In Another Life...

In another life I taught High School mathematics for 12 years. I really loved my job. I did it all. I wrote curriculum, was a mentor, was department chair for a 16 person department. Once my boss told me I was the biggest math nerd in the department. I think this speaks to my passion. When I do something I do it with all my heart.

Recently I fould out that my old school, Mountain View High School in Tucson, has a very sad place in US History. It has lost the most soldiers in the war of any high school in the nation. This makes me so sad. It is a wonderful middle class community in the Northwest of Tucson. I can't imagine the pain and sadness that overcomes the faculty, staff and students each and every time this happens. We lost many kids to car accidents while I was there, and each had a profound effect on all of us. It is just WRONG to have so many children die. =-(

As Alec prepares for Geometry, and Casey for Pre Algebra, I am reminded of my days as a teacher, a tutor, a friend of teens. It really was a different life time. Do I miss it, yes. And, I know that the boys need me here. I have a business that I love, I have a familly that I love, and although they drive me crazy some days, I wouldn't trade being with them for the world. But, some days I still think about my other life....

Getting it Handled

Ahhh, one of those errand days again. I am really wondering, how do people with a lot of children do it? I am crazy with only two! They feel like 20 most days. LOL Today we have an appointment with Alec's teachers. Hopefully this will be a good and successful year for him. If only expectations are clear and not changed, that would sure help. Then we have a follow up with Casey and his contacts. One of them went missing yesterday. I suppose it is in the land of unseen contacts, or contact heaven, or smushed in the dogs toes. I dunno. Plus, I am headed to the dentist for a cleaning. No big deal, but another thing to do.

Hopefully Mike will make that appointment with Alec's teachers. The big thing is saying, "I will be checking in on Thursday, and I do want to know if ANY work is not turned in by Friday.... not two weeks later like in 7th grade!" Yea, attitude. I know. But, heck, I could keep track when I was teaching 7 years ago, why can't they do it now! LOL

On the positive side, the house is clean and there are groceries in the house. So, maybe I can actually do some Close To My Heart work. What a concept! Off to get it all done.

Budget

OK I am embarrassed to say that I never kept a line by line budget before. I wanted to do it after all the money on Kassie this month and last month. So, I have been doing that. The truth is that I do know where the money goes. I guess I knew that and that is why I never wrote everything down. But, the surprise was that DH didn't know it! So, I think this has been a good thing for us! Funny how something so simple can be such an eye opener. How much do YOU spend on latte's? Heheheheheheh

I am supposed to be working on a Christmas Swap today. But, so far my card is dull and boring. I want a new set, but this is the one I committed to... and frankly the card on paper looks nothing like the card in my head. I hate that! LOL But, oh well.

Aspen is giving me that 'lets go for a walk' look. Maybe the fresh air will inspire me. Hopefully! It is a beautiful day, and that does make me want to lay in my hammock! The boys are off with their dad stamping text books at work. So, the house is quiet except for the lull of the washer and dryer. Although, this is the first time in months I have heard it when it is running.

If you have any extra inspiration, please send it my way!

Back To School

It should be an awesome week. You know, the week before back to school. Yet, somehow it only seems stressful. The kids have to start going to bed at their regular times. They hate that. Alarms start going in the morning, instead of that noon wake-up for Alec. Mike spends the weekend at the office getting ready for the teachers to come back tomorrow.

Sometimes it is hard to feel like the glue that holds the family together, and I feel like I am not that glue... everyone is just anxious. I know it has nothing to do with me. It is the time of year, far from this beautiful day in Cannon Beach. Everyone is stressed. What will this new school year bring? What are the hopes and joys of everyone involved? Will Casey cut his hair? Will Alec be happy in school in spite of having to overcome his Asperger's? Will Mike's new teachers be as successful as he knows they can be? Will everyone do their best? So right now I find myself looking forward to the anxiety and anticipation being over.... and school starting again. Then I will get back to my own regularly scheduled life. Until then...

My New Game

LOL The latest thing I am into is the grocery game. www.thegrocerygame.com For a small price they match up the local sales with newspaper coupons. I am finding that I am saving quite a bit, and am very happy about that. The more I save, the less I work! Oh that is too sad. If you want to try them out please use my ScrapnMomofBoys@aol.com address as a refferal. Thank you.

I am into the stockpiling of stuff right now. It is kinda neat. I have always liked not needing to buy stuff that often, so I was a big Costco shopper. But, I got tired of spending soooo much there. So, that is my new 'game.'

On a lighter note, Casey got contacts! Woohoo. He has been talking about them for awhile now. I think he is tired of dealing with glasses, and as a boy he is always tweaking them. So far he is doing really well with putting them in and getting them out. Today is day three, so hopefully it will be a success. He has beautiful eyes, so it is great to see them again!

I did work on a couple of cards for Susan's swap yesterday. I have been way more into scrabooking, and am actually caught up right now, which is weird. I have BOXES of stuff from my parents to deal with. I think that is my fall project. Overwhelming, but exciting. I think I get stuck on how to organize. But thankfully I use the post bound albums, so I can re order over and over instead of having to order before I scrapbook. I don't know what I will consider important and unimportant. But, I guess we will see as we go.

On a sad note my scanner is not working with my windows vista. So, I am going to hook it up to one of the kids computers and email it to myself for printing. Hopefully that will help with some of the chunky stuff. I really am looking forward to having less boxes of stuff.

Anyway, for those of you who check my blog (Hi Sue!) I am also going to try to post more often. No promise of pictures, but I can at least post what is going on and what projects I am working on.

Do you like my new counter? I LOVE it!

Summer Time

Maybe it is good that this summer is coming to a close. In two weeks the kids will be back in school and things will quiet down around the house. I took Kassie today to get the stitches out of her now gone eye. She is looking better. Sadly, she still can't see out of the other eye. And, it doesn't look as if she ever will again. Most days she seems to be doing better with the whole thing than I am. I guess that is to be expected.

Casey is going for an exam to get contacts. I am ready for that. He is constantly banging his glasses around, and with the Oregon rain, it will be so wonderful. We don't know who his teacher is yet, but that is OK. He will do great wherever he ends up for 6th grade.

Alec's assistant principal and I got Alec's schedule squared away. He is most excited about Geometry. This is great for an 8th grader, and he knows it. Of course his father reminded him that, "math does get harder." LOL So far, not for Alec. But, he did like learning a few new things last year. He hates the tedious stuff. Ahhh, his mother's son! He will also take art first semester. I hope he loves that too.

Mike is back full swing. He has no air conditioning at his school, so it is pretty hot. But, this month hasn't been awful, so that helps. It just seems as if it is crazy to expect him to work in such a hot office. But, whatever. I guess that he is truly a public servant.

Off to get something done.

My Princess

It has been a tough couple of weeks with my Pekingese, Kassie. Her eye popped out of the socket two weeks ago. I rushed her to the ER vet. They put the eye back and stitched her up. She was not eating well, and didn't seem like she was feeling well for a couple of days following them putting it back into the socket. One stitch pulled open and I rushed her back to the ER vet. (Of course none of this happens when our regular vet is open). Dove Lewis is a well known ER hospital though, so that is good.

The vet found it was very ulcerated (is that a word). She felt that the stitches were bothering her more and recommended we remove the eye. Which we did, after struggling with whether we should put her through all of the trying to save the eye when the percentage was well under 50%. When we were picking her up (at 2 am) they felt she wasn't seeing out of the other eye either. So, they kept her for a few more hours for observation. In the morning she still wasn't tracking with the right eye.

We then took her home (about 10 am Sunday morning) and took her to our regular vet. They started steroid drops and are watching her. We may have to take her to a specialist. It is not glaucoma, but ulcers that seemed to develop rather quickly (in my opinion). They do not feel she has any sight in the eye, but want to wait until the surgery is about 2 weeks out to refer her.

Kassie is doing great. I am wondering if she wasn't seeing that great to begin with, because she doesn't seem to be struggling at all. And, she is much happier, eating better etc, with the eye out. She isn't wild about the drops every 2 hours. Heck, it would bug me to be awakened for that too. I, on the other hand, am struggling with all of it. I am wondering why we didn't see sooner that there were problems. I know that you can't, and regular vet care is the best I could do, but somehow it still makes me feel crappy. I have heard that some pekes have their eyes pop out, but had never experienced it before. It was very scary, again I think more for me than for her.

When I get past the way I feel, I think that her life of sitting on the couch with me and running outside to go potty a few times a day, will not change much. She is still playful about once a day, as is standard for her.

I must be making progress, because I have been struggling talking about her. I really wanted to write about what happened with her though.

This morning, after Mike gave her the morning medicines, she jumped off the couch and came back upstairs to bed! Here is hoping that she is on the road to recovery.

The prank

LOL While my DH and boys were camping I came up with the perfect prank. You see, Mike loves "gracie lou." Who? Gracie Lou, his red mustang convertable. He loves this car. And they had my Pacifica to pull the tent trailer while camping.

Both of the license plate covers on Gracie Lou say "Pittsburgh Steelers." I am ok with this, I am a Steelers fan by default. LOL But, I KNEW that the cover on the back had to change. While they were on vacation I got a new license cover. "Scrap Lady" on the top. "Eat...Sleep...Scrap" on the bottom. PERFECT.

Unfortunately right before they came home was the event with Kassie's eye. So, I do believe it took away quite a lot of the shock factor! ;-)

When they drove up, Gracie Lou was sitting in the driveway with her rear toward the street. Our youngest wasn't out of the car 13 seconds before he said, "something is wrong." Immediately Mike looked at the car. What was wrong with his baby? Oh man. First, I saw the grin. Then, the next words out of his mouth were, "that has to go."

Everyone came inside to check on the pekingese. She seems to be feeling better, but she looks like she got hit by a truck, or maybe had a really rough night! LOL

Back outside, and looking over the car, Mike found two new scratches. He was so excited to drive his baby that he did actually take her out for a drive BEFORE he changed the plate. So, sadly there was no going to work. He got it fixed before that would happen. LOL But, I did get a drive out of him.

He was surprised that I thought of such a thing. AND, thankful that I didn't do something to hurt his car. LOL- I soooo know better. But, the look on his face when he said, "that has to go" was priceless.