a new school year

Day 2 is done and I have blisters on my feet. :( I knew better than to wear new sandals on a day that would involve tons of walking around the school. And now I know the rest of the week, no matter which shoes I pick out to wear, they're all going to rub my blisters. ugh! Oh well, life goes on.

Here's the bulletin board I put up in the hall outside my room. The other 2 teachers that shared my room with me last year moved to other rooms so it's just me and a teacher's aide who's also going to do Read Right with me. It's been fun decorating and reorganizing. I even found popcorn border. :)

I've been working the lunch shift from 10:30-12:30. Those sweet little kindergarteners look like they'd be so much fun to teach but I don't think I have enough patience for them. :) But sometimes it's tempting. It would be neat to watch them experience all of their "firsts" of school. Just watching them go through the lunch line and carry their tray to the table was pretty funny. They'd be looking in one direction and their tray was going the other direction. Some of them look too little to be at school yet. I can only imagine their moms feel, Michelle. ;)

Last Friday night I went to the Cowboys game against the Texans. I told Karen's little boy that where we were going had a hole in the roof. He didn't believe me until we got there. See the hole? :)

He was quite the entertainment. It was his first Cowboys game and he had a blast! Here he is using the binoculars backwards trying to find his hand.

This is the mascot Rowdy.

Brenda came down to visit us during halftime.

Karen and I after the game. Can you tell we were hot?! There wasn't much of a breeze inside the stadium.

Ok, gotta go get ready for Day 3. Goodnight!

Pat Green concert

Some friends and I went to New Braunfels to float the river recently. Mike's brother and sister-in-law live there and are the ones we stay with when we go. They are teachers but this summer they've been earning some extra money by working at this place that has concerts on the weekends. Well, this time when we were there, Pat Green was performing. Here's the first view we have of Pat singing... we're at the back of the crowd and having fun.

Then Jeff took us backstage and this is how we enjoyed the rest of the evening...up close and personal with the band. :) It was really neat. Pat's wife and kids and mom and brother were there too. We were just a few feet away from the band.

here's the hot fiddle player :)

Most of my pictures ended up being blurry because they were moving around so much.

Here's Pat singing to his daughter

his mom was beaming the whole time

his wife taking their kids to the tour bus for the night

me and Melissa

Cory Morrow and Django Walker stopped by to play a song with them

And here's a little video from the concert...

my 31st birthday . . .

(Once again, it says I'm posting this on Tuesday, but that's just when I wrote it.)

A group of friends took me to the Cheesecake Factory in Southlake the night of my 31st birthday. Most of them I have taught with at some point in the past. Some are in my Bunco group too.

Kristi has met some of them so I was glad that she came too

Mike and Wendi

Koby and Gina

Me getting sung to

my peanut butter cheesecake

(my favorite part is the glob of creamy peanut butter stuff on top)

Makes my mouth water just thinking about it. :)

Tim and Krista

Chris and Sarah

Greg and I (also a La Tech graduate, but several years before me)

Melinda and Wendi

Audra and I

Then a few nights later Kristi and Jill took me out to Mi Chula's, a new Mexican restaurant in Southlake. We usually frequent La Hacienda Ranch but we decided to branch out. Jill brought yummy Sprinkles cupcakes for dessert. Thank you, girls! It was fun!!!

Then Kristi and I went to see Mamma Mia. I had already seen it but was willing to go again so maybe I could sing along this time. The theater got crowded and I, unfortunately, had to move over right next to a stranger. I hate sitting that close to someone I don't know in a movie, especially when I have intentions of singing along. :)

Then a few days later some friends from my 1st school in Irving took me out for my birthday dinner. We try to get together about once a month but it doesn't always end up happening. Kelli (in the blue) moved to Oklahoma last summer so we haven't seen her all year. Luckily she was in town for a wedding so she got to join us. Brenda (standing up) teaches Read Right like I do. Karen and Lisa teach in HEB now, but they also live in Euless and are members of my gym so we see each other pretty often. I'm sure our waiter loved how long we stayed at his table visiting after we finished our meal.

Thank you to all of you that sent me a b-day message on facebook, myspace, etc. I really appreciate you helping make the 1st anniversary of my 30th birthday special! (That's what Koby calls it.)

more of july...

(This says I'm posting this on Tuesday but I actually just wrote it as a draft on Tuesday. I can't get the date to change when I post it.)

The day after I got home from the beach, my mom and nieces came to visit me for the week. The girls had never been to an amusement park so my mom wanted them to get to experience Six Flags. What a great Gran and Aunt they have because it was HOT out there!!!

Reanne and I at the 3D Space show ride

Ree and Jaisle at the Cirque Dreams Coobrila show

J and Gran on the hot air balloon ferris wheel ride

I introduced them to iFratelli's pizza

There was lots of time at the pool.

We spent an evening at Incredible Pizza (like Dave & Busters for kids).

We went to see the Space Chimps movie. When I was home for July 4th I went to see the Kung Fu Panda. I've now met my quota of kids movies for a while! I want real live humans in my movies for a while. :)

I took them to play at Pump It Up which has 2 rooms full of huge inflatable games. It makes me think of the Temple Tech Welcome Back party we used to have in the Family Life Center at the old Temple building. :) Good times!

Their last night here we went to Babe’s (Chicken House) for my b-day dinner. Chicken fried steak and mashed potatoes is my most favorite meal. The girls tried to find me a date but this guy was a little too shy for me! ;)

Reanne and I enjoying our meal

Jaisle and my mom after dinner

Then we tried to go up in the Reunion Tower to show them the view of Dallas but it was closed for renovations until next year.

My mom made a chocolate sheet cake with peanut butter icing for my 31st birthday. YUMMY!!!

It was a great week. On the way home my nieces were already talking about how we need to go a waterpark next time. My apartment sure was quiet after they left since I was used to having roommates at the beach for a week and then my family here for a week. But things haven't slowed down much since. The day they left was my birthday so I'll post pics from that next time.

july

Wow, July really flew by! Lots of fun things happened around here. I'll start with my trip to Navarre Beach in Florida. It was a blast! Unfortunately my tan is already fading. :(

On our first day we found this blue raft that someone had left on the beach. So Mike and I headed out to float and there are Wendi and Jaleen on the right floating too. Looks fun, right?

Well it was until the bottom of the raft tore and we fell out. It was hilarious. No wonder someone left it on the beach!

The next day Jaleen and I ventured out in one of those orange kayaks. It reminded me of canoeing at Cho-Yeh. :) The jellyfish and algae showed up our third day there. Needless to say, I didn't get in the ocean after that! Here's a blob of jellyfish that some kids had collected from the water and dumped onto the beach. We watched several people come in from the water after getting stung. Luckily no one in our group did. But we decided we liked the sand and pool just fine.

We drove to Pensacola 2 different nights. Isn't the sky beautiful?!

Here are the tan girls after a couple of days in the sun. We're waiting for our table at Flounders.

Here's a cool sandcastle. I told them I was going to blog and say we made it. But we didn't really. :)

Our condo was on the 10th floor in the 2nd building from the left. What a pretty view! I could sit and listen to the waves forever!

Here are Wendi and I in our opposite outfits ready for a night out close to Destin.

On our way home Mike wanted to take a little detour and have beignets for breakfast at Cafe Du Monde in New Orleans. Notice the powdered sugar on my pants. :) I swear there must be a pound of sugar on your plate! We decided we wanted to get home in the afternoon instead of late at night so we left Florida around 2:00 a.m. and got to New Orleans around 5:30. There are some interesting folks out at that time of the morning. I think most of them were still up from the day before. Here are Melissa and I after breakfast, so anxious to get back in the car for the rest of the drive.


It was a great trip and was so relaxing! The day after I got back, my mom and 2 nieces came for a visit. I'll blog about that next. :)