Thanksgiving 2010

The desserts kept in Myrna's bedroom.  Connor made two lemon meringue pies :)

We always called them Stuffing Balls - but Pretzel Dumplings might sound a little better...

Getting ready to say grace.

Myrna's busy kitchen with LOTS of food!

Myrna & Doug hosted Thanksgiving this year.  There were 30 of us in attendance.  Pop brought Mom to join us, and she did really well.  At the end of the evening, she said, "I love you" to Lee, which was unexpected & caught Pop, Lee & Myrna off-guard.  I guess since the Alzheimer's really took hold, she doesn't say that much anymore.

We met Jonathon's girlfriend Erin from Colorado, and Crystal turned 30 (which means Megan is also 30).  Brian also had his girlfriend from California (I can't recall her name at the moment, but she was very nice!).  Tony was there too, and he seems to be doing very well.  Trevor & Diana spent most of their time with Daniel, as usual.

Connor played a lot with Karrie & Shane's oldest & middle son.  They are rather rambunctious, and he had to hide from them now & then :)  He gets so far, and then it's too much :)

Besides the regular visiting & such, I kept tabs on Connor.  He loves the yard at this house, but it's pretty wide open, and I like to know where he is.  The cougar mounted on the wall was killed on the property, after all.  Connor's going to miss the house when it gets sold, but he's been very good about changes lately - including us missing the tree hunt this year.

Lee had to work at 5:00am yesterday (Black Friday) and he's also working today.  In the past we'd spend a couple of nights with someone in Medford and join in on the tree hunt on Saturday.  We are trying to figure out a different time to get our tree now.  There's a U-cut tree farm just outside of town.  They're more expensive than the $5 any-size tree tag to get from the mountains, but that doesn't count the cost of gas, food, etc. when you do that day trip.  And I'm not wanting us to go all alone to get a tree anyway.  Two years ago my co-worker & her husband were doing that, slid off the road & he had to trudge 12 miles to try to find help, while she stayed behind in their truck.  She wound up spending the night alone in the forest and burned the wood flooring and carpet of the truck to stay warm.  Eeek!  That was around the same time the Kim family got lost & Mr. Kim died of exposure trying to find help for his family :(

Anyway - there are plenty of places to get trees around town, even if we don't do the U-cut.  Connor is already more or less resigned to that.  However, we WILL have to take him up to the snow at some point for fun.  Probably some week day during the holiday break we'll go to the "Sno Park" and take him for that.

This coming Saturday I sign him up for Special Olympics Cross-Country Skiing anyway.  :)  I took the kids to see Tangled yesterday & Trevor & Diana will go see Harry Potter either today or tomorrow.  Then we have to get Diana back to Eugene & everyone goes back to school for two weeks (college) or three (Connor & me).

At least it warmed up & driving is safe again :)

Prepping for Open House

Yes, I know it isn't even Thanksgiving yet, but I have to parcel out my weekends so I have everything done that I want done.  There was enough of a break in the weather today to allow me to rip out all the dead wild sweet pea stalks in my front planter.  I went out to put bark mulch around my baby hydrangea to hopefully protect its roots from frost.  I think I read that in a book somewhere.  Anyway, I still had some bark mulch and I had to clear the weeds out of the front planter before I could put it down.  I have a bunch of bulbs in there that will be fine poking up through that, but I'd prefer to not have to yank out a bunch of grass when the daffodils are blooming.

In any case, I went ahead and made up my little invites for Open House that I can pass out at work & stuff.  I won't do that until a couple of weeks before - it's on Sunday, December 12th this year, so I still have some time.  I'm also composing the Christmas letter so I don't wind up sending it in January as has happened a couple of times :(  We will take the family photo at Thanksgiving at Myrna's house.  Lee is working on the following Saturday, so we won't be able to do the mountain & tree one this year.  That's okay, I think it's been a few of those in a row again anyway.  I'll order the photo cards & should be able to get those out on time :)

I also worked on the menu for Open House today.  Usually we make everything pretty much, but dang - Costco sure has a lot of great pre-done stuff!  I have to see what the cost difference is.  Like I'd usually make the spinach dip, but the one at Costco looks pretty inexpensive.  After I add up the ingredients, if it's a push - I'm getting it at Costco!  I know the chips are cheaper there too.  I had Lee take a photo of the regular price at the store on the crackers the other night to see how they compare to Costco as well.  I'll be pricing things as I go & get the stuff I need to make my share of the Thanksgiving food - probably tomorrow.

Obviously, some things will be homemade still.  Trevor's fudge, Diana's (she hasn't decided yet), Connor's Rice Krispie treats, my Stollen.  Lee usually preps the veggies & dip, but he will probably be working through some of Open House.  We'll ask to have him be scheduled as early as possible - he never has Sunday off because it's time & a half.

The cleaning part is pretty much on schedule.  I am procrastinating on clearing the dressers in my room right now, but they'll be done by the weekend.  I'm working on some knitting & intend to do some sewing too.  The knitting is easiest, because I can work on it during my lunch break at school.  The sewing shouldn't take too long if it goes the way I hope (you never know).

As for Thanksgiving, at this point Lee has Wed-Thur-Fri off, but we're not sure that's right as Lee  has heard EVERYONE works Black Friday.  We will head down to Myrna's on Thursday, and we don't know yet if we have to drive home the same night, or if we might crash at Pop's and leave in the morning.  I'm not a fan of mountain passes in the dark with winter weather.  As I said, we will have to miss the tree hunt this year though.  I'm going to have to figure out a different time to get Connor up into the snow to play.  He's already looking forward to it.

Elephant Car Wash (my footage)

Video from German TV on the "Elefanten Car Wash"

My cousin, Heiner, contacted me today thru Facebook - he saw us on TV!  So here's the link :)

German TV station RTL Elephant Car Wash

Click the link!

Elephant Car Wash

Life is funny.  I was home on Friday because our school opted to use the day after Veterans Day for conferences.  Around noon or so I get a call from our neighbors who run the comic book shop downtown.  Our local drive-through style zoo is going to be featured on a German TV morning show.  They wanted to have a family do the "elephant car wash" so they can put that in the clip.  Wildlife Safari called the comic book shop, because they figured they'd know families.  Heh.  Comic book shops know kids who buy comics.  They don't know whole families that shop for comics together.  However, the folks running THIS shop are our neighbors, and they knew we'd done TV stuff before, so they called us.  I got the number of the guy in New York who was planning this out, and called him.  At first I looked at the wrong schedule & thought Lee could join us.  He actually had to work.  However, the fact that I can speak German was very exciting to the New York guy anyway.  So this morning, the boys & I drove out to Wildlife Safari for the elephant car wash :)

Dan, the manager at Wildlife Safari, with Silke, the German reporter.  

Alice the elephant flapped out her ears when spraying.

Lots of water in the trunk!!

Silke & Douglas the camera guy, interviewing the elephant handler.

Alice wipes the window with a sponge.  Connor thought this whole experience was great :)

Connor's How to Make Juicy Lemon Cake

This was last Sunday :)  Sorry I couldn't figure out how to add music like Diana did.  Enjoy folks!

S.O. Swim Meet 2010 Freestyle 25m

S.O. Swim Meet 2010 Backstroke

Bunch of Stuff

I have the day off today.  Connor had Friday off because our town did the inservice day then.  I'm working in a different town, and they chose to have their inservice day AFTER Halloween - which I actually thought was pretty smart :)

Anyway - I'm home today since I had no inservice to attend (yay), and trying to get stuff done that typically escapes me during the week.  My list grew to 18 items.  So far, I've gotten eight done.  I'm currently heating the iron to do Lee's shirts.

Granted, some of these things are fun (like dropping off a travel bug for geocaching), but others are pretty menial, like finishing the laundry.  Others just need time, like sorting out Connor's clothes he's outgrown.  Still others will be moved to tomorrow's list when they don't get accomplished today.

I have been productive - I got a document notarized, talked with Financial Aid about Trevor's account (they are very slow & he still hasn't gotten his award letter), and I did my physical therapy exercises twice of three times so far today.  I only have one laundry load left (but then I need to sort & fold - I may delegate that to Trevor after he reads his assignments).

I still have my Girl Scout Leader meeting tonight, and some sewing I'd like to get done, although I did get some things sewn yesterday afternoon, too.  It's a good day for this sort of thing; overcast & windy.  I'm not missing out on great weather by doing chores & running errands.

Iron's hot now, so off I go.

Halloween 2010 more

This was at school on Thursday - I had made this costume a LONG time ago for Diana at her request.  It was just stuck in a tub under the house for years, so I pulled it out to bring in to school.  I figured if one of the Jr. High kids didn't have a costume, I could give it to them.  Turns out one kiddo thought it was pretty dang cool, so he wore it to school on Friday :)  I was happy to get rid of an oversized pillow, but I kept the wig.  

Saturday  morning we had our TOPS workshop at the library.  Different clubs bring a raffle basket, and this was ours.  Our "trick" to getting lots of tickets sold is to have real money as part of the basket.  This year it was $25 in cash.  Tickets are a dollar each, or 6 for $5.  I had to go bring Connor to Special Olympics, so I don't know yet who won our basket.

This was my treat from Lee.  Costco has these chocolate-covered caramel apples for $4.99 in the bakery dept.  They are massive though, and even cutting it into quarters took three days to eat!  Really tasty tho - I love caramel apples :)

Halloween 2010

Connor drew on the design, and then I did the gutting & carving.

It came out pretty cute, right?  His name is "Jack."

Cute Cowboy Connor.  He had to wear my cowboy boots, since Diana took the pair he'd outgrown.

We have some folks in this town that do a great job with costumes.  This is my favorite this year.  And he was such a nice guy!!  EVERYONE was taking photos with him :)  

After we got home, Connor took off all the costume clothes & wiped off the mascara moustache, and said, "I'm normal again!"  Hee.

Mack the Knife

The first Choir concert

Last night Connor had his first choir concert.  Last year he took art class, and brought home some interesting clay pieces - this year the schedule worked to have him try choir.

When I asked the choir teacher at conference time how he thought Connor would do on stage, he didn't have any idea.  Sometimes Connor sings extra loud, and he's managed to teach himself to read music, so while his class sang the melody, he'd sing the harmony (all by himself!).  So, not always following directions.

Last night, however, he was just so excited to be there and on stage.  Lee & I sat up close in front so if there was any issue, we could snag him quick and get him offstage so he wouldn't affect the rest of the performers too much.

No worries - he stood straight & tall, sang the correct part, and kept his voice level appropriate for the stage :)

Great stuff & a great first effort for him.  He let us know later that night that he wants to sing in the choir in High School -  We really enjoyed watching him up there.  The video below is a clip from "Shenandoah" and the one above is Mack the Knife (which I'm uploading right now).

:)

Connor's 1st Choir Concert

Preparing the eggs

First, you draw faces on the eggs.  They should all be happy.

Use a crayon, because Sharpie goes through the shell.

These eggs are happy eggs.

Until you crack them.  Then they scream (you'll need to make the noise like Connor does).  Then put X's on the eyes, if the shells are still whole enough.  He has an interesting mind, my son :)

Lack 'O Posts

I know I've been bad about posting lately. One reason is I can't access blogger (or facebook, or anything else interesting) from the computers at school. Everything is "Access Denied!" I used to use my lunch break to post when I was working full time.

Another problem is the things going on right now are on the confidential side. Most of my time & energy with work has been centered on one student, who gets off on hurting others.

Yesterday, the police had to be involved and that student is no longer in my class.

That's pretty much all I can say.

I should be doing happier posts soon again, now that I'm not stressed so much about going to work & wondering if I'll manage to continue catching chairs being thrown my way...

Aw Diana

She had to break up with her boyfriend today. He was apparently clueless as to his lack of boyfriendy behavior.

First off, they "got together" to be BF & GF before they ever went on a date. They had hung out together in group stuff, mostly other kids from church.

Just before heading home for summer, Diana had initiated the 'relationship' by letting him know she liked him. See, that would have been a cue to go on a DATE. But they kind of went straight to 'go steady.' When I pointed this out to my daughter, she said that kids date differently now. Um... yeah.

So they had a big hug (no kiss) and then they both went home for the summer. Sure, they texted & phoned now & then, and he even came over during fair week and spent a couple of nights in the trailer. More hugs. Still no kissing.

Also, when we'd gone to the fair, and we were waiting at the Billy Idol concert, Diana decided she wanted fries. There was a huge line. First, no offer from him to get them, or even go with her - I wound up going & keeping her company. Then later when she wanted a drink, the same thing again - he just sat like a lump. Even with the dark rides & other opportunities, there was no kissing. Hmmm.

So last month she gets back to school. By now, he's not really texting much to her anymore. She's back in her place, and he's in a new place - no call to come check his place out, or stopping by to see her.

On Wednesday, they see each other at church. She asks if they're going to actually go out together any time soon. He says he hasn't been much of a boyfriend (doh) and another hug.

Friday night there's a spaghetti dinner at church. When Diana is ready to leave, she has to find him & there's a quick hug. He knows she has to walk home in the dark through an area that is not the safest - no offer to walk her home or help her find a ride or anything.

That was the final straw. She was pretty upset.

Basically, she was carrying the whole relationship. It even sounded to me like he didn't care about her much anymore, and so it should be pretty painless to him to break up.

I told her to make a list of stuff she had expected out of having a boyfriend (like, oh, say - going on DATES), and see how many things he'd done. Zero.

So - not much of a boyfriend (boyfriend) but he's the only one I got...

He got a clue when she changed her facebook status from "in a relationship" to "it's complicated" and finally called her. She set up a meeting on campus today to talk to him.

He was totally blindsided. He said he thought she was mad at him. Well, in a way he's right. That's probably NOT the best way to handle it though - ignoring your girlfriend. He tried to tell her he had a present coming for her if she was still his girlfriend (wtf?), so she said nope. She did list off the things she had expected from him that never happened. And she let him know that if he wanted to ask her out in the future (like next year) that she might be okay with going out for starters. But she's already decided it was too much work with him.

She grew up with parents that are more partners in life than anything else. She needs a guy who will contribute to the relationship & be a best friend to her. Not a puppy, doing what she tells him to do.

Honestly - for a first break-up, it could have been a LOT harder on her. The pain of this one is already being repaired with the help of girlfriends & ice cream. Go Diana!

Connor's Cooking Show

I can't figure out how to burn a DVD with my system - I am missing something, but dislike downloading programs.  So I'm posting this to my blog so I can access it from anywhere to share with others :)

This probably doesn't happen to you...

Yesterday, about 8:30pm I'm at my computer & Connor comes in.  I have a photo of him on my computer desktop holding a line with a fish on the end from his Summer Camp this year.  Connor says, "I have the fish!"  and leaves the room.  No biggie.

He comes back in the room a minute later holding a plastic bag with 6 almost-foot-long fish in it.  I think they're rainbow trout (there's a pinkish line along the side).  Huh, what?

I knew his class did a field trip to the fishing pond, but usually it's just catch & release.  I didn't expect to find fish in his backpack, so I didn't look.

They aren't cleaned or anything - just the whole fishies in a bag.  I stuck the whole thing in the freezer.

I have no idea what I'm supposed to do with them now...

Ouchie-wa-wa

I've been going to the physical therapist regularly for my shoulder, and it is getting better.

Thing is, every time he treats me, he's forcing the shoulder up higher, and out further than it wants to go.  He eases it as much as he can, but there's a definite stopping point where I grimace and say, "Yeah - that's it!"  And he'll say, "Yup, that's not going any higher."  OUCH!!

Still, I'm doing my exercises at home and at work when I can, and I am improving by 3 - 5 degrees each time, which he says is really good.

I'm scheduled through the rest of September, but then I'm going to have to take a break due to change in insurance.  As of October 1, my new insurance will take effect.  I am going with the least expensive (highest deductible) because about a month later, Lee will get a much better rate for the family than I could get at my job.  I will have already been locked in, and can't change my coverage by that time.  We'll be double-covered, but mine won't kick in unless there's a big need (which we hope won't happen!).

If I change to a different job that has less hours, my insurance will be gone anyway (my eventual plan) and we'll just have Lee's regardless.

The nice thing is the physical therapist I have is pretty cool.  I told him I wouldn't be able to come in October, and he said he was fine with having me come in weekly at no charge so he can keep monitoring my progress.  :)  Once Lee's insurance kicks in, I'll get the actual therapy again :)  Or maybe I'll be better by then?  It's supposed to heal faster now that I'm past 90%...