I will survive

This is a week to be survived.

I woke up with a headache yesterday morning which is always a favorite way to wake up....

I went to the physical therapist after school and I feel hopeful.  What I have been doing--giving all my money to the chiropractor--isn't really helping, so I will try something else.

Adam had a late flight and it wasn't worth driving home, but it was late enough that he didn't need to leave straight from work.  I had the idea to meet at IKEA because October is the time for Christmas decorations.  If you go much later, you miss them and there is no joy in that.

Emma and Adam met me there.  We had meatballs and walked around looking at pretty things.  Adam left for the airport and Emma and I went to the Christmas decorations.  Emma is completely an enabler.  She kept saying, "Get it!" I got a little stash of pretty things.  Red Christmas decorations are my love language and that is all.

We got this darling little village.  One look at it and I was a goner.  Shut up and take my money.

It is sturdy enough QE can play with it.  Decorating with the goal of creating magic for that little girl is going to be fun.

So that was the shot in the arm I needed for the rest of the week.  Tonight and Thursday are Parent Teacher Conferences which are exhausting.  Adam comes home Friday and we also leave for Nevada Friday.

Let's do this!

Weekend

We asked Mark if he wanted to go to Costco and that was a big yes.  He came over and I had a handful of things for him to do.  (Carry that box to the car, move that table, etc.)

He said, "I'll happily do anything since you are taking me to Costco."

The children who hated to do errands with you evaporate when you offer to buy them stuff at Costco.  That is science.

We had lunch, stopped off at DI (that was the heavy box I had him carry), Costco and Walmart.  At Walmart, I saw one of my students.  He and his older siblings (who I also had) were shook by the fact that I was at Walmart.  Adam wasn't with us, and my students pointed to Mark and said, "Is that your husband?"

(They seriously have no concept of age.)

I said, "No, this is Mark."

He said, "I'm her son."

Later I said to Mark, "I am sorry he thought you were my husband."  

Mark said, "Don't remind me."

OK, I didn't think it was that bad....

I told Braeden the story and he said when he was a little kid in the Missoula Children's Theater, the directors (who are college students) asked them how old the kids thought they were.  Braeden said they had guessed 30 and the directors had laughed and he didn't know if it was because they were a lot older than that or younger.  I said, "Younger."

It's hard to know how old an adult is when you're little.  I think kids are used to going by height and all bets are off with adults.

We had a nice weekend otherwise.  We did our tasks; I read my book.  I enjoyed church and our tithing declaration (our bishop is our friend, so it's nice to visit) and having our people over for dinner.  After we ate, we played a General Conference Jeopardy game that Janelle sent me a link for.  Elder Anderson's daughter created it apparently.  I got it going and messed it up and Adam asked, "Were there instructions with it?"

I said yes and acknowledged I had not read them.  He knows I don't read instructions unless it is vitally important.  I handed the computer over to him and the game was pretty much anarchy because we hadn't really established any rules and therefore disagreed often about how the game should be played.  It was a good time though and then we had s'mores (and/or apples, depending on who you were) at our fire pit.

We capped off the night with a FaceTime conversation with our favorite Californians.  QE is talking up a storm!  She'll be saying sentences by Christmas, that is my prediction.

And now for a busy week ahead!

Grateful Friday

I'm grateful for adorable pictures of QE.

I'm grateful for autumn in all its splendor.  The weather is spectacular and I love seeing the colorful mountains.

I'm grateful we returned from our field trip with as many children as we left with.  That is always the goal.  Also, I think everyone had fun.

I'm grateful for the kind parents who chaperoned the field trip.  I loved watching them interact with the students and I just appreciated their help and patience with all the crazy.

Because it was crazy.

I'm grateful that my one student, that one who makes everything harder, was well behaved.  I gave him a threat at the beginning of the day that he wouldn't go on the next field trip if he didn't listen to me and a prize at the end of the day because he had.  The bar is so low, my friends.

I'm grateful for girl power.  We went to the butterfly biosphere at Thanksgiving Point, then we went to a park.  We had a big tub of all the lunches and I was having two boys carry it from the classroom to the bus.  They whined the whole time about how heavy it was and that it hurt their hands.

I carried one side of it from the bus to the pavilion at the park and a boy had the other side.  He whined and one of my tiny girls took over.  She gritted her teeth and carried it and didn't give one word of complaint.  I said, "You are strong!  Those boys complained about how heavy it was."

She said, "I can do it Teacher!"

She's going to be an awesome mother someday.

Some of the kids had home lunch and some of them had sack lunches from school.  The sack lunches also had milk cartons.  They are these heavy duty boxes like pouches with a tab you peel off to open.  A girl had accidentally ripped off the tab, but the box was still sealed shut.  She asked me for help.  I couldn't get it open.

She said, "I wish my dad was here because he can open anything."

I said, "Mine can too."

I kept trying.  I didn't have anything sharp with me.  I tried to poke my key through it, but it just bent the pouch.  One boy grabbed it and lay it on the table and was prepared to slam his hand into it.

"No!" A chorus of girls and I said.

Another girl, watching said, "How about an earring?"

I pulled out my earring and used it to pry open the milk.  Everyone was happy.  

(You do bizarre things when you're a teacher, it's kind of like the bizarre things you do when you're a mother.)

And that girl with the earring idea is going to be an awesome mother someday too.

I'm grateful for my chiropractor.  My foot has been hurting.  The shot the podiatrist gave me did nothing.  These are the kinds of things my life has come to:  ailments.  And I doubt it's going to get better before it gets worse.

I mentioned my foot to my chiropractor and he said, "Have I ever adjusted it?"

I said, "Is that a thing?"

He said yes and he did and he told me that I mostly have tendonitis and that I will still be able to wear cute shoes.  

I can't even tell you how much better it feels!

I'm grateful Adam is home. 

Speaking of Adam traveling, I realized that the birth order of our kids is pretty much perfect.

When I was a new mother and a mother of young children at home, it was lonely sometimes.  Adam would go to school or work or on business trips and I would have been very lonely without Braeden, especially when we moved to a new place.  Braeden has always been a willing distributor of sunshine.  He kept me company and kept me laughing and filled out home with happy commotion when I needed it.  

Now--and last year when Mark was the only one home--I'm so grateful for my introverts.  I'm gone to school all day and it is so very peopley.  I come home depleted and I just crave silence for awhile.  (Or time with Adam.  Even when I'm spent from being social, Adam never seems to add to that drain.). When Adam's gone, whichever introvert is home and I will eat a quiet and pleasant dinner.  We chat a little about our day, we tidy the kitchen, then one of us inevitably will say something like, "Introverts unite separately?" and the other will give a grateful affirmative.

We happily go to our rooms and read or whatever for the rest of the evening.

When I needed society and someone to talk to, I had Braeden.

When I need quiet and restorative alone time, I have Emma and/or Mark.

What marvelous children they are!  I'm grateful to be their mother!

The taco restaurant

Yesterday I asked my students for the best place to get tacos.  If you want to get third graders immediately engaged, talk about tacos I guess.  Even in the 8:00 AM hour.  They were into it!

I pointed out that our students whose parents were from Mexico were probably the experts.  I have a girl whose parents are from El Salvador and another whose mom is Guatemalan.  I asked them if they had tacos and it sounded like they had things that were taco adjacent, but I said our Mexican students were the experts.  One of them said her abuelita's was the best place for tacos.  Another said that "the taco truck by the building" was the best place.  I said, "Oh, that one...."

The last one described a restaurant and it sounded familiar.  I asked if it was Don Joaquin's.  He got excited and said, "Yes!"

I said that I like their tacos and so did my brother-in-law Edgar, who is Mexican, so I thought they must be pretty good.

One of the white kids said, "How about Taco Bell?"

I can't even describe the look of sheer horror on the face of the boy who likes Don Joaquin's.  The boy who told me about the taco truck said, "No.  No, no, no, no."

I think Edgar might agree.

So I said, we will have our restaurant be Don Joaquin's.  You all work at the restaurant.  I put them in groups and said that the tacos come in orders of three tacos.  We were talking about multiplying by 3 for math.  I went around and placed orders at each restaurant for a different number of people and they had to figure out how many tacos it would be.  

I am coming to the restaurant with Adam, Braeden, Anna, Emma and Mark.  How many tacos is that?  I am coming to the restaurant but Mark isn't, so there are just five of us.  How many tacos is that? But why isn't Mark coming? He doesn't feel like tacos.  Can my family come to the restaurant?  Yes, how many orders do you need?  Seven.  OK.  His family needs seven orders, how many tacos is that?  And on and on.

They all got the correct answers.

Many of them said, "This is so fun!"

Sometimes I forget that they are little kids and pretending a little will make multiplication into a game.

Today we're going on a field trip.

May the odds be forever in our favor.

YEN--movie night

It was movie night even though we didn't watch any movies.

Adam and I were the hosts this month.  I set the table (and took a picture).

One appreciative guest asked, "Are those real apples."

I said "Yes," and also, "You are really easy to impress."  Those are the best kinds of people though.  It was serendipity that I bought the apples randomly to maybe put on the table and I somehow got the exact amount of each to alternate them.

We gave the assignment that everyone was supposed to bring some food inspired by a movie, then we were all supposed to guess which movie the food was from.  It was a lot of fun and made for the most bizarre menu.

Adam prepared Chicago dogs (While You Were Sleeping) and it was mostly an excuse for him to recreate what he'd eaten two weeks before in Chicago.  (Speaking of Adam traveling, Dave asked me, "Now Adam is going out of town tomorrow?"  I said maybe?  Dave knows Adam's schedule more than I do, but Adam knows Dave's more than Nola does.  Also, in related news, Adam went to Phoenix yesterday....)

I made spinach puffs (The Emperor's New Groove) and I was sure going to make a bundt cake (My Big Fat Greek Wedding), but I ended up buying one instead.  Everyone thought it was really good and I said I would pass the compliments along to Winco.

We also had tots (Napoleon Dynamite) that were from The Purple Turtle, which everyone was happy about.  We had pizza in boxes decorated like the pizza boxes in Home Alone, spaghetti and meatballs (Lady and the Tramp), apple pie (When Harry Met Sally--most of us hadn't seen it so that was a hard one).  Shannon didn't have a movie idea or time to make anything so I told her to bring chips.  I not only embrace the low bar lifestyle, but I urge others to do the same.

On second thought I should have asked her to bring carrot sticks or something remotely healthy, but no one suffered.

I took a quick picture before everyone dug in.  It doesn't really show everything all that well, but you get the idea.

We gave Qwixx to the person who got the most correct and said they needed to watch fewer movies and play a game once in awhile.

Second place got movie popcorn.

We had a good time.  I like our little YEN group.  We have lively conversations across the table and we are pulling for each other and each others' children and that feels pretty great.

Inside recess

Yesterday we had inside recess.  It was raining (there were stratonimbus clouds if you are a third grader learning about weather).

I was still eating my lunch when my class trooped in for inside recess.  They were very interested in my lunch (it was leftover taco soup).  

What smells like beans?

What is that smell?

That smells good!

One student (and it should be said almost every story I tell on here is about this one student--he is a character!) stood in front of me staring at my soup.

Keep in mind they had literally just come from lunch.

He said, "Do you have an extra spoon?"

Sometimes

I 

have

no 

words.

Weekend

Saturday was a collision of General Conference, all the regular Saturday things, extra yard work because it was time + Adam was home on a Saturday, and we're hosting a party tonight at our house.

(Note to self:  don't do that on the Monday after a busy weekend if school is in session.)

Also, we were on the docket for cleaning the church again because it was a five week month.  Adam did that while I went to the grocery store in the 8:00 hour.  When Adam told me who was at the church, it was definitely the STP.  One of our former bishops taught us the acronym.  Same Ten People.  They are the people that you ask when you need someone to clean the church for the second time in a month on the day of General Conference.  I guess Adam is one of those people and I am not....

At least I married well.

Our kids helped a lot between sessions with the pruning and the gathering of limbs.  I helped a little outside but also cleaned the kitchen and did laundry and watered my plants and went through the mail.  Between the second and third session I went to Hobby Lobby and Walmart (ornament supplies for my class and party supplies for tonight) and we met up for dinner at Via 313 which has the best gluten free pizza and which was promised to our kids for their good help.

I went to bed in the 8:00 hour and was happy to do it.

Sunday was all set up to be more restful, but then I had a migraine.  I took my new migraine medicine.  My doctor said I may not want to use it while I'm teaching.

A lot of my migraines happen at school.

Anyway.  It was pretty effective at getting rid of the migraine.  It took about an hour, but then I felt super weird for a few hours.

Nobody wins with a migraine.

I did enjoy conference though.  I always feel a mix of encouragement and like I want to do better.  I also made all the ornaments for my class which has become my October conference project.

It was a lovely weekend and I enjoyed having Mark around and of course Emma too.  They are helpful and kind and add pizzaz.  I don't know what more I could want.

Yes, I do. 

Braeden and Anna and QE.  Braeden sent a video of QE watching the "conference pre-game show."  Every time a temple was on the screen, she got really excited.  I've said it before, that girl could do anything and we would all applaud.