know you can get Band-Aids at the Dollar Store? They're just a dollar.

I like these because they are pretty school looking colors. And they go well with blood.

I think I'll buy some Bactine to put in the boxes, and the girlies can give them to their teachers on the first day of school.

I need to attach a ginormous candy bar for Stinkerbell's teacher with a note that says "For the Pain and Suffering My Child Might Cause You This Year. So Sorry. Band-Aid?"

Alone in My House . . . A Staycation Dream

2011-07-22T16:58:00.002-06:00

I'm so excited to finally be at a point where I can put this post up. When we sent our girlies to Horse Camp, I had very lofty goals to completely decrapify and organize the Great Room in our basement. It had gotten so completely out of control, that I couldn't even think straight. When I'm not organized, I don't function at my best, so this project was a very big deal in my world, and sadly, it was at least two years overdue.

Let's start with a before picture, shall we? Everyone loves a good before picture, don't they?

This is the crap end of my basement, and you probably can't tell, since there's so much crap, but I have four crop tables set up in this picture, and they are all covered completely in Things That Need to Be Dealt With. Those words strike fear in my heart. What's even worse, is that there is even more stuff hidden underneath the tables. Like so much that you can't even sit in a chair at those tables.

The good news is that my Guest Room looks awesome. Well, at least when these pictures were taken. Part of the reason why there is so much stuff on and under my tables here is because I had to clean out the Guest Room for Aunt Marcia to sleep in while we were on our cruise. Since I didn't have the time to deal with the crap and make the mentally exhausting decisions about what to do with each and every little thing, I just stuffed it all into every available nook and cranny on and around the tables. I'm such a problem solver.

Enter Horse Camp and my opportunity to complete a thought without constant talking at me by my offspring. Bliss, I tell you.

The very first step actually started before we dropped the girls off in the Hundred Acre Wood, and that step was to sort and purge all the girls' toys. We took a whole van load of stuff to the thrift store, and it felt great.

The plan was to move everything from one end of the basement to the other, paint the walls and clean the carpet, then move back only the things not crap. Then repeat the process for the other end of the basement. That means I had to complete a lot of thoughts and make a lot of decisions. A lot of stuff was taken to the thrift store, and there is still more to be taken. I haven't yet made those decisions, and you'll see about that at the end of this post.

Smashley told me that she feels so much better about herself since I went back to work, because my house isn't perfect. Like it ever was, Smashley. She just always comes over when I know she's coming and I have time to hide the crap.

Here is Stinkerbell helping me unload the stuff on this IKEA Expedit unit. Of the two units I have, one of them became the new home for all the girls' toys, the 18,367 horses and their accompanying paraphernalia. All of it had to be on this unit or it was out of here. I take great joy in motivating my kids.

Here it is, all tidy and organized. I don't love all the barns on top, but there is nowhere else to put them. Besides the trash, I mean.

Here it is with the new paint color, Frosty by Valspar (Lowe's). Peanut Head doesn't like the color, he calls it Caribbean Vomit or some such thing. I don't care though. I told him he doesn't get an opinion because he has no fashion sense. He wears teal and Navy blue together and says they match because they're both blue. Yeah, so you see my point. His opinion matters not when it comes to paint colors. I chose this color because I wanted something to inspire creativity. This one does it for me.

The other color is Scroll Beige by Glidden. I have used this color upstairs in my living room, hallway, and kitchen, paired with my Milk Chocolate and Sunflowery yellow. I have stuck with it because I love it, and because tans are very hard colors to get right. I can't tell you how many times I've had what I thought was a tan color, then gotten it home and found that it looked like I had wiped a poopy diaper across the wall. Tans also tend to be too pink, too purpley, or too red. It's a hard color to get right. This scroll beige color has grey tones in it, and it seems to work.

I chose red and pink as subtle accent colors, so I painted my star birdhouse atop the bookcases in keeping with that idea. It used to be blue.

This is the same quote that I have in my classroom, and it's one of my favorites. I had Janae of Thoughts in Vinyl cut this one for me, and I like her version much better than mine. Seriously, the girl is good at what she does and her prices are great.

I have a lot more things that I need to hang on the walls, but I don't want to stress myself out trying to get it all done now. I like to take months pulling a room together. Months. A year. Whatever.

Part of this redo and decrapification process was to make room for desks for the girls. They had been wanting desks for a long time, so I've been mulling the idea over and looking at desks.

I looked for months, and let me tell you, desks are not cheap. Especially when you are considering buying two desks. I had finally settled on a single long IKEA desk, with a drawer divider thingy to divide it, when Peanut Head and I found these babies at Walmart. They are super simple, super cheapo writing desks, but they are perfect for the girls. Each desk was a whopping $39.95, way cheaper than anything else I could have gotten anywhere.

Peanut Head made these fabulous pegboards for the girls. This is my attempt at keeping their desktops cleared off so they have lots of room to do homework. Or scrapbook, or whatever. We got the bars and bins from IKEA, although I chose to paint the bars.

They were originally a silvery metallic color.

I wanted black.

I moved the large bookcases down on the wall some, and got rid of a lot of the stuff that used to be on them. I had to purge a lot because I wanted to put all my paper in the Sterlite drawers, and that took up six shelves. It was a good move. It's so easy to get to my paper now, and it is up and off the floor.

My new plan is to only keep two tables up when I'm not having a crop. Less surface area means I have less space to mess up, right?

In the space I made from moving the bookcases down, I put my other Expedit unit to create my crafty storage area. Peanut Head thinks it's busy, but again, he doesn't get an opinion. I love being able to see all my stuff and not have to dig for it.

It makes me want to create.

In spite of all the harassment from me, Peanut Head is always there to build stuff for me when I have a new project. This time it was the pegboards, and I think I quite possibly will love him for the rest of my life. I love, love, love, my pegboard. If I weren't already married to Peanut Head, I would marry my pegboard.

By attaching a metal bar and a 12x12 piece of embellished sheet metal, I was even able to get my glitter and all of my doodads out of various bins. I hot glued magnets to the lids of my glitter containers, and I found the large magnetic containers on clearance at Michael's. I love that everything is accessible now, and I can see it and therefore won't forget that I have it.

I found this little IKEA Wanna-be unit at Target, and it makes a perfect throne for my Cricut and my laminator. As a teacher, the $30 Scotch laminator was one of the best purchases I've ever made. I use it for school and for crafty pursuits. I can say the same thing about my Cricut.

All of my Cricut supplies are stored in the bins, as well as all of my stamping supplies.

I still need a window treatment here, but it'll happen when it happens.

The other corner is still home to the desktop. The cable outlet is over here, so there's not much choice about its placement, but it's a good spot for it anyway, so yay.

I'm determined to keep this area tidy. It's one of my favorite places to hang out. Not that you can tell by my frequency of posting. My new obsession is Pinterest. If you haven't checked out Pinterest, you must. Here's a link to my Pin Boards if you want a peek. I spend waaaaaaay too much time on Pinterest. If you decide you want to join, e-mail me and I'll stumble around to try and figure out how to send you an invite. I have to have your e-mail address though, so make sure you e-mail me.

This is my desk. Mostly I pay bills here. I love paying bills. Seriously, I love the feeling of getting my bills paid. I always have.

So, do you remember how I said at the beginning of the post that my guest room was looking pretty awesome when my basement wasn't? Ahem . . .

This is it now. A picture from the door because I can't even get inside.

It's a vicious cycle, I tell you.

If My Kids Scream in the Forest and I'm Not Around to Hear Them, Do They Make a Sound?

2011-07-09T17:37:00.004-06:00

So you'd think that being off for the summer from my jobsy, that I could manage to post a little more often, right? Well, apparently not.

I have been in the weirdest mood, trying to get organized like a madwoman, knowing that the summer vacation clock is tick-tick-ticking away. This weekend marks the halfway point of summer for me. Not that I'm counting or anything.

Okay, I am. I am counting, and if you want to know the truth, I even have each week marked on the calendar week #1, week #2, etc., as if the first day of school is my impending execution date or something.

And really, it's not that I'm dreading going back, it's that I am dreading going back without having everything done that I want to get done. How lame is that? It's okay. You can agree with me. Peanut Head does it all the time. It's the secret to our long and prosperous marriage.

Last week I received a little gift from Heaven. No, I did not get a baby, although I wouldn't turn one down if it showed up on my doorstep. My gift was the gift we gave our girls for their birthdays, and it was to ship them off to Girl Scout Camp. Not just any Girl Scout Camp either, Girl Scout Horse Camp.

Right now they think I'm the Best Mom Ever. And Peanut Head too. I actually get the impression that they like him a little bit more than they like me. Some blah blah about screaming and freaking out, I don't know.

So we sent our babies to Horse Camp, and of course you know that we sent them with cameras so we could live vicariously through them. Yes, we did, and in retrospect, I'm thinking we should have included a Photography 101 class with those cameras before hand, because all the amazing pictures that were supposed to document our awesomeness as parents for sending our kids to Horse Camp pretty much didn't happen. Let's take a look at a few, shall we?

Horse Butt. I always wanted a picture like this. Not. I suppose it would be appropriate to hang it in the bathroom. What do you think?

Horse Leg Armpit? I actually got this body part name from Stinkerbell. She told me the armpits of her legs were itching her one day. Okay, what is the technical name for the armpit of your leg? I'm seriously dying to know.

Rock in Grass. We don't have any of those around here. I can see why they found this fascinating.

Stick in the Dirt.

Are you blown away by the talent yet?

We told the girls that scenery is nice, but you want to try to get some people in your pictures too. People are interesting.

Perhaps more than just their feet in the dirt though.

Okay, here's a little leg for you. Don't get too excited.

And a horse! A horse! Of course it's a horse. It is horse camp, after all.

And look! A horse with a person! Hey wait a minute, I think I know that person.

I do! It's Zoe Bug. A person. We're making progress here. I feel I should tell you though, I'm sparing you from most of the carnage. Between the two girls, they took close to 300 pictures, and we have probably ten good ones. We define good as "with people in them." Horses count as people too.

A very large number of the pictures they took are of blurry scenery. If you can call dirt scenery. There were also a fair number of pictures with unidentifiable people and their accompanying body parts. Thank you digital camera.

This is actually a pretty good picture of Zoe on Chief, her horse for the week. I feel like this is a bonus picture because it has a horse and a person.

And this here, my friends, is Stinkerbell brushing her horse.

A-a-a-a-a-HEM. [mule]

Okay, in my snottiest voice, "How appropriate is that? Stinkerbell gets a mule."

How interesting. Do these Girl Scout Horse Camp People know her or something?

When Peanut Head and I heard about The Stink's mule, it was all we could do to keep from dropping to the ground and engaging in hysterical laughter. The only thing that kept me from doing it is the fact that I don't like dirt. Peanut Head is fine with dirt, but in general he's a little more reserved than I am. Just a tad.

It didn't matter to The Stink though. She loved her mule, Barbie. I have something to say about that name too, but I'm just going to bite my tongue.

This is the BIFFY. It stands for Bathroom in the Forest for You. Yeah, I went in the BIFFY right before departing for the long ride home after dropping the girls off. The BIFFY is a nasty vault toilet with a complimentary bottle of hand sanitizer sitting next to the seat atop the Gaping Hole of Ick.

I am not a fan of places without indoor plumbing. I might have told you. Stinkerbell has also inherited my very pushy OCD Freak gene. While it is something I am quite proud of, since I am a freak, I was not prepared to let the pushy gene ruin my week of Being In My House Alone. A week which I have looked forward to with longing for months.

I exited the BIFFY and said to Peanut Head on the fly, "Let's get out of here before The Stink gets wind of the accomodations!" And we were out of there like that.

Our babies were left to fend for themselves for the next five days. Yippee!

Which reminds me, this particular week of Girl Scout Camp was entitled "Survivor Challenge." These two words have frightened Zoe Bug for months. She was worried that the camp counselors were going to take her out into the woods to let her fend for herself. She really wanted them to take the word "survivor" out of the camp name.

Instead they took her out into the woods to let her fend for herself. Here they are walking away after leaving her to her own devices.

That would involve curling up in a ball on the forest floor to suck her thumb.

The Stink was very excited about the possibility of being left to her own devices. She wanted to know if she could have a bow and arrows because she really wanted to kill something. No lie.

Sorry sweetie. I think that's called Marine Corps Boot Camp. She's seriously considering it. She's up to 20 chin-ups in preparation. Her daddy is so proud.

As I mentioned, Peanut Head and I drove the girls up to Horse Camp. Yeah, our two girls were two of four, out of 48 girls total, who were driven by their parents to camp. The other 44 girls took the bus. Doy.

Guess what we're doing next year? We're not losing two days of our lives and two tanks of gas carting our offspring back and forth, that's for sure. It was eight hours round trip, and that's not including the time we got lost because someone refused to listen to the lady in the GPS.

I could have had two more days Alone in My House. I'm going to write a poem with that title. It's very special to me.

So our trip to the Hundred Acre Wood and back was actually quite pretty. Yeah, except that at times I felt like we were in the middle of a Stephen King novel. We passed through a section of country where all the birds were suicidal. They launched themselves at our windshield multiple times. I managed to avoid all their tricks, but Peanut Head creamed a whole flock in one go while he was driving. I couldn't help but think of the game Angry Birds. A game which Peanut Head enjoys a little too much. Perhaps the creator of the game has been to the Hundred Acre Wood and back.

I think these particular birds suffer from depression. It's all that fresh mountain air. Makes you crazy.

When we picked up the girlies they were so happy to see us. There was so much to tell us about. They even had letters to share. This is what Stinkerbell had to say (completely unedited even though parts were making me twitchy):

SUNDAY

Dear Mom,

Today mostly we are waiting for the bus. For dinner we had spaghetti. It was good. I couldn't sleep so I stayed awake for 6 hours. But I'm not tired. They make spaghetti even better than you!

Love,

Annika

MONDAY

Dear Mom,

Today we had french toast for breakfast. Chicken sandwitches and tomato soup for lunch. They also make french toast and tomato soup better than you and Dad. For dinner we had steak. I don't like your steak but I like theirs.

Love,

Annie

TUESDAY

Dear Mom,

For breakfast we had egg casarol. Chicken sandwitches for lunch and stroghanof for dinner. I maybe slept for an hour and a half.

Love,

Annie

WEDNESDAY

Dear Mom,

Today for breakfast we had waffles. For lunch ravioli (I had peanut butter & jelly sandwitches). For dinner we had baked potatos. I didn't eat any.

Love,

Annie

THURSDAY

Dear Mom,

Today for breakfast we had french toast again. For lunch we had a lunch hike. We hiked to the old sleeping barn. It wasn't a very long hike. We looked in it. Their was a lot of mouse poop. We had chips, sandwitches, & fruit. For dinner we had hot dogs & burgers.

Love,

Annie

FRIDAY

Dear Mom,

I didn't get a horse. I got a mule. Her name was Barbie. And if I can't have a horse, I want Barbie! Barbie is smart. When I accsadently kicked her when she was tied up she didn't move. Monday we groomed. Tuesday we saddled. Wednesday and Thursday we rode. I can't believe their food is better than yours!

Love,

Annika

Stinkerbell is now living in the Hundred Acre Wood, where I chucked her out the window on the way home. The food is much better there.

Zoe's letter is quite a bit more wordy, except that she didn't put her life in jeopardy like someone else we used to know. She did talk about the food some, but never so that she dissed my cooking. She is a sweet little heart. And a lonely only child now.

When we got home, I unpacked the suitcases and found five pair of clean underwear in Stinkerbell's suitcase. I'm still pondering what this means.

The Adventures of Compass Man and Perpetually Lost Girl

2011-06-23T23:24:00.001-06:00

Peanut Head and I just returned from a Caribbean cruise in celebration of our 20th anniversary. Now remember, we were 12 when we married, so that should help you to reconcile my immaturity level with my chronological age.

Or not. Whatever.

Cruising was a brand new experience for Peanut Head and I. I'm not letting him count his time on NAVY ships when he was a Grunt. Totally does not count. We had so much fun. We relaxed, we read, we slept, we ate . . . and we barely thought about our kids at all. They were safe at home with Aunt Marcia and Grandma Louie-Ann. Yay for us! That's probably why we didn't give them much thought. They were in good hands.

We cruised out of Miami, so that meant we had to fly to get there. Going there and back we had layovers at the Dallas Fort Worth airport. It was my first time at DFW, and I'm not exaggerating when I say that it's very spread out. It's so spread out that there are freeways intertwined amongst the runways. I kid you not. We took off on a runway that was elevated to cross over the highway, and the air traffic control tower is situated between the opposing direction lanes of the highway.

I guess you would call that a median. It certainly maximizes space, that's for sure. Perhaps the tower also doubles as a rush hour traffic reporting station? Maybe budget cuts prompted them to lay off the Eye in the Sky Man or something, and the Air Traffic Controllers had to pick up the slack.

You know, because they don't have enough stress in their jobs.

The layout of the airport and its various runways is arranged in a triple circle pattern. Circles that do not intersect, mind you. Because the circles do not intersect, the airport has its own little bullet train dealie, manned by RoboCops, to get you from one terminal to another. The RoboCops do not particularly care about speed limits. They are more about efficiency, but just to show that they do have a softer side, they play the first few notes of "Tomorrow" as the train doors open. It's actually kind of eerie and I found it a little unsettling.

Tomorrow will be better, but right now you're aboard the Crazy Train, so hang on.

Since the RoboCops alerted me to the fact that we were entering the Twilight Zone, I was on the look out for anything suspicious. Check this out.

Is it me or does TOILET seem icky somehow? Peanut Head thinks its a language deal. Since DFW is an international airport, perhaps "Restroom" isn't clear enough. Let's list all the possible alternative linguistic options to replace "Toilets," shall we? All I can come up with is Potty Chairs. You try now. It's not as easy as it sounds. If it's going on a sign, it should be somewhat tasteful, right?

And that's just the airport. I have to say that duct tape anywhere on an airplane does not instill confidence. I spotted it on the armrest of a seat on our airplane, and I spotted what looked suspiciously like duct tape on one of the wings, arranged in a way that made it look like it was supposed to be there.

Peanut Head insists that it could not possibly have been duct tape, and he pooh-poohed my suspicions vehemently. Still, I kept a stern eye on it the entire trip, watching for the hairy-sticky edges to start curling back, thereby signaling the advancement of our rapid, spiraling, flaming descent.

I have a vivid imagination.

Paranoid and delusional, call it what you like, I care not.

Since I'm already irrationally recounting our vacation, when we were boarding our Fun Ship, I turned to Peanut Head and asked "Is it wrong that I keep thinking about the Titanic?" Everywhere I turned there was opulence. Heavy opulence. I could not fathom how this big hunk of metal opulence could float. I know it has something to do with physics and the time-space continuum, but I still could not wrap my brain around it. I just kept picturing women in fancy dresses, swirling around in frigid water, cascading down the fancy staircase, tangled in chandeliers and bed linens. Cut to the scene with Leonardo DiCaprio taking his last breath and sinking into the dark abyss.

At one point during the cruise, I spotted our Captain on deck with his ship's officers, playfully bantering and enjoying the sunset.

I turned to Peanut Head and asked "If he's here, who is driving the ship?"

To which Peanut Head replied, "They probably have it on autopilot or something."

"What?! Well then who is watching out for icebergs?"

"This is the Caribbean. There are no icebergs anywhere near here."

"Well there could be. With global warming, freaky things are happening all over the world."

"Global warming would cause the Caribbean icebergs to melt."

That Peanut Head. He's impossible to argue with. He has an answer for everything.

He's such a smarty Smart Alec. He also has an uncanny sense of direction. I think in a previous life he was a homing pigeon. As a result, he has another name, one he shares with the Rocket Scientist. That name is Compass Man.

In contrast, I can't fight my way out of a wet paper bag. Hence, the Rocket Scientist bestowed me with the name of Perpetually Lost Girl. It is a name which I earned deep in the bowels of the indoor sidewalk city of Minneapolis, where I was lost without food or water for at least 45 minutes. A harrowing experience, one which I might share with you at a later date. For now, I must share the intelligence gathered aboard the Fun Ship.

Anyway, as I was saying, the Fun Ship is huge. And I am not directionally inclined. Which means I was lost. All the time. Peanut Head took to quizzing me and challenging me to find various things on the ship, as he trailed me, amused and wearing his smirky little smirk. Then he took to teaching me about the correct names for the different parts of the ship. Like the front of the ship is the bow and the back is the stern. The left side is the port side, and the right side is the starboard side.

The part that really messed with me though is the use of the directional terms of fore and aft. Aft means toward the back of the ship and fore means towards the front. Except that alphabetically, that makes absolutely no sense. Correct me if I'm wrong here, but it seems that aft should be towards the front of the ship since "a" comes before "f."

On second thought, perhaps aft stands for after and fore for forward? Never mind.

People should tell me these things when trying to introduce me to nautical terms which are foreign to me.

I do believe Peanut Head enjoys discombobulating me.

While Peanut Head was exploiting me for his personal entertainment, we had a very polite Room Steward from Indonesia looking out for us. I was not prepared for the level of attention we received from this quiet man. I took to calling him our Room Fairy because he managed to sneak in and tidy every time we left our room. We always came back to a freshly stocked ice bucket, tidy room, fresh towels--even when we had three shower days, and this little purposeful touch.

That's right. Room Fairy kept a point on our TP at all times. Because you need a point when you have business to attend to don't you? I'm going to add that chore to the girls' list of chores. Three times a day, I expect to see points on my TP.

Our Room Fairy seemed to never sleep. He was always tidying rooms, whether we were leaving our cabin at 7:00 a.m. or returning at 11:00 p.m., he was always there. I'm a little worried about him, working so hard like he does. I told him he needed to take a vacation. Go on a cruise or something. He nodded and looked at me with a pained smile.

This is the little Towel Menagerie our Room Fairy made for us. The elephant is my favorite.

It was a vacation to remember for us, and it was a great way to celebrate our 20th anniversary. It recharged my batteries, and now I'm ready to take on some projects that are long overdue. I can't wait to get started and share my progress with you.

Health Records Organized

2011-06-10T09:26:00.001-06:00

Summer in our house is when we get caught up on all of our medical appointments, so last week I took the girlies for their annual physicals. As we were driving to the medical center, I realized that I had never blogged about their Health Record books.

Well butter my butt and call me a biscuit, what was I thinking?

I made these books for the girls when they were little bitty things. Sadly, I didn't think of putting one together when we were in the midst of Zoe's medical adventures, or her book would have been a wee bit fatter.

For the first year of Zoe's life, I spent a good many of her naps at the kitchen table, with medical bills spread out, trying to sort through all the details and making sure everything got paid by the insurance company. It was a nightmare.

After that experience, I vowed to always be prepared when it came to our medical history. I wanted something portable that I could jot down questions, record appointments and results, and then always have that information in one place to refer to while I was at the doctor's office.

I started with just a small spiral bound notebook and added stick on notebook tabs.

The first section in my books is where I jot down questions that I want to remember to ask at the next doctor visit. This section alone has been a huge help, because I cannot be relied upon to remember things that are not written down.

Which is why I am blogging about this thing that I love several years later than I should have. My bad.

The next section is where I keep track of immunization records and prescriptions.

Both of my girls have the little immunization cards that were given to them at birth, but who can read those things? Doctors have sloppy penmanship.

Yes, I'm making a sweeping generalization.

The other thing I don't like about the immunization cards, is they don't give any indication of when immunizations are due. I like to plan, you know.

Enter the spreadsheet with color-filled cells. As you can see, my spread sheet isn't perfect. I still missed a couple spots, but I'm dealing with it. I am calmed by the fact that the record is in chronological order. That, and I can see that May 11, 2004, was a very bad day for Stinkerbell.

Probably it was for me too. She was such a vengeful child.

I didn't take any pictures of prescription entries, but what I usually do is attach the receipt that has the date and what the prescription is. It's a quick way to keep a record of prescriptions.

This one is pretty self explanatory. Let me just put it out there right now, I have one of these books for myself, and it does not contain this section. For obvious reasons.

This is an example of the growth and development of Stinkerbell. I would have included Zoe's, but she's a bit of a runt and the progression isn't quite as spectacular.

Her mind was developing faster than her body. Yeah, that's it.

Zoe is my flower. Annika my weed.

Whoa, bad picture. But I'm not taking it again, even though it's making me a little twitchy.

So, as the label says, Medical History . . .

I still remember this entry. Annika was born with seriously bowed calves. In addition to that, she had these odd little feet that she used like hands. I used to call her my little monkey because she reminded me of a monkey when she would pick things up with her feet.

Her little monkey feet turned in, and they were sort of floppy when she walked. I was concerned, so I made an appointment with the Monkey Doctor.

Or maybe it was a Podiatrist. Or an Orthopedist.

Whatever, Monkey Doctor is easier to remember.

It turns out that her feet are fine, it's her hips. She has a freakishly large range of motion in her hips that allow her to do this:

And this:

Creepy, isn't it?

Since it appears to be another very bad day for Stinkerbell, let's just keep going with this, shall we?

Zoe had a weeping eye thing going on, so she was taking Amoxicillin. I put a dose of Amoxicillin in her sippy cup diluted with milk, and Annika yanked it out of her hands and took a couple swigs of it before I could intercede.

As a result, we found out that Annika is allergic to Penicillin because she broke out in a full body hivey rash.

I took these pictures two days after the initial exposure and one day after The Stink started taking Zyrtec to treat the allergic reaction. It didn't even occur to me to take these pictures for her Health Record until then. Doy.

Anyway, I have this picture and a few others in Annika's Health Record book to document her penicillin allergy.

As I mentioned, I made Health Record books for Peanut Head and I too. Except ours are not as pretty as the girls' books.

We have different sections too. Not just minus the scandalous Growth and Development section.

We do have the questions section though. I like to clip and save propaganda intended to scare people into ordering expensive medical tests, save them for my yearly, and pull them out of my handy dandy Health Record to confront my doctor with. I like to discombobulate him.

For some reason, that sounds so dirty, but it's perfectly innocent. Good clean fun, I promise.

Peanut Head and I also have a section labeled Blood Tests. The main thing I watch and keep track of is our cholesterol. I need to know when it's time to stop with the bonbons.

I did my best making a spread sheet for my immunizations, but who knows if they're all there. My mom isn't the most organized person in the world, so these numbers could potentially belong to someone else.

In fact, I think they do. Look at those dates. April 1966! That was the Olden Days.

Mom? Was I adopted?

Best. Year. Ever.

2011-06-01T22:28:00.000-06:00

Can I get a Woot! Woot! for summer vacation? I'm on it right now.

Woot! Woot!

Sorry, I don't mean to rub it in. I can be mean sometimes.

I just came off of my Best. Year. Ever.

No lie. I had such an amazing class and we had so much fun, that you would think that maybe I didn't want it to end. And even though I'm crazy, I'm not that crazy because I loooooooove me a good summer vacation.

I will miss all of my little monster peeps though. Smooches, monsters!

This little cartoon was given to me by one of my students, Harrison, with a heartfelt request to post it on my blog. Don't worry, I made him get a signed note from his mom that it was okay for me to exploit him on the Internet.

If it makes me famous, I promise to share the profits with Harrison 50/50.

I'm sure that Harrison has been checking my blog daily since school got out, and turning away dejected, because his cartoon wasn't up yet. I can just see his wasted-on-a-boy, long, silky eyelashes fluttering in disappointment.

And I apologize for that, Harrison. I was busy sitting on my couch, drooling and telling myself "I should really get up and put Harrison's comic up."

It's a well-known phenomenon known as the End-of-the-School-Year Crash and Burn. It happens to teachers and college students the world over. Your body goes into shock from the abrupt change of schedule, and you either turn into an unsightly bowl of Jell-O, or you get a burning in your belly that makes you very twitchy and causes you to go on a massive cleaning and clutter purging spree. Last year I did the twitchy thing, this year the Jell-O thing.

I like to mix things up.

Anyway, here's Harrison's cartoon, complete with my unsolicited commentary. I'm sure he'll love that part.

I think this is a little dig at my "No airborne objects" in the classroom rule. I tell the kids on the first day of school that my classroom is a No-Fly Zone and there will be no airborne objects EVER. I then go on to explain that I am Air Traffic Control and they must ask for clearance before take off.

Air Traffic Control always says no.

I became a teacher so I can boss people around.

Don't touch it, you'll be sorry . . .

Consequences . . . stink.

Notice my lack of segmented insect body. I didn't like the results from that plan, so I switched to the Shapeless Skeletor plan. It makes my hair look like it has more body, don't you think?

Watch out, I'm wearing my Angry Eyebrows.

I love winning. It makes me happy.

I know this one is a dig. I'm always harping on the kids to watch their units, because if I ever hear of them crashing a satellite when they are scientists, I will come to their house and have strong words with them.

Americans and their stubborn refusal to embrace the metric system.

Harrison loves Accelerated Math. I think I'll mail him a little summer math packet. Ugly long division with irrational numbers.

He'll be so happy.