My Honey Turned 30!

All of Werty's family met us for dinner at our favorite restaurant, even his siblings who live in ID. YAY! It was amazing to have everyone together. Then after dinner, people came over to our place. We made good use of the DDR my sister and brother gave us for Christmas.

Our Finished Tree...before we take it down

Werty and I had a great FHE shopping for ornaments. Once Werty got in to it, he went to town. Made me laugh a little, because when the evening started, he was not in a mood to shop. (I think he was envisioning being dragged all over town and dealing with hours of holiday shopping traffic...thank goodness for Michael's having all the ornaments we needed.)

Thankful for Covered Parking

This is the first time in my life that I have had covered parking. I love not having to scrape my windshield every morning before work. I have to get up at 5:30am every morning - and I do not want to get up any earlier! My car is very wide - so scraping last year took a minimum of 15 minutes. In our old apartment, we had two parking spaces. Now we only have one - the only down side to our new place. However, we can fit both the motorcycle and the car in our one spot...and it's a covered spot. Hallelujah. I don't want to ever go back to uncovered parking again. I guess the house we get someday will have to have a garage. :D

My other happy thought today is that we received goodies from our friends Andi and Ti. I made cookies this afternoon and finished stuffing the boxes of goodies that are going out to them and to Dekan. Now we need to mail them.

I am taking the IB kids on a field trip tomorrow to the SMA to look at Soviet art. Werty has kindly agreed to be the second chaperon.

Our Family Christmas Tree!

I know it's big, but we plan to have it longer than we will be in our current apartment. Plus, we now know that our ceiling is exactly 7.5 feet high because the tree just barely touches. We were so exhausted Monday night after getting the tree - we went to a few stores that didn't have trees anymore before we found our tree at Lowe's - that we only put half of it up before going to bed. I have been sick all week and only sleeping about 3-4 hours a night. When I decided I wanted to be a teacher I wasn't thinking about how I would be getting up at 5am everyday and have to act chipper and be patient! Anyway, Monday night I wasn't able to fall asleep at all...stupid sudafed...so Werty surprised me when I got home from work the next day. When I walked in the door, there was the tree - finished and all lit up.

Werty wanted a tree that had soft rubber tips that looked more real and scratched less. I wanted a tree that looked bushy like the real Christmas trees I grew up with. This one was the bushiest and has a combination of standard and soft rubber tips. It really helps the tree look realistic. The tree was listed higher than the comparable one we had looked at last week at another store. However, Lowe's had all the fake trees marked down to 50% off, so in the end we got a great deal. We still need to get some ornaments, of course.

Who, me?

Last week I received the monthly "Unsung Hero" award. It's an award that teachers give to each other. My former boss, the ESL director chose me because of all the extras they have me doing, from teaching during lunch to the after school activities and fundraising. (I don't know if I can ever attend another BYU sport event again...we made like $.50 an hour at the last game.) Anyway, now I need to choose someone to present the award to next month. Not many first year teachers are recognized, so that's nice. FHE tonight - go buy a fake tree. We finally decided - if we can find one we like, we will go fake. Never th0ught I would say it, but I think it's a good idea. (Seeing what the trees available look like helped me to decide. Christmas trees should be bushier than these mountatin trees.)

Friendly Neighborhood Ulcer?

For at least the last two months, I haven't been able to eat bell peppers anymore. We started buying red peppers in a 6 pack from Costco...but now every time I eat them I get acid reflux and sometimes I feel queasy. Last night, Werty gave me a sip of his egg nog, and I guess I need to avoid sweet things late at night too. My tummy has been more touchy than usual. And unfortunately, I know my sensitivity isn't a sign of anything life changing. So, what could it be? So, I keep joking with Werty that it's my friendly ulcer. I can't remember what my sister's symptoms were when she had an ulcer, so this diagnosis isn't really based on any facts. Mostly, I think it is a result of erratic sleeping. So, I have to watch what I eat in the evening, avoid the spicy and sweet, and try to get sleep.

Werty and I tried to go shopping today. He said he didn't want to do any browsing, just get in and get out. So we had an agenda of a few things we were looking for - we went to two stores, and didn't find anything. Fruitless. My conclusion: browsing serves a purpose, especially when it comes to gift ideas and gift giving. So, next I will attempt the online shopping route. Does anyone know what Werty's oldest sister wants? Lisa, I will try to find out what my MIL wants, but she is on my "hard-to-shop-for" list. She lost weight with the surgeries this last year, and she's swimming in her old clothes. But clothes can be difficult from a distance.

Wish List for Christmas

I have been chastised. Seriously, we just had mid-term progress reports and the end of the term is coming up fast. So, I have been inundated with grading as well as trying to start the next IB unit. I am really stressed about not having enough time for the Cold War, which is one of the required topics this year. We just finished WWI to give you an idea. Today we started the Russion Revolutions - made the kids watch a silent propaganda film, "October" directed by Eisenstein.

Okay, so here are some things I would love for Christmas:
- CD, Mindy Smith "One Moment More" (my current favorite songs to listen to on youtube)
- "Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives" by Alan Bullock
- Dance Dance Revolution for PS2 (there are different playlist/versions, I don't have any of them, so I don't care - pick one that seems to have a good playlist)
- Dance Dance Revolution Dance Mat for PS2 (we need 2 total so Werty and I can play together)
- DVD, Narnia: Prince Caspian
- DVD Masterpiece Theater's Jane Eyre, the 2006 mini-series version
- perennial someday item: Pfaff sewing machine

Werty's Wish List
- Soundtrack to the french musical "Ten Commandments" - he says the one he wants is sung in french, someone at his previous job had it, and he fell in love with it.
- Ah, my Goddess season 2 DVD set
- Fruits Basket mini-series DVD set
- Card Captor Sakura DVD set
- iTunes gift card
- Disney's Sword in the Stone (We already bought WallE for ourselves - we couldn't wait)

This is the first year that I don't have any of my shopping done before December. Usually, I am at least halfway done by now. But I have been too tired to go out to a store - which is the reason we are using our travel toothpaste this week - I haven't had time to go out and buy any toothpaste. :P In the past, I had a little more time than Werty, so I took care of the Christmas presents, but maybe this year Werty will have to do it....hmmm, yeah.

So, what do you guys want for Christmas this year?