Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

[good job, Christine, now shut up about the damn cake]

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1. I actually watched two movies this weekend- a miracle! We took Sawyer to see LEGO Batman in the theater (fun) and then Scott and I watched The Edge of Seventeen (so great- I kept comparing myself to the teacher... at least in some ways) at home. I've met my quota for the month.

2. Cake update (because I am sure you're all dying to know)! I made the Milk Bar Birthday Cake and followed the recipe to the letter and it turned out perfectly (ifIdosaysomyself). The baking part was easy enough, but the assembly got a little tricky with the acetate sheets. Once I figured out how to make a sort of column of plastic it went really well. 

3. I'm reading Ready Player One so that I can give it an honest recommendation to my students and I can definitely say that I am not the target demographic. I am starting to get into it, though! You can't help but to root for Wade. 

4. I realized something recently: I have to give myself my own pep talks. Everyone in my life is so used to me being "fine, good, ready for the weekend!" or has their own issues. The problem with self-sufficiency? You get used to not asking for help and the people around you get used to not helping. Anyway, I had some coffee and said "self, get it together" and was better. Just a super fun observation. 

5. Hey! I am going to Vegas this weekend! FINALLY! I am taking my mom to see Cher and we're staying at the fancy Cosmopolitan for the night and having dinner at Caesar's, so I think it will be super fun.

6. I've been suffering from some hip pain after sitting for stretches of time that exceed twenty or so minutes for years, but lately it's gotten worse (probably because of the running). I stretch it out daily, but no dice. I want to go to the doctor, but I am guessing the resulting treatment will be time with a physical therapist, which I literally cannot work into my schedule (I have to pick my son up right after work and there is no way I can take a toddler to PT). It's frustrating and I'll just continue to hobble around and complain (and maybe figure out foam rolling-?). 

7. Last weekend the three of us went up to UCLA for a women's basketball game (only $8 a ticket!?!) and then wandered around the UCLA/Westwood area for a little bit. Because of the holiday weekend we lucked out with ZERO traffic- we made it through 132 miles round trip of So Cal freeways without getting stuck at all. A miracle.

Thanksgiving Break

[still so proud of my lattice work]

It's been pretty quiet on the blog, but in real life this week has been busy! I am fortunate enough to have the whole week off, which thankfully sort of took the edge of the mounting stressors I'd been trying to ward off. 

So, here's a lot of pictures and a few words:

[85 going on 60- this guy is a beast]

The weekend break started we had an 85th birthday party for my grandfather in Brea. My brother and his girlfriend drove to my house and we drove to Orange County together, which made the drive more enjoyable. There were lots of aunts, uncles, and cousins there, so it was nice to catch up and for them to see crazy Sawyer. We also hit up Chelo's Creamery on the way back in The City of Industry, which is one of the few places that that has rolled ice cream. It was good, but I think it's more of a novelty thing that will fizzle out.

The next morning my brother, his girlfriend, and I drove up to UCLA to do a 5k that is a charity run for The Special Olympics. This year it ended rivalry week with USC, so when you sign up you pick a school and your fees are in their pot, adding a layer of team competition to it. I ran it about thirty seconds or so faster than my goal, so I was definitely pleased. And, despite the numerous hills, I ran the entire time and had no pain, so I definitely entertained some half marathon fantasies on the way home.

I was able to see many friends while off, which made things even better. A good friend and I have the same birthday, so we left our little guys at home with their dads and had breakfast the weekend before. I met another friend with her little girl for lunch, got to spend a few hours with our friends from out of town that came home for the holidays, and then was lucky enough to see a few students-turned-friends. 

[chicken and waffles for breakfast; I think I need to try ones with better chicken...]

After talking Santa up extensively, I took Sawyer to see him the day before Thanksgiving. We rehearsed it many times:

Me: What are you going to say when you see Santa?

Sawyer: Hiiiii.

Me: And then you can stand by him and when they take a picture what do you say?

Sawyer: Cheeeeeese.

Me: And then what?

Sawyer: M&Ms

Me: Yeah!

I got this parenting thing in the bag. Obviously. It worked and I have an adorable picture of him, smiling, holding his own stuffed little Santa that he insisted taking next to the real deal. 

There was lots of food. Like "afraid to step on the scale" lots of food. It's Thanksgiving. What can you do?

As previously mentioned, I hosted Thanksgiving, which meant two days of cleaning and cooking. Everything turned out well and my oven burns are minimal, so we'll call it a win.

I finished Jonathan Safran Foer's book, Here I Am, which I enjoyed for various reasons and will discuss soon. I am also about half way through Arianna Huffington's nonfiction, The Sleep Revolution, and I am fairly confident my brain is turning to mush because of my horrible sleep situation. I somehow miraculously watched the entire four episodes of the new Gilmore Girls, and the ending made wanting more. I ran, I cross stitched, I graded far too few papers.

So, tomorrow we head back into the final four weeks of the semester and I am determined to jump back on the productivity train that I was riding before break started, so that it's not two in the morning the night before grades are due and I'm in the fetal position weeping. Because that would never happen.  

I'm also excited to get Christmas going around here! I had wanted to put up our tree today, but Sawyer napped late and I was trying to get things tied up. Next weekend will be Christmas-heavy, so, see above comment on me getting it together. ASAP.

Hope everyone had a  great holiday! 

Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

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Preface: I have been a horrible blogger lately and have been considering pulling the plug... Last night it appeared that I was locked out of Blogger for FOREVER but then my husband helped me get back in and I decided that it was a sign I'd stick around for awhile longer. I had some time today to put together a calendar of post topics, so we're back in action.

1. I've figured out they key to make mornings tolerable: coffee x 2, a good outfit, and a bowl of sugary cereal (Golden Grahams right now). Every time I go grocery shopping I consider getting something healthy, but then I say, "Christine, if consuming 15 grams of sugar in the morning from a box with a cartoon character on the front is going to make you happy,  then you do it. Mornings are hard. The choice is easy." And then I buy whatever I want and I accept the fact that I will never be an egg-white omelet with whole grain toast kind of girl. 

2. I have four ideas for novels right now. I have negative four hours to work on them. It's frustrating and sad, but the challenge is compelling and motivating, at least sometimes when I don't feel like my eyelids weigh eighteen pounds... each.  

3. Last weekend my brother and his girlfriend came over to BBQ and I made three new recipes- Cilantro and Lime Marinated Chicken Kebabs, Grilled Foil Pack Cheesy Fries, and Unbelievable Peanut Butter Pie. All successes to be made again!

4. Sometimes I take a deep breath and I get this overwhelming feeling that it has been weeks, if not months, since my last one. It's the most wonderful and horrible feeling all at once. 

5. I made this for a friend last week and was pretty pleased with how it turned out:

6. I received my first subscription box of cookies from The Cravory last week and there were some plusses and minuses. First of all, their presentation was total crap- could they not have sprung for a cute box or at least some sort of envelope? Instead they were all in separately packed plastic and in a box with some haphazard paper confetti. Three of the six flavors were excellent, one was okay, one was on the lower end of mediocre, and one I haven't tried, since I really don't know if I can accept candied meat in my cookies. I'll do it again for a few months and see if I want to continue. 

7.  I just bought this shirt five seconds ago:

[source]

8. Today my husband had a procedure and needed a driver, so I took the day off and Sawyer went to daycare. I thought I'd end up with some free time and get some things done, but no. The damn place ran over two hours past the scheduled appointment. Punctuality is sort of a requirement for all things in my life, so this was certainly not pleasing. But, I kept my cool, escaped for a delicious acai bowl once they called him back, and then made some snotty Instagram Stories about the situation. What any normal human being would do, I think.

9. Last Saturday I took Sawyer to Pretend City (a really cool children's museum in Orange County) and as we were leaving he starts singing the Batman theme song, which is what he does instead of say "Batman." I sort of ignored it, since he does it pretty much every time he sees someone in Batman apparel, thinks about Batman, etc... But he kept doing it, so I turned around, and THERE WAS BATMAN. Holy celebrity sight for a two-year-old! He said "hi" several times and then when Batman said it back he sort of got a little clingy and shy. It was the cutest. 

10. Tomorrow is September! So many good things are happening this month. 

Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

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1. If the fact that I haven't posted in a week is any indication, things have been BUSY. Not bad, but just busy. When I grow up I'm going to sit down each month and generate a list of blog post topics, write them out, and schedule them. It will be amazing. And will probably only happen once. 

2. Last weekend our newish neighbor came over to go over some general neighborly sort of things, like fence repair and exchanging numbers in case he and his friends disrupt us with their late-night pool time (I genuinely appreciated the gesture). The thing is that the entire time he was there I was thinking "hahaha you and your significant other woke me up having super loud sex and 4 in the morning a few months ago." I am soooo mature.

3. I apparently was so tired the other night that I washed my face (with my Clarisonic... aughhhhh) with hair conditioner and only shaved on leg. It's sort of ridiculous and I'm not entirely sure why I'm admitting it publicly, but here we are.

4. I'm still reading Donna Tartt's The Little Friend and while I really like it, it's the type of book that has to be read in longer sittings that I have to give right now, so I'm a little frustrated.

5. My two-year-old son has had this super-sporadic weird leg/foot issue that has been going on over the past few months and I finally bit the bullet and made an (expensive) appointment with his old physical therapist for next week. I know that it's probably because he's been growing (over an inch and a half in less than three months!) or something minor, but it does bother me a bit. It's hard since he can't tell me what it feels like and it doesn't seem to cause him any discomfort. I find myself staring at the way he walks ALL THE TIME and now I don't even know what's normal and what's not.  Or if it's his foot, knee, or hip. Or if it's changed legs. Ohmygod I'm going crazy.

6. The forecast says it might get into the 80s this weekend, as opposed to 90 or 100+. What is this magic? I might as well wear a jacket.

7. My husband gets a Marvel subscription box every so often and I'm pretty jealous, since it seems pretty cool if you life that sort of thing. I used to do some of the makeup ones, but I found myself liking the boxes and bags the products came in more than the actual products themselves. I went online and started searching for one, and low-and-behold, The Cravory in San Diego does cookie ones. So tomorrow six gourmet cookies will arrive at my doorstop and will every month after until I realize that I could make approximately seven times the amount for what I'm paying.

8. I currently am obsessed with Dairy Queen, but, luckily, there isn't one anywhere near my house. I just really love Blizzards. I want one right now. 

9. I have painter's tape all over my living room right now from the "roads" Sawyer and I have created for his cars, his stuffed animals, and himself. I need to vacuum and am sort of dreading the response to the removal...  

10. For your recipe box: this Slow Cooker Salsa Verde Honey Lime Chicken was great as tacos and as leftovers in quesadillas. Don't be off-put by the list of ingredients and also don't skip the smoked paprika. 

11. So I occasionally read The Rock Star Diaries blogs, mostly for the pictures of NYC and ideas of what to do with little kids, and their recent trip the Swiss Alps has left my obsessed with going. When we flew over them when coming home from Italy I remember thinking that I wanted to go, but now it's been moved way up the list. Icing on the cake? An alumni from the high school I teach at came to talk to the kids yesterday and he spent four years there going to college there. I cornered him after the presentation and he sold me on it- apparently it's incredibly family-friendly, efficient, and pretty much everyone speaks English. Obviously Sawyer isn't quite up to the trip now (ha!), but I'm thinking that in maybe 2019 we could go the summer before he starts kindergarten. This of course is pretty ambitious, especially since that flight may be too crazy for my husband (understandably), but if I started saving now it just might be okay... 

Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

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1. This past week has been quite a busy one (hence the lack of posts). Sawyer and I went to visit my family in Modesto for three nights and we're finally back in the swing of things here. We actually had a lot more fun than I anticipated; the 6.5 hour drive up Friday went really well and after we checked into our hotel we headed downtown for the annual American Graffiti Parade. There were over 1200 classic cars, one of which belonged to my mom's boyfriend, so Sawyer had a blast. Saturday we drove to Sacramento to visit the California Train Museum, which I had initially decided on primarily because of Sawyer's current obsession, but we all enjoyed it. The next day we went to a car show that had the cars from the parade and just hung out. I made my family go to all the old places I loved to eat at and enjoyed watching Sawyer ham it up for his doting audience. The ride back wasn't near as stellar, but my friend Val was a godsend, between her patience and willingness to play with an emotional toddler. 

2. A week or so ago I watched the Macbeth movie that came out last Christmas and was fairly underwhelmed. It was visually very appealing, and the score was fitting, but there were some liberties taken with the story that I didn't love.

3. A few months ago I optimistically bought three pairs of shorts from Loft that were a teeny tiny bit too snug- I'm happy to say they now fit juuust right and I just bought several more. Victory is mine.

4. Actually, considering the lunch that I just had they may not fit anymore... My husband is home today and we dropped Sawyer off at daycare for a little while so we could go out to lunch alone and I feel like an Oompa Loompa. It was nice to sneak away, though, since it's really rare that we're able to do that in the middle of the day during the week.

5. I know it's summer and I live in a warm place, but the upcoming weather is horrible. I am ever-so-thankful for a working AC, solar panels, and a pool. 

6. Brie's book club over on her blog voted to read The Royal We by Heather Cocks and Jessica Morgan for their next selection. Given that I have a million books to read right now, and that this really isn't necessarily something I'd choose to read, I thought about waiting until next month. But then I had a genius idea- I'd listen to it. This was the perfect solution- while it's not exactly high-brow lit, it's entertaining, perfect for summer, and the narrator is decent. 

7. I made this Mascarpone, strawberry, mint and honey tart that I found over on The How Sweet It Is blog last night. It was really easy and perfect for summer.

8. The generous gift card my seniors got me for Barnes and Noble was burning a hole in my pocket, so I went book shopping yesterday. Man, I miss those kids, and not just because they fueled my addiction.

9. Someone tried really, really hard to bait me today on Facebook this morning by saying that feminism and racism are non-issues and that people are just "sheep," giving into mainstream media by caring about gender and racial equality. Whoa, let's back that 1950's misogynistic, bigoted train up, shall we? I briefly gave my two cents but eventually closed it out by saying that I refused to argue with people I don't know (it was someone on my brother's post). I felt pretty mature, since I could have gone to town on the young man (and really, really wanted to).

10. I'm headed to an actual yoga class in a studio tomorrow for the first time in a looooong time. Pray for me.  

Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

Happy spring (at least in Southern California)! Link up, link back, say hi!

1. There are three books-as-movies that I hope to see this month: Wild, Room, and Macbeth. I've had Wild for a few weeks and it hasn't happened yet, but I really want to. For what it's worth. 

2. I sat down to look at my calendar for this month and I am busy every single weekend day with at least one thing until the second week of April. Whoa. It's all fun stuff (weddings, friend time, family time, hair appointments, etc...), but that's a lot. I genuinely enjoy being busy and social, and tend to get a little down when I am not. But, on the flip side, I'm already behind at life, so we'll see where I'm at come April. This weekend I'm chaperoning a group of students from our school to a class they're taking a UC Santa Barbara (which means that I get to hang out around campus for a few hours, possibly in the rain, but that's okay!) and Sunday I'm meeting up with a friend for awhile in the morning so that we can walk and discuss very important matters. 

3. I went to dinner at a semi-nice place with a few friends last week and brought Sawyer along to see the girls. He was so well-behaved that the couple behind us complimented him on the way out, saying that they didn't even know there was a toddler right by them until they were about to leave. Kids are so unpredictable, but I am lucky that he generally behaves well when we are in restaurants, between the people-watching, eating, and coloring. There were a few bites of my chocolate cake in it for him (local folks, try Brio in Victoria Gardens! It was my first time there and we will be back). 

4. I am in an Audiobook slump. I finished Stephen King's On Writing and have another credit available, but can't decide what to listen to. So many things I'd rather read. I'm also caught up on Serial right now, too, so I need to figure something out (I don't care what anyone says, I'm still enjoying this season). Suggestions are welcome! I prefer nonfiction for listening. 

5. I downloaded the first episode of the Podcast The Worst Idea of All Time after my husband told me about it. Basically, these guys from New Zealand watch Sex and the City 2 once a week for a year and talk about it, each week drinking more and more (or something like that). I loved the show, but the movies were horrid, especially the second one (I'd see a third one, though, admittedly). I listened to the first one today and, even though they were totally sober, it was still entertaining. 

6. Fuller House is basically a disaster. Aaaaaand it's being renewed for a second season. Aaaaaaaaaand I will watch that too (I don't ever turn the TV on when I'm home in the afternoons, but I made an exception, since this isn't really a show that requires full attention).

7. I just started Monsters of Templeton by Laura Groff, since I loved her other two novels. I have high hopes.

8. I am looking for a dress to wear to a wedding and parent teacher conferences (I always buy a new dress, it makes it easier to go and smile and feel put together) and I saw one at Nordstrom that was cute. But then I noticed it was from Ivanka Trump's line and looked away in disgust. It became hideous. No way am I helping that family! Ugh.

9. I've always wanted to make my own granola bars (because buying them is way too easy, apparently) and I think I found the recipe to go with.

10. The state of my kitchen as a I type: a very tired Sawyer (we walked, colored, played kitchen, and blew bubbles in the last three hours) eating dinner, the ingredients for a cilantro rice, chicken, cheese dish for Scott and I in various stages of prep all over the counters, the sink piled with dirty dishes, the dishwasher half unloaded, and two dogs praying someone drops something. So, basically, any typical week night at 6:30. I better go. 

Have a great rest of the week, folks! 

Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

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1. Kare Goucher, the runner, continues to break my heart. That woman is a beast and trains so very hard, but it seems like every time she feels ready she misses her goal by seconds. She ran the Olympic Trials for the marathon in Los Angeles last weekend and missed qualifying by so little! And she cried, which made me sad for her. 

2. While on the topic of running, while I've decisively sidelined half marathon plans indefinitely (I was considering doing the Disney in September before Surf City), I think I'm going to really focus on improving my 5k of 10k times (so 3.1 or 6.2 miles). I think my feet can handle that and the training is much  more doable with my life. It'll also allow me to do more cross training, which I'm excited about. I got on the bike yesterday and have been doing more yoga, so I'm pleased with that. 

3. This is my new favorite shirt:

4. I read Sherman Alexie's The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-Time Indian last weekend and really enjoyed it. I don't read YA, but I am an Alexie fan, so I gave it a try. More than anything, it made me want to read more of his adult fiction.

[Alexie]

5. I'm also reading The Scarlet Letter for my senior IB class and I'm liking it way more than I ever have before (I think this is the fourth time I've read it?). The language is still very tedious, though, and it's really heard to read when I can't completely focus. We will be comparing it to Kate Chopin's The Awakening, which should be interesting (well, for me, anyway). I wish there was a prequel, though. What the heck went down between Hester and Dimmesdale? They were praying together one day and BAM! crazy baby Pearl was made? 

6. I also just started Notorious RBG, since it seemed like the timely thing to do.

7. Four years ago I jumped out of a plane. How stupid. 

8. I've been thinking about looking into taking some sort of creative writing or literature class through the UCLA Extension program, just for fun. Mostly because I'm always like, "hey, I'm so bored, I need more things to do and items to put on my to-do list."

9. My child's new love is to sit in cardboard boxes and color in them. This keeps him busy for chunks of like twenty-five minutes, which is impressive in toddler time. I'm going to have to keep ordering things online to make sure he has the necessary supplies.

10. Holy shit, this churro cake.

Bookish (and not so Bookish) Thoughts

Happy Wednesday! Link up, link back, say hi!

1. In twenty-four hours I'll be on an eleven-day President's Day Break and pretty much the happiest woman around. It technically doesn't begin until Friday afternoon, but I'm calling a sub so that I can take care of some business. We just had winter break five weeks ago, so I know I'm sort of a jerk for celebrating another vacation, but I've been working hard at home and work and I'm TIRED. Plus I get to spend all week with my favorite little guy, which I definitely am looking forward to.

2. Next week I'm going to take Sawyer to the San Diego Zoo (tangent: I have mixed feelings about zoos, but I have an annual pass in my name as a result of needing to qualify for a credit union membership that was necessary to finance our solar panels; long story semi-short: I'm going to make a donation to some sort of save the elephant fund to make myself feel a little less hypocritical. But circuses or Sea World- over my dead body). I've had a few people surprised that I'm going "alone." Because I can't drive two hours and handle the same toddler I handle every day? Come onnnnnnnn. He's super excited to meow at the koalas that we watched videos of the other day. 

3. Toddlers in backpacks are pretty darn cute:

4. I'm making these as we speak. I've been eating like total crap lately since I've been so active, and I know after the half Sunday I'm going to either have to maintain my current level of activity so I can keep eating ridiculous amounts of carbs (like absurd), or scale everything back. Or, I guess I could keep eating ridiculously and stop exercising and just let nature take it's course, but considering it'll be bathing suit weather in about five minutes that's not happening.

5. I'm slightly obsessed with changing up my sparsely decorated mantle and came across this wood wall art thingamajig on Etsy. I'm going to email the guy for a quote on a special order asap (this one is too big for what I have in mind), but the colors are perfect for my living room and my husband actually likes it too.

[A+ cropping job]

6. Speaking of things that are aesthetically pleasing and highly necessary:

[I better decide soon, since they're so low on inventory...]

7. I don't get too political on here, but I think it's safe to say most know where my allegiance lies. The caucus results the other night were fascinating and encouraging. That's all I'll say.

8. We watched Everest last weekend and all I knew was that it was about people climbing the mountain (that's all I needed to be on board). I had no idea that it was about the trip that John Krakauer was a part of! It made me want to reread Into Thin Air, despite the fact that Krakauer apparently wasn't exactly a fan of the movie.

9. I need to sit down and make a really, really long, carefully thought out playlist for Sunday. I recently acquired quite a bit of new music, so now it's time to sit and think things like "at one point am I going to hit a wall and need something fun like Ke$ha?" and "how many times should I include "Party Rock" on this list?" and also "am I still into starting every race with 'For Whom the Bell Tolls'?" [insert judgmental comments about my taste in music here.] I'm actually really, really excited about Sunday, but that may be in part because I can't wait to get a solid night sleep in a hotel room all by myself the night before. I have this nagging feeling that I'm setting myself up for failure, though, since a little part of my thinks it could be a really solid race after my successful long run last week. Nonetheless, it'll be some good exercise by the ocean and a nice chance to spend some time alone (minus the twenty thousand people I'm hanging out with).

10. I just started Us by David Nicholls and so far, so good. I have to admit that part of the short chapters are part of the appeal right now, since it makes it easy to pick up in spurts (it is pretty long, though).

October, Revisited, Plus November

I'm a woman of my word (or at least I try to be), so when I posted some goals for October I said I'd publicly hold myself accountable. Honestly, this post is probably more for me than anyone else, but I already wrote the whole thing. So here we are:

1. Learn to turn the water main off- Nope! The weird noise went away and I stopped obsessing about my house flooding. I attempted to look at some pictures online for about three minutes, but I got bored.

2. Take Sawyer to do something autumn-ish- Yup! We went to a huge pumpkin patch with some friends, the Homecoming Carnival at my school, and then the fall festival at the place where he used to go to PT. 

3. Make plans to see friends at least once- Yup! I also had to reschedule some things from this month for next month, so I should be out and about quite a bit in November. I'm not ashamed to say that I'm one of those people that needs to interact with others. 

4. Do yoga or Piyo at least twice a week- Sorta! I've been pretty good about going to yoga on Saturdays and I've done Piyo like twice. Better than last month, but still lots of room for improvement, especially if I'm going to run again. 

5. Make a charitable contribution- Yup! A favorite colleague at work is doing a charity run, so I donated some money towards what he needs to raise. 

6. Leave at least 100 blog comments- Probably not! I started off really strong at the beginning of the month, but definitely tapered off as things got crazy. 

7. Make a new playlist- Yup!  I love seeing what other people are listening t, so, for your amusement/judgement:

8. Walk 80,000 steps a week- Yup! I was up around 90,000 once or twice, too. 

9. Hang you with my husband more- Sorta! I decided that every Thursday I'd play videogames (just the silly Lego ones) with him after Sawyer is in bed, but the past two weeks I was tied up. It's not like we don't see each other or anything, but actually putting down our phones/tablets and designating time to hang out is something to work on.

10. Do things to de-stress at work- It's complicated. But I love my students very much and I enjoy what I do. No job is perfect and accepting the things that are hard along with the things that are great will get you far... most days. 

I'd say that October was a much better month than September, although there have been some bad days and a moment or two where I thought someone had knocked me upside the head with a two-by-four out of basically nowhere. But anyway, I do have to say putting things down like this made me prioritize better and just work harder on certain things. And because I was able to do that I felt happier in general. Naturally this must be replicated.

So, things to work on for November:

1. Read five books- I haven't been reading quite as much as I'd like lately (do we ever, though?).

2. Eat at a new restaurant- We used to do this once a month. Then the child happened; there's no reason we can't still. 

3. Less Diet Coke, more water- Nooooooooooooooooooooooo. But yes. 

4. Make a new recipe a week- I'm in a cooking rut. I try to cook five nights a week, so this has made meal time a bit of a chore.

5. Start (lightly) training- While I'm not going to go balls-to-the-wall on half marathon training it's would be a joke to assume that I'd go in without some sort of base mileage. I want to be that person, who just goes for it, but I'm not.

5. Blog 17 times- I just pulled that number out of my ass, but ever since this school year started my posting has suffered a little bit.

6. Really try to finish NaNoWriMo- Who the hell knows what will happen.

7. Find some sort of not-lame Christmas craft to make- I don't have a ton of Christmas decorations, but I tend to think simple, homemade ones are the nicest. This will unfortunately mean a trip to Michael's, which will take a year or two off my life.

8. Reevaluate my fall/winter wardrobe- Last year I was trying to finish losing pregnancy weight and the year before that I was actually pregnant, so I'm frustrated with my closet. It won't exactly be freezing here, but I do need things and to get rid of those articles of clothing I won't wear anymore. 

9. Go out without Sawyer- We're long overdue for a night out without the little munchkin. My birthday is this month, Scott's is next, and our anniversary is next week, so maybe we can lump it all into a night out in the next few weeks. 

10. Throw out or store a bag of junk a week- I'm a minimalist and with the holidays approaching it's time to downsize. 

Weekend Update

[they said this was the tallest ferris wheel in the state; LIE]

If every weekend were three days my quality of life would go up exponentially. It's a fact. Our Labor Day weekend wasn't anything terribly impressive, but it was downright enjoyable. Here's what we/I did:

Played

We went to the Norco Fair to check out all the animals (Sawyer belly laughed at a goat that jumped up to bleat in his face. This went on for several minutes. If I could relive that moment, somehow, I'd pay some solid cash to do so). We built with LEGOs, played with his new Little People Pirate Ship, and tormented the dogs. I even tried to watch Twenty-Two Jump Street with Scott but fell asleep an hour in. Oops. 

Walked and Walked

Saturday we went to a shopping center nearby that has a large man-made lake that is perfect for early-morning walks. There are lots of ducks and a cool bamboo bridge that we spent a lot of time on. We also spent some time cruising the neighborhood Sunday morning and did some laps up and down the street on Monday. Sawyer is walking more and more now, which is both a sigh of relief and a nightmare.

[what you don't see: lots of ugly stores and restaurants]

[save your correspondence for later, Sawyer]

Did Boring Adult Things

I cleaned a lot and did about ten loads of laundry. I got really, really angry while trying to order birth and marriage certificates online for a stupid insurance audit they gave us little warning for. We shopped for, and bought, a refrigerator. 

[sorry for all the Sawyer fingerprints on your stainless steel, Best Buy]

Spent Time Alone.. and Away

I met up with a friend her her baby for coffee on Saturday morning (I even got to feed him, which was weird, since he just laid there quietly and sucked on his bottle, as opposed to what I have now). I finished Zeitoun by Dave Eggers, read a bit of Macbeth for work, and started San Miguel by TC Boyle Saturday night while my husband was out late at his draft. I floated around the pool by myself on Monday. I went to Starbucks and Target solo.

[No, I did not go to Starbucks three days in a row. Never.]

[view from the pool]

Shopped

I spent way too much time online deciding what kind of Top Siders and tennis shoes to buy (why do I want Top Siders? Why? I don't own a boat). I rediscovered some great things at Trader Joe's like those stupid hollow apple sticks, and their garlic olive oil and Pasadena Salad. I replaced a fake pearl necklace that Sawyer broke at Charming Charlie's (there's too much stuff in that store to wade through, I've decided). I also picked up Star Wars stuff for the whole family.  Target got me again. 

Baked

If you call Rice Krispy Treats with peanut butter and chocolate chips baking. Pretty easy stuff.

Worried About Uncontrollable Things

Just keeping it real. I've always had an issue with this and this weekend required some serious self-monitoring so I didn't lose it. Unfortunately, my lack of sleep exacerbates the situation, and the fact that I haven't gotten more than 6.5 hours of (broken) sleep in weeks isn't helping. Sawer just will not stop teething. One day at a time!

This week should be quick... right?