So, I've been having a really tough time getting into the Christmas spirit lately. I was originally thinking that it was because we are still in the process of catching up from the last year of me not working, but we've had tougher financial years so that can't be it. Then, I thought it was because most of my close friends have moved away and I miss them terribly. My next thought was that this will be the first Christmas without my grandma and that really sucks. I really still haven't narrowed it down, but I did notice that the last two days of shopping made me physically weepy and a little nauseous. Today while I was standing in Target trying to decide if I had "enough" for all of my nieces and nephews I realized that what was bothering me was the utterly disgusting excess of the whole thing. Tim and I had a looooong discussion the other day about spending the day together alone rather than spending money on crap that we really don't need. Paul Bunyan goes to his dad's house on Christmas day and Tim and I are just going to spend the day together. Some of this came from being totally broke this year, but after much racking of the brain, I really couldn't think of one stinkin' thing that I need this year.

On a side note, Suze Orman says that the first step to dealing with debt is admitting what you don't have rather than talking about what you do have...so, I am here to admit that we are 100%, prime time broke this year. There, whew...

Ok, back to my holiday rant...While I was standing in Target I realized that, even if we had disposable income this year, there isn't anything that I need. I am so blessed to have so much more than most. I apologize to you all for all of this rambling, but this was all just bumping around in my head like a pachinko game and I knew that I need to write it down. I just stood in the candy aisle listening to parents bribe, threaten, cajole, codle, and indulge their children while the children whined and moaned about what they wanted. AHHHHHHHH! What have we done to our children? We lived just fine without X-boxes and Play Stations. Somehow, when my mother said "no" we just dealt with it and moved on. Maybe not all the time, but the majority of the time. Heidi and I turned out just fine only getting a couple of gifts from Santa and a couple from Mom and Dad. I also got one, reasonably priced gift from my grandparents. They had seven grandchildren for Pete's sake. Needless to say, I took my crap to the check-out and ran to my car. I couldn't wait to get home. What happened to the "reason for the season"? Our Lord gave his life for us and all I can think about is whether or not I had enough stuff for my nieces and nephews. When is enough, enough?

My students asked me what I'm getting them for Christmas. What? There are 30 of them. I told them they would be lucky if I got them a pencil and a couple pieces of candy. I don't want to be bitter. I don't want to dread the holiday. I had a talk with them about respect and grace. I don't know if it will help any of them, but it certainly helped me. Ha!

Blah, blah, blah.

By the way, I kind of get Slater's comment thing. I obviously don't know his reason, but I know why I would do it. Does that make sense? Find your own drummer...

Science Camp

Blogging, blogging! I haven’t blogged in like forever. Don’t mind the grammar. These days I spend more time trying to decipher bad grammar than I do teaching good grammar. Make sense? I tend to pick up on some of the bad stuff because it’s actually pretty funny sometimes.

Never mind that. I am blogging today because I don’t have to plan lessons this weekend. Why? I am not planning because I am packing to go to science camp. Um, what did I get myself into? Three of us teachers are taking 80 sixth-graders to Angelus Oaks for the week. I was really pumped for this trip until it snowed yesterday. It’s not the pretty, white, fluffy snow with warm sun. It is the hard as a rock, icy, freezing snow with bone-chilling cold. Now I know this is the stuff that young Mr. Slusser would love, but not me. I am a curl up by the fire when it’s below 65 kind of girl. The good news is that I get my own warm and toasty cabin. The kiddos are staying in cabins with counselors. I get to lead a hike each day and I signed up for the 1.5 mile ecology hike. This should be interesting. My saving grace is that most of these kids have never been out of Colton so they will be amazed by anything that has to do with nature. I don’t know about the other sixth grade classes, but my kids loooooooove science. If I did science all day, they would be the happiest students in the world. They even like to talk about “biotic” and “abiotic” factors. They will proudly tell you the difference between them and give you lists if you like. They are really out of this world excited to go tomorrow. God was kind, and I don’t have to ride the bus. The principal decided it would be good to have at least one vehicle with us, and since I have the most experience with mountain driving I was nominated to drive my car. OK, maybe I nominated myself, but the other two absolutely did NOT want to drive. Yeah for me.

Teaching is still wonderful. I really can’t believe that my first year has been so nice. The staff is still great and I get along really well with the principal. My five week vacation was really appreciated, but I was happy to get back into the swing of things when we went back on track last Monday. The kids didn’t forget too much. Adding and subtracting fractions is hard even when there hasn’t been a five-week break. Just wait till we have to divide fractions…oy gevalt!
I figured out just how spoiled I really am. I went to WalMart with my mom yesterday and one of my chores was to buy cables for my new car. Ok, that doesn’t seem so difficult. We found the tire aisle and they had a nice selection of cables and chains. Seems pretty easy so far. Of course, I forgot my list so I had to call Tim for the tire size. He sat on the phone repeating the size for his challenged wife. “No, 205 55 15 not 255 60 15!” Whatever! Did you know that they list the sizes by the last number in that stupid sting of numbers? 205 55 15 is listed numerically by the 15 not the 205. I felt like a flatlander. I must have stood there for a good 10 minutes while Tim calmly waited for me to finish ranting about how stupid it is to list the items by the last number and not the first. Anyway, I got the cables and got out of that aisle as fast as I could.

Only three weeks until winter break!!