Ten Things Tuesday

1) It is definitely fourth quarter. My students are losing their minds, and slowly taking mine with them. Today one of my students told me "this is boring, so I'm not going to take the notes." I told him I didn't realize that I was a clown here for his entertainment. F*(&*%*&^%. Pray for my patience.

2) Speaking of patience, I got on the scale today and saw a number I haven't seen since my senior year of college. I'm hoping it's just a residual chocolate bunny hangover. I'll be at the gym.....forever.

3) In my eighth grade Language Arts class, we are starting to read one of my all time favorite books, To Kill a Mockingbird. The students' incredulity over Jim Crow laws and Emmitt Till gave me great hope that we're moving in the right direction, even though I know we still have a long way to go.

4) I love going to the grocery store. I went this morning for some school day lunch staples, and it took me to a happy place. It's like a scavenger hunt for grownups. Especially when you have exactly 8 minutes to shop, thanks to leaving the house later than planned.

5) The temperature dropped this week, but due to the unseasonably warm temperatures a few weeks ago, all of the May plants are blooming over a month early. It smells like spring but feels like winter outside. How bizarre.

6) Does anybody have any cures for making blisters heal faster? After running outside during the faux summer a few weeks ago, my feet are still torn up. Such little things take so LONG to heal. Leave a comment with help. My tootsies will thank you.

7) Kev is off of work this week after finishing his last two weeks at his old job and before starting his new one. In the five years we've been together, he's never had a week off with no agenda. He keeps proclaiming it WEEK OF KEVIN with fist pumps. Watching him navigate so much free time is like watching a recently released baby penguin explore the wild. I shall keep you posted.

8) One of the worst things about moving out of a neighborhood is being farther away from your former favorite places. Tonight we are meeting some friends at a place we used to go to at least biweekly, and I can't wait. If they've changed the menu, I'm going to be VERY upset. Huzzah.

9) On second thought, I hope they only serve hummus and carrots (see #2 today). My pants would thank them.

10) I'm glad I'm back on the blogging train. I missed these brain dumps. Thanks for sticking with me :)

What's on your mind today?

Catchup Post

I cannot believe I've let a month go by without blogging. I am a terrible person. Here's the thing: as a teacher, I still have summers off. You would think that this would mean that I have expert knowledge on how to structure my time to do fun things, while also doing all the things (photography, half marathon training, etc) that I SAY I am going to do. Truthfully? notsomuch. I always end up spending the first half of my summer in complete sloth and the second half of the summer trying to get all the stuff done that I said I would do all summer long. Oops. I've missed all of you invisible friends though :)

So, here is what the first half of my summer looked like:

Kev and I went to Washington, DC, Virginia, and Maryland to visit our friends Paul and Amanda. We did the museum thing (loved the Newseum and Smithsonian American History), the Mall (loved the WWII memorial) and got to see the marine band play on the Capitol's steps. We ate dinner together every night, spent the weekend at a fabulous house on the Chesapeake, and it was fabulous. I wish Paul and Amanda lived closer, or that Kev had summers off so we could travel more. I've also decided that if we ever left the midwest, I'd definitely move southeast. I freaking love that area.

I've also been babysitting a ton for my cousins. I totally forgot how awesome it is to work for a day and get handed a fistful of cash at the end of the day as a direct result of your labors. Also, is there anything better than hanging out with little kids in the summer? Parks = awesome. Popsicles = awesome. Sprinklers = awesome. Naps = awesome. Kids rule. I've also gotten a good tan from playing outside with them. Winner, winner.

When I'm not kid wrangling or travelling, I've been enjoying all the fabulousness that summer in Chicago brings. Baseball games, free movies in the park, drinking on porches, watching Kev's terrible softball team (sorry, Great Balls of Friar, but it's true), and generally making mayhem.

So, fret not, I am alive and I'll be getting back to a regular blogging schedule this week. Thanks for coming back after the hiatus!

Fill in the Blank Friday

Usually on Fridays, I do Five Things Fridays, but I'm getting kind of sick of the routine. Not to mention all of my posts are incredibly random anyways. To change things up a bit, I decided to link up with Lauren and give you some randomness in a new and different way. So here you go! Want to play? Link it up!

1. People always tell me I look like........Minnie Driver. I think its the big boobs and big lips thing. Or the unruly mane of lion hair. Although, my dad swears I look like Angelina Jolie. If I was a parent, I don't know that I would admit that to myself. Maybe I need some tattoos.....

2. Friends don't let friends........moan about needing to lose weight if it's not really necessary. They also don't let friends say something negative about themselves without saying something positive. Friends also shouldn't let friends be picky eaters. Friends know how to talk friends into and out of bad decisions.

3. A sunny day is perfect for........reading outside, drinking outside, or taking pictures outside. A sunny day is also perfect for aww-ing over people's cute puppies or babies. Or both, apparently, if you live in my neighborhood. Some families just hog all the cuteness.

4. My favorite accessories are ........my wedding band and engagement ring. I love, love, love, love them. I also adore the Pandora bracelet that my mother-in-law got me and that my family keeps adding on to.

5. If I could afford it I would ..........take an international vacation every single year, forever. I'd make sure I got in 3-4 good airplane-worthy trips a year. I get stir-crazy if I don't have a trip planned.

6. The cure for boredom is to............... get out of your house. Go for a walk, bike-ride or drive. Take a book with you- if you can't find a cool place to go, you can go read in a park or a coffee shop.

7. I am currently "in like" with .... I'm slowly welcoming more salads in to my life. I've discovered that if I add a lot of stuff to them, that it doesn't taste like rabbit food. I'm also in like with some new running shorts I got from Target. They are tight like bike shorts but on the longer side to prevent chub-rub. I'm hoping I can grow to love them as I run more. I'm also currently only "in like" with my students. Usually I love them but they are getting the May crazies, and I'm losing my mind.

How would you answer these questions?

Disturbing Dreams

Hello long lost friends. I haven't posted in ten days, and have been getting many a text reminding me so, which makes me a very bad friend indeed. Kev and I have been living in chaos lately, what with the upcoming end of quarter in grad school, end of my school year, and general emergence back into the social scene after a long winter of hibernation. Things have been downright busy and disturbing around here, including our bedroom.

See? Yikes. Kev and I have ordered a new, big kid bedroom set, which comes tomorrow. However, because our new QUEEN-SIZED (!!!!) mattress arrived and my brother claimed our old bed for his college apartment, we are temporarily sleeping on a mattress on the floor. Like meth dealers. (Sorry if you are a meth dealer, but it's true. You all sleep on mattresses in your dens.)

Now, sleeping in such minimal conditions has its perks. When you lay down and gaze up at the ceiling, the fan sort of looks like a UFO.

(Sidenote: should I say "a UFO" or 'an UFO'? I know 'an' follows the vowel rule, but an UFO sounds awkward. Help.)

Also, from this vantage point your room looks ENORMOUS, since the door appears to be very, very far away.

Best of all, sleeping on the floor has induced strange, strange dreams in both Kev and I. The past few nights I have dreamt that I was a 50s housewife, wearing gloves in the supermarket. I have also dreamt that all the floors in our apartment were trampolines, which was a much more inspiring vision.

Kev's dream was much more fabulous. He dreamt that he surprised me with a baby seal, which he kept in our bathtub so that he could swim. Sadly, however, I was furious, because I felt that he was trying to torment me with heartbreak, since clearly a baby seal would grow out of the bathtub in a few short months. I feel that if this happened in real life, I would find a way to make it work, though. Baby seals are really freaking cute, and a big seal would be pretty rad. I also feel bad that Kev was picturing me mad in his dreams. Have we really been married so long that I nag him in his dreams instead of fill him with lust or joy? Sigh.

Thanks for tolerating the long delay, folks. I promise to get back to my regular 3-4 times a week schedule soon. In the mean time, what bizarre dreams have you had lately?

Shipping Mysteries

I love online shopping. It is ridiculously convenient, especially since I am crazy busy these days with grad school and other assorted mayhem. Of course, I prefer to shop locally when I can, but for my chain stores like Express, AE, or Toms, it's sometimes easier to go online. I love many, many things about the city, but often when I want to shop at one particular store, I find it easier to do so online, since I get too lazy to take public trans and too skeptical to try and find a place to park my shiny red Focus.

Of course, online shopping comes with hazards. Clothes that don't fit the way I imagined. Mishaps with what has actually been shipped, versus what was ordered. Thankfully, I tend to have very positive shipping experiences when I do shop online. I also love to track the packages and see when they are coming in. Recently, though, with Old Navy, I had a package tracking mystery. Check out the dates and locations of this package below:

This really, really boggles my mind. My package started in Ohio, went to Georgia, came up to Highwood, and then decided to CHANGE LOCATIONS and go back to Atlanta? Maybe the weather wasn't warm enough for it. I'm totally stumped. Good thing I only ordered some basic tank tops and not anything really valuable.

How does this shipping stuff work, anyway? Postal workers of the world, please explain it to me. Mil gracias.

Spring Break!

I've been on spring break all week, and it has been awesome. I've done a ton of lounging, and have mowed my way through the first two books in The Hunger Games trilogy. Oh, friends. Read them immediately. A strong female character to be the anti-Bella Swan that is still relatable, action, romance, these books have it all. I'm mildly obsessed. I'm also super pissed that they whitewashed the characters for the movie version, but that's another post for another time.

Now I realize, you might be thinking "Why Nicole, with all this free time, wouldn't it be wise to update your blog more frequently than you usually do?" and I hear you. I meant to bombard with my usual posting schedule and more but I....didn't. Because I've been sitting on my couch. See?

I'm also being stalked by cats, which is more terrifying than it sounds. I'm fairly certain Dante is judging me for not working while Daddy slaves away in his office all week.

Sometimes, it's so terrifying that I have to flee outside, get on the el, and head off to poke around new places in the sunshine. Today, I'm headed out with my fancy camera to take some pics of the city, and then probably finishing Citizen Girl, a book that ended up being much more chick-lit than I usually prefer. Meh.

If you are rivited by this post of my exciting staycation, follow me on Twitter @colie025, where I will be giving hot updates under the hashtag #springbreakbitches. Also, as a personal favor, if you have a gmail account, please oh please would you follow this 'lil blog? It helps me figure out how many people are reading, and my goal is to hit 50 followers by the end of 2011. So do it, I won't bite. Hard.

5 Things Friday

1) Today, in exactly one hour, spring break will commence. To say that my heart will fill with joy when the final bell rings will be an understatement. I'm going to have an epic staycation at home filled with photo taking, pumpin' workouts, and hopefully some healthy eating. Even though as I write this I am eating a smore. I can always start tomorrow. Besides, I'm still seeing snow when I go grocery shopping (see below) so I'm not too concerned about getting into a swimsuit just yet.

2) My students earned a good behavior party today during which we watched Beverly Hills Chihuahua 2. In this fine epic film, the chihuahuas get married and have babies, but unfortunately the dad just wants to play with his pups instead of being a responsible parent. I would say it was the worst movie I've ever seen, but my dearest husband did subject me to the awfulness of 300, which I haven't yet forgiven him for. This was a close second however.

3) I'm about to start the Hunger Games trilogy over break. I cannot wait. I'm planning on doing a LOT of couch time in the coming days. I'm also going to start Ahab's Wife soon, and I cannot wait. It looks chunky and delicious. Hurray for having time to read books.

4) Speaking of time to read, I start my LAST GRAD SCHOOL CLASS for my masters on Wednesday. Yes, people, my VERY LAST ONE. I am one thesis and one 10 week class from being an officially licensed reading specialist. Booyah Grandma.

5) I can nevr spell the word license. Or exercise. Or Chihuahua. Because of that this has been a particularly difficult 5 Things Friday post to write. Epic fail. Blame it on the spring break brain.

Goals

I reached into the depths of my work bag today and pulled these out:

Perhaps I need to get more organized.

5 Quick Things

1) I've been crazy busy with work lately, as it is report card and parent teacher conference time. I'm really proud of myself though. I feel like I tackled some tough discussions this time (bullying, lack of attendance, recommending a child repeat kindergarten, and domestic issues to name a few) and I did it with grace. I'm so blessed to work with such great parents and for the first time ALL OF MY PARENTS SHOWED UP FOR THEIR SCHEDULED TIME!!! Woop woop.

2) I think spring is finally starting to arrive to Chicago. I wore a dress to school today without freezing my patooties off. I even threw on some open toed shoes. It was awesome. See? Sun.

3) Kev and I are starting to feel like roommates. Stupid grad school raining on our fun. While I love my friends, I feel a date night might be in order soon. Time to start planning something mysterious and fascinating where I can utterly charm my guy.

4) All of the sundresses in stores right now are taunting me and its not fair. Yes, it's getting warmer, but it's still not warm enough to be ogling the potential lounge-ability of the dresses. Harumph. STOP TAUNTING ME TARGET.

5) I'm in a real conundrum about a job offer. Do I take it even though it isn't my ideal position? Or do I hold out hoping one of the other places I applied pans out? Door Number One? Door Number Two? Ack. Being a grown up stinks sometimes.

Alright friends, off to do my LAST CONFERENCE of the school year. The life of a teacher....so glamorous. I can't wait to get in my car and drive, drive, drive.

Little Life Updates

I had a few whole big posts in the works, but then I realized that I probably won't have time today after school to do the kind of life update and reading update and photo updating that I'd like to, so those posts will have to wait for other days this week. For now, here is a teensy list of items floating around my brain.

1) I like the cold, but I wish you could exercise outside in it. I love the snow, and bundling up in blankets, and the sheer adventure of wondering if you will survive when you step out the door, but I wish it was bike riding season, or running season. I know people do both of those things in the winter, but I'm just not willing to risk my life in such ways.

2) Kev and I had a fabulous day on Saturday. We had no plans all day, hung out in our wicked awesome bathrobes (which truly do deserve their own post), read books, played video games, and went out on a fabulously wonderful date to the sushi place near our house, where we drank wine and solved the world's problems. I love my partner in crime.

3) Things have been tough at work lately. Without getting into it, there has been a whole lot of drama. Luckily, instead of letting it bring me down, I'm letting it give me the courage to explore my options and I'm finding some great ones. I've also found a support system of people I never knew were cheering me on ready to help. And of course, I have my man by my side (see #2) and a whole passel of friends to take my mind off things. Life is good, despite the mayhem, and I'm oddly grateful to be going through what I'm going through.

4) I have some kicking reading challenges lined up this year, which also deserve their own blog post, and I'm having a great time with them.

5) I also get to walk my Godpuppy today. He's a corgi and he's silly. More on that later.

6) I'm getting absurdly into the skinny jeans and boots look, although I have a strong belief that people need to wear butt-covering shirts with such apparel. I have seen far too many adult women running around without pants and it makes me uncomfortable. I like to choose whose buns I get to see and when I see them, thanks. What's with that, anyway?

Well, my friends, I know this wasn't much of a post after the two week hiatus, but given a terrifying to do list at work, homework, and a friend's birthday party tonight, it's the best you are going to get today. Happy Tuesday

Ten Things for Tuesday

***I planned on doing a long post about what we did over break and New Years, but I'm tired from getting back to work and quite frankly sick of reading other people's posts about how they are too fat, so you're getting this instead.

1) I want to go to Florida to spend some time with my grandparents over spring break. The airfare is not cooperating with this plan. Boo hiss.

2) I'm playing a round of Game-On Diet with my co-workers to start 2011 off right. Fortunately, it's holding me accountable. Unfortunately, eating healthy serving sizes is leaving me STARVING after binge-ing all of break.

3) Today I had a great day at school! My two lowest students (who happen to be sisters) both showed flashes of brilliance today and used more English than I've heard them use before. Sometimes I think I have the greatest job in the whole world.

4) Kev had a major disappointment today. Oddly, it reminded me how much I adore him, because I hurt worse for him than I think he ended up feeling for himself.

5) I love the All-State Mayhem commercials. I still giggle every time I see the high school texting one. I want them to keep airing forever.

6) After a month-long hiatus, I went back to my normal routine of walking my former neighbor's dog. I opened the door and he came running to me. I think he was happier to see me after Christmas break than my students were.

7) I'm absurdly excited that Teen Mom 2 is going to happen. This show also makes me absurdly thankful that I didn't have a child when I was 16. Especially since that child would be 10 now. Yikes.

8) Kev has his 10 year reunion this summer. I'm already a little stressed about what to wear. I hope I can find a fantastic sundress for the occasion, especially since we went to the same high school and I'll know a majority of the people there.

9) I know a lot of people that think that Facebook has made high school reunions obsolete. This makes me sad. What about all the people that I don't stalk on Facebook? What about all the people that are going to appear much more or less normal in person than they do on Facebook? So many questions.....

10)I'm officially addicted to swap.com., which has yielded me a gigantic to-be-read pile that Kev is starting to comment on. I'd better finish my trashy vampire book tonight so I can start reading some big kid books again.

Happy Tuesday Everyone!