So much to be thankful for this Thanksgiving

Rodney and I hosted our first Thanksgiving at our house this year. We normally have Thanksgiving at my Grandma's house, but she found out in October that she had breast cancer and she had a double mastectomy about three weeks ago, so she wasn't quite up to cooking a huge feast! My wonderful hubby made the turkey and dressing and it was delicious! Now comes my favorite time of year.....gonna spend the weekend decorating the house for Christmas!

Busy, Busy, Busy!!!

I had high hopes when I started this blog that I would update it once a week, but we have just been so busy, and when we aren't busy I have wanted to be lazy :) Here is what we have been up to..........

We were lucky enough to get tickets to go to Game 4 of the World Series!!!!! Rod's mom and dad flew in for the day and went with us. We had a great time, even though the Rangers lost. It was great to be there and experience the energy at such a big game. Here are a few pics.....

We also went to the Tech/Baylor game at the Cotton Bowl. It was unbelievably hot, but ended up being a great game!

Notice how empty the Baylor side was in the stands......

This shirt makes me smile :)

We went to Stillwater, OK for Tanner and Ashley's wedding. The Harkey's went with us and we loved getting to spend the weekend with them. They are expecting their first baby in April and we could not be more excited for them. We had so much fun listening to them try to pick out baby names, and add in our opinions as well :) I love that Kate and I were such great friends in college and then we were lucky enough to have husbands that are best friends! 

We also started building a Pergola in our backyard. We have worked on it two or three weekends now, and it is almost finished. I am so lucky to have such a "Handy Husband" who can build me whatever I want :) My Dad came over and helped out too......Here are the progression pics so far....

Our next project will be to lay flag stone or maybe have some stamped concrete to enlarge the patio. That will probably be our Christmas present to each other this year!

This is what it is all about......

Teaching is a hard job, no if's and's or but's about it. Sure we have the whole summer off and 2 weeks at Christmas, but it is because we need it. Teaching has changed so much since I was little, and even in the last 6 years since I started. I find myself complaining to everyone about all of the paperwork and minutia that is required of us. Between RTI folders, Lesson plans, grading papers, tutoring, workshops, and parent conferences, we actually have to TEACH! Sometimes I think that maybe teaching is not for me, but today I got a note that reminded my exactly why I teach....because "to teach is to touch a life forever" I have taught for 6 years and never gotten anything like this from a parent. So thank you for reminding me why I do love this job!

Mrs. Leon –

I wanted to say thank you for being the person and teacher that you are. I know I haven’t met you (yet) but "B" cannot say enough good things about you. The character that you possess precedes you and you are making a lasting impression on my daughter. Written words cannot express my gratitude for who you are and what you have done for my daughter!

Last school year was a horrible one for her – she would get in the car every day after school in tears and say she never wanted to go back and even getting her out the door in the morning to go to school was a daily battle. She was REALLY dreading this school year (and I was, too – it’s awful to see your child in pain.) If she did not get placed with a compatible teacher this year, things were literally to the point that I was going to change her school if there continued to be problems.

It may not mean anything to you, but we have been praying since the middle of last school year that the teacher she would get in 3^rd grade would be a better fit for her. And it hasn’t just been the prayers of our household, but the prayers of others in our family, our church community, and personal friends. Even though we did not know who her teacher would be, you have been covered in prayer for a long time now! God knew who you were before we did!

"B" is SO happy now. She is enjoying herself SO much, and FLOURISHING! God has answered our heart-cries to Him for a good teacher that can handle her little idiosyncrasies with great grace! I literally cried when I received her report card because there were FOUR positive comments about her! (Last year, the negative comments far outweighed the positive ones.) She shows those comments to EVERYONE that she can – even the mail man – and she is just glowing. She’s even eager to do her homework – which for ANY parent is an answered prayer!

Keep doing what you’re doing, Mrs. Leon. I am sure that one of your goals as a teacher is to positively impact the lives of the children, and I must say – you are doing an awesome job at that. I asked "B" who her favorite teacher was out of all the teachers that she’s had, and she said you. 

Again, thank you. God bless you.

Home Sweet Home!

I can't believe that this time last year we were moving into our very first house! It is amazing how fast time flies. Buying a house was a very quick decision for us. We went home to see Rod's fam and found out that his sister was buying a house and she was all excited about the 8,000 tax credit and low interest rates. I never thought we could do it, especially with Rodney not working, but we crunched the numbers and found that we could buy a house for pretty much what we were paying in rent every month. We came home looked at houses for less than a week and found "THE ONE". We didn't have much time to dwell on the decision since it was such a great deal so we made the decision and never looked back and I am so glad that we did!

So here is what I LOVE about our house and where we live....

• We live in a small town with 2250 people...crazy to think that you can find that just 30 miles from downtown. 
• We have a great community that has a swimming pool and gym (in case I ever felt like working out, I have been once in one year!)
• We have become great friends with 2 of our neighbors. It is nice to be able to walk across the street for a BBQ or to hang out with friends.
• I absolutely love our house, and feel so blessed that our "starter home" is so NICE! I never dreamed that I would have 3 bedrooms, 2 baths, and an office, plus granite counter tops and stainless steel appliances!  
• We have a Sonic within walking distance (I think Cherise likes that more than I do :)
• We can see the stars in our backyard :)

What I DO NOT like about our house and where we live....

• We live at least 15 minutes from Shopping, restaurants, movies theaters, and anything fun!
• Most of our friends live at least 30- 45 minutes away :(
• We are already running out of storage space in the kitchen and we have no hall closet in our house, who builds a 2,000 sq ft house without a hall closet???
• Traffic.....grrrrr
• Teeny Tiny spare bedrooms (Sorry Cherise and Carroll)
• Pretty much all we have is a Sonic :( I stop there frequently so that they will not go out of business!

Even though we have lived here a year, we haven't been able to do too much to the house. Between Rodney not working the first 6 months we lived here and paying for some wedding stuff we haven't been able to afford too much.

Here are a few before and after pics...

Before.....This picture was taken waaaay before we moved in and by the time we bought the house the grass looked awful so Rod laid new sod in certain areas.

After......

Close up of the stone work Rod did around the trees

Rod built a flower bed in the corner because that is where all the water would run when we didn't have gutters, it was a mud pile and nothing would grow there.

Before......

After......Our Hibiscus plants are growing out of control!!!

Before.....ugly, plain white fireplace

After.......gorgeous, thanks to my hubby!

Before........

 After... (Mikey wanted his picture taken)

Before.....

After.....

 Before......

After....

Pics of our office....

And our bedroom..... and 2 months later it is still a work in progress!

A wonderful pic from our snow day last year.....been playing around with the effects on iphoto

Labor Day Weekend!!

We were able to head to Lubbock for Labor Day Weekend and spend some time with Rod's family! Rod and his Dad went dove hunting on Saturday, so Cherise, Beth, Kristen, and I headed out for a girls day! We went to Abuelo's for lunch and then Cherise treated Kristen and I to pedicures at the Day Spa. It was WONDERFUL! We then went to the mall with everyone else in Lubbock and searched for some new Texas Tech T-Shirts! We found some and now I am officially ready for Football season :) Cherise and I watched "Back-up Plan" while the guys finished hunting that evening! Sunday we had lunch at the Country Club with some of the fam and then headed back to watch the TECH game. Sunday night we got to eat some of the dove that the guys shot! Not my favorite, but I'll eat since my honey worked hard to bring it home :) We rented another movie on Sunday night---"Brooklyn's Finest" Carroll and I were not a fan so I wouldn't waste my money on it! Hope everyone had a wonderful Labor Day weekend!

I Survived my first week in 3rd grade!

I can't believe that summer is already over and I have finished my first week of school! I am always sooooo sad to see summer go, but happy to get back into a routine. They say the more time you have the less you get done and I find that to be very true when I am home all summer!

I spent the last week of my summer moving classrooms and getting my new one decorated and ready to go for the First Day of School. Every 3rd grade classroom has a "Space" theme so it was fun finding things to go along with that. I haven't taken any pictures, but will and post them soon!

Everyone has been asking me how I like 3rd grade compared to Kindergarten and I have to say that I think this might be the best move I have ever made! When I came home from teaching Kinder I was physically, mentally, and emotionally exhausted everyday! In the five days that I have taught 3rd I haven't come home one day feeling like I did in Kinder. I'll be honest when 3:45 rolled around in Kinder I was out the door and ready to be home and laying on the couch, but this first week I have stayed at school till 4:30 or 5:00 everyday and it hasn't once bothered me! I think the main stress will be that I am teaching Math and Science to my homeroom and the Bilingual class and I am worried that the Bilingual class will struggle because of the language barrier. We started with Place Value in Math this week and most of my class is grasping it but less than half of the Bilingual are. The other 3rd grade teachers assure me that this is one of the hardest concepts and that rarely any of them grasp it until January! YIKES! I hate moving on from something when they don't fully understand it!

Hopefully the second week will go as well as the first and we aren't just experiencing the "honeymoon period" as most teachers call it!

Stay tuned.......

A lot has happened this past week!

 First we were able to go to the Rangers game with some friends. Chrissa's company has a suite so the game/food/and drinks were FREE!!! I am typically not a fan of baseball, but I watched a game with Rod one afternoon and started to really enjoy watching it. Since there isn't much on TV in the summer we have been watching lots of Ranger games.

                             

We spent Sunday at the Lake with Jolene, Holly, Greg, and Jared..........

                   

                             

                             

                             

Last night we got to babysit Carter. He is such a fun, easy going baby. We ate dinner, played, and I gave him a bath, which he loves! Here is a cute pic of Carter in Rod's work boots!

                             

  

I saved the craziest news for last! My principal emailed me Monday night and asked if I could come up to school and chat about some things for next year. I got the email Tuesday morning and knew immediately that something was up, your principal doesn't ask you to come to school over summer break  if she just wants to chat. She informed that a 3rd grade Math/Science position was opened and she had interviewed lots of people, but really wanted me to move up. I have only taught Kindergarten, and as much as I love that age.......they wear me out! I knew I might be needing a change since Rod and I could be having kids in a couple of years. I don't think I could teach Kinder all day and then come home to a baby. So it looks like now is the time for me to make a change!!! I am excited but scared at the same time! At least I LOVE Math and I will have had some of these kids when they were in Kindergarten. Summer is almost over, but I am going to enjoy my last week and TRY not to stress about it too much!