This year's garden

Inspired by my sister's and sister-in-law's progress, I decided that we should get our garden in soon. So far we have four different types of tomato plants (including a "Mr. Stripey" heirloom tomato) an acorn squash and an eggplant. I still need to set up the drip system (the secret to my actually being able to keep the plants alive) and I may still add a little more.

And Mom, if you ever wondered what happened to your little orange tree, here it is. It's been thriving.

My Little Ninjas

I host/advise the Anime Club at school. As a thank you for letting the students use my classroom two to three times a week, the president of the club got some Naruto (a manga and anime series) headbands for the boys. They enjoyed them.

Valentine's Day

I just wanted to show off Richard's Valentines gift to me this year. The bear was neither here nor there; it was just a generic stuffed animal that the florist included for an extra five or ten dollars. The cool thing was the fruit arrangement. We had seen these advertised before and they looked kind of cool. Richard asked me if I would like to have one and said why not. I don't know how much he paid for it but it was really good. All of the fruit was delicious especially the chocolate covered strawberries. I'm a little particular to floral arrangements but this was a nice change.

Snow sledding, the expensive way

I am very over due with some posts that I had wanted to write. Normally I would just forget about them, but there were some pictures that I wanted to share too. So the next few posts will have happened a while ago, but I want to share them anyway. Some weekend in January (I think) we decided to take the boys sledding. This first photo is of Richard and Nathan coming down the hill. This is the first time that I have ever paid to go sledding and as a busy someone from sunny southern California, I think that is was just about worth it. We went to Big Bear, to the same place that we had gone back in September. There is an old ski resort that had been turned into a family fun center type place. During winter they have the old bunny slope covered with snow (man-made if there hasn't been enough natural) and something called a magic carpet, which is basically an outdoor moving sidewalk, that brings you up to the top of the hill. They provide the tubes to ride on and of course there are bathrooms and a snack area near by. It definitely wasn't the ward snow parties that I had growing up and I missed not coming with a big group, but it was easy and we all had a great time.
By the way, it was $25 per person, but both Nathan and Joshua were young enough that they were free with Richard and I paying.

Joshua walking around in the snow.

One of the runs. Look at all of those cars. And this is only a small part of the parking lot.

The E-ticket run.

All of us tired but happy.

Pink in my new color

So, if anyone is wondering, I got my pink slip. So I'm fired, but probably not really, because LAUSD needs science teachers too bad to actually get rid of me. There is still the chance that someone from district would push me out (because they need to go back to a classroom and have more seniority than I do) but I doubt that because, while I love my kids and like the school, we are still considered the bottom of the barrel here at Fremont. The LA times may call this area historic, but it is still historic South Central LA.

Signs of a slow economy

Now you all have probably seen the commercials for Disneyland where they will let you in free on your birthday (good ploy because who goes by themselves and then also buys nothing?), but did you know that you can also pay monthly installments for a Disney pass? We decided to get Disney passes again this year (we have had them before although not for this last year). When we were talking to the lovely ticket lady, she helpfully pointed out that Disney now sells the passes on an installment plan. You just pay the price of a full ticket your first time and then they will automatically bill your credit card every month for 1/12th of what ever is left. They don't charge interest (although I didn't do the math so I'm taking their word for it) but it is definitely better than putting it all on your credit card at once. I thought it was very clever if them.
A second sign of the recession, girl scout cookies. I just bought a bunch (eight boxes, I support our school librarian's granddaughter) and although I don't think the price has gone up from last year, I am sure that there are less cookies in the thin mints. The stack of cookies in that sleeve used to be at least two inches longer. They are still yummy.

What I did today.

1. Woke up early (unintentionally)
2. Kept Nathan and Joshua from killing each other (getting harder and harder each day)
3. Made green eggs and ham for dinner, per request from Nathan (I think because they celebrated National Day of Reading and Dr. Seuss's' birthday yesterday at school)
4. Got completely up to date on my grading (and grades aren't even due)
The last one was really the reason I'm posting. I don't think that I have ever been up to date with out having a deadline pushing me. It's a nice feeling but also very strange.