The One Where I Confess That I am a Vandal(50-56)

Day 50


No, you are not looking at El Chupacabra. This poor little thing had to get two baths in one day. Not only does she like to dig, it was also raining. So the puppy formally known as "Snow" by the shelter we adopted her from looked more like mud. Don't you love the look she is giving the camera? She knows how to play it up already.

Day 51


Every week we have a different coloring page that introduces the stories we talk about in our Preschool choir. It is funny because Aaron HATED coloring when he was that age. In fact, that was his kindergarten teacher's only complaint about him. By the way, his fine motor skills could be a lot better if he would have not been a rebellious six years old.

One of our regular kids brought her little sister with her. I think her little sister is barely four. I made instant friends with her because I agreed to call her whatever she requested. It was good I had her on my side from the very beginning because she is a fire cracker. I had to constantly change the subject because she was bringing up conversations of death and destruction. She also kept moving her chair closer and closer to the door and tried to lock herself in the bathroom. Of course, she couldn't reach the light switch so her mission wasn't very successful.

Day 52


Look who came to pick me up! We overslept this morning by thirty minutes and I couldn't find my keys; therefore, the rest of the day I felt completely rushed and out of sorts. I did get the opportunity to be driven and picked up by my husband- and Lucy, in the afternoon. We are working on her car rides. We are driving to Austin next week to celebrate my dad's, brother's, and niece's birthday next week so I am hoping the five hour drive won't be too much of a disaster.

Day 53


First period, some of our kids go to general-ed classes. The other assistant goes with the students who go to art and I go with one who goes to a Human Services class. I never heard about it but it is a class that talk about different jobs that deal with people. The other assistant wasn't here today so I went over to art. They need more help over there because the general-ed kids are nuts and most of our kids are in that class. They art class was learning about the importance tracing and my kids insisted I do one. So here is a tractor I traced with me driving it. Yeah, I have already accepted the fact that art is not my forte.

Day 54


Knowing that we are going to my parents' house in the country next week, we decided we needed to start training Lucy with a leash. We went to one of our favorite places in Midland--the duck pond. Lucy did so well! There were a lot of dogs and toddlers and ducks, of course. She did not bark once. She got better and better on the leash the longer we were there. I am looking forward to whenever we take her to a real trainer. She has a lot of potential to grow into great dog from a sweet puppy.

Day 55


We usually go to this one Mexican food restaurant every Sunday, Usually I am the one requesting this. They have these stuffed chicken medallions that I crave all week. We went today but it was going to take forty-five minutes so we decided to go to another restaurant. They told us it would take thirty minutes. It was really an hour for us to be seated and our half our food was overcooked. I know I am being picky. They were really busy and I am sure there were worse tempered costumers. It was just a little disappointing knowing I was missing those Medallions for a burnt hamburger.

Every day when I drove home from school I saw evidence for a carnival so Aaron and I decided to go today. It was pretty small but we still had fun. I love anything that resembles "small town"- carnivals, rodeos, parades etc... We only road the Ferris Wheel and we were too full to eat any junk food but we had fun walking around and people watch. Carnival rides freak me out more than regular amusement parks. I think I have seen "Are You Afraid of the Dark" one too many times.

Day 56


In case you were wondering, it is not a good idea to put tape on white board. No one has asked me about it. I wonder if this is considered "destruction of school property." Oh gosh, I am a vandal.

I love You 'ilada! 43-49

This week my resource class got to go to a Valentine's dance and I got my first beat down from one student over a ball but don't have the bruises to show it. Also, I am a little late on the websites but they should be up tonight.

Day 43


Today was the first day I ever celebrated Mardi Gras. No beads were awarded in the celebration of this day. One of the kids in my class has parents who are Cajun so they brought us a king cake to eat. Although this is the first King Cake I ever ate, I can testify that HEB makes a mean cake. The tradition is to put a trinket of "baby Jesus" in the cake and whoever eats the piece with the trinket is the "King". None of us knew that and didn't discover the baby until it was too late. Although I don't think it is a bad idea to fast from certain things to bring you closer to God, I don't agree with the whole sinning on purpose thing that goes right before that. I guess that is part of what makes me a Protestant.

Day 44


Wednesday night consisted of the same routine at church. I did give the preschool choir a valentine card but there are only four members so that didn't take much prep work. After church Aaron and I went shopping for some supplies for the Valentine’s Day cards I made for the kids. I love cheesy puns. I had a friend in drama class who could whip them out like nobody's business.

Day 45
< Speaking of cheesy puns, I made cheesy enchiladas because "I love you 'iladas'. It's something I am kind of famous for. Well, by famous I mean my husband and in-laws love me just a little bit more every time I make them.

Day 46
< I feel like I will review every Mexican restaurant in town by the time this blog is over, believe me, there is a lot. This was definitely a hole in the wall place which is the best place to find Mexican food. Another sign that this was a good idea was the fact that we were about the gringos in this whole place. I made a point to take a nap when I got home from work so I could actually participate in conversations and not fight going to sleep at 8pm. Day 47


Tuesday the in-laws are heading to Tennessee for a math convention, so while the men were doing the typical Saturday tradition of working on Aaron's truck, the ladies went shopping. Whenever my mother fantasized about adopting a little girl, she imagined we would go shopping and play Babies together. Instead, she got a girl who would rather climb trees and has zero tolerance for shopping. Well mom, if you are reading this, I am sorry you never actually got to buy an outfit while shopping with me. I am sure I will get to experience the joys of an impatient daughter someday. I am still not sure how to behave when I go shopping with someone. Am I supposed to go try on outfits while people wait? Am I supposed to show off my outfits and ask their opinion? Am I supposed to pick out outfits at all? What is the proper time one is supposed to be in the store? What are you supposed to talk about while shopping? Where is Emily Post when you need her?

Day 48


I have this nightly ritual to put the puppy to bed. Lucy sleeps in a crate at night and we read that we have to make the crate seem really safe. Whenever you get Lucy to stop moving she immediately goes to sleep, so I basically rock her to sleep and then put her into her crate. This particular night she went to bed really quickly. Ten minutes later I see the cat walk out of the room and Lucy starts whining. I figured the cat just messed with her and ignored it. I usually don't like to encourage whining so I let her whine herself to sleep. The following morning, Aaron wakes up to see this. Apparently the cat knocked the crate over. The poor thing's bed was toppled over and she had to just live with it. Bad pet parenting award.

Day 49



Today was another teacher work day. Because we just had one less than a month ago, there wasn't much for me to do. So I deep cleaned the classroom and got materials ready for STAAR alt. while movies were playing in the background.

Bringing Home Lucy(36-42)

Well, I guess this blogger needs to be honest every once in a while. I typically work on my blog every day; however, I had a really hard time finding motivation. The good thing about doing a 365 days of pictures challenge is it forces you to blog every week. Any kind of challenge is a good one in my book. If you haven't checked out the blog babble page, check it out! I update it every sunday.

Day 36

The school I work at celebrates the teachers' birthdays of that month by providing a spread of sweets. I eat in the teacher's lounge by myself everyday. It is usually a tumbleweed short of a ghost town but today I saw teachers I have never seen before. I don't think I saw any of the teachers with the actual birthdays but I still celebrated... a lot!

Day 37

This blog either features food or hands. Well, here is a picture of my naked hand. This is a very scandalous blog. My ring I got sautered in June fell fell apart while we were leading PreK choir. I have always had a ring on that finger- a purity ring since I was sixteen and then I switched it out with my engagegement/ wedding ring. It will be a week until I can get it back. I'll just have to remember I am married without it.

Day 38

The animal shelter we visited on Saturday told us a litter of Cavalier King Charles Spaniel mixes would be ready to pick up on Thursday. When Aaron went there, no one was there. I look on their facebook page and fifteen minutes after they were suppose to open, they said that they were no longer going to be open on Thursdays. I was so worried we were not going to be able to pick up our puppy. They wouldn't let us get on a waiting list because some people don't show up and then the dogs don't get adopted. I just knew if they didn't let us adopt today, all the dogs would be picked up by the time we got there on Friday. After Aaron called eleven times, they finally picked up the phone. My knight in shining honor convinced them to let us adopt today. He picked the smallest of the litter, formally known as Snow but now known as Lucy. I am just in love with this puppy. I guarantee most of this blog is going to be dedicated to this little ball of fluff.

Day 39

We go out to eat a lot on weekends. Today we went to a Mexican restuarant where only one person working there spoke English. It was awesome. The rest of the night was spent watching movies on Netflix. I am pretty sure Netflix should make a the list of "most amazing ideas." If that list doesn't exist, then it should. That's an amazing idea!

Day 40

Earlier we bought a bag of apples that didn't turn out to be very crisp, so I decided to make some kind of dessert with it. I found this cake recipe, which I can no longer find. If you are interested, I can at least give you the measurements.

Day 41

As it turns out, cat food and grass do not make a good combination for this puppy. Making a mess in her crate and our bed, it was decided she needed a bath after she got better. She proved she is not really a fan of bathing by shaking the whole time and repeatedly attempting to escape. The good news is that Lucy's fur dries really fast and is even softer than it was before. Also, she doesn't smell horrible.

Day 42

Whenever I started student-teaching one of the teachers asked me if I drank. After I said "no," she replied that I will be the end of it. She was right, but not with alcohol. Any time I have a stressful day, I end up at Sonic. My kids hardly ever stress me out. It is when I am around general ed students. I had to send two students to the office today and yell at several others. It is such a weird feeling being on the opposite side of the desk. I am now the man. Figuratively speaking of course.

Death by Volcano (29-35)

Day 29

Little did I know that playing the cat's version of "Laser Tag" in the morning was foreshadowing the events of today. In short, I was the cat and almost all of my students had giant laser lights I was chasing all over the school. I had to run after a couple of my students and convince a stubborn girl to throw her food away in the trash can. After ten minutes, my stubborness won out, but I still had to vacuum up the rest, which was sticky rice and somehow all over the classroom. This was after I just finished cleaning up the milk one of my other kids spilt all over the carpeted floor. Four of the students can't handle being in the cafeteria because of the crowd, so they stay in the classroom with me. It is usually an adventure just to get them to eat. Long story short, I definitely earned my paycheck today.

Day 30

Today, we had the largest we ever had in our preschool class- a grand total of four! The kids learned the song "Amazing Grace" and went over the songs we learned in the previous weeks. I am so impressed by how much they retain from week to week, and they all know so much about the bible already. We were talking to them about what it means to sin and were trying to think of sins that were relatable to them. We asked if they ever got in trouble with their parents to which they reluctantly replied yes. One girl stood up and said that she gets in trouble "a lot!" Aaron's intention was for them to stand facing the wall and with their right and left hand indicate which pitch from the xylophone is louder or softer, higher or lower. The plans had to be altered a little once it was realized that preschoolers don't know left from right.

One of the kids, the one who gets in trouble a lot, joined us in the adult choir afterwards. Whenever the choir stood up, she would come sit in the chair behind me. I would move, she would move; I would move again, she would move again. Needless to say, we were both too giggly for me to actually participate in the singing.

Day 31

Three years ago, Aaron asked me to be his girlfriend. The funny thing about it was I decided that day that I was going to give him two weeks to ask me, otherwise I was going to become all modern and ask him myself. Apparently, my brain is very persuasive. At the time, I had no clue I would become his wife. I wouldn't have dated him if it wasn't a possibility and it really didn't take too long for me to realize he was the one. Now, he is my best friend and we are learning how to do this whole "growing-up" thing together. We are going to celebrate Saturday but today I wanted an excuse to get a treat so naturally I got a "Happy Birthday" cupcake. So "Happy birthday" to Aaron and Chelsea's love.

Day 32

Friday, we ate at a Chinese restaurant that we've been talking about visiting for forever. The inside of the building looked like it used to be a seafood restaurant. The walls were painted to make you feel like you were eating on a boat and they even had pictures up of boats. Either they didn't feel like redecorating whenever they bought it from a seafood restaurant or they were going for a "chinese-seafood restaurant" feel. By the way the count for the amount of times I said "restaurant" is four. If you are upset about my repetitiveness, here is a link for different words I could have used. You can mentally replace "restuarant", if you so desire.

Afterwards we went to Wal-Mart for "a few things". Here is a picture of Aaron making fun of an advertisement for lipstick, or a lip-stretching service. I'm not sure:

What do you think? Pretty close, right?

Day 33

Aaron had planned for us to go to Monahans to adopt a puppy from an animal shelter and then go to a park and have a picnic. He is so romantic. Their website made it seem like they were really legitament but whenever we got there, it was in a trailor and the person we were supposed to meet slept in. Also, they didn't have as many puppies as they claimed to have on their website. A little disappointed, we went to Odessa to look at their animal shelter. On their website, they said they were open until noon on Saturdays. Nope, they aren't open at all. So we ate at Chicken Express and watched G

roundhog Day.

I still have yet to see that whole movie. Not giving up, we went to a shelter in Midland and found out that there will be Cavalier King Charles Spaniel puppies up for adoption on Thursday. Aaron is going to have to pick up the puppies without me because I will still be at work by the time they close.

Day 34

This is the first year I actually got to watch the Superbowl with my hubby! Aaron always has done some rushing/ pledging thing with his fraternity. This is also the first year in four years I haven't been asked to lead at a d-now. It is also the first year in a long time that I have been able to watch the entire game because I am usually traveling from Austin to Abilene. This won't be a long post because I am not going to pretend to know anything about football. I will say that this is the first half-time show in a long time that I actually enjoyed. I am not a big pop fan but Beyonce is amazing.

Day 35

This is a picture one of my special ed. kids drew for me. It is a picture of a volcano erupting and killing me. Thank you...