An Attitude of Gratitude

Ryan and I are so blessed to have such wonderful family and friends. Whether you live near or far- all of you are in our hearts and we are so fortunate to have you in our lives!!!

This weekend was my nephew Dylan's 2nd birthday party. He will be 2 on September 3rd- the same day as his Uncle Ryan. Here is a pic of the birthday boy with his dad (my brother-in-law, Danny) and his mom (my younger sis, Alyssa). We obviously were not able to attend, but we were there in spirit. The party was at my dad's house in Perris, CA. It was a pool party. It has been scorching hot in SoCal the last few weeks...day after day of temps in the triple digits!!! It looks like everyone had a blast!
Our neighbor, Layne (Zach and Kristen's son) also had his 2nd birthday party this weekend. You may recall that Dylan and Layne are only a couple days apart. Here is Layne with his grandma. Lisa and me :)

Ryan, Brian and Steave being CHEEEEEEEESY!!!

Throwing bags in front of Zach and Kristen's...

I went home and got Ryan's telescope so we could do a little stargazing...Here are Zach, Ryan and Brian getting set up.

Kristen and me :)

Ryan and Brian showing off their Spiderman skills...

Me and Ry :) The past week we have had PHENOMENAL weather...cool and crisp in the mid-upper 60's! On Sunday, we went to the lake to go play Frisbee golf. Here are some pics on the drive there... Ryan and I have been able to wear sweatshirts and jeans and we love it! We can't wait for fall! It is our favorite time of year! Here is a pic of Steave landing his disk...I guess this would be considered comparable to the "hole" on a real golf course. You try to land your Frisbee in this contraption. On the landings, it gives you the yardage and difficulty just like a real golf course... Zach, Ryan and Steave heading off to the next platform/tee box... Nice launch, Zach! Me making an attempt... Ryan and his professional pose...is there anything the guy can't do well??? Pretty lake on a pretty day :)In a few more weeks the leaves will turn...I took this pic on the drive home. It has to be one of my ALL time favorites pics of our town!We are looking forward to Labor day weekend and being able to celebrate Ryan's 29th birthday this Thursday!

Again, we are so thankful to live in such a beautiful place and to be a part of such a loving, caring group of family and friends!

Until next time...xo

School's in, Let the Work Begin!

Well, it's that time of year again...we are both OFFICIALLY back to work! We are both looking forward to a wonderful 2009-10 school year and are EXTREMELY grateful to have employment in this very difficult economy.As promised, here are pics of Ryan's new Science Lab decorated by yours truly. The guy in the picture is Ryan's buddy Eric, who teaches Geometry, Trig and Pre-Calculus...

Ryan thought he was going to have 5 periods of Physics, but he has now been assigned 4 periods of Physics and 1 period of Integrated Physics and Chemistry. Ryan is on a block schedule, so he has 6 classes and sees 3 of them each day...As you can imagine, he is thrilled to have an actual lab this year! Ryan is also going to be a "Science Bound" mentor. Science Bound is an intern program through Purdue University.

My principal let Alissa and I each have our own rooms this year (we split our Bilingual Instructional Assistants up, each taking one). I am still teaching ESL for grades 1 and 2. I have a caseload of about 50 students I am in charge of servicing...

I will push-in to the first and second grade classrooms and work with the children learning English. I will also be co-teaching with a first grade teacher for part of my day. I look forward to this, as I taught first grade for 5 years and miss that rapport you build with a class of your own. Lastly, I will be pulling-out ESL students who have low levels of English proficiency into my own room for an hour at the end of the day to focus heavily on English Language Acquisition skills like comprehension, phonics, grammar and vocabulary. This should be a very productive year and I am REALLY looking forward to it!

This weekend began with a trip to the dog park. Frodo and Sammy have been neglected since we both had to go back to work. We decided we should take them out and spend some quality time together.

The dog park we went to was really nice. It was about 5 acres and had a few obstacles and a self-refilling water bowl for the pups to drink out of.

Here is Ryan trying to get Frodie to climb up the ramp...

He had a hard time, but Sam did just fine :)Go get it, Frodo!

Run through the tube...

Good boy!!!

Our dogs did great interacting with the other dogs! Check out Frodie with some of his 4-legged friends...

Sammy mostly kept to himself, but found this canine companion to keep him company.

It was the perfect day to be outdoors. The weather was really cool and crisp.

Ryan and I love spending time together outdoors. This weekend was especially nice because we got to spend it with our baby boys.

When we got home from the dog park, we didn't want to go inside! We decided to take the dogs on a walk around our neighborhood.

It was so refreshing to put on jeans again! We are kind of burnt out on the heat and ready for a change. I'm sure it will warm up again for awhile, but we are looking forward to fall. Frodie loves to sit with Ryan :) Sammy being silly after a day of fun :) On Sunday, we decided to go to the State Fair. It has been going on for the past 3 weeks. It was the last day...There was a lot going on there....a dog show, car show, beauty pageant, fruit and vegetable exhibits, racing pigs, Elvis Impersonator contest....the list went on and on- There were also exhibits on old-fashioned practices like canning and candle making....Quilting, tin-making and wood working...

There was a TON of agricultural stuff going on as well. Here I am standing next to half a million dollars worth of John Deere!

There was a ton of food stands too. I am sure that 99.9% of it was REALLY bad for you...

And of course there were rides galore...

We also saw a huge sand sculpture of sunbathing cows...

and a family made entirely out of cheese...1,400 pounds to be exact!

I got to hold a baby chick for the first time :)

and then we did what everyone has to do at a State Fair! We sampled the deep fried delicacies...

This was the "new" thing this year...we had to sample some of that as well.

The chocolate covered bacon was okay- but it was cold and limp! I think it would have been better hot and crispy. Ryan hated it!!! I thought the nastiest thing was the deep fried Pepsi! The deep fried Snickers, cookie dough and Oreos were AWESOME!!!

Mmmmmmmm bacon- you only live once people!!!

After our mini fried food fiesta, Ryan wanted to check out the cars...

We also got to check out this tractor which ran on Soy Bio-Diesel. If you recall from previous photos, soy is the 2nd largest crop next to corn in Indiana. Finally, a trip to the fair wouldn't be complete without a souvenir. We had this sign made to hang next to our front door!

Have a great week everyone!!!

Until next time...xo