bruises

I bruise like a peach. For real though. Emily decided to test it out one day and punch me in the leg, and yup, there was a bruise from it. As I was stumbling online, I found a tip about bruises. It said to apply a cotton ball dipped in white vinegar to a fresh bruise and it will go away faster, and not get as dark. I got a HUGE bruise right below my knee days before a wedding I was in, so I decided to try this trick. Here are the results.

Day 1a

Day 1b: Applying cotton ball

Day 2...better? Not quite sure

Day 3: No way is it better

Day 4a: Nope.

 Day 4b: I applied some makeup on it in hopes it wouldn't be as obvious with my bridesmaid dress. I think it just made my leg look really strange with those different colors.

My results are not good. However, maybe my bruise had been there too long and not fresh enough for it to work. Or maybe I didn't apply the vinegar cotton ball long enough? I will try it again and document the results.

run to the sun

I'm doing a 90 mile relay run from Mount Bonnell to Enchanted Rock in a month. It's going to be crazy because there will be 8 of us doing 2 legs each, running from Saturday afternoon through the night and finish at sunrise at Enchanted Rock. Someone said rattlesnakes might come out onto the road at night because the road will be warm still from the sun....awesome. We are trying to raise $5000 for Batten's Disease, and can use your help! Please see below for the link and more information. Thanks!

Teachers Together - Running With Purpose

Everyday, teachers are supported at Casis Elementary. Everyday, we are grateful for the support from our community, so we'd like to give back.  Eight teachers at Casis, one from every grade level, will be running in the Run to the Sun Relay supporting the Beyond Batten Disease Foundation.  

When you visit the link below, you can meet the Casis Young Guns Team, watch a touching video clip about Batten Disease, and you can make a donation.  We hope you can help us out on our mission to fund research to end Batten's Disease.  http://www.younggunsrun.com/beyond-batten-relay.html

new obsession

Amy introduced me to this new website StumbleUpon. I am obsessed! I can't stop stumbling and looking at all these websites. I did find one website that has the coolest cake recipe that I can't wait to make for someones birthday. (Maybe Miles' birthday?! It might be too girly of cake colors though. Maybe I could make it in camo colors?)

It's rainbow cake that you cook in a jar! You can even make it and then mail it to someone. Who's birthday is coming up? I want to make this cake!

they've arrived!

One of the big units we teach in second grade is butterflies. We even get a ton of painted lady caterpillars to grow and watch turn into butterflies. It's pretty awesome! I'm not going to lie though, I am always nervous once they get into their chrysalis because of what happened my first year. 

   *       *       *       *       *      *

So it was going great. The kids were so awesome about being careful with their caterpillar and not shaking the container, or killing them. Once they get into their chrysalis you have to be really careful not to shake them too much because they could fall, and if they fall they either die or come out all deformed. (Both scenarios make the kids cry.) Once they got into their chrysalis I had to transfer them from the little container they were in, into these two plastic cake containers. (They form their chrysalis to the paper in the cup in the above link's picture, and that gets taped to the cake container top.) So I talked to the kids about how they can't touch the containers, and it would probably be best if they put their hands behind their back and stood one step backwards when I let them go over and observe them. 

Everything was fine until one morning before school about a week later. That's when it happened. I was standing on a chair stapling some work to the wall above the shelf where the cake containers were. On my way down my hand hit one of the cake containers and it crashed to the floor, and ALL of the chrysalids FELL! Crap. I literally stood there for 2 minutes staring at it not believing what just happened. What do I do now? I ran next door with the container panicking and asked Nichole what I should do. She laughed and then shrugged her shoulders. So I did the only thing I could do. I ran outside with the container, dropped all of the chrysalids in a bush away from the classroom and ran back into my room before any students would come up and catch me.

I had 5 minutes to come up with what to tell the kids. No way could I tell them I did it! Especially after all the crap I gave them about not touching it, and keeping their distance. I finally thought of what to say. It was wrong. I knew it was wrong. But really, I had no other option since telling the truth was out. I told them I came to school that morning and it was on the ground. The custodian must have accidentally knocked it off the shelf. There were gasps, and shocked faces. My response? "See kids, that's why I keep telling you to be so careful and not touch the containers." They were pretty terrified to go over and look at them after that

   *       *       *       *       *      *

I haven't had any problems with them since then. Hopefully I didn't just jinx myself by saying that. But just in case, please cross your fingers for me.

another roommate bites the dust

Emily got married this past weekend! It was such a fun weekend, and all of the CHEPS (Conlin, Hodges, Ewing, Patterson, Sartain) girls were in town to celebrate. I picked Danni up from the airport on Friday, and we went to Maudie's for dinner that night. That was quite an interesting way to start the weekend to say the least. 

We sat down out on the porch and a minute later this guy comes in and sits behind us. He has scraggly hair, mutton chops, looks very disheveled, and can't stop moving. (He was totally on something.) He is by himself and asks for two waters, and then orders a margarita. I then hear him call someone and say he is freaking out because a cop pulled up behind him and so he parked and ran across the street and now there are 2 cop cars waiting for him. Then he called another friend and basically said the same thing. I was dying to know why he was freaking out so much! 

When he got his drink he came over to our table and said he just had to tell someone what was going on. (Didn't he just do that twice on the phone?) So he starts by apologizing for his lost voice because he's a singer in a band and just had a gig. Then he says his tags were over due and that's why the cops were after him, and that he didn't want to go to jail because he's never been in jail before. (Yeah right! Also something else was clearly going on, you don't go to jail for expired tags.) He then says he has pot stashed in his glove box and he's worried the cops will go through his open windows and find it. So he realized the cops were gone so he put his margarita on the sill and walked out, and then of course grabbed it off the sill, waved goodbye, and ran across the street to his car.

What a dummy. The cop pulled back in right behind him. At this point all of the waiters, Danni, and I were watching what was going on after he stole their glass. As I was telling all the waiters what was going on (several were quite interested in the part about the pot and then open window) he totally got arrested! Dinner was quite entertaining to say the least. 

Right before he was arrested.

Here's the rest of the weekend in pictures:

Friday night at the Tavern

Emily was having a little bit of a freak out, and was super hot. I was fanning her along with some others, and then even more people were holding cups of ice against her.

Cocktail hour! Look at Nat's huge belly full of twins!

Best favor ever! (I may have stolen someone's who didn't show up. I would've taken more but I thought someone might become suspicious when I walked out with a whole set of glasses.)

They're both German so everything had a German flair to it.

Nat eating cake. I told her to eat more because she was eating for 3, but she held back.

I don't think I've been to a wedding where so many dance circles happened. We even had a giant one for their dog Penny Lane when the song of the same title was played.

In the photo booth we had to use the chalkboard to write them a message, and I wrote this with our new name since 3 of the girls are now married.

One of many dance offs between these two.

Our send off! You can kind of see them back there. It was quite a risk giving a bunch of drunk people sparklers, during a burn ban.

Congrats Em and Matt!!!

kids these days

We started a week long unit on famous women (my boys were pissed and didn't get why we weren't going to do a study on famous men). The first thing I had them do was write down a list of famous women they have heard of and why they were famous. Here are some of the women they named:

• Rosa Parks
• Harriet Tubman
• Helen Keller
• Taylor Swift
• Lady Gaga
• Hannah Montana
• Miley Cyrus (yes, one student had both Hannah and Miley, I don't think she gets that it's the same person)
• Fergie
• Britney Spears (it's unclear if it's pre or post head shaving)

The only reason the first two were named is because we just studied them. After hearing the lists they made, I said "See guys, this is nuts. You are only naming are famous pop singers. This is why we need to learn about famous women that actually made a contribution to our world."

We also took a measurement test today. Part of what they need to be able to do in second grade is know how to measure things, as well as be able to estimate measurements. One of their questions was "About how many inches tall is a CD case." Easy enough, the choices were:

1. 5 centimeters
2. 5 inches
3. 5 feet
4. 5 yards

I had 4 kids come up and ask what a CD case was. I asked them if they knew what a CD was and only 3 of them said yes, but they didn't know what their cases looked like. WHAT?! Before anyone else asked me, I had to pull out a CD case just so my kids could answer the question. 

RIP CD's and CD cases. You had a good run there.