A December to Remember

So...where to begin?  This month has had its ups and downs for sure.  The first weekend in December I got to go back to Kansas for my grandpa's 80th birthday celebration.  I had decided a couple months before to take the time off and go because I hate only ever taking time off to go to funerals.  And I decided turning 80 was a pretty big deal.  The night before I planned to leave I got a text message from my sister that said my mom was really sick and that if she was still sick when I got there, I could just stay at my sister's house.  Well, I was halfway there (this is a 500 mile trip one way) when I got a message that not only was my mom still really sick, but my dad was too.  So I went straight to my sister's house.  The next morning I wake up and my sister has the sickness!  By the way, we are talking about a nasty little stomach virus here.  My brother-in-law had to work, my parents were still not 100%, so I got to watch my 14-month-old niece for the day.  The whole time I am hoping I don't get this bug!  My stomach is kinda flip-flopping by the end of the day, but I figure it was just because I hadn't eaten anything like all day long.  I grabbed some dinner finally and it seemed to help a little.

That night my parents were feeling better and had disinfected their house, so I decided to stay over there.  The next day was the day of the party.  My stomach was still feeling weird, but I convinced myself it was just me being anxious about the possibility of getting sick.  I went to the party and the strangest thing happened.  There was *tons* of cake and I wasn't really in the mood for it!  Hello, it's cake, and I'm a girl who loves to eat cake!  Why wasn't I pigging out on this cake??? So I finally grabbed a piece but only managed to eat a few bites because my stomach was doing too many flips.

I managed to make it through the party but the mention of going out to dinner just didn't sound like something I wanted to do.  At all.  So I put on my sweats when I got back to my parents' house and decided eggs could be something I might be able to eat for dinner.  Wrong-o.  A few bites into the eggs I just felt nauseous.  And before I knew it I was running to the bathroom.  I had gotten the sickness!  Since I have already rambled on more than I should about getting the stomach flu, I will just say it ended up taking me an extra day off from work to get over it.  I wasn't going to drive in that condition.

So Tuesday I finally was feeling better and started to make the 500 mile journey back home.  Now that I am an old lady, I have to stop several times to pee when I am traveling.  I pulled into one rest area and the actual bathroom was closed and instead they had a huge row of port-a-potties.  Um, no thanks!  I kept on driving until I found a McDonald's a few miles later.  I pulled into McDonald's to use their restroom, and then decided to grab a burger and see if I could eat that ok.  When I was done there, I pulled onto the street and stopped at a stop sign.  This SUV pulled up and stopped behind me.  There was a truck turning  right onto the street I was on, and I really couldn't see around it to see if it was safe to make my left turn, so I was going to wait for them to finish turning.  So I am still stopped at the sign when BAM.  The moron behind me freaking hit me!  So now I pull into the gas station and she pulls in too.  Apparently she was following her boss (who was the car that had been in front of me) and thought I had gone.  Really?  REALLY?  So my bumper has to be replaced and there is a dent in the trunk lid that needs reworked.  Luckily, since it was her fault, her insurance is paying for the repairs and for a rental car.  (Let me just observe that when I had a used car for 7 years it only incurred two major blemishes...one when my husband's cousin backed into my front bumper and her trailer hitch scratched the paint off, and one when it was keyed in a ghetto parking lot.  My first ever brand-new car that I have had for 2 years as of today has had the front bumper scratched to hell by something in the Walmart parking lot, a big-ol' dent in the passenger side from an unknown object hitting it, 2 unpleasant door dings in the driver's side, and now a wrecked rear-end.  I think I will stick with used cars after this.)

That was just the first weekend of the month!  Can you believe I went back for Christmas?  The husband went with me for the holiday and we had a nice, uneventful trip.  It was good to see my family and no one had the stomach flu!  My stomach felt great and I ate tons of sweet crap! :) 

Give yourself a pat on the back if you actually read this whole thing. 

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Happy Thanksgiving! (a little late)

My family came to visit us for Thanksgiving this year and it was awesome (and exhausting)!  We had a really good time and our first attempt at a Thanksgiving feast turned out really well.  The turkey was delicious and so were the other dishes.  Besides doing a lot of eating and washing of dishes, we did get out of the house some too.  My mom, sister, and I went to the movies and saw Breaking Dawn Part 1 one evening and it was really good!  The whole gang went to the zoo on Friday afternoon and enjoyed the beautiful weather.  Then on Saturday it was rainy and dreary, so the highlight of the day was family photos! (Or maybe it was playing Guitar Hero for hours with my mom and husband.)  Anyway, I spent many hours crocheting these scarves for a few of the pictures and they were all good sports and wore them!  So it was one of the best Thanksgivings I have had in a while.  Here is one of the pictures we took on Saturday at Confetti Photography.  I hope everyone had a Happy Thanksgiving!

The Neverending Project Room

The last room to be painted before the holidays is now done.  It only took a little over forever a month.  I dubbed the room the "neverending project room" (to be sung to the theme of the movie, The Neverending Story) because every time I thought we were going to finish, something happened that prevented the project from being complete.  But now, it is finished!  Well, mostly.  There are a couple minor things that need some attention.  Anyway, here are some before and after pictures. 

This is the computer room that is right at the top of the stairs in our house.  This is how it looked shortly after we moved in.  The 2-color walls are accented with a grapes border, and then the curtains are some floral pattern.  I'm not sure who thought this whole combination looked good.

This is the same corner of that room now!  The color is called Sugared Lemon, and it really is a warm-toned yellow color that I love.  I decided to accent with red curtains because I just like the way that looks. 

This is another before shot by the actual staircase railing.

This is the staircase area now.  I painted the baseboards the same color as the walls in this room because they are all different sizes for some unknown reason.  I like the way it looks.

Texas is one of 50 states

So today is Veterans' Day and we had a little program at school this morning.  They were playing some patriotic music before the program started, as the kids were coming in and getting breakfast.  One of the kids that I had last year came up to me and asked me if I liked that music.  I said, "Of course I do, I am proud to be American."  She then asked me where I was born and when I told her I was born in Kansas she exclaimed, "You are not an American!"

Good grief. 

I then explained to her that Kansas is a state in the United States of America, just like Texas is a state.  She then asked me where Kansas is located, and I explained that.  She then looked at me with a straight face and said, "That's why you have that accent.  You have an accent."  And she walked away.

Really?!  When I first moved to Texas I was asked all the time where I was from because I wasn't twangy like everyone else in East Texas.  Not long after I would go back home and be told how "country" I sounded.  So I think I am stuck in accent limbo.  In Kansas I sound like a hick now, and here I still get called "Yankee" from time-to-time by adults and now kids.  I just can't win. 

The Postcard Project

My friend, Veronica, who is an awesome cook (it's true, I've had her enchiladas, cake, and cookies!) and posts tons of tasty looking recipes over at Veronica's Cornucopia is also an employee of the United States Postal Service.  She has started "The Postcard Project" to spread joy and support the USPS at the same time.  I have signed up and am going to try to send a few pieces of mail each week and encourage you to check it out and do the same.  You can go to the link on her blog, or click on the button on the side of my blog (under the email subscription box).  Check it out! 

FaceTime is Awesome-sauce!

Ok, I have been an Apple fan for a while.  Their products are so easy to use and are just spiffy overall. (No, Apple doesn't compensate me for my opinions.)  So after 2 1/2 years of rockin' an iPhone 3GS, I decided to upgrade when the 4S was announced (though I'm sure it will be out-of-date next summer, as is what seems to happen in the world of Apple...for a fairly accurate representation of what it's like to own Apple products, go here: http://theoatmeal.com/comics/apple).

Anyway, I know I am late to the FaceTime party because iPhone 4 users have had that for over a year.  But the other night I finally got to try it!  My sister, who lives 500 miles away, also has an iPhone.  We did a FaceTime call and it was so awesome to actually see her in real time!  I was rather impressed with the sound quality on speaker phone, and the video only lagged once on my end (I don't know about on hers).  I remember being little and hearing that "in the future" people would be able to make video calls, and if you watch Spaceballs or Romy and Michele's High School Reunion, you can see what I imagined video calls would look like.  So I am super-excited that the future has arrived.  Text messages and emails are fine, but sometimes it is good to actually see the other person, when you don't get to but a few times a year.

Random Randomness

I haven't posted in a while because I have been super busy with school.  Things are still going well.  A few kids are trying my patience, but they are still pretty good overall.  I can't believe it is already the middle of October (probably since it's still HOT outside)! One funny moment this week was shared with me by a co-worker.  She just got her hair colored a new color and it looks really nice.  She said a student walked up to her and was complimenting her appearance and telling her she looked so nice that she looked just like Mrs. Beck!  I thought that was pretty hilarious, yet flattering I guess.  (By the way, she got her hair colored a shade of brunette, and I am still as blonde as ever.)  And let me just say I learn the most interesting things on Fridays, when I have my kids free write in their journals.  Two words...hillbilly hand-fishing.

In other news...we cut down two trees in our front yard that were right next to the house.  The smaller one had already broken in half a few years back and was pretty pathetic.  The other tree was 60-70 feet tall and leaning right towards our house.  This drought made me more nervous about this tree than I had been before.  So we got it cut down and then spent two weekends hauling away the remains.  Part of the trunk was rotting on the inside, so I am glad it is down.  I just really miss the shade.

We are still working on some painting and repairs on the inside of the house.  We are on the last room to paint!!! (Well, besides the living room...I forgot about that.) The hubs needs to cement the wall so we can finish painting it and then I will post some pictures.  Hopefully by Thanksgiving we will have everything around here in pretty good shape.  We aren't having our Halloween party this year because the hubs really isn't in the Halloween spirit this year.  There are so many other projects around the house to work on.  Besides, with the burn ban we can't have all the special effects and fires we usually have.  But he mentioned he has some big plans for Christmas lights this year...that makes me excited!  :)

Last random note...I pre-ordered the new iPhone 4S last week and it arrived today, on the first day of sales!  I am super-excited about it because before I had the old 3GS and now I have FaceTime capabilities and hope to see my niece more via video calls!  Of course there are tons of other awesome features, but why bore you when you can google an article if you really wanted to?

A Random Kid Funny

With the little extra money I've made on the side doing the diva birthday parties for the local photography studio, I decided to jump on board the ugly-shoes-for-a-good-cause bandwagon and bought a pair of petal pink Toms.  If you aren't familiar with Toms, they give a pair of shoes to a child in need with every pair of shoes they sell.  Anyway, I wore my new ugly shoes earlier this week and I had a kid at school ask me if she could have my shoes.  When I told her "No way!", she then asked, "Can I have them when you grow out of them?"  Ahhh, kids.

Time flies when you're old

This upcoming week is the 5th week of school, but it marks the end of the "first six weeks" grading period.  Our school year is broken up into 6 six-week periods, yet I don't think any of them are actually six weeks in length.  The first semester is all like 5 week chunks, and the second semester is usually 7 week chunks.  Weird, huh?  Anyway, the point of all this rambling is that I can *not* believe that we are already 1/6th of the way done with this new school year.  It seems like school just started yesterday.  Time really does go by fast when you get old.  All you youngsters...you've been warned.

Pray for Rain

As you may know, Texas has had the hottest summer ever and the worst drought (maybe ever).  People have had to sell their cattle because there is nothing to feed them.  Trees are dying and the grass crunches when you walk on it.  And just in the past few weeks we have had an outbreak of wildfires.  Some are a result of arson, some are the result of idiocy. 97% of the state has been under a burn ban for months, yet people are still trying to barbecue on charcoal grills.  This  video is a fire that started yesterday to the south of me, and we could see the smoke at our house.  Of course this morning we had to breathe the smoke as it was low-lying throughout the town.  This fire started because some redneck went to set up his deer camp and parked his vehicle in tall grass and left it running while he ran about on the 4-wheeler.  Of course the heat from the vehicle caught the grass on fire and burned his vehicle up and many, many acres.  I am so thankful for all the volunteer firefighters that have been working day and night to try to contain these fires. 

Where Were You?

As you are more than well aware, it is the 10th anniversary of the horrific attacks that took place on September 11, 2001.  I still remember where I was when I learned of the plane crashing into the World Trade Center.  It was my last semester of college and I was student teaching in first grade at Sunflower Elementary School in Andover, Kansas.  Classes started at 8:30 a.m. CST, so when I arrived shortly after 8:00 that morning, my cooperating teacher had gotten wind that something major was going on and had turned on the news on the tv in the classroom.  I could hardly believe what we were seeing.  It was all very surreal.  Of course the kids started to arrive so we had to shut the tv off and act as normal as we could.  When the kids were at lunch or at activity, the news was back on and everyone was glued to it.  The mood among the entire faculty was very somber.  It's a day I will never forget.

Where were you on 9/11?

Friday Night Fun!

I had the great pleasure of attending a 7-year-old's birthday party this Friday night.  Sound like fun?  Believe it or not, it was!  A local photography studio in town offers Lil' Diva birthday parties where the guests get to play dress up, walk the red carpet, eat cake, and have a photo shoot.  The photographers (who are also educators at my school) had invited me to come help out.  Well, I have always loved dress-up and playing with makeup so it sounded like more fun than my usual Friday nights, which consist of Michael passing out on the couch and me trying to stay up until 10.  It definitely was more exciting than that!  I got to be the makeup artist and help glam up all the girls. I did my best to make sure they still looked like little girls and not the hooker clowns you see on Toddlers & Tiaras. The girls were so excited and several told me they felt like celebrities.  They were so cute!  I even made a little money.  Not bad for entertaining my makeup artist fantasy for a couple hours. However, I was very thankful to come home to a child-free home after the two hours of squealing laughter.

Oh Happy Day!

This past March I went to Kansas for Spring Break and brought back an antique pump organ that was taking up too much space in my parents' house.  I already had a spot picked out for it in my living room.  But, when I got it in the house, the top piece was just  a smidge too tall to fit where I wanted it.  So we had to put it against another wall and the room began to feel very cramped.  We have a moisture problem with two of our walls and I didn't want the organ to get moisture damage, so there was only one place to put it. ( But as of 5 minutes ago, I have ordered a dehumidifier and hope that helps with the problem...and my allergies!  That's one of the downsides to having a windowless living room and not running the a/c at night or during the day when we're at work...horrible basement-like conditions.)

Anyway, the hubs and I tossed around the idea for a few months about getting rid of the shelf that was causing the organ not to fit where we wanted it.  We were afraid it might look really stupid.  But we woke up bright and early today and hacked that shelf off.  Then I painted all the shelves and the wall.  The organ fits perfectly and I am super-happy with the results!  See for yourself:

This is what it looked like after we cut the shelf.  You can see the brown line where it used to be.

This is the organ in its new home.  Our living room feel much more open now!

First Week Down!

Well, last Monday marked my 10th first day of school as a teacher.  I still get a little anxious the night before, but not as bad as I used to be.  My schedule has changed again this year (I've never had the same schedule more than 1 year at a time), and so far I really like it.  I hope it works for everyone and we can do it this way again next year.  The main difference from previous years is now I am back to having just 3 classes, so I see around 60 kids each day instead of 80.  Also, I get to begin and end the day with my homeroom which is super nice.  Everyone is teaching their own Social Studies and Science last period, so I feel like I will get to know the kids a little bit better.  All in all it was a great first week.  The kids were well behaved (there's been some years where I have had to correct a student on the very first day!) and they are getting the hang of all the switching of classes they do in 4th grade.  Now I know in a few weeks I may have changed my tune about how good the kids are, once they get more comfortable and start testing their limits.  :)  But I am going to stay optimistic that this will be the best year yet!

That Darn Cat!

This morning I was enjoying my coffee and watching the episode of "Drop Dead Diva" I had DVR'ed last night when I heard a *clunk* in the ceiling.  I kind of shrugged it off and kept watching tv.  A few minutes had passed and I heard another clunk.  Michael's cat was on the floor in front of me and she looked up at the ceiling at the same time I did.  So I went upstairs to investigate and didn't see anything.  Back to the tv.  A few minutes later I hear another clunk.  That's when it hit me.  My own cat was nowhere to be found.  I went into the bathroom and called her name and heard a meowing by the air vent.  Yep.  That darn cat was in the ceiling!

How did she get there you ask?  One of the bedrooms upstairs has an access panel to the bathtub pipes for the adjoining bathroom.  Michael is going to start fixing up that room and for some reason he took the access panel off yesterday and left it off.  There is just enough space for the cat to crawl under the bathtub and down a hole by the drainpipe for her to have free range of the space beneath the floor, or above the ceiling, however you want to look at it.

So the stupid cat was clunking around the ceiling.  After trying a few things, unsuccessfully, she finally finagled her way back up through the hole she went down to begin with.  She only lost a few clumps of fur on the way out.  Dumb cat.

Be Our Guest

This is a picture of the guest room right after we moved in.  Notice above the headboard there is a section of the wall that the previous owners failed to paint.  Classy, eh?

This is the wall with the wallpaper and the paneling.  As I shared in a previous post, it was in pretty horrible shape under that paneling.

This is how the room looks now.

I did all the painting (except for the ceiling, which the husband did) and I am pretty pleased with how it turned out.

This is the wall that had the paneling.  I ripped it and the wallpaper off, and the husband patched up the wall.  It looks loads better than before.

3 Weeks and Progress!!!

So, I did my weekly weigh-in this morning and...the number went down 1.6 lbs from last week!  I guess my body was in shock of all the exercise and smaller food portions that it just took it a couple weeks to readjust.  I read a few articles that suggested the initial weight gain could be the body retaining more water for energy use.  Anyway, I feel loads better and if I don't gain any next week (or even have another loss) I will convince myself that I don't have some serious medical condition!  (I've used WebMd to diagnose several possibilities...I hate that website.)

I have been making myself eggs and toast with peanut butter all week to get my protein in the morning.  I also started drinking at least 8 glasses of water of day.  Let me just say, that if you decide to start drinking more water, make sure you are somewhere where you can stop to pee every 30 minutes.  That's all I did the first 2 days.  I even got up twice during the night, and I never do that.  But by the end of the second day, my body seemed to reset itself to the increase in water and I have been back to normal.

Well, I just thought I should give an update since I was so irritated last week. I will report on this again when I have an impressive number to share! I will be sharing pictures from the latest house renovation soon.  :)

Public Works in Action!

I swiped this picture from Michael's facebook page.  He is the head bobbing in the foreground.  Part of his job this summer has included changing out fire hydrants.  Sometimes the water doesn't cooperate and they get to go swimming! (Click on the picture for a larger view.)

2 weeks and frustrated!

Well, I can officially declare myself "frustrated"!  I have an app on my phone that I have diligently been keeping track of my calories on since July 5th.  I have been working out (though had to cut some activity out because of my pesky plantar fasciitis which reared its ugly heel last week).  I have ceased snacking at night for snacking's sake.  I've been doing better than I did at the beginning of the year when I lost the weight.  So why am I gaining weight???  Yep.  I have gained 2 pounds in the last 2 weeks.  Part of me wants to say screw all of this and give up.  The other part thinks I need to just give myself some more time.  The numbers just dropped off so easily before with a little exercise and watching my food intake, I expected the same thing to happen this time.  One thing I am going to change is replacing the low-calorie cereal for breakfast with a protein-packed breakfast.  Obviously the low-calorie cereal is doing absolutely nothing for me and protein was my champion a couple years ago when I lost 60 pounds!  The other thing I am going to change is drinking more water.  I don't drink hardly enough and have read that drinking more water can help the ol' metabolism.  Other than that, I am going to keep on truckin' along. And if I continue to gain weight at 1 pound a week, I am going to the doctor! 

Confessions of a Sugar Addict

Remember way back in January when I was so excited about the Biggest Loser game for my Wii and that I was losing weight?  I did that game religiously and was down 12 pounds by Spring Break!  I was so close to getting the one pair of shorts I was only able to wear one summer zipped back up without a struggle.  Yep.  Those were the good old days.

Spring Break came along and the workouts stopped.  I started eating sugary delicious ice cream again.  The Coca Colas were being guzzled left and right reintroduced into my formerly cola-free world.  The workouts didn't resume.  Before I knew it, Easter was upon us and with Easter comes the most delicious candy!  Starburst Jellybeans and Reese's Eggs, anyone?  And the chocolate bunnies!  Oh, and then there was the clearance candy after Easter.  More Reese's eggs!!! 

I did a workout here and there, but that number on the scale was climbing.  Then came my birthday and Cheesecake Factory.  Oh, and a Butterfinger Blizzard cake from DQ.  Then a couple weeks later it was Memorial Day weekend and we had company and cooked out 3 times in 2 days.  My stomach hurts just thinking about all that food.  Was I working out at all at this point?  NOPE!  To top it all off, it was the end of school, and with that comes donuts and retirement cakes.  Sugarpalooza!

The end result of all of this....I gained all 12 pounds back.  Yep.  Every.  Single.  One.  Those shorts are collecting dust at the top of my closet because there is no way in hell I could squeeze those suckers on.  So, after my last pan of brownies for the 4th of July, I am getting serious again!  No more night time sugar-snacks.  No more Cokes.  We brought the elliptical downstairs where it's cooler and I have access to TV.  I have the Biggest Loser that I still do.  And the newest weapon in my fat-fighting arsenal is Zumba Fitness for the Wii.  It has been a good, sweaty week so far.  And for the first time, I actually laughed during a workout.  Yes, laughed! It was a big change from the usual expletives I scream huff at Bob and Jillian. Today was my second day doing Zumba and it is so much fun.  It's so stinking hard, I get a stitch in my side just after the warm-up, but it is fun.  I know I am not doing any of the moves remotely right, but I have a blast just trying.  There is a lot of hip shaking and shimmying, which was the cause of my laughter.  If I could see myself, I know it would be hilarious.

Anyway, I know for me exercise and cutting back the sugary junk will work on getting the weight off.  Here's hoping I can stick to it for more than 2.5 months this time.

9 years

This past 4th of July weekend we celebrated our 9th wedding anniversary.  I have friends who take trips for their anniversary.  Others get each other nice, expensive gifts.  We are not that exciting (or rich).  The actual date of our anniversary is the 4th, but we started celebrating a little bit early.  First off we took a trip to Tyler on Saturday to buy a new shower door!  Just what every girl wants for her anniversary!  Our old shower door was really disgusting.  It was falling off the hinges, leaking everywhere, and was crusted over with rust.  So we bought a new one and spent the whole afternoon assembling it.  We did get to try out Chuy's before we came home though.  It was tasty food, but I don't know if it was worthy of all the hype surrounding it.

Sunday morning we got up early and took the motorcycle to Jacksonville for breakfast at Beverly's Country Cafe.  I love their hashbrowns!  Then the afternoon consisted of Michael going to deal with a sewer (he was on-call this weekend) and me doing laundry.  Let the party start! ;)

Then came Monday.  We exchanged presents over coffee...Michael wanted a cast-iron fish shaped pan thingy (to pour metal into) and I got Zumba for the wii.  We also bought a blender when we were in Tyler, so we blended up some smoothies!  Later we went to lunch at Jalapeno Tree and then bought some fireworks to light at home.  He invited his cousin and cousin's kid over that evening and we played in the driveway, lighting all kinds of fun stuff.  Let me just say that the quality of sparklers was really disappointing.  The "morning glory" sparklers that shoot different kinds of sparks were really sad.  They kept going out.  It's no fun dancing around with a sparkler like a huge dork when they won't stay lit!  So they made a quick run and found the old school wire sparklers, the ones that look like punks.  They only do one kind of spark, but they worked!  I will only buy those from now on for my dweeby dancing purposes.

So that's it.  That is how we celebrated 9 years of marriage.  It was a truly great weekend!

Well guess who is at it again...

Me!  I finished the downstairs bathroom today.  I'm not going to ramble on and on about it.  I'm just going to give you some before and after pictures instead.

This first picture is how the bathroom looked in 2004 when we moved in.  Notice the hideous wallpaper, yellow sink, and peel-and-stick tiles on the floor.

2004

The next picture was taken in 2006.  I removed the wallpaper and painted the bathroom a pale, pale yellow.

2006

 

 

 

The last pictures were taken today.  You can see the real tile work my husband did not too long after I painted the bathroom in 2006.  The most recent update included new color  on the walls (a blue-gray) and a new light fixture.

A Most Brilliant Wallpaper Removal Technique!

As you know, we are working on some home improvement (and probably will be until they day we die...or move).  After removing the wallpaper and border in the guest bedroom, there is only one room left with any wallpaper!  We have ripped wallpaper and/or border out of 5 rooms in the house so far.  The room that is left is the computer room.  I haven't been in a rush to tear it down because although it is not my favorite, it wasn't bad enough to motivate me to paint.  I really hate painting.  But this room has moved up on the project list thanks to the Great Catsby.  That's right.  Catsby.  Michael's little terror of a cat.  This cat has invented a fun new game.  She gets on her hind legs and jumps straight up and rips chunks of the wallpaper border down.  A piece came floating down the stairs this morning and the cat came bounding down the stairs after it, attacked it, then let it be.  She has played this game enough to clear a whole side of a wall from the majority of the wallpaper border.  Whoever picked out this border stuck it on top of an uglier border, and the latter is still stuck to the wall.  Maybe I should try to wet the wall for the cat...

Anyway, here are a before and after pic of the walls:

He's in the paper!

New fire hydrant

I hope this works. Michael's picture is in the paper.  Click the link above. :)

In Other Renovation News...

A couple months ago we gave the laundry room a facelift with some new paint! I got to paint it a bright pink, since I am the one who spends actual time in there.  :)  Here are some before and after pictures for your viewing pleasure:

Show Me What's Behind Wall #1...

We bought our house in May of 2004.  I know I felt pretty grown up, becoming a homeowner the day after my 24th birthday.  The house we bought was built in stages...it used to be a garage with an apartment on top.  This was built in 1935.  Then remodeling was done, the most recent in '71 and somewhere in there the downstairs was converted from a garage to a living room, kitchen, and bathroom.  In the early 80s, the dining room, laundry room, master bedroom, and the garage were added on.  Despite all these changes, they did a pretty good job of keeping the brick uniform on the outside of the house.

All of the upstairs, save the master bedroom, is still old, old, old 1935 old.  The rooms still sport the huge baseboards, the doors have the old-timey knobs, and underneath the carpeting in the original narrow hardwood flooring from 1935.  I *love* the old stuff!  My husband gave up trying to get me to modernize the upstairs and instead bought me a skeleton key so I could play with the doors.  :)

As you could imagine, a house that is 76 years old has some problems.  The people we bought the house from did a pretty stinking good job covering up a lot of these problems.  Due to lack of funding and motivation, we have just now (7 years after moving in) uncovered one of the nastier looking problems.  I am not at all surprised.  I knew something was strange when we moved in, but I went with the whole "ignorance is bliss" thing and the room was ok enough until we had some cash to fix it up some.

This is the guest room as photographed on June 6, 2004.  The rooms have cement walls, and in this particular room one wall was half wallpaper/half paneling. Hmmmmm, why would they put paneling up in a room of cement walls???  That was something I thought was weird, but never wanted to think too hard about it.  If you can see the larger view of the picture, you can see the have patched cracks in the bottom board on the window and the baseboard with putty.  Stay classy, East Texas.

Moving on to June 12, 2011...I have paint, cement wall repair junk, and lots of time on my hands this summer.  So yesterday I ripped the paneling off the wall to see what it was hiding.  There was an obvious problem before removing an inch of paneling, because the panels under the window had peeled up and fallen off in layers.  There was just a thin layer of wood remaining.  This is what I found when I yanked the clever cover-up job off the wall:

Scary, no?  It might be hard to tell, but that would be a chunk of moldy sheetrock they tacked up on the wall.  Why is it moldy?  Because that window is leaking!  Which should have been obvious by the patch job on the window trim.  Why is the window leaking?  Because of the obvious termite damage the previous owners dealt with covered up.  Isn't it funny how that passed the termite inspection?  Must be because the putty wasn't cracking yet and they had a treadmill in front of that window.

The good news?  The termite damage is obviously old.  My husband fixed the window and it hopefully will not leak any further.  The wall will be restored to its original cement glory (once we figure out the best way to do that).  No more grandma wallpaper and border. Hooray!

Who Let the Dogs Out?

Michael ran the Who Let the Dogs Out 5k today at the annual Fair on the Square.  Isabelle even got to run with him for a mile. :)

Our Day in Dallas

Ever since we have moved to Texas we have tossed around the idea of going to Medieval Times in Dallas. But every time we are in Dallas, we are zooming on through it to get to Kansas.  We have stayed in the Big D overnight just a few times (I can count them on one hand) and never have the money to splurge on Medieval Times.  We don't normally spend money on entertainment because we are old, fuddy-duddies.

Well, a few weeks ago a co-worker forwarded me an email that was offering a buy-one-get-one-free deal at Medieval Times.  That got my attention!  I decided that since it was such a good deal and since my birthday was coming up, I would see if the husband would be interested in going.  Of course he said, "sure". (I often get what I want.)  So I ordered the tickets and planned out a day trip.

Yesterday was the big day.  We went to DSW and I got 2 fabulous pairs of shoes for cheap.  I always need more shoes. Ha!  Then we headed over to NorthPark Mall and walked through that glorious, magnificent shopping world.  Sooo many wonderful stores, but not enough money in my bank account to actually buy anything.  I did fall into the Gap and found a few things on sale.  They have closed all the Gap stores anywhere near me, so I *had* to go. :)  Next we headed across the street to the Cheesecake Factory and grabbed a couple slices to go.  Then on to Medieval Times!  (By the way, I was very impressed with myself because I had studied my maps earlier in the week and never had to look up anything yesterday to find these destinations.  I drove right to them! Go me.)

Medieval Times was great fun.  We paid way too much money for some beer, skipped the overpriced souvenirs, and took our own pictures.  If you had kids and were taking them to Medieval Times, you had better empty your bank account first.  Lots of neat stuff to buy to remember your great day!  For those of you who have no clue what Medieval Times is, it is a "castle" and while you eat dinner you watch a tournament with horses and knights.  That is why the admission is so pricey.  You eat the meal without utensils for that "authentic" medieval feel, while the waitress offers you Pepsi and others are trying to sell you flashing LED necklaces.  But the food was decent and the show was entertaining.  All in all it really was a lot of fun and I wouldn't mind going again sometime.

Buzzzzzz

Have you ever watched "Billy the Exterminator"?  I remember one episode he was called out to a house with a bee problem.  He removed a section of the outer wall of the house and uncovered a 6 foot tall active bee hive.  I had a flashback to this episode last week when I came home from work.

For a few days I had been coming across random dead bees by the windows.  Sometimes the sliding door doesn't get closed all the way, so I didn't think much of it.  A bee or two must have flown in the house.  We have a ton of flowers blooming around the house at the moment.  Well, Tuesday afternoon when I came in, there were 2 bees buzzing in the dining room.  I went to the bathroom and there was one buzzing in there.  While I was in the restroom, Michael came home from work and he heard the buzzing in the wall.  Houston, we have a problem!

He went outside and saw a million quite a few bees flying in and out of a teeny, tiny hole in the brick.  I could hear the loud buzzing in the wall and started to panic, just a little. I could picture there being a huge hive in the wall and we were going to have to call Billy the Exterminator!  I wondered if he would come all the way from Louisiana, and how much that would cost.  While I was plotting how to get Billy here, Michael went outside and started spraying the hole with roach killer.  I googled bee infestatations, Michael went to the hardware store to buy wasp & hornet spray.  I told him the complicated process for removing the bees and that we were going to have honey seeping through the walls, he sprayed the hole again with the new bug killer.

The next day, there was no buzzing.  There were no bees.  There was no honey seeping through the wall.  I guess when the husband says he's "got this", he means it.  Who knew?

Happy Easter!

I hope everyone has a wonderful Easter!  Sometimes I forget where I live until I am reminded by unexpected events.  For example, this morning Michael ran to the grocery store to get a couple items we needed to make breakfast and came back empty-handed.  Why?  It's Easter, so the store is closed.  This shouldn't have been surprising, we both had the day off on Friday since it was Good Friday.  I just forget sometimes that I live in East Texas and things are different here.

Another event happened earlier last week that made me remember this is a different place.  I was in the cafeteria at school and the kids were going through the line.  The lunch ladies were telling the kids that their choices were between mini corn dogs and catfish.  Yes, CATFISH!  The kids were soooo excited, and I even heard a couple of them ask if the lunch ladies could serve catfish every day.  I couldn't believe it.  If I was a kid, I would've had to skip lunch that day.  I don't do corn dogs or catfish.

Emma

I have just a few pics of my beautiful niece saved on my school laptop, and have this AutoCollage program that I thought I'd try out.  You choose the pics, and it automatically arranges them for you.  Ta-da!  Enjoy. :)

Chicken Invasion!

The past couple of days have been a true example of what it means to live in small-town Texas.  First of all, about a week ago I had one of my students ask me if I would ever be interested in purchasing some "farm-fresh eggs".  We have a couple kids this year who are entrepreneurs and are selling eggs.  I decided for $2, I could buy some eggs.  He did tell me that I should crack them in a bowl first, in case there was some blood in it.  Yummy, can't wait to try one! Haha

The very day after I brought the eggs home was April 1st...April Fools' Day.  When I dismissed the kids to PE at 10:15 in the morning, I checked my phone and saw I had a voicemail from my husband.  When I listened to the message, I couldn't believe what I was hearing.  He was saying that he went by the house to drop some things off and we had 2 "full-growed" chickens running around and squawking in our back yard.  I wasn't even thinking of it as an April Fools' joke at the time, I was just wondering who on earth would have abandoned some chickens in our yard?!  I called him and he said that there were in fact roosters in our yard and it donned on me that is was April Fools' Day and I started thinking about who I knew that had chickens.  I decided it had to have been his boss, and I just happen to work with his boss's wife.  He said he already asked his boss and of course he denied the roosters were his.  Well...I marched out of my room and found the wife and asked her and she couldn't keep a straight face!  Yep, those roosters came from them!

When I went home I didn't see or hear roosters, so I let my dogs out.  Sure enough, 2 roosters came clucking and flapping and started running around the yard!  The dogs were chasing them, and the roosters chased back.  It was total chaos!  Then one of those roosters managed to climb the chain-link fence and flapped its way over into the neighbor's yard and disappeared.  The other one disappeared too.  A few hours later we found it and caught it, and hopped in the truck and dumped it back in the yard it originally came from.  The other one we never found, but we sure did hear it at 6:15 this morning!  So there is a rooster somewhere loose in the neighborhood.  Hopefully someone will get it and eat the sucker!

Here is a picture of the one that never left the yard.  I called him Henry.  We returned him to his owner last night.  At least I feel better knowing they are stuck with him again!

Spring Break 2011

One of the perks of being a teacher is getting to have Spring Break!  This year I abandoned traveled without the husband (he was starting his new city job!) and headed north to see my family in Kansas.  I drove "The Beast", aka Michael's Dodge Ram 2500, so I could haul back the antique organ from my parents' house.  My mom is now babysitting my cousin's little boy and my niece and needed more room in their house.  I have plenty of house and couldn't bear to think of that organ being sold or given away, so I volunteered to take it! 

Anyway, I got to play with the babies a lot, saw a few old friends, visited with the family, drank green beer, did a little shopping, and even squeezed in a pedicure.  Then I got to make an unexpected (but good!) trip to Iowa when my Great-Grandma Fannie passed away.  My dad, sister, niece, and I all loaded up into the car and made the trip.  Little Emma did such a good job in the car, but we were all pooped by then end.  I have a few pictures I am going to share, including one I found today when I was going through the boxes of stuff I had stored in my grandparents' attic back in 1997, and just brought back home with me this trip.  It is a picture of my Iowa cousins and my Great-Grandma.  Enjoy!

Me and Emma Grace on St. Patrick's Day

Emma Grace and her mommy, Hannah, on St. Patrick's Day

Modeling a dress I bought for her

Emma and I in Iowa

Emma and I the morning that I left

Taylor, Mallory, Carly, Hannah, Emma, and me

My Iowa Family

This was taken the summer of 1995

This is the organ and stool I brought home.  I found the serial number under 125-year-old dust, and this was built by the Estey Organ Company between 1884-1886.

Here we go again!

If you know my husband, you know he likes tends to change jobs quite frequently. Well...in a couple weeks he will no longer be an auto mechanic. He will be working for the City of Rusk in the Public Works department.

I think this will be a good change. He'll be making more money, have health insurance once again, and won't be coming home covered in grease. Did I mention he'll have health insurance??? That is the main thing that has really bothered me about the mechanic job. No insurance! It costs waaaaaay too much to put him on mine and I worry about him being an old man with no insurance. I'm glad I won't have to decide now if it would be cheaper to plan a funeral than pay medical bills.

Anyway, that's the latest news from the Beck household.

Super busy!

I know I haven't posted in a while. I've been super busy at school and at home grading 50 million compositions a week. Okay, it was really only 160 a week, but it felt like a lot more. Luckily I am done with those for the rest of this school year. My TAKS test was yesterday and it is such a relief to have it be over! Now I can use the laptops more in class and maybe do some fun things. Kids like to have fun still, right?

Rewards of Teaching

In 4th grade the kids have to take a state writing assessment and we work on writing compositions to get ready for the test.  One of the prompts we have written about is an adventure you have had.  I was grading these and came across this one.  I am going to type it just as it was written.  There are some errors, but overall it was an true "awwww" moment for me.

Mrs. Beck

Ring! Ring! The clock struck 8:00. "Time for school." said the teacher.

The first class was over, and then I met Mrs. Beck She was the most spectaclaur, fantastic, Amazing, most faboulas teacher in the history of teachers!  She teaches writing and spelling  At the first of the year I bearly knew how to spell school, now I know how to spell extraordinaryily and knowledgeable.  Another thing sh helps me with is writing.  I haven't quite gotten it down yet but It's Readable.  She also helps me with compositions.  I really love working with Mrs. Beck.  She makes school fun


School is a really big adventure for me.  I really like it and you should to.

You Know You Live in Texas When...

...this much snow warrants a snow day from school.

2/4/11