Busy, Busy, Busy!

Until I started teaching ( and it is only pre-kindergarten!) I never gave a lot of thought to my kids complaining about the last few weeks of school. Now, I have a greater appreciation of school getting out. I honestly believe that teachers look forward to it more then the kids. The end of the year clean up, organizing, etc. etc, etc. goes on and on and on. Also, finishing up the children's memory books, binding their ABC books ~ and as a gift from me to my families, I give each family a disk with anywhere from 400 -600 digital pictures I have taken through out the year and pictures parents have taken and been so kind to give me a disk I can down load. But to make it easier on me, I do edit the pictures through out the year. What takes time is just putting then on a disk. I have the pictures in a folder and all it takes is a click, but I have to do 24 disks. Enough complaining. School is out the 12th, and my official last day is the 13th. I have gotten all (I hope) my retirement papers in and now am waiting to hear back, the usual stuff.

We had a good weekend at the lake. I will post some pictures later of the 'thinning' of the trees. The place still looks like a mini forest, but with a little more visual in the front, yeah! I really do not like overgrown places, reminds me of old people (we'll just ignore the fact that I am 60). My brother and his youngest were there. Timmy is now 13, wow. We had a good visit.

The weather forecast said today was suppose to be 98 and it was 102 and it felt like it. The AC in my classroom went out a week ago Monday, and finally got fixed yesterday. My class gets out at 11:30, so with windows open and doors open it wasn't to terrible. Yeah for the AC getting fixed. The weather forecast said/explained how the heat created the thunderstorms tonight. And tonight quite a thunderstorm came through the area, lots of lightening and some rain. I am really hoping not to wake up to some massive fire somewhere because of the lightening. I think the thunder got stuck above the house, as you could feel the house vibrate slightly and the cats hid where ever they could. The sound was very loud and the lightening almost blinding. Nothing like the thunderstorms we experienced living in the Sierra's, but still impressive. God can light up the sky!
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It has also been busy here, getting Keith ready to move to Santa Barbara. He and his dad took a load down on Wednesday. He will be leaving here on Saturday and his first day is the 1st. I still need to sew the patches on his shirts and will do that tomorrow evening. We will prepare his room, as his bed is gone, for the grandchildren to sleep in. We will turn it into a library, not a spare bedroom, except for the grandkids. We will put in the children's books and the toys, also.
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I have been wanting to update my side bars on my blog, but work has side tracked me on that also.
I probably should sign off as it is late and I need to get up early, and am really misspelling words now. The children are having "octopus" for snack and I have to leave earlier to get the stuff at the store, on the way to work.
God bless

Going.

We are getting out of town for a few days this weekend. Going to our place at the lake. Not all of us, Keith's last day of work was yesterday, and he starts his new job June 1st and has things he needs to do here. Moving to Santa Barbara, gee! He should like it, going from the heat of the central valley to the cool coast. Working at a beach, who can complain. I loved it when we lived at the beach near Santa Cruz and in Monterey. I think those are some of my most favorite places. I love to smell the ocean air, even like the coastal fog, it has much more personality then the valley fog~ which just sits here and takes in all the stale smell around us.

Don't know about anyone else, but my computer is not letting me open up and stay on some blogs for very long. Sorry about that. Hopefully it will feel betting when we return. That's what happened last time. I think I will virus scan it and spy ware scan it.
Have a Blessed Weekend!

Hot!

It was 104 yesterday, today it hit 106. We turned on the AC and got the fans out. Even the cats had no energy. I thought this was just funny of Squirt, he just lay there.

I see my windows need to be cleaned, they shall be added to my list of things that need to get done as soon as school is out or sooner!

Quotes

It all started with a quote I read yesterday, I believe was said by Ronald Reagan and it goes something like this:
In this current crisis government is not our solution,
it is the problem.
(it's hard to write when you are driving)


The problem is not that people are taxed too little, the problem is that government spends too much.
Ronald Reagan

There are no easy answers' but there are simple answers. We must have the courage to do what we know is morally right.
Ronald Reagan

We are never defeated unless we give up on God.
Ronald Reagan


We might come closer to balancing the Budget if all of us lived closer to the Commandments and the Golden Rule.
Ronald Reagan

Without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure.
Ronald Reagan

Only God Himself fully appreciates the influence of a Christian mother in the molding of character in her children.
Billy Graham

The framers of our Constitution meant we were to have freedom of religion, not freedom from religion.
Billy Graham


It is a masterpiece of the devil to make us believe that children cannot understand religion. Would Christ have made a child the standard of faith if He had known that it was not capable of understanding His words?
Dwight L. Moody

We are told to let our light shine, and if it does, we won't need to tell anybody it does. Lighthouses don't fire cannons to call attention to their shining- they just shine.
Dwight L. Moody

Empty pockets never held anyone back. Only empty heads and empty hearts can do that. ....
...................Norman Vincent Peale

Every problem has in it the seeds of its own solution. If you don't have any problems, you don't get any seeds.
Norman Vincent Peale

Stand up to your obstacles and do something about them. You will find that they haven't half the strength you think they have.
Norman Vincent Peale

God Bless ♥

Yeah!

Conferences are done and the papers are all turned in. Just need to get what I have left in order and place in the childrens files. I had 22 of 24 families come in for conferences. So tomorrow I will be able do some belated housecleaning.

Ready or not!

I am ready and glad my parent conferences are almost over so I can move on to other things.
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I am not ready for it to be 104 on Sunday! I hope the weathermen are wrong in their predictions as that is above normal for this time of year!

Owl Lady

The "Owl Lady" as she is called, came to my class today for an on site field trip. As you can imagine the children were captivated by her and her birds. They are all rescued birds that cannot be let loose in the wild. While they want to fly, the three she brought in today cannot. They were hit by cars and their wings broken.

This owl was angry and kept scolding the lady, as she had recently laid an egg and wanted her egg, though infertile. The children thought she looked angry.

The burrowing owl was the smallest yet the oldest ~ almost 12 years old. He is called "Grandpa owl".

If you look closely you can see where the wing was broken on this Red Tailed Hawl. She was only 3 months when she was hit.

It was a wonderful presentation, geared to the ages I have in my class. She talked about each one, showed ~literally~ an example of the different wing spans for some of the birds. The Calif. condor has the largest wing span and the hummingbird the smallest. She explained some of there behavior, talked about what they ate, where they lived, etc. She asked the children questions and let them answer. Needless to say all the birds flapped and spread their wings to the delight of the clsss. She was great and so were the birds. I don't know why I haven't called her in before this.

After all was said and done I let the children out onto the play yard for approximately 20 minutes before we brought them back in for activities. They did remarkabley well and needed the outside time to run and let loose some of their energy.

♥

God Bless!

1915

This is the photo that I recently restored. I printed out a 5 x 7 copy last night at the college, and it is really nice. The photo was very yellow with lots of stains on it. It had been cut with scissors and the edges on the original are ragged. My instructor said it was very nice, and maybe we could do a copy in black and white, only. I worked on it in photoshop CS3. If you click on it, it will enlarge. It was taken approximately between (I am guessing) 1915-1918. My grandmother was born in 1905 and she is the young girl in the center of the photo. It is my great grandmother and g. grandfather Laura and Frank. Guy (L) is the oldest, my grandmother~ Bernice, and Elwin. The youngest I am guessing, wasn't born yet, not sure. I plan on getting copies printed for other family members, but will wait on that for a little while. FYI, they lived in Minn. until my mother was 7 when they moved to Calif.

Now it is back to conference paperwork, for tomorrow.

Pray

I finally finished restoring the photo I have been working on of my grandma and her family, taken around 1915 or so. If I do say so myself, I was pleased with the way it turned out. Later I will try to save it in jpeg so I can post it.

Went with my hubby to a doctors appointment today, and while there he told me a friend had been in an accident Monday morning. Since we were at Kaiser I was able to call the info line and find out what room she was in. So we headed up to check on her. God was with her Monday morning, as she may be bruised, cut and have broken bones nothing is life threatening. She was hit by a semi she did not see. Please pray for Chris. When she leaves the hospital she will go to a a rehab facility for some physical therapy. I pray for a speedy recovery for her. She is probably one of the nicest people I have ever known.

I so look forward to 2:oo Friday, as most of my conferences will be over, with just a few the next week. Right now I am just taking a break, my spelling is horribile and I think I should finish my conference notes, have a blessed night.

So much to do!

So much to do and so little time. I have parent conferences Friday and all next week. It's not hard just very time consuming. My staff help me with the observations, assessments, etc. but in the end I still have to put them all together. I usually don't get the sleep I'd like, but always look forward to Saturday mornings when I can sleep in. Friday evening there is a girl's night out at the church and am looking forward to a little fun and games with some friends.
♥
Friday Elizabeth picked up her Bridesmaid dress for Hilary's wedding in June. It looks real nice on her and fits very nicely, she won't need to get it altered.
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Today I went with Elizabeth to Lamoor NAS where she got her overseas physical, which had to be done and signed by a military doctor. She got a power of attorney so that after she leaves for Korea, sometime during the summer, I can authorize what can be shipped overseas, when the military come by to pick up their things, of course it will be what she decides goes. Slowly things are coming together for the transition so she can join her husband.


Eric came down, he bought a newer pickup and now will sell the one he has. (He actually came down to help his dad work on his 55 Studebaker.) As we have a corner house, you should have seen the front and the side, everyone has a pick up and I have a car~ 5 pickups parked outside. It looks like a car lot for pickups or a bunch of rednecks live here! Sigh.............
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Keith went down to Santa Barbara Saturday, to look at the room he'll be renting and get information, etc. I believe he said he'll have a 12 mile commute to Carpenteria. He will need to look for another place to live within the year as his friends plan on moving away from Santa Barbara. At least he will have a little more time to look and will be near his job. So we will be putting together food, ordering uniforms, etc. in anticipation of his move. He won't be able to take all his furniture at this time, but will have to decide what he wants besides his bed, desk and computer. Oh, he will take the dorm 'fridge we have and keep it in his room.

We will be looking at an empty EMPTY nest come this summer, with our nearest child living 2 1/2 hours away or should I also say the nearest family. That is life isn't it.

I have recently discovered a show on TV called California's Gold, with host Huell Howser. Many people I know have heard of him, but not me. He does half hour shows about interesting places in California to visit. I Tivo them until I have time to watch. Some I am not interested in, but others yes. After I retire I think we may be taking some 3-4 day trips to go and visit these places. You would think that being born and raised in Calif. for most of my life I would know some of these things. But some of those places are little out of the way places or things I just never thought about. However, he also does State Parks in Calif. and most of those I know about.

I really dislike the politics in California, but there is so much here!