In Short: A Solicitor, Balloon Art, & Flash Photography.

Hey kids. I hope all of you had a great Christmas Eve, Christmas, day after Christmas, and all of the days that have since followed. Next up, New Years fun. This year is the first in a great while that I will actually be out among the living and celebrating. Will I be dressed up? You betcha. Will I be the third wheel among my favorite couple ever? Yes. Yes, I will. Will I be kissing someone at midnight? Maybe. Hopefully. Miracles do happen. Sometimes.

I'm actually heading out tomorrow to go out of town on my little New Years rendezvous. I'm excited. Twill be fun.

I had a good Christmas. I'll be back in a couple of days and post about some family Christmas fun. I actually have a pretty good story, but right now I'd much rather write about the fun I had on Wednesday.

If you follow me on Twitter, then you've already heard the story I'm about to tell. Sorry. You're going to hear it again.

The time was Wednesday afternoon. The place was my house. I was busy getting myself ready. Doing my makeup and all that. My hair was still wet and twisted up on top of my head. I'd done eye makeup for only one of my eyes. And I was wearing sweatpants and a cami. So basically, in case you didn't quite follow, I just painted a picture of myself looking really good. In the midst of getting ready, my doorbell rings. It rang multiple times in an annoying fashion like it was being rung by someone I would know. Hmm. That kind of makes it sound like everyone I know is annoying. Interesting.

Moving on.

This doorbell ringing threw me off my game. I'm normally cautious and look before I open the door (I've even been known to hide before), but I was convinced it was someone I knew. Like a family member. Or an unannounced friend. Because it went 'ding dong ding dong ding dong ding dong' all fast and crazy. Not something a stranger solicitor would do...or would they? [Cue dramatic music]

When I opened the door I was greeted by a black man. Now don't read into that because I'm not implying a thing. I'm just stating facts and I'm a detailed and descriptive person. Like I said, I'm just stating the facts.

Moving on.

He was wearing an over sized red hoodie and dirty jeans. He then proceeds to ask me if my Mom was home. He explains that he's asking for my Mom because he can tell that I'm "just a kid".

Hmm. Okay, uninvited and unwelcome solicitor. You think I'm a rude teenager at home on winter break without the supervision of her parents? Well, do ya? What you think is what you will get then. I'm a pretty good actress and I can play your games.

He then asks if my Dad is home. Um, I don't think he should be asking a kid all of these prying questions. I told him I didn't know when my Mom would be home and that my Dad was at work. I also made sure he got a good close look at my ferocious dog. You remember her, right?

I could tell he was frightened. He then pulls out a business card and said, "Well tell Mom and Dad that "Preacher, the Meat Man" was here." As he got closer to me and handed me the card, he got all up in my business, if you will. He was inspecting my face. Maybe my makeup on only one eye was really throwing him off. I bet he thought I was a kid playing in my Mom's makeup again. Boy, I really fooled him.
I could see that he was second guessing his age estimation skills, but finally he said, "Hmm. Yeah...I guess you're a kid". I just smiled.

And that's when I stopped being nice and said, "I'm gonna give you to the count of 10 to get your ugly, yellow, no good keister off my property...before I pump your guts full of lead. 1, 2, 10."

Well, I'll let you all draw your own conclusions, but I'm pretty sure you know how the rest went down. You've seen Home Alone.

I really don't like solicitors. They shouldn't be allowed. It's a violation and it's creepy. Plus, a kid shouldn't have to deal with strangers coming to her door. Amiright, people?

The business card from the man really says "Preacher, the Meat Man". He's a man that sells cases of meat out of his cargo van. And because he lists that he's a preacher makes him legit without question. It features his picture with him holding an open Bible. He even included the following verse, Matthew 4:4: "It is written, Man shall not live by bread alone, but by every word that proceedeth out of the mouth of God." (which is the Meat of God). I copied that exactly as it was written on the card, by the way.

I don't want your meat. I don't think my parents want your meat either.

Guys, how old do I look? How can someone think that I'm "just a kid"? Seriously. I'm 28. I'm old. I'll be 29 in four short months, but let's not talk about it.

Oh well. Forget him.

After I finished getting ready, I met up with my girlfrans to head down to Nashville. We originally went with the intention of shopping and then attending the hockey game downtown. We successfully shopped but unsuccessfully were able to obtain tickets for the game.

So there we were. In downtown Nashville. A place that is full of fun. What do we do? What do we do?

Brief side note: for Christmas I got an iPhone upgrade to the 4S. I'm already in love with the phone and with Siri. She's quickly become one of my good friends. I talk. She listens. She helps me fix problems. She's amazing. Another great thing about my new phone is the picture quality and the flash photography. I was thrilled to be able to take pictures with my phone while being out at night. Prepare your eyeballs for this delicious feast of pictures that I am about to serve you.

I'll tell you what we did. We found fun times. That's what. We went out to eat and a creepy nice balloon hat making man stopped by our table. I unfortunately made eye contact with the man and that's all it took. He made Ashley a hat because he thought she needed a smile. He does clown work. Always trying to turn a frown upside down.

Doesn't she look so happy?

Let's get a closer look at the balloon man, shall we?

After our meal and balloon man encounter, we went up and down Broadway.

We saw Billy Ray.

We met Dirty Sanchez.

We found abandoned balloon hats and made them ours.

Please notice the fun photo bomber in the background. By the way of our pointing hands, it looks like his position was planned and known by us. It wasn't. Strictly awesome coincidence.

Balloon arch of friendship. That's what this is. We had fun on the sidewalk and people were loving it. Especially when we stopped and made people limbo. 

There we go. Just walking down the sidewalk. A balloon hat connected by friendship.

Balloon hats make you crazy, as evidenced in the two phone pictures above. 

Exhibit A: crazy balloon hat man. Exhibit B: me.

Yes we're crazy. Crazy for balloon hats!

Nights really do come full circle. Our evening started with balloon hats and it ended with balloon hats. Such delight. 

I'll be back in a few days. Hopefully. All of you have a great New Years. Be safe and don't get into too much trouble. Unless trouble is fashioned into a balloon hat.

Fact: It's the Holidays.

And because we I just can't get enough, here are my latest facts. Holiday Edition.

Fact: I went out with my friends last night to enjoy some holiday friendship time.

Fact: "It's the holidays" was my phrase of the night. I don't understand it either. "May I have a cherry? It's the holidays." "I have to go to the bathroom. It's the holidays." "I want a short stack of pancakes. It's the holidays."

Fact: A kind anonymous patron bought our meals and drinks at the restaurant. That's three meals and a whole lotta drinks. It's the holidays.

Fact: Because we had a free dinner, I thought it would probably be a good idea for us to go eat another dinner somewhere. *Please note several hours passed between dinners. 

Fact: We went to IHOP because I had been wanting a stack of pancakes for three days. And everyone was probably sick of hearing me talk about pancakes. You want a hungry pancake obsessed girl to shut up? Give the girl pancakes.

Fact: Pancakes are delicious.

Fact: International is the key word in International House of Pancakes. And it's not about the pancakes, guys. It's international in terms of the diverse grouping of people under one roof. I understand that now.

Fact: My eyeballs beheld so many wonders last night. People of all shapes, colors, and sizes. People of all clothing and hair stylings (my personal favorite being the periscope-shaped bun). People from far off lands like caves, and holes, and bubbles. And possibly the depths of outer space.

Fact: When I can't sleep I'm going to start going to IHOP to conduct case studies and take notes for future blog posts.

Fact: A woman squealed like a pig in the restaurant. Just out of nowhere. She was having a conversation with what I'm going to assume was her husband. And she just squealed. Maybe the sight of bacon just overcomes her. Maybe they're sympathy pangs for the pig that perished. I don't know.

Fact: It sounded just like this little pig who cried all the way home:

Fact: Pigs are delicious.

Fact: You know what's not so delicious? Applesauce. There was a container of applesauce sitting in the middle of the road as I was driving home last night. Now that I'm thinking about it, it was raining...was food falling from the sky? Uh-oh. I've seen the movie Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs. Kinda scared, guys.

Fact: A person in my neighborhood has a Christmas sweatshirt hanging in the front window of their house.

Fact: Christmas sweatshirts, while they look stunning and stylish on the body, are not a substitute for window treatments. Or proper Christmas decor.

Fact: The people that live in that house were probably among the patrons at IHOP last night.

Fact: Because I'm feeling like a bragger, I just need to let you all know that I got an A in my Gifted & Creative Psy grad class. Receiving an A is a rare occurrence for me, so it needs to be documented. Here. For all to read.

Fact: I love you all so much and if I could sing you a Christmas song right now, I so would. I would sing it so loud and so hard. But, it's the holidays, so I won't.

You're Welcome.

Dancing With An iPod in Public: Christmas Edition.

Not only does he have dancing skills to rival that of Napoleon Dynamite, he has probably the most fashionable Christmas sweatshirt I've ever seen. I'm jealous of it. I think it's just about perfect.

Watch it. Enjoy it. Love it. 

Survey Says!

I love surveys. I also love making lists. That's something Santa and I have in common. We both like making lists. And while Santa is apparently on top of his game enough to only check his list twice, I have to check mine about 50 times because I am sure to forget something or I have to re-write it because I had to scribble something off and now it looks horrid and my writing looks sloppy and it just will not do, so I wad my list up and start a new list on a fresh, clean piece of paper.
And I believe that, my friends, wins the award of being the longest run-on sentence of all time. I should probably consult the Guinness Book.

Anyway, back to surveys and list-making. I saw this little Christmas survey over at Melanie's blog and it looked like loads of fun to me, so I'm doing it.
And away we go.

1. Wrapping paper or gift bags?
Confession time: I'm horrible at wrapping gifts, but I give it my best attempt because I do like to see wrapped boxes with pretty bows (mangled as they may be) under my tree.

2. Real tree or artificial?
Growing up we did the real tree thing. Until my dad had had enough of the tree disasters. Now my parents do artificial trees. About 7 of them. No joke.

I also do artificial, but I only have 2. And they're black. I don't believe in green trees. Too normal. Plus green would clash with my interior decoration.

My tree that's not green.

And yes. It's leaning. Always. Sigh.

Close up of the pretty.

This is my bedroom Christmas tree. It's just a little tabletop one.

3. When do you put up the tree?
I like to put my tree up as early as possible. It's usually the second week of November. This year I was late. It was up just a couple days before Thanksgiving. Very unlike me.

4. When do you take the tree down?
I'm kinda ready to take it down now just so I can get my house back in order. I guess I'm a Grinch.

5. Do you like eggnog?
Why yes I do. And this is very odd considering I detest milk. I'm strange. I know this.

6. Favorite gift received as a child?
Oh goodness. I received so many good things throughout the years. My favorites were probably my Barbie town house and the Samantha American Girl doll.

7. Do you have a nativity scene?
I surely do. I'm a proud supporter of Baby Jesus. And adult Jesus.

8. Hardest person to buy for?
My Dad. So far I've gotten him a gift card. Wow.

9. Easiest person to buy for?
My Mom. She likes everything.

10. Mail or email Christmas cards?
Who emails Christmas cards?

I'm actually bad about the whole Christmas card thing. I don't ever send any out. I love receiving them though.

11. Worst Christmas gift you ever received?
I really don't know how to explain it. Luckily I have a picture so I can show you.

I received this gift a couple of school years ago. I unwrapped the wrapping paper and saw this:

My reaction was that this was pretty odd, but my students know I love food, so it was kind of thoughtful. It was a bulk-size brownie mix box from Sam's Club. Double the brownie-making. 

But low and behold, it was not brownie mix. There was a treasure inside:

A wadded up bundle of catalog pages that wrapped up this little gem:

A fruit mug. And the mom took a Sharpie and wrote "I miss you" on it. Um...?

You know what I miss? I miss receiving good gifts from students.

12. Favorite Christmas movie?
Christmas Vacation is a family classic. I also love Home Alone. And The Holiday. And The Year Without a Santa Claus. I like a lot of Christmas movies.

13. When do you start shopping for Christmas?
Well, I haven't started yet and it's December 19th. I procrastinate in all areas of life. Christmas shopping is no different. I've sure bought a lot of things for myself though.

14. Ever recycled a present?
Of course. And I'll recycle again and again. I still have the brownie box and mug. Watch out, friends...

15. Favorite thing to eat at Christmas?
That would be my Mom's Christmas morning breakfast. Casserole City. So yum.

16. Clear lights or colored lights on a tree?
I don't like colored lights. I think they look junky. Honesty hurts sometimes.

17. Favorite Christmas song?
Baby It's Cold Outside and Carol of the Bells

18. Travel at Christmas or stay at home?
I stay home. All of my family is from around these parts.

19. Can you name all of Santa's reindeer?
Bish, I can sing it! You know Dasher and Dancer and Prancer and Vixen. Comet and Cupid and Donner and Blitzen. But who do you recall, the most famous reindeer of all? Rudolph the Red-nosed Reindeer!

Did that answer the question?

20. Angel or star on top of the tree?
Neither. I use decorative picks.

21. Open the presents on Christmas Eve or Christmas morning?
Christmas Eve we always open a pair of pajamas. It's a tradition thing. Christmas morning is Santa time with gifts and stockings.

22. Most annoying thing about this time of year?
Mainly just people. Crowds of people in stores. People in their cars creating stupid traffic. Also people that write sappy facebook statuses about the season. We know you're dreaming of a white Christmas. We know it's the most wonderful time of the year. We get it.

23. Favorite ornament, theme, or color?
I like glittery sparkly ornaments. And they have to be red, silver, white, or black to match the theme of the tree.

My trees definitely match my house color schemes. The living room tree goes with my red couch and black furniture and my bedroom tree goes with my black furniture and black and gold/tan accessories and comforter.

24. What do you want for Christmas?
Honestly, I don't really want anything this year. I'm not really in a Christmasy mood. I have what I need and I typically buy what I want. There just aren't really any big ticket items that interest me much this year. I'd love to have a Canon Rebel one day in my life, and a Kindle Fire would be a nice gift, but I won't die if I don't get one. Which is a good thing because I probably won't get one.

And just because I feel like it, here are a few more Christmas shots from my living room:

The stockings hung with care in hopes that St. Nicholas would soon be there. 

Daisy's stocking has some delicious treats already in it. Sometimes she stands below it and sniffs the air. 

Here's my Charlie Brown Christmas tree.

This little white tree with red birds is 28 years old. Same as me. We're twins. My Mom used to be in a big crafty phase when I was a babe and 1983 was the year of the ceramic crafts. She made this tree for my first Christmas. The little birdies light up when you plug it in. It's an oldie but goodie.

That's about the extent of the decorating that I do. 

I hope you enjoyed this Taste of Christmas with Sarah. 

Good tidings I bring to you and your kin. I wish you a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year.

The Post Where I Do Nothing but Complain.

So I wrote this post last night but passed out before I hit publish. I fell asleep on the couch around 7:00 and didn't wake up until this morning. Girl was tired. Luckily I was already dressed for bedtime because I wore pajamas to school yesterday.

So let's go back in time. To yesterday...

I am officially on Christmas break. No school until January 3rd.

My day in noise: "Jingle, jangle, jingle jangle. When's our party? Jingle, jangle. I'm telling! When's our party? Jingle, jangle, jingle jangle. I'm hungry. I'm telling! When's our party? Jingle, jangle. When's my mom going to be here? When's our party?"

The jinglin' and janglin' were the stinkin' bell necklaces that I give the kids for Polar Express day and then always immediately regret it after I pass them out. The bells were put in timeout in the lockers for the rest of the day at around 10:30.

I don't want to hear another bell for a long time. Right now I don't "believe".

You know that moment in The Holiday when Iris tells Jasper it's over? She closes the door on him and then screams and she throws her hands up in the air? And then she says she's going to start living her life. I feel like that. Right now in this moment. And it feels so good.

I'm ecstatic and happy to have this break. It's much-needed for everyone. Teachers, kids, parents. We all need it.

Even though I'm thrilled, when I got home I cried. Full-on cry fest. I felt crazy. And I rarely cry, but I just had too many emotions going on. I was way hormonal.

Today was stupid busy. Way too much packed into one already crazy day. Morning Meeting, school-wide pajama day and Polar Express movie watching, Book Buddies, classroom gift exchange, school-wide assembly, and we ended the day with our Christmas party. I detest party days. They're not fun. It's not a party that I'd ever want to willingly attend.

I was convinced Ashton Kutcher was lurking in the shadows of the school and he was going to run out at any minute to tell me I was Punk'd. I wish I had been Punk'd today. But I wasn't. So there's no excuse. Nothing to blame. It was just pure authentic chaos.

And why do parents come and just stand around at parties? If you're going to be there, maybe you should interact with your kid? Maybe? Just an idea. I had a total of 13 parents in my room at one point. The majority of the time, a large group of them stood behind my desk just hanging out. I even walked up on one mom snooping through some of my things. Like paperwork things. I was not happy and I had to do the whole "Excuse me?" thing. At another point during the party, a Mom and Dad made some really smart aleck comment to me. I think they were trying to be funny and cutesy but some people just aren't funny or cute. And that's all it took to push me over my already fragile edge. I was done. Over it.
I jumped.

And then everyone was able to see me turn into a bear and I started snapping at the adults in the room because I'm attending to one kid that is crying and another that has sugar overload and is bouncing around the room, all the while wishing I was an octopus and could sprout six more arms to help me collect all of the trash. And I did all of that simultaneously. And I'm used to doing this simultaneously on a normal day and I can handle it because I'm a kindergarten teacher. However, today there are 13 other able-bodied and competent (that's questionable) adults in my room that have two working hands and legs and should be able to do something instead of standing in my room taking up space and air, but they just stand. And stare. And criticize. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh! I'm short-circuiting. End of vent.

Okay. Not exactly end of vent. Just a little bit more.

The two parents that planned the party brought 2-liters of coke to serve to the kids. RC and Mountain Dew. I about fell out. I have some kids in my room that aren't allowed to have cokes of any kind. We could have at least had Coca-Cola where the purchases supports the Arctic Home for the polar bears. That would've been for a good cause. That and the fact that it's my favorite. But who am I kidding. Like I would have had time to drink anything.

And tonight on facebook there have been all kinds of teachers from my school that have posted positive and uplifting things about how blessed they feel. What a great day it was. How many wonderful things they received. What a great party they had. Excuse me? Did we work at the same place today?

I really do love my job. It may sound like I don't right now, but I do. I love my students. I don't always like adults so much. Sometimes it's just the bombardment of all the other crap that gets in the way and causes me to get bogged down.

I'm beyond thankful for time away. Now onto finishing up my pesky final. Once this B is submitted, my break can truly begin.

And thank the good lord my professor gave an extension on the final. I would have failed because I didn't submit it last night due to falling asleep. Now I have until 11:59 p.m. tonight. Like Mario, here we go!

Fact. Ode to Dwight K. Shrute. Part Dos.

I enjoyed my little 'fact' post that I did recently, so I told myself, "You just need to do another one. It's a spectacular idea. Yeah. Everybody will like it. Just do it". Such peer pressure. So here we have it.

Fact: I went shopping today. I needed to shop so hard after spending all day locked in my house doing homework yesterday.

Fact: I was on a quest to find a fun NYE dress. I failed. I found no such dress.

Fact: Every dress I tried on would have shown my unmentionables if I bent over. I don't need to be pulling a Britney when I go out. Nobody needs that.

Fact: One dress I tried on had lots of glitter on it. Not sequins. Pure silver glitter. Now remember what I told you about glitter being the herpes of the craft world? Today it proved true once again. You will see why below.

Fact: Everyone was staring at me in the next store I was in. I mean, I'm used to it. I'm pretty stunning. However, when I looked in a mirror, I discovered the real reason for the stares.

Fact: I had silver glitter all over my face. Everywhere. In my hair. In my eyebrows. On my cheeks. I looked so beautiful. Like an angel. I almost cried.

Fact: And you all know you can't get rid of the stuff. So I wore my glitter proudly. I owned it. I don't see me being like Regina George and starting a glitter all over your body fad though.

Fact: When I took off my bra tonight to put my pajamas on, glitter fell out of my bra and went all over my floor. That dress had serious glitter leakage. Glad I didn't buy it.

Fact: My brother busted in my room earlier. I was standing in my bathroom naked. I screamed. He said he was glad I screamed. He quickly closed the door and managed to not see a thing. It was a close one.

Fact: I put a towel around myself and went to his room to see what he wanted. He said he didn't want anything. He just wanted to sing for me.

Fact: And this is why we're perfect roommates.

Fact: My brother doesn't sing for real. He's not some kid that you'd hear on Glee. That doesn't stop him though. He sings all.the.time. And whistles. But he sings nonsense and uses words like "leggo" and "dough bruh" in his original lyrics.

Fact: He's white.

Fact: One of my students came to school one day last week so angry. I mean, he was pissed. When he came in the room, he grabbed the sleeve of his huge puffy coat and slapped it against the classroom floor. It was very wrestler-ish. I asked him why he was angry. He said, "Santa didn't come last night". Oh dear. I had to explain that Santa doesn't come on December 8th.

Fact: Pray for me guys. Pray that I make it the next five days with Santa-crazed kindergarteners. I guess it doesn't help that I'm cramming North Pole goodness down their throats and it's not gonna stop any time soon.

Fact: I don't really cram anything down my kids throats. Just knowledge. Pure knowledge. And love. And the occasional craft covered with glitter.

Fact: I did cram lots down my throat yesterday. I did the Bad Santa thing. Remember when ol' Billy Bob  ate all of Thurman Merman's chocolates in his advent calendar? Yep. I did that. To my calendar. I ate 'em all up. All the way to number 24. It was December 10. I cheated big time.

Fact: I couldn't help it. I was stressed. I was working on my paper for 12 hours. I just needed chocolate. I tore that poor advent calendar to shreds.

Fact: 5 more days of school and then it's Santa time. Two whole weeks off.
Yeeeeaaaahhhh boyyyyyyyy.

Another Brick in the Wall.

I'm angry. I typed out this whole post and then lost it. It deleted itself. Just vanished. I hate having to do things over, so my second attempt isn't going to be nearly as good or witty. Rats.

I feel like I've been a more frequent poster of blogs recently. We can thank procrastination for that. The past few weeks have been crunch time in my class. My end of the semester projects have been due. To me, deadlines just mean avoidance, denial, and procrastination. What better way to avoid homework than by spending hours perusing Pinterest/Facebook/Twitter/Blogger.
Ashley has also been a professional procrastinator tonight. She worked hard making this little poster display since we're the spokeswomen for procrastination. I'm not sure if you were aware of that, but we are.

Here's my poster:

If that face doesn't say "panic", then I don't know what does. It definitely shows a panicking procrastinator. You know what else it shows? A nice double chin, that's what. That's not something that I need to panic about later. That's something that I need to panic about, umm, let's say, yesterday. Lay off the cheeseburgers, Sarah. I bet you all just scrolled back up to the picture to get a closer look. Am I right?

The end of the semester is wrapping up. Praise J.C. for that. My big case study is due this weekend. I'm just going to let you guess how far along I am on that little project. Then I'll have my final. Then I'm alllllllllllll finished. Until January 3rd when a new class begins. Boo for education. "Hey! Teacher! Leave them kids Sarah Marcum alone!"

Listen to this. My brother left gum in his pants and put them through the dryer AGAIN! Twice in a lifetime is too many times, but twice in a week? He's fired. Fired from ever chewing gum again. Fired from doing his laundry and any other domestic duties in my house. He's also fired from being my brother. The same poop-resembling skid marks that I scrubbed from the dryer the time of the last incident are all back again. With a vengeance. I found a half a piece of gum that survived the heat. I took it in his room and threw it at his face and yelled, "REALLY!?! AGAIN!?!" And then my head started to spin.

He may not be a laundry genius but he is sweet and I love him. Especially when he buys me food. He took me out to dinner on Saturday night to our favorite Mexican food joint. Sometimes it's awkward when the two of us go out together. I feel like people think we're dating. We're not. Let me just clarify that right now. Don't believe all the rumors you hear about Kentucky. I don't date my brother. Now my cousin on the other hand...KIDDING! Totally kidding.
It probably didn't help our 'we're just siblings and aren't dating' cause when we ordered dessert and split it. And then my brother picked up the tab. Eh. Who cares. What does that prove besides the fact that we like to eat and he's a gentleman (sometimes. Unless he's doing laundry).

I've been without heat for 5 nights. I told my parents that I need to quit teaching and get my contractors license. There's obviously a great need in this town. I've had the hardest time to get someone to come and repair my unit. I have a checkbook. Have checkbook, will write check. Anyone? Anyone?
I've been talking to an HVAC guy since Saturday. I've called this man more in the past several days than I have any other man in the past year. You'd think we were in a relationship. When I called him today (which was twice, by the way), I didn't even have to tell him who I was anymore. It was a casual, "Hey Doug. It's me." Like we're buddies. We're not going to be buddies anymore if he doesn't get his rear in gear. Supposedly he's coming tomorrow after school, but I've heard that story before. Like two other times before.

Do you all love school picture day as much as I do? I like it because teachers get a free complimentary pack of school pictures. Do any of you? We get an 8x10, a couple 3.5x5's, and a whole slew of wallet size pictures. It's semi-frightening to have a continuous page of your repeating picture. And even though it's the same shot, I swear you can start seeing differences between them. Or maybe that's just me and my faulty eyeballs. They're like those old Magic Eye books.

Stare at the multiple Sarah's and a magic image will appear...

If anyone wants one of the wallets, let me know and I'll send you one. I have plenty. I'll write you a special message typical of school pictures on the back like, "LYLAS, Sarah".

The funny thing is that I've been getting these picture packages every year that I've been teaching so I have all of these 8x10s of myself. What do I do with them? Should I start a hallway picture display? One like my Granny has in her hallway that's featuring all of her grandkids, but mine will just be featuring nothing but pictures of myself. High quality school yearbook pictures. I bet that wouldn't scare off any potential dating material boys. Wouldn't scare them off one bit. I can picture it now. They're in my house and need to go to the bathroom. They walk down the hall, see my line up of school pictures through the years...Bam. They suddenly remember that they have to go--and not as in go to the bathroom. Go as in get the heck outta my house.

Well, so if the hallway doesn't work,

I could display on the mantle,

the refrigerator,

the possibilities are simply endless.

Today at school one of my kids very randomly decided to write a list of "things Ms. M likes to do". My list of real life hobbies is quite sad. I don't have many hobbies. After this child wrote my list she said, "Are you lazy?" Yep. Pretty much.
This is the list she wrote based on what she's heard me talk about and what she's observed. She's right on target. TV, crafts, read, hang out with friends, write, clean.

I asked her why it says "clean silly!" and she said, "It's because you like to clean and I think that is so silly".

I need more hobbies.

I'm sure I'll be back sooner than later.

It's the Day I've Been Waiting For. Plus Sweet School Pics.

Today is one of my favorite days of the year. It's not a holiday. It's not my birthday. So why do I love it? Well I'll tell you why. December 1st is the best day of the year because it's the day I can bust into my chocolate advent calendar for the first time. I have to exercise a lot of patience and self-control to wait until the 1st before I start opening the paper windows of the calendar. Hmm. Speaking of exercise, exercising patience and self-control is the only kind of exercising I do. Definitely not any of the physical kind going on around here. As if that wasn't already obvious considering the fact that I'm writing a post about my love for a box filled with 24 chocolates...

And here she is. Window #1. This little chocolate square is currently sitting in my belly. It was delicious.

Do any of you do a chocolate advent calendar? My Momma's been buying these things for us (my siblings and I) since I was a tot. I still love them just as much (if not more) at the age of 28 as I did back then. Delicious tradition. I've written about my advent calendars for the past couple years on my blog. HERE's a post from 2009 and HERE's a little mention from last year with some of my favorite Christmas things, just in case you're interested in some Waiting on the Butterflies archives.

As a kickoff to December, I will give you much delight as I bombard you with some Christmas photos. I have some pictures of my home Christmas decor including my beautimous tree, but those will wait for another day. My tree is not that of the average bear. I don't believe in putting up green trees. It clashes with my living room. But all of that will have to wait for another day.

Today I'm going to share some school pictures because I just finished this project today and I'm wanting to show it off. I don't really do a great job of posting pictures of things I do in my classroom, but since I've recently acquired many new teacher follower friends (hey guys!), I thought I'd share a little somethin', somethin' for all you because you'll appreciate it. This has been a labor of love. I have a sore back and glue stick burns to prove it. Thanks to stinkin' Pinterest, I was inspired to decorate my door for the Christmas season. Well, one thing led to another and the ideas just got bigger and involved more and more glitter.

The end result: a gingerbread duplex. 

Our duplex. Unit A (Kelly's classroom) and Unit B (mine).

I did this little project with the help of two great kindergarten assistants and Kelly, one of my kindergarten teammates and my classroom next door neighbor. It took us a couple of days to get it completed. It was exhausting but SO much fun. I love doing crafty things at school when we have the chance. It just makes me happy and the kids love it. They said, "It's like we're really inside a giant gingerbread house!"
One of my students from last year (that is a total character and one of my favorite people in my life) walked by and said, "Hey, cool Gingerbread Fortress". I love that I have a fortress. Another kid, that I love just as much and that I could sit and listen to for hours, said (in the cutest country twang you've ever heard), "I just love all this decoratin'".

My classroom

The full view

The roofing is my favorite part. Beautiful gumdrops and "icing" that looks like sparkly clouds.

Here's another close-up of the beautiful glittery gumdrops. I painted bowls and covered with Diamond Dust glitter to make them look sugar-covered.

You know, I love glitter so much. It makes me so happy but I swear I'll be sweeping it up from my classroom floor for the next month. Extra emphasis on I because I know the night custodian sure as heck isn't going to do it. Grumble, grumble. Anyway, I'll be sweeping it up for the next month because it just gets everywhere and it's impossible to get it all cleaned up. Glitter is like the herpes of the crafting world. It stays with you forever.

Yummy candy.

Scrumptious.

I took this shot before we were finished with the roof of our duplex. I wanted to show the peppermints and gingerbread men from the ceiling that we hung for added cuteness. It's important to make hallway displays as over-the-top as possible. It brings out the comments from haters and grumblers for sure.

Oh, and let me explain the Japanese flag. We didn't just randomly hang this as part of our gingerbread decor. At our school, we have international flags hanging all the way down both of our super mile-long hallways to represent all of our diversity. Just wanted to clear that up.

Here's my bulletin board. It is the most boring and simple and pointless bulletin board that I've ever done, but after doing the door display...well, I had nothing left to give. So I sprinkled candy on the board. Short and sweet. Pun very much intended.

Well, that's my little hallway tour.

Here's one more little treat for you. This is my cute little classroom Christmas tree. It's actually a picture from last year, but the tree still looks the same.

I hope you enjoyed the picture fest. Happy December!