So far, so good...

Just a quick little update after that last exasperating post...

1. Only 15 more IA's left to grade...and I've only had them for 4 days. I can breathe again.

2. Christmas cookies WILL be made on Saturday evening - the little one and I are hanging out together while the men are at the basketball game and we will be baking fools.

3. Christmas decorations will go up on Sunday - inside and out.

4. Everything I needed to do this week both at home and school got accomplished. I don't know where the energy came from, but it was there and mentally, I'm WAY better than I was on Sunday last week.

5. Just for fun, I've posted my favorite pic from last week's Thanksgiving festivities.

The Most Suffocating Time of the Year...

Damnit...it's happening again. I spent nearly every minute of Thanksgiving Break making sure it wouldn't it, but it's happening again. Yep. Three weeks of hell till Christmas Break. I got the senior IA's graded, finished the laundry, cleaned my entire house, cooked Thanksgiving dinner for my mom, got every chore I could think of finished, plus found time to hang with my kids and go to the museum and out to dinner and all that jazz only to have tonight come along and remind me of all the stuff I still have left to do before Christmas.

Every time I think about the fact that the junior's IA's need to be graded after tomorrow night, I start to hyperventilate.

I hate the fact that the entire semester is finished before Christmas. I hate it. I'm starting to hate Christmas more and more the older I get and adding the end of the semester to the fun that is a mom trying to pull Christmas out of her butt is no fun at all. The whole working mom thing is no fun at all. None.

I didn't want Christmas to shake down this way...but with school obligations, the oldest's basketball schedule, the little one and her ballet, and the husband's constant obligations at his school doing basketball stats and another 8 meetings he won't tell me about till the day of, I'm drowning...and Thanksgiving Break isn't even over yet.

My kind of town...

'bout a month ago, the family and I took a quick little jaunt west to Chicago for a weekend.

It was a gorgeous weekend, crisp autumn air, pretty lights along Michigan Avenue, nice breeze off of Lake Michigan, and I got to see Katydid as a special bonus.

Here's how things shook down.

The husband got a great deal on a really cool hotel on Priceline. Check out The Avenue. We only paid $90 a night and we were 1/2 a block from Michigan Avenue - right around the corner from the Nike store. It was a tall hotel - forty floors with a pool on the roof. The kids were fascinated with the whole 40 floors thing.



First night, we had pizza at Gino's East. It was the first Chicago style pizza for the other three and they were very impressed. The whole drive up, I kept telling everyone not to eat, to save the hunger for the pizza...they didn't believe me. And then, it came. We weren't able to finish it, but what we did eat, we enjoyed.



Next morning, we grabbed a cab and went to The Shedd Aquarium - another favorite of mine. I've been three or four times, so I was very excited to show the kids the oceanarium and the show. The show has changed since I've seen it last (10 years ago, go figure) and now it's even cooler than ever. The show at the oceanarium features dolphins, belugas, sea lions, red tail hawks and penguins. The sea lion came right up to our seats, as did the hawk. The oldest has always been fascinated with hawks, so having one an arms' length away was a pretty big deal for him - even as a jaded 13 year old. When he was little, he loved the zoo. We went once a week. He was a zoo overnight camper, went to zoo class for at least a week each summer and drew lots of pictures of animals all the time. It was cool to see a glimpse of that little boy again.




After The Shedd, we walked to The Navy Pier. This was the most challenging part of the trip. The hubby typed in the address of Navy Pier onto the GPS of his phone and said the total mileage was only like 1.2 miles from The Shedd to Navy Pier...so it's not like it was far. However, if you listened to the little one, you might have thought it was going to be an eighteen mile trek across the desert during the dry season with a large dung beetle hot on your tail. It was not that bad. It was a really nice day and it was really pretty on Lake Michigan. We're really happy we made the walk, but the kids still act like they were abused.


We did a little shopping on Michigan Ave, met Katydid by the Hancock building and ate a little gelato and took off the next morning. We're going back again this summer. We've got plans to visit the Field Museum, do more shopping, go back to The Shedd, spend a little more time at Navy Pier, and enjoy the pool that was on the roof of the hotel.

A Bit of Advice

If you stupidly cut your finger really bad, don't put the bandage on too tightly in a way to overcompensate to stop the bleeding. You might not sleep very well for two nights and it will be no one's fault but your own.

Blood is an important thing and all your body's tissues need it. When they're not getting enough of it, they let you know and it's incredibly painful.

Stupid...

It's getting very interesting...

I'm really enjoying the fact that the Bengals are having a winning season. Two wins against the Steelers is pretty much enough for me to qualify the season as a success. That's good stuff.

I'm also enjoying the fact that the Bengals are looking toward making things a little more interesting this year. Signing Larry Johnson could be an extremely beneficial (and affordable) move for the team. According to the pic above, the guy can fly...

I know I'll be rooting for him against the Browns on the 29th of this month. I'm also happy that this year when I get to make my annual trip to PBS the game is going to matter.

Oh, and favorite line from the MNF announcers tonight: "I'm waiting for Brady Quinn to DO something..."

yes...and so is all of Cleveland.

I believe...

I grew up Catholic, went to Catholic school and church every Sunday and holiday. While I don't subscribe to every single doctrine of my church, I do believe in a higher power. I don't know exactly where my belief begins and where it ends because I question lots of biblical teachings and know that, rationally, lots of it is complete bull.

I also grew up in the United States where church and state are supposed to be separate. In my little Catholic school jumper and saddle shoes, I learned how we are all free to practice our faiths as wish. And even though the only faith I ever came into contact with was my own, I believed this happened in my country. I knew there were other churches in my little neighborhood and I knew people attended them and I was fine with that.

I'm not threatened by the beliefs of other people. I'm fine with the fact that other people believe things different from me. I'm also fine with the fact that some people don't believe at all. Great, awesome, welcome to America where we can all believe what we want and no one hurts each other or has to practice their faith in secret.

We can even put up billboards:






Oh wait...not in Cincinnati we can't. In Cincinnati, if you put up a billboard like that, you get death threats and you have to take it down within 48 hours. Yeah...you get death threats from the people who believe in God and are supposed to be Christian. I remember a song we used to sing in Catholic school "They'll know we are Christians by our Love." I remember hating the melody but thinking the lyrics were a nice message...that a Christian would be so obvious because of their unconditional love for each other and the rest of humanity. I'm pretty sure even Catholic school jumper and saddle shoes Calen didn't believe you were supposed to make death threats against the non-believers. I'm pretty sure even that Calen knew that making death threats (even to people who are publicly admitting they don't believe in God) isn't very god-like or Christian.

And I'm pretty sure lots of other people know that too...

New Shoes

I need to buy some new gym shoes. The ones I've been using are getting pretty worn and I'm starting to feel the familiar warning signs of shin splints so I'm going to need to get a new pair pretty quick or my legs are going to start hurting to the point where they keep me up at night.

I'm usually a Nike or Saucony kind of girl when it comes to the walking shoes, but the ads for these Reebok Easy Tones promise that your legs and butt will look better just from wearing these shoes. So...I'm gonna give them a try. I walk for 45 minutes every day in regular shoes and my legs and butt look presentable.

In these new super shoes, maybe that super model career I've always dreamed about can finally come true.