Gingerbread houses

 Today at school we made Gingerbread Houses with our Kindergarten Buddies. . . The teachers also had ugly sweater day and this is what Jill (my kindergarten teacher friend) and I wore. . . Yes she is tiny and I am a giant and we decided that on top of it, we had ugly socks so we showed those off too!

 

 Here is the crew. . . all 49 of them. . .

Here are the finished products. . .

And here are my favorites, if you look closely, you will see the frosting on the face and the frosting behind the ear. . . and in the hair :-)

We fed them lots of candy, made a big mess, and had some fun :-) We decided this might become an annual tradition, and can you believe we did not win the ugly sweater award?!?!  One teacher actually told me she was kind of offended because she thought my sweater was really cute and she would have worn it. . . Only in elementary school!

I can't think of a title. . .

Our pastor recently did a whole series on thanksgiving and how we need to continually be thankful for everything in our lives, even the little things because in the end, we don't deserve any of it and it truly does not belong to us, it all belongs to God.  This weekend, I am thankful for this:

 

because it helped me do this: 

 

some of this was done before and in the freezer but I feel like I am now officially ready for Christmas.  Most of these cookies will go to other people, my friends, Ryan's work, etc. . . but it is one of the things I LOVE about Christmas.  I grew up helping my mom in the kitchen and if you know her, you know what a fabulous cook she has and the love she has for others so when I started to think about what I want to give others this Christmas, I thought of her and how she gives away cookies and decided I could do the same.  There are 6 kinds of cookies and chocolate dipped pretzels, all baked with love. . . feel free to stop by if you want to share, I am sure Ryan won't let me give them ALL away. . . 

Bloooooooduh! and Excitement

So my kids in my class have this odd obsession with pulling out their teeth and I often catch them with most of their hand in their mouth and then they pull out a hand covered in slobber and blood clutching their tooth and off they go to the nurse to get the much desired treasure chest.  Well, yesterday I had a little talk with them about pulling out your own teeth because in the middle of one of my lessons a boy does the above mentioned act and yells "I got another one!" (this being 3 in one week, mind you).  So we had a little chat about how it grosses me out that they have their hands in their mouth, covered in blood, and then touch my things. . . eww  Well today, no teeth were extracted, they decided to have bloody noses.  TWO in one day!  It is a good thing I am not squemish around blood!

And excitement. . . I am SO excited for Christmas.  I can't wait.  I feel like my 5th graders. . .  I don't know if it is the traditions that I love or the feeling of the season, this is just one of my favorite times of the year!!  Some things I am excited for: (in no particular order)
1.  The annual Wooldridge/Kuhlman/White Christmas Party
2.  Homemade Macaroni and Cheese
3.  Seeing my family and spending time together!
4.  Watching A Christmas Story
5.  Fires in the fireplace
6.  Reading the Christmas story by the tree in our jammies
7.  One step at a time. . .
8.  Christmas Cookies
9.  Celebrating the greatest birth there ever was
10.  Giving gifts to my favorite people
11. NO SCHOOL
12.  watching Katie eat gag down a fish stick
13.  pinochle/boxers or briefs/malarky
14.  Playing mario (stop jumping on me, put me down, hey, hey, hey)
15.  spending time with the best families in the world!

Enjoy the season,

This guy

Can I toot his horn for a few minutes?!  So Friday night we had a Christmas party to go to and I have just been super busy with school and basketball and I had no time to make anything to take to this party.  So this guy leaves work early, makes the treat, and when I walk in the door, he is cleaning up the kitchen and left it just as clean as he found it.  He didn't think a thing of it but I was sooooooooooooo impressed that I needed to toot his horn!  Thanks for your help and your support of my career and my coaching.  I love you Ryan and am the luckiest girl in the world!

Rants and Raves

Rant:
So I got out of my car at work today and a colleague looked at me and looked at my car (a 2010 ford fusion) and said to me "Wow, that's a nice car for you to be driving. I didn't realize you drove such a nice car. . . teaching must be a good business for you." You know what, he really pissed me off!!!!!!! Who is he to judge me based on the car that I drive?! What makes him think I shouldn't drive a car like that?! Does he know how hard my amazing husband and I work at managing our money?! Does he know that the car is over halfway paid off and we have only owned it for a little over a year?! Does he know that Financial Peace University was one of the best choices we have made in our marriage and that we have had ZERO fights about money in the last year and a half?! Does he know that our money does not control us, we control it?! Does he know that we are living like noone else so we can live like no one else?! You know what, he doesn't know those things and I am sure that he doesn't care. But I sure wish that more people would look at how I act, how I talk to them, how I respond to them when all I want to do is punch their guts out, and what drives and motivates us to work hard for the things that we have rather than looking at the things that we have. Things are only things and we don't get to take them with us when we go. We have been very blessed but I truly believe we have worked hard for what we have and have not been handed everything we have so Mr. Teacher (with your head up your you know what), Can I introduce you to my friend Dave Ramsey?!

Raves:
So I found out this morning that a para that is in my room for a lot of my morning (and is a part of my cobber family) was in a car accident yesterday. She was hit by a semi that was going between 50 and 70mph! Her car was totaled and the EMT's have told her she is lucky to be alive. The amazing part, she walked away from the accident! She said that "I must be right with God and his angels sure were protecting me." Then I went to Beth Moore's blog on my lunch break and read this:

My dear Siestas, talk to me today about miracles. I know some people who could use one. Take some stones of remembrance this day and be used of God to build up somebody’s faith. Ground rules: No exaggerations. No make believe. Just pure honest Biblical truth about what you know your God can do from first hand experience.

You guys are so dear to me.

Lord Jesus, show up in a mighty visitation this week in our community. You are our Hope and our Salvation. In You we place our trust. The very sign of that first Christmas was a miracle: “The virgin will be with child and will give birth to a son, and they will call him Immanuel – which means, ‘God with us.’” O Come, O Come Immanuel. So many need to know You are here. Grant us eyes to see and hearts to love. You are our everything. Thank You for Your goodness to us.

WOW! talk about miracles and feeling tingles down your spine! My rave today is that God is GREAT! He works miracles, saves lives, and loves us all no matter what. I was reminded today just how precious life is and that it can end at any second. I am thankful for you and who you are and the role you play in my life (whether I know you or not)! Tell your loved ones that you love them this Christmas and enjoy every moment, it may go away all too soon. . . Jesus and I love you, no matter who you are, no matter where you are, no matter how long it has been since we last talked,

Need a Laugh?

So I decided today that I must teach some really interesting things. All of the things in red are what was actually on the paper of my students, spelled exactly as they had spelled it. . . While reading and responding to 14 reading letters today I came across talk of a comevarer belt (conveyor belt), I learned how to become famoose or famouse (famous), I was expeshily (especially) delighted when I read that your hockey team came in farts (first), and I lavet (laughed) when I read your information about hobos having weed/pot conventions that you learned about on the History Channel. I also had a student write to me about a book, check out the title. . .


and I will leave you with my aetegerafe (autograph)