Christmas

I think I'll move on to Christmas--warning, picture overload.  I am having a difficult time uploading pictures; I have to take them with my I-Pad and upload them to Picasa then download them onto the blog then open my blog on my laptop and edit them.  It's a long process and it's been keeping me from posting.  Now I'm so far behind.

We had a lovely Christmas.  The week before Christmas we had a fun day at the Botanical Garden and making gingerbread houses.  I was watching Abbey and Erin for the day and Amy's kids were off, so we made a day of it.

 John and Chellie came in the day before Christmas Eve, and we spent Christmas Eve getting ready for Christmas, decorating cookies and delivering little gifts to all of the neighbors.  Then we all went to Amy's Christmas Eve.  Unfortunately, Kate and the kids were not able to come. It was really fun having the little ones here Christmas morning.  Christmas day we went to Lorie's for a brunch then to Patty's Christmas evening.

John had to go back to work the week between Christmas and New years, so he flew back to Cincinnati and Chellie and the girls stayed with us that week.  It was great having them here.  We did a lot of fun things, but the Tuesday after Christmas we were going to the zoo, and Amy and her three were going to join us, but she fell in her drive way and broke her leg pretty badly.  Chellie and I took the kids to the zoo then, and Amy had surgery the next day.  We also took the kids to the Nature Center at Powder Valley that week, which was a lot of fun.

Thanksgiving Eve

I've got a lot of catching up to do, so I'll start with Thanksgiving Eve.  It was really nice this year because all of the kids were here (and grand kids). Kate and the kids got in Tuesday evening, and the airport was a mess.  I have never seen it so crowded.

We started the Thanksgiving weekend the night before going to the Garden Glow at the Botanical Garden.  Wayne and I had gone last year and really enjoyed it, so I knew the kids would, too.

Into November

We had a busy couple of weeks with Halloween and going to Cincinnati the first weekend of November.  John and Chellie came in for Halloween and it was fun having them here.  It rained that evening but it wasn't too cold so it turned out alright.  Rob and the girls came here to trick or treat and Jenny and Audriana came shortly thereafter.  Then Amy and Dave came a little later with Sara and Michael.  We probably had about one hundred trick or treaters here.  My sister who lives a few blocks from here had about 500.

The first weekend of November we went to Cincinnati for Grandparent's Day at the girl's school.  We took turns going to each of their rooms.  It's a really nice facility.  I think the girls both enjoy it there.  After school, we met Bill and Polly at Steak n Shake then came back to the house for cake to celebrate Polly's 70th birthday.

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They'll be in St. Louis again for Thanksgiving next week.  Kate and the kids are also coming into town, so all of the grand kids will be here.  We'll have 20 for dinner here, with our family and Wayne's brother Jeff and his wife Judith.  Then we go to my sister Libby's for dessert.  It's always so much fun to see everyone on holidays.  It will be good that Kate will get to see everyone since she won't be here for Christmas.

My class is going better, but I'm ready for it to be over.  The one student who was giving me such a hard time didn't show up for five classes and I hoped she had dropped.  Then last week when I walked up the hall to my classroom I saw to campus police officers sitting outside my classroom.  They asked about that student and said they needed to talk to her.  She showed up about half an hour after class had started and I got a hold of the police officer.  Apparently, she had cursed out a math teacher that morning because she did not like her grade on a  test.  She had to meet with the academic V.P. before she could go back to any classes.  She showed up the next class and was a perfect angel this week.  She knows she's on thin ice.

I've been selling a lot of stuff on the Webster Swap.  I'm trying to get rid of a lot of toys in the playroom so the kids have room to play up there.  I'm also getting rid of some dish wear type stuff because I have too much.  I usually turn around and spend any money I make buying from others on the Swap.  It's lots of fun.  I've done a little Christmas shopping, but most of the grand kids just want gift cards, except for the two little ones.  And we just give our own children checks, so I don't have to do so much shopping anymore. 

October

October is almost over and life is rolling right along.  I'm keeping busy with teaching and working in the tutoring center Wednesday evenings.  My class is going okay for the most part.   I have one student who s a pain in the behind, a real smart ass.  She sends me e-mails when she's not coming to class to tell me I can't count her absent for me be reason or another. I finally told her this week that I don't care if she is absent or not; it's much more pleasant when she isn't there.  When they turned in their first papers she asked when they would get them back and I told her in a week, then she asked how many classes I was teaching .  When I told her one she asked why it took me a whole week to grade papers.   She's on her phone texting the whole class, although I tell her every class to put her phone away.

I went to Boston last week for a long weekend.  It was a busy weekend; Jack plays hockey, football and soccer.  Corinne plays soccer and does Irish dance, so Kate runs constantly when she isn't working.  We did get to go to a pumpkin farm in between games on Sunday.  It was a pretty drive with all of the fall colors.  We road through Cambridge and there was a big rowing tournament so the streets and bridges were lined with people. It was cool to see.

We're getting ready for Halloween.  John and Chellie will be here with the kids, so it should be fun with most of the grand kids here.  I'm sure I'll have lots of pictures next week.