Blizzard of 2010

I swear, this blizzard must've been created just for me! :-D

I haven't been able to find the time to do anything to prepare for my daughter's arrival even though I know it has to be a priority. Unfortunately, it seems like lately everything is a priority! Bills. Meetings. Assessments. Report Cards. Family health issues. The nursery and all the other hundreds of things related to her arrival have taken a back seat since that's over a month away. And then when I am not dealing with life-stuff, I want to be hanging out. I want to accept every invitation since I know that's all about to be shut down. But at the same time I really, really, really need to be home getting everything ready. It's a Catch 22, people!! Well, there's a blizzard out there so now I have no choice! Everything is shut down and I am alone in this house with nothing but time on my hands!!

I got home early on Friday because my school district closed 2.5 hours early. It had just started to snow. I was celebrating in my front yard, giddy with the prospect of a chance to accomplish some things off my mammoth never-ending to do list!

It was all fun and games taking these pictures until my camera fell off my car, smashing onto the concrete. I'm lucky I didn't crack the screen, although it now has a grinding noise whenever I open it or try to get in for a tight shot. :(

oops.

So I went in the house with my bruised camera, unpacked my groceries (salmon, ice cream, Chardonnay and pizza were some of the musts!) and prepared to hunker down for the storm. I turned on my heated mattress pad - love.it. - and got cozy in my bed to work on a name for my girl. I am keeping Almaz as part of it but want to add something to it. Look for a post on that process to come. I spent the whole evening coming up with combinations of the names I love. Meanwhile, it kept snowing and snowing and snowing. It's blowing like crazy out there now and the snow keeps piling up. It hasn't stopped snowing since Friday morning. There has got to be at least 2' out there. It's incredible!!

This morning I created a Blizzard To Do List. Trust me on this: it's long. But it's also manageable! I am sure that I don't just have this weekend to accomplish the items on it. DC is not prepared to handle snow of this magnitude. There is NO WAY they will have this plowed in time for school on Monday. Or Tuesday. And they are forecasting even more snow for Tuesday so that means there probably won't be any snow on Wednesday either! I'm predicting we are out until Thursday at the earliest. That gives me five straight uninterrupted days to get things done! First up, the nursery. Remember these photos? I will start on this today and will do another nursery-related post at the end of the blizzard. Wish me luck!

Have a Good Weekend!

It's going to be warm this weekend! I'm so glad it's Spring. I hope the warm weather doesn't distract me too much from working on my dossier. Wish me luck!

cherry blossoms bulletin board by my kindergartners

Spring Break

I am on Spring Break! Yay!! This morning, the first thing on the agenda was to photograph the cherry blossoms before the rain came. I drove downtown, found a great parking space, put 4 quarters in the meter and walked about 20 steps when it started to drizzle.


So, I returned to my car to wait it out. While waiting I took these shots:


After about 15 minutes I hopped out of my car--put another 4 quarters in the meter (1 quarter only gave 7½ minutes) and snapped these right before it started pouring:


The lighting wasn't the greatest but I think I got some pretty decent shots. I really need to study my camera manual this week while I'm off. On the way home I stopped to pump gas. It was there where I spotted a penny on the ground.


Like I have done since I was was about eight years old, I recited "See a penny, pick it up? All day long you'll have good luck. See a penny, let it lie? All good luck will pass you by". As I bent down to pick it up I wondered what good luck I was going to have.

I found out 15 minutes later. When I got home I saw this parked across the street from my house.


The man, an employee of the water company, asked me how long I was going to park in front of my house because he had some work to do. Knowing I hadn't requested any work (and growing concerned as I spotted the front end of his bulldozer with remnants of broken asphalt therein) I asked him to double check the address of the assignment. He repeated my address to me and informed me that he was to begin right away but would call his supervisor to prove to me that this was where he was supposed to be. Turns out he was supposed to be digging up at my street address but in a different quadrant of town! Can you imagine what a mess that would have been if I hadn't been off this week; if I hadn't gotten home in time? Thank goodness for that lucky penny! :-)

Yay! Snow!

I woke up and checked the forecast.
Yes! The predictions were correct!
I love being a teacher!


I made some fresh-squeezed o.j.

and hit the blogs.

It's going to be a good day.

Btw, I've lost 7 pounds and I finally got an email from my SW saying he did change my homestudy the way I wanted. :-)

Snow Day!

Yay! A snow day today! The best thing about being a teacher! (is that a problem?!)
Meanwhile, I have strep throat.

I called in sick Monday and Tuesday so at least I only have to use one day of leave now. I really should be saving up those days for when my little one comes home... although I'm really not sure how that works anyway. Do I get to use sick days for materinty leave? Do I even get maternity leave if I haven't worked there a year? Can I extend FMLA if I don't feel like we've bonded enough? Hmmm... things I clearly need to figure out!

Beauty in Nature

Saw this on my ride home. Such a quiet, peaceful scene ...to balance out the craziness of 15 kindergartners over stimulated by candy and thoughts of vacation... which, by the way, I am on until Jan. 5th. Hallelujah!

NaBloPoMo #23 theme:thankful

lovely

They bloomed!