Happy New Year!

As I look back at 2008, it wasn't soooo bad. There were certainly some ugly parts, but all in all it turned out ok! As most of you know, Brian moved out in January of 2008. He is living a few buildings over from me, which is good for Alex. Alex started new living arrangements shortly after Brian moved and he's doing wonderfully! Kids are amazing and sooo resilient. Brian picks him up from school on Wednesday's and Thursday's and he spends the night at Brian's - and he rotates weekends with each of us. The funny part is that we all go to the skatepark every Saturday morning (at least almost every Saturday) so that Alex can skate for an hour or two. We usually go out to lunch too. I swear that most people wouldn't know that we aren't just a happy little family. I know, it's odd, but it works - especially for Alex, which is most important!

Work is going well. I have a full class and my assistant and I are very busy every morning. Sometimes I just have to keep watching the clock so that I can remember that recess is coming soon, then lunch and nap!! :) Most days are fun though and the kids are loving and want to hug you - that can make all of it worthwhile!

So, as 2009 starts, my divorce is final - on the 6th. I'm officially single now! I invited some friends for a martini and snacks party on the 17th - I'm sure that will be super fun! I signed up for eHarmony - don't laugh!! - but I have not "subscribed" so I can view my matches (there are more than you think - lol) but I can't communicate with them yet - you have to pay for the priviledge of chatting via eHarmony. I am not sure about dating, but life is good and since I know that God has had His hand in this whole thing - moving to Georgia, Montessori teaching job, finding an awesome church, making fabulous new friends - I am sure that He will put the right person in my path! I'm just working on remembering that my time is not His time and that things will happen when they are supposed to!

Hope your 2009 is awesome! Love to you all! :)

Merry Christmas!!!!

Well, the day is just about over and it was super fun! Alex got a PS3 (it's at his dad's - he got it from Grammy and Grampy) and some games for his DS and for the PS2 here, plus Heely's (he thought that they would be super easy to do, but not so much - as he's finding out)

and some Tony Hawk shoes and shirts, a cool book that I made on Snapfish (thanks Oprah for the freebie) that is all about him and has his skating pics in it,

an iDog soft speaker for his iPod,

a new PlanB belt and a few miscellaneous toys. I got a Nintendo DS lite with a gift card that I got from my kids at school and a case and a game (my DS is pink and it's soooo cool!), plus Alex gave me a framed piece of his artwork, 2 books and Gavin Rossdale's new CD. We had quite a good time.

We got Angel a Kong and some treats for it - that was quite funny watching her try to get it out.

In the afternoon we got an invite to go to our assistant pastor's (Shannon) house for dinner and a fun time! It was fun and of course Alex loves to hang out with John and Shane, so all is well! Hope you all had a great holiday! Merry Christmas with love from both of us :)

The Christmas Decor Is Up!

The king of the goofballs! Happy to be done putting the ornaments on the tree....but he's the one who wanted me to wait to decorate the tree until he got home from his dad's....

We didn't put up as much stuff as we could have, but we have our stuff up! I realized more this year just how much Christmas decor I have and how I could never arrange it artfully enough to fit it all into this apartment! Here are some pics...

The tree - with and without the flash so that you can appreciate the 1000 lights!

Our countdown to Christmas calendar...

The beautiful poinsettia that my class got me! Sweet parents and kids!!

Cute living tree - gotta find a place to plant it in the spring!

My teddy bear creche and Alex's bendy people creche from VBS - Cute, huh?

Memories of Christmases long ago - this was our gift from Alex in 2003...it's sooo stinkin' cute that I have saved it and get it out every year!

Hope you all have a very Merry Christmas!!

Thanksgiving in Michigan

I decided that it would be a great idea to drive to Michigan for Thanksgiving weekend....man, that is a long drive to do all at once! We left Peachtree City about 8:30 pm the day before Thanksgiving and finally arrived in Battle Creek at about 9:45 am on Thanksgiving Day. I was soooo tired, but so glad to be there! The kids were all thrilled to see each other, I got to go on the crazy Black Friday shopping trip with Robyn and Margie, and I got to hang out with the family.....it was just what Thanksgiving was supposed to be! Black Friday was crazy! I went to bed about 10:30 on Thanksgiving night, then got up at 2:30 am to be to Robyn's by 3:00 am and Margie picked us up at 3:15! We got to Kohl's at 3:40 am so that we could stand in line to get in when they opened at 4:00! What a crazy thing to do....I did get some good deals though, so it wasn't too nuts!! The funniest part was that we got in line to pay at 4:45 and didn't get out of the store until 6:20!! Yeah, that's right - and hour and half to spend my $75!! We also wanted to get a great deal at Target for Caleb (Target opened at 6:00 am), but they were already sold out by the time we got there at 6:30!! Anyway, it was a fun time - we had lunch about 11:00 at Applebee's and then headed home - we actually had to take stuff over to Robyn's parents house and drop it off so that we had room in Margie's PT Cruiser for the rest of the shopping trip!! It was a really great day and lots of napping took place that afternoon!!! :)

We took some pics of the kids playing in the basement at Scott and Robyn's - here they are, but don't expect too much, they didn't exactly cooperate!!

Here are some more pics of the fam...

Skate Video

Here is some video of today's skate park outing. Alex is working on a couple of new tricks in the 4' mini ramp. Here's the 50-50 grind:


Here's his run with a couple of different tricks in it:



It sure was cold in there today!! We didn't go until noon just because it was sooo cold. It only got up to the mid 40's today and it's probably down to the low 30's already now. Winter is here too stinkin' early for me!!

More Skate Pics

Sorry this is all crazy with the songs, but I just decided to try this cool site, so you have to deal with me being crazy! Isn't Alex getting good!!

All He Lives For Is Skating