Around Here: Week 51: 12/18-22

This is it parents- the week we train for all year! Let's do this magical performance fueled by Christmas spirit, caffeine, and an obscene amount of cookies! 

taken at 2:30am when I woke up on the couch still in my work clothes - LOL

our classroom door decoration for the theme: Christmas villain 

Intentional Outdoor Hours: 538+ minutes (of 1000)
Any time earned this week was from hiking up the driveway or trying to get cars pulled out of ditches!

Reading Worlds of Ink and Shadow by Lena Coakley, Jujutsu Kaisen Volume 0 by Gege Akutami (Manga borrow from my student Faith), and I started Where the Forest Meets the Stars by Glendy Vanderah (a borrow from my student Ruby!) 

Smiling at the kids in the church Christmas pageant. We had an angel (Rusty), a donkey (Vi), a communion server (Gemma), and Joseph (Grey)! That morning as I was waking Grey up I said, "Wake up Joseph! Your wife is pregnant and you need a place to sleep!" (which was his line in the show, hah). The pageant was precious and I got to sit next to my sister Kitty who came to watch the kids with us. Reddy and Liv were fairly good during mass, but that's because they played under the pews and made funny faces at the people sitting around us. As always, thanks to our church community who offer us patience and grace with very antsy pantsy and vocal toddlers. 

Mailing our Christmas cards (finally!) Sorry it took so long, but we're coming in hot this year - hah! I got them all addressed on Sunday and then didn't buy stamps until Tuesday (!)

Dress up week. Good grief. We had pajama day (all schools), reindeer day (elem)/grinch(middle)/tinsel(high), snowman (elem)/ugly sweater (middle/high), and red&green (elem)/santa(middle)/flannel(high). It's been a hectic week. 

Packing up teacher gifts for the kids - we handed out farm fresh eggs! We retrieved as many eggs as were available this week and I made up sticky labels on Canva to attach to the cartons. 

So proud of Gem who has been diligently (endlessly) practicing her trumpet piece for the Christmas breakfast concert at school this week. She has been working so hard and it definitely shows in her ability. I am requesting her to play at our Christmas eve merrymaking evening. 

Christmas Cookie Baking - this week we made chocolate & peppermint cookies (Grey helped), peanut butter chocolate covered balls (at Brandon's request), and candied oranges (my first time making!)

smh at Olive because she is out of her toddler mind right now. Wrecking everything, taking all her clothes and diaper off, putting miles worth of toilet paper into the toilet and dragging it all over the house, drinking out of the dogs' water bowls, and stealing the big kids' slime and then affixing it to herself and the couches and carpets. #sendhelp Brandon took her to run errands just the two of them because I was like, "I cannot get a single thing accomplished with this child in the house!?!"

Wonky sleep schedule. We rush around all day, then pass out on the couch at 9:30p only to wake up at 2am or 3am to finish up (dishwasher, tidying, elf) and then move to our bed. It's bizarre and annoying but we're making it work because our batteries die out and there's nothing we can do about it - HAH! 

Sister wrapping night. I send all my kids' gifts to Kitty's house because they are snoopers. So bless her and her delivery man. Then her and Uch help wrap all the gifts and it is the sweetest and most helpful Christmas I get each year! (love you, thank you!) We wrapped and talked and enjoyed potato soup (yum, kitty!) and laughed until 11p. So grateful for the help with this huge task but most of all thankful for the time and company. xxox scf.

Struggling with our driveway. Lucille couldn't make it up the driveway and has been parked at the bottom since early in the week. Thankfully we got Sheila back and she was able to get up until Thursday after school when we got stuck perpendicular to the driveway. Poor Miss Emma had to walk down the driveway to get to her car (which also didn't make it up that AM) because we had no car to drive her down (B was picking up the new pup). My BIL Kevin was the hero of the afternoon when he pulled me up out of the hillside and to the garage for the upcoming artic blast. Ughhhh, this driveway.

Giving Miss Emma a big hug as we won't see her for a few days for her holiday break. She was the sweetest; baking and decorating sugar cookies with the three babies. Oh, Miss Emma - we are so blessed by you! 

Thankful for sweet students and their families that thought of me when buying holiday gifts for me. Since I'm not a core subject teacher and especially since I'm at the high school level - I never expect gifts from students. But I was lucky to get lots of little treats this year. A candied chocolate apple from Olivia, a whole tub of chocolate covered treats from Madeline, homemade cookies from Emma, a bag of Lindt chocolate from Miguel, an adorable jingle bell tree to decorate my desk from Courtney, peppermint hand lotion and a peppermint candle from Kelci, a candy cane of candy from Chloe, and a homemade card from Julie. 

Bringing home our new puppy! We named her Osa (it means bear in Spanish) and she is a Great Pyrenees from Iron Hawk Farm. She is just the most darling, fluffiest sweetpie we ever did see. The kids had not even an inkling of a dog being on our radar so they were shocked and it was love at first sight. Our other two dogs are doing pretty well with the addition. Bullet is protective and watchful over her and she wants to play with him so much ("Play with me grandpa!") while Trixie is mostly ignoring her and asking us for a billion snuggles. We have a few weeks of puppy dog house training (good grief), but the plan is to have her sleep in the house until the Spring but spend her days with the goats & birds because eventually she will be a full time farm guardian dog. 

Teaching and holding on for dear life because this week is crazy. The only crazier week in the school year is the last week of school. The students are all amped up on Christmas candy and wishes of snow days and lots and lots of dress up days. Spanish 1 worked on finishing their capibara projects, Spanish 2 picked the winner in the Holiday commercial contest (this one from Amazon Prime), and Spanish 3/4 finished up their novel La Llorona reading chapters 11-14. We had just enough time to learn about Caga Tio too, and we got him out and beat him with the stick and sang until he pooped us out some candy (LOL). We had a virtual day on Friday due to the artic blast (40+ miles an hour and wind chill advisory). 

Sporting with two basketball practices and two basketball games for Grey. Luckily they were both home games so we were able to watch him. He kept his wrist taped this week, mostly for the support - but it has been feeling better each day just still kind of weak. Thankful for all the family and friends who come to watch the game and help us occupy kids and toddlers! B had a basketball game with his team on Sunday night and won. He is loving playing with the same guys he used to play against in high school. 

Making creamy baked chicken over rice, air fryer salmon and asparagus, cheesy beef sheet pan quesadillas (Rusty helped), Swedish meatballs in the crockpot over noodles, and Pioneer Woman skillet lasagna. This week is so tough figuring out what to eat because you don't want overdo it knowing what the holiday will bring...also, so many cookies.