Did you survive the New Year?

We ended up at Mike's aunt and uncle's house on New Year's eve. I had a horrible tension headache that would not quit. I hate those things...... But we saw in the New Year and it was nice. The girls stayed up and saw it in too. But, just as soon as it was here Whitney put herself to bed and wasn't having anything else to do with all the hoopla. She was tired! Now, Allison is a different story. She was tired but too excited to go to bed. I think it was around 2:00 in the morning when she finally gave in to sleep. Needless to say she slept late the next day. And, I let her. :D

We go back to school on Monday, Jan. 7th. I am not ready to go back. I am enjoying my time off. I wish the breaks we get didn't go by so quickly.........

Whitney turns 7 on Sunday. It is hard to believe that 7 years ago I was still pregnant with her! She has grown up so fast. And, although she still needs me for some things, she is so independent! It just kills me! My baby is no longer a baby and that is hard to swallow. We are planning on taking her to any restaurant she wants to eat at on Sunday. I have a bad feeling that she will want to go to Chuck E. Cheese's. But, if that's what she wants...... She wants to have a slumber party the following weekend. It will be her first. I think we are inviting all the girls in her class -- which is about 11-- and I am not sure how all this will work but I think pizza, a movie, and cake will be good. She said she wants to play dress-up princess with them all. We'll see. We still have lots of planning to do! Mike has already made it clear that he ***thinks*** he will be gone that night. Thanks Baby! I'll have to take lots of pictures of this! I can't wait!

It's a beautiful sunny day today. I think sidewalk chalk is in order. Can't wait to play with my girls! Talk to you soon!

Wasn't It Merry?

Hope everybody had a great Christmas! We did! The girls made out like bandits -- Santa brought so much stuff! Thanks Santa!

I stayed busy right up until Christmas Eve. I have never waited this late to get thing finished for Christmas. I am usually done a couple weeks before. Not this year! It just crept up on me! I was still getting things ready to go when it was time to head out to visit with the family and exchange gifts. It was nice to finally slow down to enjoy the night!

We started off at Mike's parents' house. It was fun watching the kids rip open their packages. My youngest nephew got a drum set. I sure am glad it didn't come home with me. :D Although, Whit did bring home a working microphone that plays songs she can sing and a noise making guitar. Not the real kind but one that she loves anyway. She still feels like a rockstar when she plays with it! Ally got Hannah Montana stuff. She is crazy about HM. I have never seen anything like it.... Sometimes it drives me crazy but I can be happy that she is crazy about a pretty good role model. I hope HM doesn't turn out to be like the Spears girls. That is another entry though.

Once we finished at Mike's parents' house we headed to his aunt and uncle's house. We started off by playing Dirty Santa with $5 gifts from the liquor store. Do you know what you can get at the liquor store for $5? Nothing really great, I can tell you that! By the end of the game you had to take at least one drink of what you ended up with.

I ended up with Hot Damn! as my "prize". At least it didn't taste horrible! Some of the things they brought were NASTY! The two worst ones were these: Arrogant Bastard Ale, and Rattlesnake shots. All I can say is: Dis-gust-ing! The Rattlesnake shots were awful. I couldn't even tell you what was in it. It was two different liquors that tasted like rubbing alcohol. Definately pukester drinks.

The next picture is Mike and his Uncle Don discussing how to steal from somebody else. I think they were strategizing. They both were eyeballing something they wanted.........

Can you guess by the last picture that Mike got what he wanted! :D He likes to try different dark beers and this was no exception. Only this one was so dark it looked like black coffee when we finally poured it down the sink. It was super strong and quite bitter! We kept the bottle though. It was pretty cool. There is a neat story/warning on the back of it that tells you that it is pretty stout and disgusting. It also tells how/why they started making the crap. I think they should quit making it and just make the cool bottles. Although, it does make a pretty good gag gift......

We had a good time on Christmas Day too. We ate BBQ with Mike's parents and relaxed at home in front of the good ol' tv while the girls and played. It was nice to put our responsibilities aside for the day and just enjoy our family! I hope you all enjoyed your holiday as well! I hope you have a great New Year!

Today was pretty cool...

I made this frame last night for the Creative Christmas Countdown we have going on at AC Bailey Designs. I am really pleased with how it turned out too. I took it to school today just to show a couple of people. Harmless enough, right? Well, I got to talking to a teacher friend of mine and told her about the etsy stores for crafters. (Etsy is like an online store/site for crafters to sell their goodies.) Anyway, we were talking about what something like this should cost and we finally decided on something we both thought was reasonable. She had some of the same thoughts and ideas as me and I think I really needed to have somebody else tell me. Know what I mean? Anyway, I thought I'd "test" it out by showing this frame to some people at school and tell them a price. I NEVER dreamed anybody would actually WANT one. But, within about 10 minutes I had 7 orders for picture frames! How cool is that! I couldn't believe it! I am so excited though. I only showed a few people -- maybe 10 -- and got a really great response! I think I may need to push this a little more. It could be quite equitable for me... :D (Love it!)

I have been pretty busy lately. School has been hectic and stressful. We have so much to do to get the kids ready for the TAKS math and reading tests. The reading test is in March. They have to pass this test to go on to 4th grade in TX. That is a lot of stress not only on the kids, but also on the teacher! Eek! (See the sweat bullets beginning to form?) And this week and next are going to be rough since the kiddos are ready for Christmas break. If the truth be known, their teacher is probably more ready than they are. I need a break!

My sister and mom can relate to the stress. They both teach 4th grade. Mom in Oklahoma, Mandy in Florida. I am glad that I can call and vent to them and they totally get it. It is nice to have somebody understan exactly where I am coming from. Mike can sympathize but he can't empathize. Ya know? I usually call my mom. She has taught longer than ever. I am not even sure just how many years she has taught. Mom, you need to leave me a comment and let me know. :D I can call my mom for anything. It is nice to be able to call her and know that I can count on her and Dad for anything. I hope they know just how much I appreciate all they do for us. I have great parents. I am a lucky girl. Thanks for being there for me Mom and Dad..... Love you lots! XOXOXOXO

I need to get the girls situated in bed. We are a little late getting there tonight. I guess they will be fine though. After all, Christmas break is only 7 days away! Talk to you soon gang!

Just Call Me Grace...

That should be my middle name. I seem to do the most graceful things at the worst possible moments. Or at least in front of too many people.

Today's situation:

I really needed to hang some things from the ceiling in the hall at school today. Okay, didn't NEED to but WANTED to. The kids made some cute ornaments and I thought I'd hang up for everyone to see. So, I do the most logical thing a gal of 5'2" can do. I get one of the kids' chairs and decide to use it. I pull it out into the hall and climb on up. Not for long though. The chair starts to feel like it is sliding on the tile and lo and behold it is! Two legs of the chair are totally coming out from under the chair! Well, being the graceful swan that I am I totally bust my a$$ right in front of the kids that were in my class because of course I start right smack dab in front of my door. I hit the floor with a nice smack! (I later found out that the gal that teaches next door to me heard it. She just didn 't know what the sound was! Lucky me!) Anyway, this was the conversation that followed my graceful decent:

Colby (my 9 year old student): Are you okay?
Me: Yes, I'm okay.
Colby: You don't look okay.
(I think, 'Thanks kid!')
Me: I promise I am okay. I think I just bruised my pride more than anything else.
Colby: Okay. If you say so.

I love that I can be so graceful under fire. Lucky for me there weren't any classes in my hallway at that time. Usually our hallway is pretty busy. I lucked out. I hope I get lucky the next time I fall. Oh, yeah, this wasn't my first time. I took down a table earlier in the year. I just leaned up against it....with my hand! Like I said, just call me Grace!

Whoever is sending the message...... I GOT IT! I need to lose a little of my fluff! I promise to start working harder on it! :) (Just gotta get through the holidays! Can you say YUMMO?)hehe

Got any stories like this one? I'd love to hear them so I know that I'm not the only one in this boat! Later!

Kids, Candy, and Trees

This had been a long week for me. So much to do, so little time. Story of my life! Not to mention that I have had to deal with kids misbehaving all week long. I'm not sure what has been in the water this week but it seems to be one thing after another! WOW! I have talked to more parents this week than I can count on my hands! I hope the next two weeks of school are better!



I have been busy working on some projects for my design team at AC Bailey Designs. I had so much fun with these papers! I have a hard time scrapping certain holidays -- ie. Halloween! But the Scenic Route Salem line was so much fun it was easy to scrap these pics! I also used the My Minds Eye Confetti paper collection on the pictures of Whitney. They just seemed to match! I also liked how they worked with Whit's "Rockstar" poses!I also doodled on this one. I summoned my inner Aubrey and just went for it! (For those of you who don't know Aubrey -- She's my mega talented best friend and the most artsy farts gal I know!) Then there are the cards. I have been on a card kick. I am really enjoying making cards at the moment. They can be a challenge sometimes but I have fun with them. :D I have a few more projects that I am working on this month. They are just taking a little longer because they are altered projects. As soon as I get them finished I will post them here.

We still don't know anything about the situation on our house. The owners still want to move back and I don't blame them. They are in the same situation we are in. We are thinking that we really would like to move back to Bryan. I already know I really like the district and Mike has a couple of job leads. Plus, there are plenty more places for him to look. The girls really miss it there too. They miss all their friends. We have really give this a lot of thought and don't know for sure what we will be doing but we have been leaning towards moving back. I think it would be beneficial to our family. We all want to be there and I think that being some place that you are happy to be takes a lot of the stress out of our lives. Know what I mean? I am sure that we will get it all figured out soon. Just say a little prayer for us!
We got the tree up this week. The girls helped get it decorated. We cut it down at the tree farm. The girls had a blast trying to pick one out! They were running all over looking at trees! Well, we got us a crooked tree but the girls think it is the most beautiful one ever! I'm glad they like it! I'll post pics of all that in the next day or two.

Not much going on this weekend. Probably cleaning the house and hopefully scrapping a little. I hope you all have a great weekend! Later!