lesson learned

funny thing.

it turns out that if you leave steamed broccoli in your classroom refrigerator for OVER a week ...

it will smell like something died in your room when you come back.

no joke.

i looked for a dead rat in the cupboards & was about 2 seconds away from calling our custodian when i found the decomposing vegetables in the refrigerator.

there are not enough outlets in this room for my glade room fresheners to drown out this smell.

i feel bad for the kids.

they keep saying, "your broccoli smells terrible!"

ya think!?!

gross.

Diederichs Thanksgiving

We celebrated Thanksgiving with my side of the family this year.

We made a weekend out of it and stayed up in Port Ludlow with my parents for the weekend.

Here are some of my favorite pictures from Thanksgiving Day.

Dad carving the ham ...

{We also had a turkey - but being a former vegetarian,

it felt gross to post pictures of it.

Don't ask me why I don't feel the same way about the ham.

I have no idea and can not explain my thinking on this.}

How pretty are these?

Our hostess' mother made homemade banana-nut bread

and wrapped them beautifully for everyone to take home.

I love thoughtful, creative touches like this.

The table was so pretty.

My Grandpa Diederichs.

Love him.

Trying to soak in everything about my grandparents that are still alive.

It was so heartbreaking losing my other Grandpa last year.

And I wish I would have just sat and listened to what he had to say more often before he passed.

I listen more, talk less now.

Nothing says Diederichs Family Get-together like chardonnay chillin' in the snow.

This is hands-down my favorite picture of the day ...

Hope you had a great Thanksgiving too!

Long Overdue Post

I have been HORRIBLE about blogging this week.

It seems that the hectic schedule of the holidays has already caught up with us.

Everything is so much fun, but I feel like I'm hardly ever home - long days at work - fun activities in the evenings - family get-togethers on the weekends - then right to bed.

I feel like I'm hardly ever home during the daylight hours anymore.

Oh right. That's because I'm NOT!

cRaZy fun chaos - but my blogging time suffers.

I'm going to get a bit caught up on Thanksgiving weekend.

We stayed at The Inn At Port Ludlow.

We LOVE this hotel, have stayed there many times, and always enjoy our time there.

Here are some beautiful pictures of the Inn's grounds ...





On Friday (the day after Thanksgiving) we visited Fort Flagler and Fort Worden.

Both were so beautiful but apparently I'm only posting people-pictures. :)

I hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving!

Taters

I can't get enough of this girl ...

My god daughter is BEYOND adorable.

T-Day 2010

Happy Thanksgiving

I hope you were able to celebrate with loved ones.

Yippee!

No school again tomorrow!

So glad we're all able to stay home, where we're safe.

Looks like our 4-day weekend turned into a 6-day weekend!

Snow Day

What a beautiful day.

Check out these pics that Jay took on a frigid 20 degree walk today ...

Gorgeous.

Hope everyone is safely home.

Snowy Night

It snowed all day.

It's been snowing all night.

School is cancelled tomorrow.

Fun!

Weekend Wrap-Up

I've been working long hours, writing report cards and meeting with parents for conferences.

On Friday, I came home and crashed.

And by crashed, I mean I fell asleep at 7:00 pm and didn't wake up until 9:00 am the next day.

NICE!

On Sunday, I spent 9 hours making homemade chicken broth, and in the evening, I made chicken & wild rice soup.

Look how many containers it made:


Also, I hope some of you are noticing the BOX of Corbet Canyon wine behind the creamers!

Yep.

That's how I roll.

I'm happy to be back at work today.

It's snowing and Seattle is covered in a blanket of peaceful white.

Tomorrow I'm sure it will be brown, gunky sludge, so I'm soaking it all in today!

Water/Coffee Goal

I'm a self-professed terrible water drinker.

However, I make up for it in the area of Coffee Drinking.

I'm quite skilled actually.

Some may be jealous.

When I was doing Weight Watchers* I actually had to make a Water-Drinking Goal. Or perhaps it would better be titled as a Stop-Drinking-Coffee Goal.

I made it a point every day to be done drinking my coffee by the time my students went out for morning recess.

So basically I would chug down as must coffee as possible (which is actually difficult to do since you know, teaching involves talking, and talking is VERY difficult to do with a mouth filled with liquid glory).

The much-anticipated 10:30 recess bell would ring, and that was my signal to switch to water for the rest of the day.

I know, sad.

So, you can imagine my splendor of happiness when I quit WW (yah, I'm a quitter - but I accepted that about myself a long time ago when I dropped out of my Master's program) and the Stop-Drinking-Coffee Goal was null & void.

I DID however put limitations on my coffee intake by modifying the Stop-Drinking-Coffee Goal. I pushed back the 10:30 limit to 11:15.

Hooray!

11:15 is the time my students to go lunch.

So basically, I'd drink coffee all morning, and then will myself to ONLY bring my water bottle with me to the cafeteria.

There are days I falter and bring my coffee, but for the most part, I stay true to my goal.

All this being said, here is reason #1 that I love 1/2-days of school.

I may shock you by saying that reason #1 is NOT the conferences.

I'll give you a minute to absorb that one.

The #1 reason is (insert drum-roll) ...

I push the Stop-Drinking-Coffee Goal back to 12:20 on 1/2-days!

12:20 is the time the students get excused to go home ...

And the moment I switch to water.

Happy Drinking my friends!

What goals do you give yourself?

*Note: I'm still a member, but apparently I'm 'taking a break' from a lifestyle of healthy eating