Mission Accomplished

I am done filing! Wahoooo! I made all the file tabs and then neatly filed away all the papers. I even created two new binders. One for reborning doll instructions and another for "fun" recipes for like holidays and all the dog bone recipes I found about a month ago. I even had time to take about a 40 minute much needed nap. And I picked a good day to play "hooky" as it has been absolutely beautiful outside today.

Another other good thing about organizing is:

I cleaned out an old handbag I had that I no longer carried because it was too heavy from all the change in it. I sorted out all the change and put them in their appropriate jars. A couple times a year we take the change to the bank to cash it in and then go do something fun as a family. We usually have around $200 change when we do that. It really does add up so start saving your change today!

I also found the following items that I had no clue I even had:

The Manning Sisters book by Debbie Macomber

A Panera Bread gift card

Carrie Underwood's Carnival Ride CD (I came this close (--) in going out and buying that last week....glad I didn't or I would have had two!

Now I need to go get ready for Energy's football games tonight.

At home

I had to take a mental day from work today. I have so much to do at home that I thought it was best to just get it done rather than carrying all the stress around with me worrying about getting it done. Now that school is back in session it is without fail there is something going on every night. It is hard to keep up.

Right now I am organizing paperwork as the picture above shows. The "Save the Trees" people must hate me because I print off alot of stuff. Then there is the official paperwork that I need to save. Then of course, the awards, grade cards, special papers that the kids do that I have to save. I have little sticky notes laid out on my table and am organizing the papers and then will file them or put them in their appropriate binder. I am already feeling some relief by tackling the project.

I pretty much have the new blog thoughts ready to go. I just need to go out and "create" the blog and come up with a name! I have the hardest time naming things. That is why this blog doesn't have a good name. I will ask Coach to help me as he is good at those types of things.

Oh and before I forget....we got an email from Master G's teacher last night and she did find the math book in the "office". She told us someone from the office came down to borrow one so that they could order more and then forgot about it and left in lay in the office. It seems kind of strange to us but at least the book was found. She never apologized for the way she handled herself. She did apologize for it all being so confusing as "she was confused herself."

Have a great day.....I will be organizing away!

How do you see it?

Yesterday we were over at my parents house for dinner and my sister brought up an interesting conversation. Her and her husband had lunch with a group of people and this conversation was a topic of discussion. The conversation was how everyone can be thinking of the same thing but see it in a different way. For example, my sister asked us to tell her what we saw when we imagined the alphabet in our minds. Our responses were:

Sister: Sees the alphabet in a long straight line with a capital letter followed by a lower case letter on a green background in white lettering.

Dad: Sees the alphabet in a long straight line in all capitals on a white background with black lettering.

Me: I see the alphabet in in rows with 7 letters in each row. All letters are capitalized and follow an alternating pattern in the colors of the rainbow.

Then we imaged the months of the year:

Sister: Sees the months of the year in a long straight line with a white background and black lettering.

Me: I see the months of the year in a circle with a white background and black lettering.

When then did the days of the week:

I can't remember what my sister seen but on the days of the week I see the week starting with Monday in a long straight line and the days are written in fancy cursive script lettering with a white background and black lettering.

So what about you? How do you see the alphabet? Months of the year? The days of the week?

Funnel Friday

I had been looking forward to this weekend for weeks. We didn't have anything at all planned, which is rare for us, and all I wanted to do was relax.

I wasn't home for 5 minutes from work when the news station announced we were under a tornado warning. A few minutes later the sirens sounded. So off to the basement we were and spent 45 minutes down there until the all clear was given. There was a brief touchdown of a tornado a mile away from us. As far as I know it did not cause any damage.

I had been craving a burnt end sandwich all week long so my husband and I were going to go get one, bring it home, and watch the KU game. Unfortunately we had to take shelter until 15 minutes before the game started so Sonic had to do.

The KU game was a pretty good game. We were behind for so long but then came back and took the lead. The game ended up being tied a little bit later and in the remaining seconds we through an interception and ended up loosing by a field goal in the last second of the game. Bummer!

Tonight we are going to go see Pam's kitchen (she has been painting it) and then go out to dinner with her.

Later gator!

The KNOWS have it

Update on Master G's math teacher

First and foremost this precious math teacher goes on and on about what she knows she did in her first email to my husband. She knows she put the math book in Master G's cubby. She knows she had him write his name in it. She knows every student in the class had a book.

Apparently she knows alot.

My husband has sent two emails to this math teacher. In both emails he specifically states for her to not reply to the email but to send her response to (insert hubby's work email address) so that he can get the response quicker. What does math teacher do? Presses the reply to button.

So we know she is not detailed oriented. So that leaves room for error that she may not really know if she gave Master G a math book or not.

So we wait and wait today for her response to my husbands work email (since that is what we asked her to do) and we never hear from her. In the late afternoon I decided to check our home email account to see if by chance she replied to the email we sent last night. And low and behold there is a response there.

Math teacher has now changed her tune. She is as nice and sweet as can be......and you will never guess where she thinks the math book is. Read her response below:

Dear Parent:

Thanks for getting back to me.

Please don’t take offense. We loose books all the time in sixth grade. Mostly they are in someone else’s cubby. We’ll do a team check to find the book. We haven’t used the book until this week. That’s why you haven’t seen it coming home. We have been working long and hard on long division and multiplication. This is not a skill in the book. Blake seems to do well with both of those skills. We’ll keep looking. They always appear. I’ll have to check with the office about him borrowing another book until we find it. I think they may have borrowed his to order more for the school. We have a huge group of sixth graders and there aren’t extras like there usually are.

I’ll be sure to let you know as soon as we have a solution.

Math Teacher

So after we get a hateful email last night from her where she knows she gave him the book and she knows he lost it and how incredibly difficult our boy is to communicate with now her story is this happens all the time and she thinks the office borrowed his book so that they could order more.

I can't wait to meet this cookie in real life.

It is all about the teachers

Last night we had curriculum night at Kayk's school. It all went really well and I really like the teachers she has this year. Yes, even the math teacher. I do need to share something I forgot to mention about the math teacher. The math teacher is the sister of Kayk's aunt's best friend while growing up. (Does that make sense?) In a nutshell, the math teacher knows Kayk's dad side of the family very well and we have met her prior to her being the lady we would know as Kayk's 7th grade math teacher. I did have a chat with her about the frustrating math homework and she told me that as long as Kayk attempts the math problem she will get credit. It doesn't have to be the correct answer but she must at least do the problem the way she thinks it should be done and they will go over it the next day during class. So, as of now I am letting her off the hook of having to come over and cook the meals and clean my house 4 nights a week.

So on one hand everything is great with Kayk's teachers and on the other we are having a devil of a time with one of Master G's teachers. Master G has ADD and his math teacher (what is it with these math teachers?) is the type that doesn't want to be bothered with ADD students. We know this type all too well as his 4th grade teacher was the same way. Master G said he never received a math book from his teacher and she said she knows she put one in his cubby. Apparently for the past three weeks she has hounded him to bring in $50 to pay for the missing math book but has never ONCE contacted us about the book being missing. So my husband sent her an email yesterday trying to figure out what was going on and she sent a real nasty email back to him. In her email she said she spent 20 minutes trying to ask Master G where the book was and more or less said he was too incompetent to communicate with. So today, my friends, it is on, with math teacher #2. I will keep you posted.

I will leave you with a picture of Energy's first school football battle wound. Once again, my camera skills are not the best but this is what happens when several pairs of cleats trample on your leg.

Tribute to 9-11

Today marks the 7 year anniversary of the 9-11 attacks. As I drove into work this morning the radio station was doing a dedication to 9-11, its victims, their families, the hero's, to Americans and to all people in the world as this effected everyone. The radio station asked the listener's to stop and think about what they were doing at the time of the attacks. I thought I would share my story.

I work for a large company in the financial industry. I was already at work when the first plane hit. I heard people walking around talking about it but didn't think much of it. At the time I was an executive administrative assistant and I couldn't walk away from my desk without someone covering my phones so I couldn't really go inquire about anything. Then my co-workers started coming around saying a second plane had hit. Almost immediately after the second plane hit our phone lines were ringing off the hook. We had several clients located in the World Trade Center buildings and some of their remote clients were calling in. We had family members calling for their loved ones who were not at their desks trying to locate them in order to make sense of what was going on and fearing what might happen next. I asked one of the other administrative assistants to cover my phone and I walked down to the conference room to watch the news with several other co-workers. I saw the video of the first plane hitting the building and my stomach dropped. The second plane had already hit by this point but if you didn't know that you would have thought the first plane was just a freak accident of a plane going into the building. By the time the video showed the second plane and I saw it for myself I knew our country was under attack. And yes, I feared being in the building I was in. I slowly walked out of the conference room and headed back up stairs to cover my phone. Everything was completely chaotic in our office. No one stayed in their offices or cubes. I continued to field calls and associates who congregated by my desk. And just as I was hanging up from a call I heard someone yell out that one of the buildings had fallen. We all ran down to the conference room to see the TV. I remember thinking there was NO WAY those buildings would come down. No way. Even today after I have seen the video several times I still can't believe it happened. After the buildings collapsed and we had heard about the other plane attacks everything got very quiet in our building. The phones didn't ring. Many folks continued to stand around in groups and talk but it was hard for people to go to their cubes and try to work. By early afternoon our company announced that is was closing and that we all needed to go home. In some ways it was worse once we got home because we could actually see all the footage of what had taken place. Still 7 years later it is so much to take in and understand what happened that day. I cannot begin to comprehend what the people went through. All I know is I hold a special place in my heart for those that did not make it out, for those that did, for those that rescued and for those that died rescuing. We will never forget.

I am going to leave you with a beautiful song today by Lee Greenwood. Please take a moment to remember those lost on 9-11. Take a moment to remember those that made it out, those that lost family members, those that rescued and those that gave their life rescuing. They are all our hero's!

If tomorrow all the things were gone. . I'd worked for all my life,And I had to start again. . with just my children and my wife,I'd thank my lucky stars. . to be livin' here today.Cause the flag still stands for freedom. . And they can't take that away. And I'm proud to be an American Where at least I know I'm free And I won't forget the men who died Who gave that right to me And I gladly stand up. . next to you and defend her still today Cause there ain't no doubt I love this land God bless the USA From the lakes of Minnesota ... To the hills of Tennessee... Across the plains of Texas ... From sea to shining sea... From Detroit down to Houston ... And New York to LA Well there's pride in every American heart And its time we stand and say..That I'm proud to be an American Where at least I know I'm free And I won't forget the men who died Who gave that right to me And I gladly stand up . . next to you and defend her still today Cause there ain't no doubt I love this land God bless the USA And I'm proud to be an American Where at least I know I'm free And I won't forget the men who died Who gave that right to me And I gladly stand up . . next to you and defend her still today Cause there ain't no doubt I love this land God bless the USA!