Garden Update for May

My baby rhody in bloom.
The calla lilies apparently don't die no matter what.
Double peony doubling over from rain.

New growth on the transplanted little Douglas Fir.
Hydrangeas in their cage.
Snowball bush in full bloom.



The very messy rosebush after a strong wind with rain.

Oregon State Recognition Days in Seaside

At the site where Lewis & Clark reached the Pacific Ocean (according to the plaque). Seaside is a couple of hours to the west of Portland. These are my roomies as well as a couple of other ladies from our club.
Seaside is a great convention town.
On the balcony of my room just before the KOPS alumni go to inspire all the TOPS. I knitted the purple wrap during the convention because it gets too cold for me with the air conditioning!


With our area captain, Arlene.
Grilled salmon! Yay!
Lots of people were out crabbing this weekend :)
On our way home - we were so high up above Tillamook Bay, it felt like being in a plane!
This is me with last year's Oregon State King, Ryan. He has Down's Syndrome and just spent the last year visiting chapters all over Oregon, as well as going to the International conference in Florida last summer to represent our state with all the other states & Canadian provences. Pretty cool!!

It was a beautiful day for a Sunday drive down the coast!

My Mean Streak

I'm reading "The Witches" by Roald Dahl to my students at school. It's a kid's book & we'll watch the movie when we're done. But it's kind of freaking them out a bit. I'm using it to teach them differences between real & fiction. I don't know if they're getting it though.

But I'm gonna keep reading it anyway.

Happy Mother's Day!

Here's what Diana sent me just after midnight last night :)

I love how she has us wearing our 'real' clothes. Those boots she has on are the ones we bought when we went up to visit for my birthday. I'm wearing the boots, shirt & jeans I got from Macy's when she went shopping with me after Christmas :)

Happy Mother's Day to my Mami - I hope the card made it in time!

Happy Mother's Day to Mom K - I hope that card came in time too!

Happy Mother's Day to my sisters & sisters-in-law. You are all wonderful, inspiring mothers to your children!!!

Happy Mother's Day to all of us - I hope everyone gets a nice day doing things you love with your families!

:)

Missing it

To help figure out Trevor's way of studying - I'm tutoring him through an online intro to sociology class. This is pretty easy for me - after all, my Bachelor's degree is all connected with Soc & Psych stuff anyway - I took a number of Soc classes for my degree.

I have him set up on a schedule (which he promptly mislaid - so now it's stuck to the wall). He is supposed to read his chapter and the supplemental texts, as well as post something on the online forum & read the lecture notes. The online forum is pretty cool - you can't see anyone else's answer until after you've posted your own :)

I have been skimming the texts, and then sitting in on his quiz at the end of the week.

The quizzes are timed at 30 minutes each. The first one he took in 10 minutes, and then clicked on the 'submit' key before I could stop him. He missed 3 of 20 questions - which isn't BAD - but it didn't have to BE.

The next time, I advised him to answer everything first, and then go back and check his answers, starting with the ones he was least sure about. After all, it's open-book and you can DO THAT. He got 95% on the next test.

The following quiz, he was *sure* about a couple of answers, so he didn't want to double check them. Turns out different theorists have similar theories, but they use their own terminology. He got tripped up on the terms and didn't match the correct theorist, although it WAS the same idea...

This last time around, I skimmed the chapter he had also read, and I didn't read the other texts. If I had - I would have noticed the chapter topic was all about methods of research, whereas the supplemental readings were all about business environments. He was on Unit 5, but the text should have been Chapter 7. He read Chapter 5.

Within a few minutes of looking at the quiz, I recognized the questions were not at all about what had been in what I'd skimmed. Trevor was just confused. He actually insisted he'd read the right chapter. I had him go through the quiz and answer what he could to the best of his ability, while I quickly looked at the next few chapters and figured out it should have been Chapter 7.

I was able to help him find the right terms, but we didn't really have time to check everything. He wound up hitting the "submit" button at 1:26 to go (he kind of freaked when the 5 minute warning came up).

He wound up with 90% - which is pretty decent (especially since he read the wrong chapter - although there are only 10-12 questions for that - the rest are the supplemental readings & lecture notes).

Lesson this week? Don't assume the chapter number matches the unit number. I'm glad I was able to move him past the panic of having read the wrong chapter & get him back on track for the test. It could have been a LOT worse.

Acupuncture

I'm trying it. I have been twice so far for pain in my shoulder. It is most likely a combination of stress & straining. I have had a couple of knots at the base of my neck for at least two years. I've tried various massage therapists, with one gal even using her elbow as hard as she could to try to loosen the knots - it didn't work.

The knots don't bother me so much, but now I have pain radiating to my left shoulder and down my arm. I'm guessing that came from pulling Connor behind me when he first started cross-country skiing. I know I had pain in my pectoral muscles from that, and I think the angle was bad for my shoulder as well.

Anyway - it's gotten to the point where it wakes me at night. I have to take ibuprofen or something to manage the pain, so I decided to give acupuncture a try.

After the first visit I was good until about 4 days later. Today she did a few things different, and we'll see how long it takes to come back again this time. She used a cigar thing this last time to heat the needles until I told her it was too hot. Interesting.

My shoulder is good right now... The knots are still there. It's hard to say if they're any smaller though.

I also have some chinese herbs to use to help things along..

I'll post again next week on how it's going.

Today's work

I wanted to do some stuff to spruce up my front walkway. I have to be aware of what is or isn't 'deer resistant' since otherwise I'm just setting out a buffet :P

These are called Gazania, and they should grow 8 - 10 inches high. I'm not sure if they spread out or not, so I left some room.

This is the whole petunia pony-pack all in one hanging basket. These are the type that are supposed to hang out & over the basket.

Here's my little fence thing so no one goes off the end of the concrete by accident. I put a little birch tree in the large pot on the right. I have managed to keep that Christmas flower plant alive for four years now :) Ta da! Tidied front walk!

For Rita

Here's the matted composition of family photos I put together for Lee's Mom.

I used different color pens to denote the families of the various siblings. For example, Kraig & Nancy, their kids and the grandkids are all listed in red.

If you click on the photo, it will go to full screen :)

Happy Birthday Cole!

That's actually a card Connor got this year from Donna & Jim. He likes it really well, and I thought it would be fun to have him share it with Cole. I don't think he understood me saying 'sing' and heard 'said' or something like that instead...

Happy Birthday Cole!!

Test Driving fundraiser

While we were in Glide, their High School was doing a fundraiser. The Ford Motor Company does a deal for certain schools where they allow people to test drive their cars, fill out a survey, and then the school gets $20 for each household that participates. They can get up to $6,000 depending on how many folks come out to test drive.
We tested the Edge first. Nice car :) It's a very spacious SUV with all the bells & whistles.

Then we tried the Escape. This is a compact SUV, and reminded me of our Ranger. The seats fold way down so the whole bed is flat if you need it that way. This would be a great Dad-Mom-Connor camping car :) This one had a sun roof, which was nifty :)

Finally, we tried the new Focus. This is the only one we'd ever consider trying to get. This was a stick shift. The A/C worked great, and it had lots of neat stuff tucked in & around it for comfort. There was all kinds of room in the back. It wouldn't work work our family all together, but as a commuting/get around town/something for the kids to use car - it's great! Nice MPG too - 35 to 40 :)

That was fun :)

Wildflowers & Running

These are the lilacs one of my students gave me yesterday. They are out on the front porch because the scent is REALLY strong! It was a little overpowering in the classroom :)

This was the check in for registration for the 10K run, 5K walk/run & 1 mile walk.

We had breakfast while waiting for Lee to run past. :)

This is the guy who won - far & away the fastest. The 2nd place guy took another 10 minutes to show up. This guy has won the Portland Marathon, and the locals say he runs everywhere he goes. Later on, he ran past with a double jogging stroller with 2 kids.



In the community center, there was this great display of the local flora :)

I thought these were pretty cool.

Trevor surprised me a bit - he recognized all the stuff that grows in our backyard. Maybe he should consider botany?

48 & Feeling Great!

Well, great enough. I am making an appointment to see an acupuncturist for my shoulder...

But other than that - yeah!

Anyway, with a birthday in the Spring & having really nice weather, last weekend after all that yardwork, I had a couple of things I wanted to do in the yard. One was to take out the dead plum tree (after two years, it's not coming back) and replace it with a little pine tree that has been pining away in a planter (ha!). I also wanted to plant either a hydrangea or a rhododendron - both grow really well in our climate. I wasn't sure which one.

After church on Sunday, Lee & I went to Lowe's and found the rhodies & hydrangeas right next to each other. Turns out I could get both plants for about $20, so that's what we did. We put the rhody in to grow & hide the concrete walkway, and the hydrangea should grow to offer some privacy in the backyard. That's the plan, anyway.

My actual birthday fell on a Thursday. I got a call from my mom first thing in the morning to wish me a Happy Birthday. Right after I hung up, the phone rang again & someone & their kids were singing Happy Birthday to me! After they were done, the woman says, "Do you know who this is?" I said, "No - you guys sounded great, and my family always puts a cha-cha-cha in between verses!" It was AnnaMarie Vandewalle with McKenna, Lauren & Patrick :D That was just really sweet :) Then I got on my computer, and I had about SEVENTY birthday wishes from different friends & family! WoW!!!

Thursday is also a weigh-in day, and I tend to be super-strict with my food, especially since I'd been inching up on the scale lately. The teacher I'm working with gets this, and so she brought me a big bouquet of daisies, instead of taking me out after work, which would have been her plan :) So I stayed 'safe' calorie-wise all day :)

After work, Connor had his Special Olympics track practice. I baked my carrot cake & set it out to cool. Then I picked up Lee & we headed to the college track. Trevor met us there. He had a mug for me that says "I'm on my way to a MEETING to discuss what we MET about at our last MEETING." Apparently, I go to a lot of meetings (between Girl Scouts, TOPS, Bible Study and work - I guess I do!).

Right after the practice, Lee & I went to TOPS. I won the pledge contest (chances were good - besides me, there was only Lee & one other person who made their pledges!). Then I was on for the educational program as well. I talked about "Diet Traps." I guess most of the members in the group thought they fell into most of the traps - oops!

After that, Lee & I went to Red Robin for a nice dinner. I had a good salmon burger :)

When we got home, I made my cream cheese frosting for my cake. I didn't eat any because I was still full from dinner - I started my day with it today though :P I put in pineapple, extra carrots & coconut - YUMMY!!!

Connie called me in the evening & we had a nice chat. I'm really looking forward to getting up to Canada in June! Yay!!

At school today, I brought cake to share too. We did a little field trip with a picnic & some geocaching. At the second cache there's a feed store & they had little bunnies, so we had to hold those too. And I got myself a birthday present with a nice gardening hat :)

Tomorrow we'll go to the Wildflower Show in Glide. Lee wants to run in the 10K, and they are doing a fundraiser for the high school there where you drive new Ford vehicles & then fill out a survey - it's free for us to drive :) Sunday we'll go to Eugene & visit with Diana.

So... I guess we'll see what this year brings!

Out in the yard

Yesterday was the first nice day we've had that was warm enough to work in the yard. Trevor did a great job on the mowing (we're on 1/3 acre, and it's hilly - not the best to mow!). Lee spent a good couple of hours cutting back the overgrown blackberry vines. I worked in the little bits of the yard I've actually tried to tame - my rose bush planter, clearing around the lilac bush & also some gladiolas. You need decent gloves for gardening around here - the blackberries hid in the weeds & you can grab a hunk of crabgrass & have thorns go right through the glove - ouch!

I had also asked Trevor to mow the grass really short in a trail for Connor. Now that he has his bike, he likes to try to ride around the backyard. As he likes to do the same path over & over, he'll create a nice little trail for himself pretty soon.

Connor kept himself busy digging "the cave." I'm not sure why he wants a cave, but he's using a pickaxe, a big shovel and a camp shovel to do it. He's got the wheelbarrow that he's filling as he goes, and it seems the cave is currently being dug straight down in a slope, so it's really more of a hole. That's fine. I can see where he is & what he's doing, vs. digging in the poison oak in the wilder back part of the yard :)

We'll see what he does today with it...

Spring pics

I got some bulbs through Breck's a long time ago. The tulips that were just single blooms are now 5-6 blooms to a bunch :) The wood hyacinth are nice, big bunches now too.

Some of these have bent over from heavy rains, but they are still okay. There's a purple iris about to bloom in back, and you can just see the little round purple ball of a peony bud just above the yellow tulip on the right.

This is my front door planter & I love the strawberry & creme tulips in there :)

This was just one bulb when I planted it...

Our mutant grass. It should be dry enough to mow next weekend!

Trevor Trials & Tribulations

First off, I have to thank Diana, because she's proving its not all me. *sigh*

Trevor has had a tough time with college. After not being very successful at Oregon Institute of Technology (although he absolutely LOVED being there), he came home and started attending our local community college. He has to take the bus, because he isn't driving (with no job, there's no car). He hasn't been as successful here at home as I'd hoped either, even with Lee & I "encouraging" him frequently.

In order to help him try for higher grades, he's been taking the minimum units needed to be full time (vs. Diana, who crams as many classes as she can in, so that she's already considered a Junior in her Sophomore year). This means, however, that if he fails any classes, he no longer has enough grade units to qualify as full-time. In addition, he has to have x-amount of successful units each term to qualify for Free financial aid.

So this last term, he let things slide more than he thought. He kind of lied by omission when we'd ask him if he'd turned in all his homework (this works in his head, somehow). He turned in his assignments incomplete. Or missed the date due, so was docked points, or didn't realize a question on the syllabus was part of the assignment. Stuff like that. Due to this, he got a D in Chem, and a D in CAD. This was his second time taking the Chem class. *sigh*

I really, really don't understand how his brain works.

He gets up in the morning, has to walk through all kinds of weather (in the dark for most of this term), has to sit next to strange people on the bus (who can't drive for whatever reason), and attends all his classes. He had no absences. I think that's the only reason he didn't get F's in those classes.

Somehow, his brain is not getting that the most important thing is to get the work done & in to the instructor on time.

The first Monday of this term, Lee went with Trevor to the college to figure out if anything could be salvaged. I thought it was over, and I just wanted them to figure out what he'd have to do this term to be able to qualify for financial aid next term. Trevor has some money in his bank account (thanks Omi) so he's able to buy books and pay for a couple of classes. We signed him up for an online Sociology class, because I can tutor him through that here at home (so far, he's turned in everything on time for full credit & got 85% on his first quiz).

The first thing Lee discovered is the Special Ed counselor, whom Trevor had tried to visit at her office numerous times at the end of last term, has been out for THREE WEEKS due to her husband dying of cancer. No one had contacted Trevor to help him through the final weeks of last term, or finals or anything. The same sign saying "Be back at 2:30" had been on her door all that time. Again, with Trevor's disability, it never occurred to him to ask anyone else where his counselor was. He'd see the sign, and turn around & leave.

Lee asked someone in the office where the counselor was, and got the story about the dying husband. Then Lee asked who was taking over for the counselor, and was told he'd have to talk to an administrator. Trevor immediately got discouraged because now you're supposed to fill out papers, make an appointment, etc (following the rules), while Lee just went up to the door of the administrator, who looked up and asked, "Can I help you?" (Go Lee!).

Lee let her know about Trevor's situation, and she saw the need for expediency. She let them know who to see next, and what might be done to help Trevor. And small town-wise, this lady is Connor's Sunday School teacher (although they didn't recognize each other at first).

Lee & Trevor next went to see the CAD instructor, and then the Chemistry teacher. The CAD guy said, "Sorry - there's nothing I can do at this point" (which was what I expected). The prayers come through at this next point - for some reason (thank you, Lord), the Chemistry instructor was willing to hand back Trevor's incomplete assignments & labs and give him a couple of weeks to FIX THEM! She said that she had thought Trevor didn't "get" how some of the assignments were set out - so she was okay with him giving them another try.

So - we left him enrolled in the four classes for Spring Term, and he basically worked non-stop on those plus his old Chemistry for a week and a half. Last Wednesday, he met with the Chemistry teacher again. She accepted his old assignments, graded them, and raised his grade to a "C." She then accompanied him to the financial aid office, and helped him file the paperwork necessary to qualify for financial aid again. He should get his disbursement check this week. Thank you Chem teacher!

To insure this scenario doesn't happen again, I am going to be having Trevor review everything with me after his classes every week. I will tutor him with the Sociology, and we'll track everything that gets graded from all his classes, so he knows where he stands on everything.

I feel like we're back in Jr. High. I don't know when the counselor will be back, or if someone has been hired to take over her cases or what. That's the next step. In any case, I'm going to just have to be a lot more involved with Trevor, and hopefully teach him through this where the priorities are in college. I'm not very happy with the college dropping the ball like this on a Special Needs student, and we might have to take this further somehow with them. I'll talk to the administrator after Sunday School (I'm her assistant in the class, after all!!).

He just needs to get the AA and find a job that lets him work in his little cubicle!! He can go back to OIT when he's older and has matured past an immature 16-year-old mentality. It's so weird how he can be so academically bright, and be missing such key common sense parts! Grrrr.

Welcome to Asperger's Syndrome!!

Kinda Sorta Pretzels

I like watching Food Network's "Good Eats" with Alton Brown. He had an episode where he made pretzels, only instead of dipping them in lye, like my dad did, he made a boiling water & baking soda wash (a little safer).

I thought I'd give it a try. The dough did just what it was supposed to do, and using the egg yolk wash made the pretzels brown up very nicely, however...

They were soft. Like, all over. They were more like those mall pretzels, or maybe the kind you get at a ball park. I made rolls as well as standard pretzels, because I like using them like a sandwich - these will mash :(

The German pretzels my dad made were crunchy on the smaller bits & the crust was very crunchy. Only the middle was soft on my dad's pretzels.

So... while these tasted okay, I kind of like the crusty hard kind better.

These were also very moist inside. I'm used to a drier, chewier texture, instead of something more like a fresh potato roll.

Still, the baking soda wash worked pretty well. I wonder if I use my dad's actual recipe and try the soda wash, and then bake at the lower temp for a longer time if they would be more like the pretzels I'm used to having... Guess I'll have to experiment a little more.