I'm so sick!

I feel like I've been hit by a bus!

Seriously!

Hubby and kids are taking great care of me. However, they all want me locked safely away in my room so they don't get sick.

I snuck out though.

I'm feeling better than yesterday. I was even lightheaded yesterday. But some nyquil last night and some robitussin today and I'm leaning towards feeling human again...barely...but I'm on my way.

I'm going back to bed.

Sniff

Cough

Sniff

*sigh*

Night night

Ripping my heart out...

Oh geez, the teenage years are going to kill me I'm sure of it. It's not that Chelsea is a difficult child. On the contrary, she's a total sweetheart (most of the time), but because of that I guess, she gets walked on a lot. I hate that for her. I feel her pain. It just breaks my heart to see it happen to her.

See, she's been friends with the same group of girls for a long time now, since elementary school. Last year one girl in particular started to ignore her. This really hurt her because it was her best friend. She was hurt but she didn't say anything. Over the summer that girl started to act like everything was great again. She was hanging out with Chels and calling and texting her. Well, school started and suddenly Chelsea isn't cool enough or pretty enough or something enough and she's started her crap all over again. Poor Chels. She doesn't know what to do about this.

Mark and I are really proud of Chelsea in that she doesn't follow the crowd. She does her own thing. We've always told her that cattle follow the herd, not people. She's free to make decisions on her own. She doesn't need her friends' approval to wear a certain shirt or look a certain way. So, she's always a little left of center because in her words, "I'm cool like that." The girl that's sort of snubbing her now doesn't do anything out of the ordinary because she's afraid to stand out from the crowd. I think she'd march right off a cliff if the rest of the group did. Sad really.

So, Chelsea was crying today because she feels like all her friends hate her suddenly. We talked a lot about if they were truly her friends then they'd be her friends no matter what color her hair was or how funky her outfit. We talked about being who she is because she likes who she is. I told her, "You be who you are because you like who you are! Love you and others will love you too!" But that's hard to live by when others are snubbing you. Ya know?

So, anyway, it hurts for my daughter to hurt. I hate it. A lot. And right now I want to march right down to that little divas house and tell her that one day she's going to look around and the people she thinks are her friends are as superficial as she is. And that one day she'll look around and wonder where all her true friends are and realize that she doesn't have any, because she didn't know how to be one.

And that's the end of my rant.

I'm a bad blogger....(extremely random post)

See, this is how I am. As soon as life gets a little busy, I neglect my blog. I always do it. I've got a journal elsewhere and I neglect that too. I did it when I was younger with my written journals. At times when life is busiest, when I should be journaling what's going on and how I'm feeling about it, I ignore it. I'm a bad blogger. *sigh* So, what's a person to do? Well, I just don't know. I suppose I should make some resolution to be a better blogger and come up with a set time to blog each night...but that won't happen. I've done it before. I'm too disorganized in my own mind to follow it.

So, that aside, what's going on? A lot and nothing all at the same time. The girls have started dance again so of course I'm at the Rec Center every day for some length of time. Chelsea is taking ballet, pointe, tap and jazz as well as being a student choreographer and a dance demonstrator. That's keeping her way busy. Myrena is taking ballet, tap and jazz and also playing field hockey right now. She's loving both. I always thought she'd be a sporty kid. She's always on the move doing something and it very rarely involves sitting inside. At the same time she always has to have someone to play "with". She is not a kid that entertains herself well. As soon as she's up, she's looking for someone to play with.

Chelsea is enjoying high school for the most part. She's discovering things about some of her friends that are distressing to her. Last night she discovered that all the people she tried to talk to on the phone were at a party. A party she didn't know about so obviously had not been included. She was a bit bummed about that but we went out to eat and had a fun time laughing at all the people that were staring at her. And she didn't even look strange last night...not really. I mean, her hair is pink and black, but she was wearing a black tshirt that looked like it had a string of pearls on it. Not way out there. She had on skinny jeans and pink converse...and a white belt around her hips. I didn't think that was so out there. But there was a man and woman of about mid thirties that just kept staring at her, blatantly staring at her. They were way preppy though so maybe that was it. Then there were two "surfer" looking girls that kept looking at her, not in a mean way, they just kept looking over at her. Chelsea is such a goof. When she noticed them looking at her she started "fluffing" her hair like some movie star. Goober! We had a giggle about that.

Aaron has not been doing much. He's not motivated to do anything so I think I'm going to have to motivate him myself. He's going to either go to school, or get a job. He cannot sit around my house for the rest of his life playing video games. It's not going to happen. So, I'm going to have to force the issue of driving and getting a job. He's not going to like me for it, but that's the way it's going to be.

I'm doing okay. I still am not happy with my schedule at work, and I'm watching for a better opening. I'm just so worried that people will be upset with me for leaving. I mean, I like the teachers I work with. (Oh, and Leish, OMG! I have to email you about something. ) I like the kids and I don't want the boss mad at me. But I hate when I'm doing right now. It's so ridiculous. Have you ever heard the phrase "if it isn't broken, don't fix it" well that applies here. We finally made AYP and now the whole of what was working, is moved all around. I could go on and on about this one but I won't. It aggravates me to no end.

Mark is working and traveling a lot so I don't see much of him. I'm feeling a little like a single mom without the worry of the bills and all that. I wish I had one day with no one around so I could totally clean my house and get it looking nice again. There is clutter everywhere and that's a drag.

Oh, this really bites. My camera is in the repair shop. I just got it in April. When I got it I noticed that it wasn't really centering the pictures like it should. I had to compensate a lot to get the picture where I wanted it. It looked like it was in the middle through the viewfinder, but not on the picture after you took it. Then when I took it to Ritz camera the guy there (Tony the butthead) tried to make me look like a fool saying that it seemed to be taking pictures just fine. I explained what was happening and he took a few shots, deleted a few, then took a few more and said, "No, it's taking pictures just fine see." then handed me the camera to look over his pics. Well, yeah, he already deleted the ones that were messed up then he took some more allowing for the difference. I knew what he'd done. I was getting angry with him and told him that I knew what the camera was doing and it had done it since I got it but that I was unfamiliar with dslr cameras so I thought maybe it was a quirk. After talking with others I realized that it shouldn't be that hard to take a picture with a camera like that and took it in to be replaced. He kept insisting that there was nothing wrong with the camera. A girl that was also working there heard him talking to me and came to look at the camera. She took some pictures and noticed it right away. Then Mr. Anal Bin Loudmouth decided to send the camera in for repair. I thought it shoudl be replaced since it had been doing it since the day I got it, but he insisted that it needed to go to repair shop. I had better not get it back with more issues than it had. I bought the extended warranty, thankfully. So, no taking pictures right now. *sigh* That's really hard because I take pictures of everything.

Okay, I need to go and pick my watch up at Sears (also had to be sent for repair). I missed that terribly since there were no clocks in the rooms at school for a while. That drove me nutso. ha ha Short trip, I'm half there already.

Okay, enough whining. I'm going to post some pics with this I guess. I'll see what I have.

Mark getting ready to blow out the candles on his 50th birthday cake. NOw, see, I'm holding the cake right? And he's going to be blowing toward me right? Well, right about this time I realized what a bad idea this was. The candles were melting and there were little puddles of wax all on the tops of them....and he blew on them. You can I'm sure guess what happened from there. Yup! I wore the wax! All over me from forehead to chest. Nice.

My sister and me at the Air Force Museum in Dayton, Ohio. We just thought the Icarus statue was way cool, and we were maybe trying to see what he had tucked up under that big feather in the front. Heh!

This cracks me up. All the girls doing the "rock n roll" sign with my stepdad. Too funny. He's a pretty quiet guy and so to get him to do this was quite an achievement. We tried to get him to do the peace thing but he wouldn't.

The most awesome grandma in the world. See that computer behind us? It's hers. She's a plugged in granny for sure.

My timecard says K5 Assistant but....

...I don't feel like one. I'm so frustrated I could just scream.

My favorite part of being a k5 assistant is the interaction with the kids. Kid writing, math centers, science, fun stuff at holidays. Gone, all gone. My schedule sucks and I really hate it. I'm not a kindergarten assistant because I'm never in one classroom more than 30 minutes at any one time. I only see each teacher for one hour daily. That's it. That's all they see the assistants.

Okay, here's my schedule.

8:30 - 8:45 Door Duty
8:45 - 9:00 Assigned classroom (what I'm goingto accomplish in 15 mintues before announcements I have no idea)
9:00 - 9:30 Mrs. P's class for centers
9:35 - 10:05 Mrs. S's class for centers
10:05 - 10:35 Mrs. W's class for centers
10:35 - 10:50 Break (what the??? Break???)
10:50 - 11:20 K5 Recess
11:20 - 11:40 k5 Lunch
11:45 - 12:10 3rd Grade Recess (did I mention they hired three new playground people?)
12:10 - 12:20 Assigned classroom (yeah, 10 minutes)
12:20 - 12:50 Lunch
12:50 - 1:00 Assigned classroom (uh huh, you read it right, another ten minutes)
1:00 - 1:30 Afternoon Intervention Time (not to be used for kidwriting! What? ) Mrs. S's class
1:30 - 2:00 Afternoon Intervention Time (again, no kid writing) Mrs. W's class
2:00 - 2:30 Afternoon Intervention Time (*sigh* I love kid writing) Mrs. P's class
2:30 - 2:45 Assigned Classroom (not enough time for kid writing)
2:45 - 3:00 Break (what the hell's the point???)
3:00 - 3:15 Assigned classroom (Oh goody, just in time to say goodbye to them)
3:15 - 3:30 Dismiss the kids and clean up the classroom

I hate it.

It sucks.

I'm not a recess aide. I'm a kindergarten aide. Say it with me. K-I-N-D-E-R-G-A-R-T-E-N!!!!

I'm in a shitty mood now.

Even worse for the teachers. Let's add it up. If a teacher has an assistant for the day (one day a week they're without since there are three teachers and two assistants) then they have an assistant for two hours and ten minutes daily. One hour of that time is devoted to intervention centers. The other hour and ten minutes is broken into 10 and 15 minute chunks.

There's isn't support for kid writing (which needs all the support you can get especially at the beginning of the year). There isn't support for those activities that need extra hands. There isn't support for anything. It sucks for them too! I've seen Mrs. P for barely enough time to say hello. I'm in her room tomorrow and won't even see her then either. This really sucks. I love the people I work with, and the kids, but I feel like I'm never doing anything with them.

Did I mention this sucks?

Did I mention I'm in a shitty mood about it?

Did I mention I hate it?

Okay then, 'nuff said. (hmmppphhhh)

School has started!

Well, yesterday was the first official day of school and it went pretty well (excpet that we were missing my most favorite teacher....*sigh*). I was in Mrs. W's classroom yesterday but really, with my schedule, I'm not really in anyone's classroom for more than a half an hour ever. It's so weird. Out of the entire day, I spend 3 hours in the classroom assisting teachers. The rest of the time I'm at lunch with the kids, at recess with them (or 3rd grade *snarl*) or taking my built in 15 minute breaks. That's a new strange thing to get used to. We never had built in breaks before. They're nice, don't misunderstand, but it's just odd. We used to just grab a potty break or a snack break when the kids went to specials. But now they go to specials while we are at recess with the bigger kids. There is absolutely no time for the extra work that we used to get accomplished. There is no extra time in there for laminating or putting things together, or cutting things out. I'm complaining, I should stop that now.

Chelsea and Myrena both started yesterday as well. Chelsea likes her teachers all a lot. Myrena of course loves her teacher because she has the same teacher as last year. Yesterday Myrena was wearing the goofiest socks. She's so silly and of course she's going to start the year by letting everyone know how silly she is. Chelsea went to school with pink and black hair. But that's not anything unusual and the kids that went to middle school with her are, I'm sure, used to her by now, however, the kids that she doesn't know were a bit surprised by her look I think. She said when she walked into Science class there were lots of "OH!"s going on. My kids are definitely individual eggs for sure (Chelsea happens to look like an Easter egg!).

I know it's been a long time since I last posted. The summer got really busy on me and before I knew it, school was starting and I still hadn't posted anything from our summer adventures. I'm going to post some photos and do it that way very soon. In the meantime, here are the girls on the first day of school (yeah, I'm a dorky mom and make my kids pose on the first day!).

Oh shoot! You can't see Myrena's crazy socks. They had little headphones and music notes all over them. *grin*

Here's a better on of Chelsea's hair.

Wow, her face looks really white there. Oh well, it's the picture I have for now. ha ha. She's a nut! Her ballet teacher commented on it. She doesn't like it. Chelsea was sure she wouldn't.

I need to go for now. Time for school.