We rarely have the opportunity to go to the movies, and we were so glad we went to see "The Fall" this past Sunday. We hadn't heard much about it until we read what was playing at Amherst Cinema, but we watched the trailer and decided to give it a try. This was one of the most visually beautiful movies I have ever seen. The scenery and the costumes were unbelievable! I don't know why she isn't pictured on the poster, but the true lead in this movie was a little girl around 5 years old. Ethan and I were so impressed with her acting abilities. The movie has two stories intertwined, one about the little girl and a stunt man who meet in a hospital, and the other story he tells the little girl, filmed as she imagines it. We would highly recommend this movie!

Today was my last day of school. I left school and went to pick Esme up at the library. When I got out of the car it was just starting to rain. I went into the chapel and said a prayer for all the students I've taught this year, and asked God to specially protect and guide 2 or 3 that were struggling. Then I walked out into the rain, and into the middle of a field so that it could pour down on me and wash away all the stress and tension of the last year, and leave me ready to start my summer. While I was in the rain I felt overwhelmed and grateful for my wonderful family that I was about to go inside to see, and so thankful for the opportunity to have this summer with Esme. When I went inside Ethan's whole desk was covered with Polly Pocket paraphernalia.

One of our new favorite things to do is letterboxing. We find clues at www.letterboxing.org and have successfully found two. I took my class letterboxing and planted two along the way.

I recently finished reading The Screwtape Letters for the first time. I loved this book! It's written by a demon who is training his nephew to pull people away from God ("the Enemy") and how they use the trappings of this life to try to separate us from Him. Each chapter contains at least one lesson, and this book really made me think about my relationship with God and how to be closer to Him in ways that I hadn't before. C. S. Lewis has opened my eyes in other books as well, and if you were touched by the messages in the Chronicles of Narnia, you would probably enjoy this book as well.

I can't believe how much I fit into my day yesterday!

• taught 21 second graders for a full day
• shopped around for a lawn mower
• mowed a quarter of my lawn before the new mower stopped working
  
• payed my electric bill
• went to the post office
• returned a call for a job interview
• endeavored to get mower fixed, but shop was closed
• made meatballs from scratch for dinner

Then I relaxed and watched the second half of "The Empire Strikes Back" with Ethan and Esme, talked to Lisa for a bit, and went to bed!

Last time I had a long term assigment at school I hardly kept up with anything. I did manage to keep all my homeschooling activities going, but I don't think I scrapped at all for those 3 months. This time, I had a plan to make sure I keep scrapping.

My best friend, Lisa, lives about 75 miles away. With the price of gas getting higher and higher, I don't get to see her as much as I would like. We crop together once a month, but neither of us were satisfied with the amount we accomplished. Lisa and I are both big telephone people, so decided to crop together over the phone once a week. Yes, there are some periods of dead air and once a week I'd have a crik in my neck, but it was working out okay.

Other scrappers started gently picking on us about it. We realized we were losing the best part of scrapping together which was help on each other's layouts. Finally someone told us about Skype, which enables you to use your computer like a telephone. We purchased webcams and this week we had our first virtual crop. It was fabulous!! I love being about to show my page when I'm stuck and she loved being able to eat Samoas in front of me. (cruel cruel girl)

We challenge each other once a week - we've done things like, do a completely monochromatic layout, or use a combination of glitter and dye (although when she said dye I thought she meant die, so I she used dye and I used a die cut), do a completely black and white page, etc. It's lots of fun!

I am a second grade teacher again. I love my new class. They are so easy. I think this year may have spoiled me to ever do long-term assignments again. My class from October to January wasn't always easy, but the kids were so full of spirit and fun that it was a pleasure to work with them. Some of my students now are still feeling and little wary about me. One told me today that she likes me a lot, but she still likes her old teacher better. When I ran into one outside he asked me if I was going to be his teacher today. I have to tell him YES over and over - YES I am your teacher for the rest of the time you are in second grade!

It's hard to adjust to working every day again. I miss seeing Ethan. I miss being with Esme more. I know it's the right thing to do for our family, but it's still difficult to get up and go to work every day. Lucky for me, in just a couple weeks, I'll be on vacation again!

I have been blog-tagged by Rita!! Seven random things about me:
1. I love buying Barbie clothes for my daughter so I can play with them.
2. My favorite online game is puzzlepirates.
3. I have a lot of shelving in my scrapbook area and still have stuff all over my table.
4. I planned a very successful Girl Scout meeting last night and I'm proud of myself.
5. I am lonely for my laptop while waiting for its new power cord.
6. I am bummed I am missing a homeschooling field trip today because I have to work.
7. If I don't leave for school now, I'm going to be late!

This photo seems so long ago now...last night's layout.

When I was about 10 years old my dad bought me a white bookcase for my bedroom. Over 20 years later, those bookshelves made nine or ten moves through moving with my family, my college years, and moving with Ethan. They made their final move from my basement scrapbooking room to my guest room scrapbooking area. I put all my cool supplies on them, but they were leaning in a serious way. Ethan suggested that I find something new before they crashed to the ground, taking all my gemstones, textured paints, and silk flowers with them. On my brother's advice, I got some cool gently used Ikea Expedit shelves. Charles recommended the 4 cube by 4 cube set but I was lucky enough to find the 5 by 5 set on craigslist. All of a sudden I have sooo much space! I am enjoying filling my cubes up with all the crafty stuff I love. I would highly recommend these to any scrapbooker - they hold a ton of stuff, and fit 12 by 12 papers and albums easily! My old shelves will get nailed together and won't be so attractive, but they'll make good storage for our camping gear in the basement.

I just finished an incredibly interesting book. It wasn't just about the cholera epidemic of the 1850s, but about how epidemiology was developed. It told the personal story of two men who we can thank for a major advancement in medicine. As I type this, it sound a bit dry, but believe me, it was fascinating and suspenseful! This book was both entertaining and extremely educational - a great read! I'd highly recommend it!

I had a harder time choosing who to vote for this year than usual. I was okay with almost all the choices, so it made it hard to narrow down a final candidate to get behind. I finally decided - good thing, because I had to vote today! Our family is going for Barack Obama! I'm ready for a really intelligent president, and I like his ideas, so I finally committed and gave him my vote! If he is the Democratic candidate for president I even have some signs ready to hang up on my fence.

I can't believe how busy I've been since I finished my long-term assignment! I thought once I stopped working every day I would have tons of time on my hands. I guess I forgot what real life is like, and how quickly days fill up! I have been doing a variety of different things. Our Girl Scout troop is finally up and running, I've been working on homeschooling lesson plans, finally seeing some friends, cooking more, etc.

I was excited that I lost approximately 16 pounds during my long-term assignment. I have a new doctor who was very encouraging. He gave me good advice about what I can do to stay on the same track. The most major thing I'm doing is giving up having soda at home. I've always drunk tons of soda, and when the doctor and I sat down and added up the calories I take in every week just in soda, I was amazed. Also, watching Super Size Me really opened my eyes to how bad soda is for you! So NO MORE soda in our home. We're going to try to teach Esme not to get hooked on the stuff either.

On Thursday Lisa and I got sewing lessons from Edwina, and for the first time ever, I finally feel like I might get the hang of a machine. Edwina is a former professional sewing teacher. Lisa and I have been hand-sewing doll clothes for weeks, but now that we want to graduate to a few simple outfits for our daughters, Edwina recommended the strength of the machine stitch. My MIL was nice enough to give us each a used machine. Now that I'm gaining a little confidence, I'm also looking forward to making some cool stitched scrapbooking embellishments!

On my last day the second grade teachers gave me a gift certificate to Olive Garden. Yesterday was my monthly scrapbooking day with Lisa, and we'd missed our annual birthday dinner, so we met and had our mini party! Lisa is the most wonderful person - I love spending time with her. We ordered three entrees so we could sample each and bring Ethan home lots of food too. Then we got to come back to my house and scrap for a few hours - this was my kind of night!

I am a teacher for one more day. One more day of actually having to prep during my prep periods, one more day of seeing the same little faces I've seen for the past three months, one more day of correcting, disciplining, and working with some great people.

Well, it's not exactly like I'll be gone forever. In fact I already know several dates I'll be back at the same school. But it won't be the same. One of my girls cried today because tomorrow will be my last day. I couldn't look at her or I would have cried too.

On a brighter note, tomorrow by 3 I will have returned to my true calling of the last four and a half years - SAHM. Esme asks me every day how many days I have left. I can't wait to take a more active role in her homeschooling, and I'm especially excited about getting to know more homeschoolers in our area. We're ready to write our first narrative on her progress and I know it will be a big undertaking, so I'm eager to get that started too.

I'm also looking forward to having more creative time again! Teaching takes so much energy, it's hard to be jazzed enough to come home and really want to work on detailed projects. This is something I've missed to much, especially since now I'm scrapbooking and sewing and altering. Ahhhh time for me again. That will be so nice!

I could never have finished this outfit if it wasn't for my friend Edwina. She told me how to sew in the elastic, and explained how to put the bloomers together. This is my third completed outfit for Esme's Bitty Baby, who she named Emily. Esme chose this fabric. It's a little old-timey for me, but she loves it. I have the next outfit in the works out of a soft pink star-patterned flannel.

I spend quite a while tonight reorganizing and cleaning off my scrapbook table. These Mrs. Grossman cowboy stickers have been floating around my desk since I received them free at CKU about 4 years ago. They never got the boot because my mother-in-law likes old westerns and I always held onto them with the possibility of doing something for her with them. Tonight as a reward for all my hard work I gave myself some creative time and made this card.

Have you seen Enchanted? Esme and I love this movie so much! We are already fans of the other Disney princess movies, and this one was very fun and the music was outstanding! Esme is obsessed. She has been playing poison apply, steal-my-crown, and singing the songs since she saw it. Her dad got her the CD and since Grandma took her to see it a second time, she's really all about playing Giselle. I an old-time musical fan and this movie definitely combined the big production numbers with and modern story.

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

We've had a wonderful vacation together - I am bummed that we only have one day left. We've got more family time and couple time than we have in months! I have a short two and a half weeks left of my long-term work assignment, and I'm really looking forward to spending more time with Ethan and Esme.

Lisa and I braved the Black Friday sales to get new computers, so Ethan and my gift to each other is a brand spanking new laptop. (Thank you Staples!) We are loving being able to access the internet, our music, and our pics anywhere in the house!! It is changing the way we use the internet in general. I also got a free printer, and tonight I am going to try printing photos on it for the first time.

I haven't done too much scrapping since I've been working full time, but now I am happily getting back into the swing. Ethan got me an ATG for Christmas and I am feeling inspired to stick lots of little pieces of paper together. Stephanie invited me over to scrap and I did most of a couple pages over there. I have so many great photos to work on - Esme at Christmas, Charles and Kim's wedding, etc. Hope to post more pages here soon.