Parent-Teacher Conferences

Wow! I have a huge sense of accomplishment this evening. I have just finished my parent-teacher conferences! I'm telling you they are the one thing I dread the most the whole year. It doesn't matter if I am telling parents all good news I still dread them. I am hoping that this feeling will subside after a few years! I know I felt a little better than the first time I had conferences!

Now for our busy weekend...
Michael got home on Friday night. We were supposed to go to my parents house that night and help them with their tile. Michael decided that he was too tired after his busy week of being gone to his conference! So we ended up staying at home that night.
We got up the next morning and headed to St. Joe. We helped my parents for a little bit and then it was off to Topeka, KS for the NWMSU game vs. Washburn. It was a really close game and it wasn't the 'Cats best but they ended up winning 24 to 21. We went back to St. Joe and helped some more on the tile.
Sunday rolled around and we worked at my parents house until about 12:30 and then headed back to the 'Ville. Once we were back in the ville we went over to a friends house and helped her paint and do this thing with tissue paper on her walls. We were at her house from 2 until 7:15 or so.
So basically I spent my whole weekend doing home improvements for other people. This of course made me want a house even more than I already did. I just wish we could go buy one or build one but as my father says, "Money doesn't grow on trees." I'll just have to wait and be patient. Our time will come and I just have to have faith that God has a plan for us!
As for tonight... I will be home most of the evening by myself so I am thinking about watching Fiddler on the Roof. I think that might be an enjoyable evening. Tomorrow at school will be a little hectic but tomorrow evening I have nothing planned and that is kind of nice. I am really excited about Thursday though... the Hangar (movie theatre in town) is showing Ghost Busters for $5.00 and Michael and I are going to see it. Then Friday is HALLOWEEN. I love trick-or-treaters and HALLOWEEN. Michael's sister and her family are going to be in town so that makes it even better and it is Micheal's father's birthday! So it is a busy but enjoyable week. :-)

My last night as a single girl ;)

Well... It is my last night as a single girl... tomorrow Michael will be back home! I'm pretty excited about that. I haven't seen him since Tuesday morning and that was for about five minutes and he wasn't really coherent yet! He had just woke up.

I am stoked that Michael will be at home! The only thing that is kind of a bummer is that when he gets home we won't get to really spend a lot of alone time together because we are going to my mom and dad's house to help them tile their kitchen. We are working on their kitchen Friday night and Saturday morning. We will leave their house on Saturday mid-morning to head the the NWMSU game at Washburn. Then we will come back to the ville. On Sunday we are going to help my friend paint her stairway.

So it's another busy weekend for us - not to mention at some point I will have to get all of my lesson plans done for next week and get ready for our Parent-Teacher Conferences. There's definitely a lot to do this weekend. I think I am going to do laundry tonight and watch Gray's Anatomy! :)

Life as a Single Girl... At least for the week ;)

So this morning my lovely husband left for his maintenance conference that is down at the Lake of Ozarks so I am a single girl for this week. Which is a strange feeling. I feel odd being at home by myself and just the cat. I havne't done this in quite a while. I haven't been at my apartment knowing that I am going to sleep in my bed for the next three nights by myself. By the way... I'm not the only one that is feeling wierd - The cat puked twice tonight when I got home!
So this evening I went with my friend - Amy - to go eat pizza. We went to eat with our school's volleyball team because she is the coach and we were celebrating the end of their season. After we were finished we went to the NWMSU volleyball game.
At the game they decided to have a PINK OUT night. Everyone was supposed to wear pink to bring awareness that October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month. They were passing out free pink shirts to people with pink shirts but they didn't have enough for everyone so they were just randomly handing out. I felt really bad for our volleyball girls. Only four of them got a shirt. I was trying to get one from the guy handing them out for a younger student who is moving after this year. She was almost in tears because she really wanted a shirt. I talked to the guy and some very rude college students were complaining that he handed them out to all of these "12 year olds and not the college students". She as being extremely rude and obscene. She was saying the "f" word and making a complete fool of herself. So we just walked away. The volleyball girls were talking about her later and I just told them that they should be proud of themselves because they acted more mature than the dumb college girl!
Now.... that I have vented I am headed to bed!
Night!

Fun Weekend!

We had a really fun weekend! It was homecoming this weekend for NWMSU! Friday night we went to Bubba's parent's house to celebrate his birthday. After we ate supper and had cake and ice cream I dropped all the boys off at the bar and came home. I just relaxed on Friday night. Finally at 1:30 in the morning Michael called me and said that he and the boys were ready to be picked up. I went and picked them up at the bar. Then we went back to Bubba's parent's house and we were there until almost three in the morning. Michael was feeling NO PAIN by that point! I told him that I had planned on going to the parade the next morning and that he was going with me. I knew the Saturday morning was going to be rough for him.
We got up on Saturday morning and Michael took some medicine before we left. It was pretty chilly but I enjoyed the parade. Michael was pretty cranky but that's what happens when your hungover! :o)
After the parade we came home and Michael took a nap. He finally woke up at 12:30 and we headed over to the tailgate. The game started at 1:30 in the afternoon. We went to the game which was wonderful. The BEARCATS won 56 to 7. After the game we helped pick up trash in the stands and left. I told Michael that it was too nice of a day to hang out inside all day. We decided to just drive around. We went out by Mozingo Lake and drove around and then we went to Parnell and ate supper at the bar. I love their food! It is WONDERFUL! Then we came home and I watched a movie called "Living Proof" on Lifetime. It was a really good movie. I asked Michael to watch it with me and he came in and laid down on the couch and feel asleep.
We got up this morning and I took a shower. Michael made breakfast (french toast and bacon). Then we headed to church. After church we drove around and looked at houses. We're a little disappointed because we would like to buy a house but there just isn't anything in our price range that we think is worth the money and/or doesn't need completely remodeled! So I guess we're just going to have to wait for a while to get a house or build.
Now it's 2:15 in the afternoon and my husband is asleep on the couch (the Chiefs just weren't worth watching today) and my cat, Callie, is asleep on the top of my chair. I think I may join them and take a short nap and then it's time to get ready for school this week... Yeah lesson plans... You can tell how enthusiastic I am about writing them can't you!
Have a good week!

Another Medical Disappointment

Well I have had yet another medical disappointment. For those of you who don't know in the end of August my doc found a lump in my breast. I got an ultrasound done and it didn't show anything but my doctor wanted to make sure that it wasn't anything because I have a strong family background. I went to Maryville's hospital to get a MRI done and I couldn't do it because of the way they had me laying and the fact that I am clostraphobic. So they decided to get one scheduled in St. Joe. This is going to be an OPEN MRI so the clostraphobia shouldn't be an issue.
I take off work (which means I have to write lesson plans for a sub) and so does Michael and we head to St. Joe. I get to the hospital and they inform me that they don't do Open MRI's at the hospital and that I will need to go to the OPEN MRI office which is NOT in the same building. So we jump back in the car and head back the direction we had just came from.
We get to the Open MRI place and ... they don't have me down for an appointment! They call several other Open MRI places and... guess what... no appointment for me at any of those. Finally they call the hospital and guess what... they have an appointment for a regular MRI (which if you remember was what I tried to do in Maryville). So we drive back to the hospital, by this time we are late for the appointment, and check in with the desk. I get back there, change in the robes, and get ready to do the MRI. I go in we try again... and I get stuck just a little bit. The nurse removes some of the mats (that are there for comfort - by the way it isn't comfortable at all with out these and they are expecting to be in there for 20 minutes) and I try going in again. I get all the way in but I can't breathe because of the machine pressing on my back. I tell the lady to GET ME OUT NOW! She starts telling me how I might try KC because they have a bigger machine (thanks... I don't already feel fat enough, let's rub it in that I can't fit in the machine) and that I will definetly need some vallium. I, of course, start crying and go change and have a minor panic attack as we are leaving the hospital.
I am so frustrated with all this stuff. I would just like it to be done and over with. If they need to give me something to knock me out to do it... then let's do it so I don't have to keep taking off work and writing lesson plans!
Sorry... just needed to vent!

Interesting Perspective

I have never been one of those people who comes up with deep insight but I have recently realized that I have some interesting perspectives on a couple of different things. I have figured out that rarely can anyone actually say I screwed up (including myself) and while that isn't new to most people I am amazed at how it is still true. People mess up and blame it on others so much so that they end up damaging others' self-esteem. Let me just say when you are struggling to have any self-esteem it is hard to have others sit there and blame their problems on you. I know I can never get away from this guilt as it occurs to everyone but I just wish I could find away around it where I could let it go and not let it bother me so much. I guess it's because I try so hard in certain areas in my life and yet.... to no avail if there is any problem it is all my fault. I know that I am not perfect and guess what... I probably did screw up part of the time in this instance but it isn't all my fault.
How does a person get self-esteem when they can't find anything that is worth feel good about? I know this might seem like a downer but it is just what is going through my head. I guess all I can do right now is give all this confusion up to God and hope that he will help me. I just want to know that everything isn't my fault all the time. That would be a good feeling! I guess I am just going to have to take it in baby steps. One thing at a time and one day at a time.

Busy Day Ahead...

Michael and I have a busy day ahead! We are going to go up to the Elks Lodge to watch the Bearcats game around 1ish....Then we will go to the Pheasants Forever banquet and after that we have to cook some BBQ. We are cooking a case of pork butts for the Knights of Columbus family picnic tomorrow. Michael almost forgot that he agreed to cook the pork. Hopefully the meat will turn out really well!!! I know that will make Michael happy! :)
It was nice this morning we actually got to sleep in together! It was wonderful. Michael and I haven't been able to sleep in a VERY long time! We both really enjoyed that!
Off to my busy day! Gonna go clean and head to the game! GO CATS!!!!

Our Crazy Life

As most people are aware our life has been extremely crazy as of late. My father-in-law accidentially cut the top of his wrist while working on a dishwasher. This happened about two months ago. The same day that this happened the doctor thought that she felt a lump in my breast. That made our evening really interesting because we didn't want to tell Michael's parents and cause them more striff especially when his dad was getting ready to go into surgery. Michael's dad's surgery went well and he is healing slowly but it is getting better. Michael has been running calls with him at night so we haven't seen each other a lot. Next week (Wednesday) I go to St. Joe for an open MRI. (I already have had an ultrasound and they didn't find anything but my doctor wants to double check because of my family history - my grandma died from breast cancer when she was 42 and my aunt had breast cancer at 25 years old) Hopefully once we've gone to this open MRI we will get a clean bill of health and be done. Not to mention in the middle of all of this.... My dad hurts his back and they won't let him work for over two weeks. At on point we thought that he was going to have to have surgery.... He isn't :) So we are all very happy about that!

I will say that I am amazed that next Friday is the end of the first quarter. It doesn't seem like it is October 10th. In a little over a month it will our anniversary. It is amazing to me that we are already up to a year. The only crappy thing about it almost being our year anniversary is that we still don't have our photo album from the wedding photographer.... Can you believe that???? It's been a YEAR (almost)! We have been talking to her for months about this and she has finally gotten us website where we can see what it looks like. Michael and I are pretty disappointed! It isn't nearly what we thought it was going to be. She doesn't have any pictures of the boys (groomsmen) in the book and it doesn't have any words in it at all ... Like... Michael and Jamie Casteel or our wedding date... NOTHING! I am just really frutstrated that it is taken so long and it doesn't even look that good.