Look who's ONE!

I'm finally joining the rest of the nation

Look what I got! Long story short, we opened an account with Key Bank in September and finally got our new nano from them today! Since the Husband has his own, this one is mine! Now you've (read: E and L) got to post your FAVORITE song since I don't think I'll ever think of enough songs to fill it up.

Sad

My mom called the Husband's phone tonight (never a good sign, means she wants to make sure he's with me and I'm not alone). Cinder, my 18 year old cat that lived at my parent's house passed away today. My mom came home from work and found her laying on the floor in the family room. Apparently she died in her sleep. I was fine on the phone with my mom because she was so upset but as soon as I hung up I lost it. I'm sad but I know she had a great long life. While we were in Alaska this winter, I held her a little longer, let her lick my empty ice cream bowl a few more times than I usually do, and cuddled with her each day we were there. I knew her time would come soon but it doesn't make it any easier, does it?

After six days off of school (3 snow days, one MLK Jr. day, and a weekend) we finally headed back to school on Wednesday of this week. By today the kids were bouncing off the walls. They were crazy hyper today! Today I had to; tell a student to take the basketball out from under her desk, ask another student to stop army-crawling across the floor, pick up 42 pencils off the ground (totally an approximation), type 5 "monster descriptions" on the ancient computer that continualy freezes, sent one of my third graders to 1st grade because she couldn't handle being in my class, ate my lunch while I prepared the room for health and math, sent one student to study hall (three times), and sent and recieved about 30 emails.
I'm beat. So now we're going out for dinner. Yippee!!

Drum roll please ladies and gentlemen. . .

Another snow day today. I didn't even post about it this morning because we already had two last week (Thursday and Friday) and we had Monday off for MLK Jr. day so now the kids have been out of school for 6 days. Think they'll be able to concentrate/work well tomorrow? That is, if school is open!

Reason #621 I love my husband

Before


After!

We're going on day 4 of snow still in the yard. We've only ventured out to return a library book and pick up supplies for the Husband to build a shelving unit in the laundry room. Exciting? Not so much. Relaxing to have so much time off? Yes. In the last few days I've watching too much television, played with the dog, made chocolate chip cookies (double batch!), knitted, paid bills, vacuumed, gone thru my clothes for Goodwill, looking online for birthday present ideas for my almost-one-year-old nephew, watched the snow fall, went on one slippery walk, done laundry, and watched some movies. We still have two days (today and tomorrow) off! To be honest, I'm not even sure what I'm doing when we get back to school. After almost a week off (5 days really) it's hard to remember where we were in all of the subjects and I left school last Wednesday not knowing we were going to have a snow day (make that snow days!) so I didn't bring any work home. It's been nice to take a REAL break though, and not work at all on schoolwork. Well, I'm off to. . .enjoy my time.

Another snow day

On a walk yesterday


Our front walkway


Our lone icecicle

Good news: Snow day!
Bad news: We have to make up the day (the fourth we've had this year) and we're going to be in school until June 26th.

Some pictures for your enjoyment.

So Frakin' Tired

So I just wrote a really negative post and I decided not to post it and instead I'm going to go read a book and relax on the couch. I'm just exhuasted from work and I don't want to take it out on you. Yes, I'm addressing the internet as a whole.

Happy 2nd Birthday

The first day we picked you up you were so timid, scared. You had to be carried out of the house you were being fostered in and I felt really bad, taking you from the only good home you had known. You lived with a bunch of cats and dogs and kids and I was worried you might be bored at our house. You had been adopted out twice but were returned because you were "too aggressive" which is the strangest thing I had ever heard. Your foster mom agreed. She'd been fostering animals for years and said she had never seen a sweeter puppy. She had even taken your information off of the petfinder website because she was too scared to let someone else take you only to return you a few days/weeks later. She said it would be too hard to see. We found you through someone who knew her and told her we would be your forever home. I'll never forget driving you back to our house, you didn't made a peep.


You're the kindest puppy there has ever been. You've never done so much as nip at any person or other animal. When we first took you for walks, you were so submissive around other dogs you would roll onto your back as you walked up to them, to let them know it's okay, you knew they were in charge. Luckily you're not quite that bad anymore. Sometimes you'll even stay on your feet as you meet a new dog.


You use to be terrified of water in all forms-baths, lakes, streams, and even puddles. Much to our surprise and delight, we took you down to the Sound about 6 months ago and followed another dog into the water! You even swam! We were so proud of you-your ex-lifeguard dad has always wanted you to be a "water dog."


Before we adopted you we read a book called, "How to Be Your Dog's Best Friend" written by the monks of New Skeete, which is a crazy titled because that's not what it's about. It's a dog training book that helped me feel more prepared to be your new family. I never had a dog growing up, and I was afraid I wasn't going to be a good dog mom. Little did I know it would come pretty naturally, although dog class helped too! You're still not perfect at walks (you want to prance pretty fast!) and you don't always come when I call. You bark (only inside the house, okay, in the backyard too!) when you see squirels, birds, dogs, or neighbors. You use to get carsick and puke all over your crate in the car. I was worried we might fail out of dog school because you pulled so hard I almost dislocated my shoulder on more than one occasion. But you also get so excited when I come home from work, gave me kisses when my Grandpa died, and have made me laugh time after time when you were chasing a toy around the house and slide crazily all over the hardwood floors. I know most people think it's crazy to love an animal this much, but I don't care. They've never had a Rex before I guess.


I love you pup.

Happy New Year!

We're home! Our trip to Alaska was great but I have to post about it later. I'll try to post some pictures too that we took with our *new* camera-lot of snow and moose!