trillium lake

Last week, the Mr. and I decided that we were going to go on a date on Friday. He asked me where I wanted to go and I had been thinking for a while now about going to a lake over by Mt. Hood somewhere, but I wasn't sure which one. Then Thursday night it rained and got cold and I didn't particularly feel like sitting in the cold by a lake in the mountains Friday morning. So we postponed our date until Saturday. It was very cloudy almost the whole way there, then we stopped at the Ranger's station in ZigZag to get our day use pass and by the time we left there, the sky was perfectly blue with barely a cloud.

Whenever we take this drive up Rt. 26 to the mountain, I am always amazed by how many trees there are. It's insane, really, how many trees.

I gave Phil three choices of lakes: Frog Lake, Timothy Lake (where my hairdresser camps every summer), and Trillium Lake. The ranger said the best views of Hood were from Trillium Lake, so that's where we went.

It was beautiful. 

We did a little hiking and then went back to the car for our lunch and grabbed some chairs. We found a spot tucked away behind some trees and I sat there and read some journal articles while Phil took Wilson for a walk the whole way around the lake - about 2 miles, or so the signs said.

Wilson doesn't particularly like laying on the ground, especially ground that is somewhat muddy, and he was whining like crazy. I put up with it for a while, but then it just got annoying, so we left. He's a spoiled dog, and sometimes that comes back to bite me in the butt.

currently

drinking iced tea.

hoping for a break in our current lack-of-work situation soon. Ugh. So frustrating.

feeling like I've been in a funk lately.

listening to Phil on the phone scheduling an interview and the baseball game on TV.

procrastinating on my discussion board assignment that's due tonight. I'm so done with doing school. It's getting harder and harder for me to focus on sitting down and getting stuff done. This is week #3 of 8 in my very last class and I'm lacking serious motivation. 

thanking my professor from my educational technology class for giving me credit for an assignment I uploaded that disappeared. It changed my final grade from a B+ to an A and I am so very happy about that. So is my GPA.

looking forward to my mom, sister, and niece coming out for a visit the week of Thanksgiving. It will be mom's 3rd visit and the 1st time for Jenny and Hannah. Can't wait to do turkey and pumpkin pie at the beach!

praying for renewed hope and jobs.

loving the hydrangeas. I seriously can't get enough of them.

anticipating graduation. I cannot wait to get my diploma and official transcripts in the mail.

listening at night before bed to Beth Moore. I've got the Living Proof Ministries app on my phone and she's got a bunch of videos and podcasts on there. Good stuff.

needing to exercise and get a pedicure.

making dinner in the crock pot. Pot roast to die for. Need to send the hubster to the store for potatoes. And I'm craving watermelon.

ignoring all the stupid political stuff right now. I don't like our options. The hide button on facebook is my friend.
reading not much of anything really. I have some books I want to reserve at the library but haven't done it yet.
wishing for a vacation.
planning some ladies events for church. We're looking at Beth Moore's new study coming out in September on 2 Timothy called Entrusted for our fall Bible study. I'm trying to figure out a date for a women's night of worship, fall festival is coming up, and I've been in the early planning stages for our Christmas luncheon. 
wanting to scrapbook.

thinking about school supplies, hopefully a job situation working out for both of us, and going back to the beach. We were there Saturday for the day for our church camp out. We couldn't go for the whole weekend because the reservations are made really early in the year and it's way too difficult for me to plan anything beyond the upcoming weekend with school stuff. Oh well. It was fun despite all that. It rained in the morning, and then the sun came out and it ended up being a beautiful day.

believing I could've had a totally different career field in something like game show hostess.

twenty sixteen garden report

currently growing: zucchini, yellow zucchini, 4 kinds of tomatoes, green beans, snap peas, kale, peppers, 2 kinds of cucumbers, basil, rosemary, and weeds.

we've harvested: lots of zucchini (it's the one thing I grow really well), 6 cherry tomatoes, 3 cucumbers, a small bowl of pea pods, and a couple rounds of kale. 

baby pea pods are pretty.

seriously. there is nothing better than eating a tomato right off the vine.

it kind of looks like a hot mess. you have to be really careful when walking between the two beds.

Phil505 built me some tomato cages. I first thought they were way too big, but the tomato plants are growing into them. My dad told me about the ol' sprinkle and water in some epsom salts trick on the tomatoes and peppers. so far it seems to be working.

next year we're going to need to replace the wood for the raised beds. it's rotting out in several spots. might have to redesign and create some smaller boxes because the current layout is a little bit of a pain.

in the flower department: the hydrangeas have done awesome this year. multiple colors on one bush. I've been cutting them and bringing them inside to enjoy. planted 3 more pink ones and 2 peonies that I got with birthday money.

I have one daisy plant that is like 4.5 feet tall and falling all over the place. I tried tying them up, but they're still leaning over pretty bad. but they're pretty.

here's to eating home grown veggies and higher water bills!

anniversary #12

Our 12th anniversary fell on a Sunday this year. We decided a few weeks before that I would take the week off from worship team and we would do some stuff in Portland. We rarely go to Portland. Phil used to work downtown and once he came home, he didn't want to go back. We get the occasional concert or Christmas-y thing in, but for the most part, we stay away from the city. Well, I had read about this place called Off the Waffle and wanted to go, so that's where we went and had brunch. Seriously, the best waffle I've ever had in my life. It's some sort of special Belgium waffle that has sugar pearls that melt in the waffle iron and make the crust a little crunchy. Mine was covered in Nutella and sliced bananas and I got a side of some amazing maple flavored bacon. It was really good. I don't normally do sweet things like that for breakfast, but with it being a special occasion and all, well I did this time (and I would totally order it again).

                              

We walked around the area where the restaurant was and then we headed down to the Portland waterfront. It was the last day for the Rose Festival and it was very busy. We meandered through the Saturday market and then we headed to the Rose Garden where we got engaged, but it was packed and there was no place to park (sadness), so we drove further up in the hills to Pittock Mansion. I'd heard of this place lots of times, but we'd never been there. There was only a half hour left until the tours shut down, so we didn't go inside, but the outside was beautiful and there were nice flowers everywhere and a fantastic view of Mt. St. Helens and Mt. Hood.

I also pretty much took the day off from doing homework (the only thing I did was record my 1 minute video discussion board reply before we left) and it was so nice to just have a normal day again. We ended up in Sellwood and browsed some antique shops for a bit, then we had dinner at a little Mexican restaurant called Cha Cha Cha. We had patio seats and it was a beautiful night. I loved celebrating with my guy. I love him so much.

I've waited three years for this

My pink peony bush, that I planted as a little baby our first summer here, finally got buds on it this year. Three of them, to be exact. The first one finally opened and it did not disappoint. I want more. If I could have a whole yard filled with nothing but roses, hydrangeas, and peonies, then I would be one happy lady.

state testing is for the birds

So, I started a kind of long-term, well, until the end of the year, sub job on Tuesday. I say kind of because I'm really not supposed to do anything over 20 days in the same position, but this one will probably go over by a few. I'm not in the classroom though. I'm subbing for the literacy facilitator. She is in charge of the school's literacy program (obviously) as well as the supervisor for the paras and she coordinates the building's testing (state and district). That's a pretty big responsibility for anyone, but especially for a sub (who knows very little about technology to begin with).

I had probably six or seven days of training with her, including two actual testing days. Those were fine. My first day on the job I couldn't get the computers to autologin correctly. We finally figured it out, but it was a pain in the neck. I called Harrison over at IT after school and he became my new BFF. Wednesday was pretty much a breeze compared to Tuesday. Everything mostly worked like it was supposed to. Today, all the laptops in a 4th grade classroom lost connection with the state server (or something like that) and all the kids got booted off the test. That is not supposed to happen. I called the District Assessment Office three times. Jenny and Dawn are also my new BFFs. And, lucky me, I got to fill out my first (but not last) Irregularity Report. woot. woot.

Yesterday I got the last of my new books for the first summer term. For the next 8 weeks I get to curl up at night with these bad boys. Say your prayers now, people.

Tomorrow it's supposed to be 90 degrees and that just means all sorts of fun in an old school with no air conditioning. Then it's supposed to rain all weekend. . . which will be good because the grass is already starting to die. But not good because we were really wanting to do yard work and get some mulch before the insanity of my life kicks in to high gear.

Oh, and I looked at the course guide for the technology course and discovered that not only do we have discussion boards (which I hate) but we get to do video discussion boards (which I'm sure I'll hate even more). I do not want video footage of myself talking smack about technology out there on the interwebs. Maybe I'll just have to call my BFF Harrison in IT and get some pointers.

Happy Thursday, and may all your packages from Amazon be more fun than mine were this week.

And yes, in case you were wondering, I am totally procrastinating on finishing up my Lewis and Clark unit plan by writing this post.

so apparently a boy band stole my blog's name

I noticed tonight that I've had an unusual volume of blog traffic lately. I checked my stat counter to see what in the world people were searching for that landed them here. I mean, I get some people that are checking out stuff I've pinned on pinterest and what not, but it's not that much traffic. Well, the results showed. . . bing.com - PART OF MY STORY, yahoo - part of my story, etc., etc., etc. So I googled it and, what do ya know? Part of my Story is not only the name of my most beloved blog, the one I've had since at least 2008, well, it's also now the name of a 12 year old boy band. Probably one that my niece is all googly-eyed over. I don't know if I should be honored that they liked my name so much they stole it or just completely annoyed that they stole it. They're even abbreviating it POMS.

For the record, this is the original part of my story. And don't you forget it.

this just in. . . i'm still alive

My dad asked me the other day if I gave up blogging. Of course not, I just don't have time to write beyond what I'm required and graded on. And when I do have time to write, all I feel I write about is school. I love my dear ol' blog. It holds a lot of memories. I don't have plans on quitting it anytime soon. Long pauses, maybe. Calling her quits, absolutely not. It's sort of like scrapbooking. I want to do it, but there's just no time.

I've been super busy with subbing, pretty much nearly every day I'm booked somewhere. I'm getting ready to do a maternity leave for the lit. specialist at Marshall. My job will entail making sure all 3rd-5th graders get their state testing finished and the end-of-year district testing done for 1st-5th. Then I'll do some data stuff and have that ready for the teachers to mull over at their last data meeting. It's kind of a lot of responsibility and I'm slightly nervous about it, but the staff at this school is awesome and the principal told me not to worry about it, so I'm not. I'll worry about getting my homework done instead.

I'm on week #6 of class #9. My current cumulative GPA is a 3.95. (I'm working my butt off for that, by the way.) I received verification last week that I can pay $100 and apply to graduate. Yeah! My next two classes overlap with the class I'm taking right now the week of May 16th. And then it gets real crazy for the rest of May and most of June as I'll try to basically work full time, do homework, and keep my husband fed. I'll take 2 classes the first summer term and the last class the last summer term. Best of all, I'll be done August 26th.  Hallelujah! School starts August 31st (which also, coincidentally, happens to be the big 5-0 of my Phil505). I'm still not sure what will happen in the fall, I've been told I'm "on the queue for fall hiring," but I don't really know exactly what that means. I'm praying fervently for a full-time position that's not 5th grade at a school I love, and I'm still praying for Phil to find work as well. He's going on 3 months of unemployment.

Here's a few recent pics from our little spring break to-the-beach-and-back-real-quick trip to Astoria (so I could research Lewis & Clark for a project I'm working on) and Cannon Beach. It was crazy busy, so many people crowding around. I like it a little less littered with people and so does Wilson. We don't let him off-leash when it's packed. It was nice to get away for a short time and hang out on the beach for a little while.

the one about an answered prayer

Well, this story deserves a blog post of its very own. It's the story about a completely unexpected answer to prayer this week. It encouraged me and I hope it encourages you too.

So, as you know, Phil has spent the last month looking for a job. While we're not standing in the soup kitchen line, we are being cautious about our spending. And something that's coming up is spring retreat. I am on the conference women's ministry team as the historian (a.k.a. resident keeper and maintainer of the scrapbooks), and part of my "job description" is to attend the events that are put on by the team. I'm also the photographer, and it's kind of hard to scrapbook if you don't have pictures, plus there are other responsibilities that each of us have. And besides all that, I really like going. Well, it was something that I prayed about the other morning on my way to school. I just told God that He needed to provide for me to be able to go in a way that wasn't going to stretch our budget too thin.

I've been working at, what I guess you could call, my old home base school the last 2.5 weeks. I've told a few friends there about our current situation and I know they are praying for us. I love that about them.

Friday morning I get there, head over to the teacher's desk I'm subbing for, and right away I notice a Panther Pawsitive. These are tickets that kids earn by being safe, respectful, and responsible. They are part of the school-wide positive behavior program. There was a sticky note stuck it with a message for me. I have no idea who my secret admirer is or at what point it was left in the room, but it made me smile.

Later that afternoon, I was invited by a couple other friends to go to happy hour with them. I've gone once before, but it's been a long time. I thought it would be fun to catch up with them, so I went. We hung out for almost two hours before they had to head back to school for bingo night. I got my check from the waitress and took my wallet out from my purse. When I opened my wallet, five $20 bills fell out on my lap. They were folded up together. It caught me by surprise and I immediately kind of looked around to see whose wallet they fell out of. No one else even had their wallet out. 

When I got home, I asked Phil if he had put money in my purse before I left for school. He told me that he hadn't. I know that money was not there on Tuesday when I was getting a few things at the store. So at some point, someone anonymously put $100 in my wallet. I'm 99.9% sure it was someone at school. I don't lock up my purse, and I'm not always in the room where I can see it. (Probably not the best practice, but when you're a sub, you don't usually get a key to a closet or desk drawer.) I have no idea who it's from. I have no idea if it's related to the notes that were left for me. All I do know is that that money is a direct answer to my prayer about paying for spring retreat. And it's a direct answer to some of your prayers as well. So, thank you. 

And this is the confidence that we have in Him, that if we ask anything according to His will, He hears us. ~I John 5:14

happy leap year eve

It's Sunday night. I just submitted my science experiment to Livetext about 20 minutes before the deadline. I know you don't really care, but in case you're wondering, M&M's are not equally represented by color. I counted and tallied and averaged and percentaged (which isn't a real word, but who cares) five bags each of plain and peanut. Green won for the plain and orange won for the peanut. Red was the biggest loser for both varieties. Wilson got a few pieces when I dropped a couple on the floor. Thankfully, he didn't die from chocolate poisoning.

I have two weeks to go and about a million pages to read. I also have chapter assignments for six or so chapters to complete, an integrated unit plan with five lessons to write, an electronic vocabulary notebook to create, and two discussion boards to finish. Then, if I make it and don't die. . . a week of freedom. Hallelujah.

The job search for Phil505 continues.

A current favorite song of mine at the moment is Trust in You by Lauren Daigle. She's coming to Portland in May. I want to go.

We had a visiting couple in church today that just moved here from Washington Court House, Ohio! Larry and I had an instant connection as we talked about wearing Buckeye t-shirts in Duck territory.

We headed across the river yesterday to go dog bed shopping. Wilson needed a new one for the family room and none of the Ross stores on this side had ones that were big enough. Since Phil has been up with me at night, there isn't an extra recliner this spoiled dog can steal and make his very own. So we finally found one at Home Goods that he seemed to like right away.

We also went for a two mile walk along the river. As we were driving to find a place to park, we saw a bald eagle fly by. Then we saw a seal (or maybe it was a sea lion?) out in the river, and we could make out just the tip of Mt. Hood. It was a beautiful night. Today we woke up again to rain. We even had a tiny bit of hail this afternoon.

This week I'll be in kindergarten all five days again. Lord Jesus, help me.

Yesterday I found my elementary music teacher, Miss Susan Peters, on Facebook. I sent her a message and thanked her for her class, one of the highlights of my elementary years. She wrote me back and told me my message made her cry. She's still teaching music. And she has a fluffy yellow dog. And it was pretty cool to reconnect.

spring and love and stuff

Here's what's been going on lately. . . 

We went to a Matt Maher concert at the end of January. He has a lot of songs that I love like Lord, I Need You and Because He Lives and Your Grace is Enough and well, I could go on and on. That concert was exactly what we needed at that moment. When he put the guitar down and sat at the piano and played and sang by himself I could hardly hold back the tears. So many confirmations from Scripture and in the lyrics from his songs to put our minds and hearts at rest in what was and is a very stressful time for us.

Valentine's weekend: We finally used the movie tickets I got for my 40th birthday and went to see The Finest Hours. We had a breakfast date and got some good chocolate at Whole Foods. We also used a coupon for a free pay-per-view from Dish and watched Everest. Nothing like climbing the world's tallest mountain and freezing to death.

My little baby daffodils have bloomed and my bigger daffodils will most likely open up within the next day or two. The hyacinths are coming out and the tulips have started popping up out of the ground. I saw on facebook that the cherry trees are blossoming in Portland already. I haven't seen any around here, but I don't think it will be long.

Yesterday I took a break from school and took some time out for me. Met my friend Barbara for coffee, took Wilson for a walk in a new-to-us park, and started cleaning up the flower beds and the yard out back. It was a beautiful day and I needed to do something different for a change. I get to this point at just about this time in every class where I'm just ready to be done. My mind is scienced out and I'm ready to move on, except it's not quite time because I still have a stupid experiment to finish with M&M's! Yesterday's weather was just too gorgeous to sit at the dining room table and answer questions from chapters 1-9.

Three more weeks to go and then I get a week off before my next class starts. Next up is Teaching Reading in the Content Areas. After that I have 3 classes to register for in the summer, graduation to apply for, and a job to hopefully get for the fall.

I've been working pretty much every day with the exception of President's Day. This whole week I'll be in kindergarten and with my friends at Fruit Valley.

I feel all I write about anymore is school and work, but really, that about sums up my life at this point. I mean, I still have a few Christmas things that haven't been put away yet, like my Willow Tree Nativity and a few printables that never got changed to the ones for Valentine's Day. Maybe someday my blog will be exciting again. Until next time.

1st post of twenty sixteen

*I just discovered this post that I didn't quite finish and therefore hadn't published. Here it is anyway.


I'm sure you all thought I've fallen off a cliff somewhere. Nope. Still alive. I've enjoyed a month of no school. That all comes to a screeching halt tomorrow when my 8th of 12 classes starts, Teaching Science in the Elementary School. We are on the downhill slide, people. August 26th can't arrive soon enough.

What did I do over break?

• Slept a lot. Took naps. Slept some more.
• Cleaned up after my dog.

• Scrapbooked a little. I started a December Daily album using photos from 2013. Haven't gotten very far because, apparently, it's more fun to read about what everybody else is doing in their December Dailies than to actually work on mine.

• Watched a lot of HGTV.
• Started hanging stuff on the walls in the dining room. Still not finished.
• Went on a musical date without my husband who stayed home sick. I took my friend Barbara. We stopped for a look at the tree in Portland's living room.

The show was An Appalachian Christmas with Mark O'Connor. Lots of fiddles, guitars, bass, and singing. It was so good I think I'll go again next year and take my husband.

• Took selfies in front of the tree with my guy.

Happy New Year!

the annual "in search of the perfect picture of the dog in front of the tree" post

Ya, I'm that person who takes Christmas pictures of the dog. Because, well, he's cute. And he has a jingle bell collar. And because he pretty much camps out in front of the tree every night. Hope your day was merry and bright!

you've never heard o holy night quite like this

My friend Jody (who happens to be a music teacher at a private school in Nashville) always sends me the link for this fabulous little video every year around this time. I've probably shared it here before, but it's so "good" I'm going to share it again. Enjoy!
Merry Christmas

the day i taught 50+ women how to make a craft

So Saturday was the Christmas luncheon for the ladies at my church - An Old Fashioned Christmas.

This was my 5th year planning and organizing the event. Every year I try to make it a little bit different. Somewhere in August or September I got the idea to include a craft when I saw this one on pinterest.

I thought it looked old fashioned and seemed easy enough. My friend Barbara and her husband were super helpful, and I couldn't have done this without their help. She ordered a sample kit and they used that to get the dimensions for the wood that was bought in long pieces and cut down.Her husband did a lot of sawing for us. The heads were purchased in bags in the three different sizes. We punched stars out of heavy glittered cardstock, cut the wire and twine, and printed out the tags, and painted the pieces for Mary and Joseph. We used acrylic paint mixed with a tiny bit of water and there were four colors they could choose from. Everything was bagged up and ready to go. We found hot glue was the quickest and easiest way to hold everything together.

All last week I was so doubtful that the ladies would like it or want to do it. Totally was wrong on that. They all loved it and had a great time. And even though we only had like 10 glue guns, they all just hung around and chatted with each other while they waited.

We put out some finished samples on the tables and I typed out direction sheets just so they could have a reference. (I talked them all though it before they started, but just in case, they had something they could look at if they forgot.) The picture below makes me laugh because we had told them the shoulders would be painted, but the feet would not and this was one of our samples :)

I didn't decorate a table this year because, well, I really didn't need to because we didn't have as many women come, and I was busy getting the trees ready so I really didn't have time to do a table. I also brought in a collection of canning jars to set out on top of the piano with tea lights.

Ours ended up being taller than the pinterest original, but they turned out super cute and everyone had lots of fun making them. Lessons learned: 1) don't be afraid to add a craft to a women's event. 2) keep in mind it's a lot of prep work to make it happen. 3) have samples and printed directions ready. 4) don't make it too complicated.

If you look closely at the above picture, you might see one of my origami stars (they were all on the tree on the left), the oranges I dried, and a doily garland. All pinterest ideas for an old fashioned Christmas, of course.