countdown

ok.  i’m not one to countdown the number of school days remaining.  it stresses me out!  but, i may start.  it’s been a fairly good school year.  we’ve had our bumps along the way, but i’m not sitting on the edge of my seat waiting for school to finish.  however, by the time i get everything accomplished this week that needs to be done, i may be tempted to start the countdown.   my eighth grade exam is friday morning, and my seventh graders have their huge revolutionary war test friday afternoon.  guess what i’ll be doing ALL day saturday? 

 

another long walk

this year since the weather is so nice, we decided to walk to downtown holland and watch the memorial day parade. it took a little longer than i thought it would, but it was a great walk. round trip from our house to downtown and back, it is 4.6 miles. i was very comfortable walking in shorts and a t-shirt; on the way home it was a little breezy. quite a few people passed us along the way, on their bikes. next year we may consider riding our bikes!

about 3/4 of a mile from our house there is a little bakery/restaurant. so on our way home from the parade, we stopped for a late breakfast. it was really busy and we had to wait for quite awhile, but it was quite tasty! i had my favorite, a fresian omelet –broccoli, spinach, bell peppers, and a tasty white cheese i can’t remember the name of! I’m quite full now; i definitely don’t need lunch!

it feels like saturday and seems strange that i am returning to school tomorrow. i have some paper grading to do yet this afternoon. i don’t really feel like it, but my life will be so much better tomorrow if i do. so, that is the plan for today. i probably should do some laundry too!

i have really enjoyed the long weekend. it has been nice to have some time to hang out with ty. it doesn’t look like we will see much of each other over the next two weeks. between our two schedules, life is a just a little busy!

a peaceful hike

this afternoon we hiked somewhere around 3-4 miles in a park called hemlock crossing. it was beautiful weather; perfect hiking weather really — sunny, 70 degrees, light breeze. the woods were quiet, and we saw the pigeon river along the way. it felt great to be outside, and the hike felt great. i know i don’t exercise enough, so this was so good for me. we saw a few other hikers along the way, but otherwise it was a peaceful walk. i took a lot of pictures. hopefully i can do a nice layout in the scrapbook!

this evening we went out to holland state park. it really clouded over late this afternoon, so we didn’t get to see the sunset. but, it was just nice to be out by the water. the breeze was warm on the beach, but it was quite chilly out on the pier. i’m looking forward to watching the sunsets this summer.

i don’t think it’s a secret that michigan hasn’t been my favorite place to live. i miss the mountains around seattle, wa and the weather in san jose, ca was perfect for me. i’m not a fan of snow, so the winters here get a little long for me. but, today i really gained an appreciation for where we live. the park where we hiked is only about 15 minutes from our house, and the state park/beach on lake michigan is less than 10 minutes. lake macatawa is only about 1/4 of a mile down the street. we are very blessed to be able to enjoy God’s wonderful creation in so many ways.

i really hope we will be able to get out and hike more often-it was such a great walk together. however, i will remember next time to use bug spray. it’s not even mosquito weather yet, and my legs and arms are covered in bites!

a relaxing day

it’s finally the weekend, and it is absolutely beautiful outside right now! ty and i took a walk to lake macatawa this evening. we started out walking past the house we have fallen in love with and want to purchase. it’s 2-3 blocks from where we live now; it’s a three bedroom ranch, and it needs hardly any work. (but, we’ll have to just keep admiring it until we sell ours.) our walk through the neighborhood was very nice; it’s a quiet street with lots of trees.

after admiring our new house (i hope!), we continued on to the lake. about a mile from our house, there is a beautiful little park on howard street called dunton park. it’s along lake macatawa, and they have built some very nice walkways through the park, the woods, and down to the water. we were quietly walking down the trail through the woods, when i spotted a deer in the trees. we stood and watched a minute, and then we saw a second deer. i think it’s the closest i’ve ever been to deer. they were in heavy brush and trees, and in an area almost completely enclosed by walkways. we watched them for a while, quietly moving on the walkway as they danced through the brush. it was quite amazing. the sun was out, and it was just a perfect temperature to be out walking. we walked all the way out on the pier, and enjoyed the view of the industrial parks all along the shores of the lake! it felt wonderful to be outside, enjoying God’s creation!

it’s been quite a relaxing day for me! i slept in, and then we went to the farmer’s market for a little while. i took a 2-3 hour nap this afternoon which felt wonderful; i was tired. we had some friends of mine from work over for dinner and a campfire last night, and the last ones left around 11:30. (i’m used to going to bed at 9:30). plus, the last couple mornings i’ve woken up at 4:50! since i have so much to do at school at the end of the year, i’ve just been getting up and going to school early — i’ve been there around 6:30 the last two days. although i have been getting a lot accomplished, i really hope this trend doesn’t continue!

i’m thankful to have been blessed with a quiet, relaxing day. hopefully it will help me gear up for the craziness of the next two weeks. it’s hard to believe that school is almost finished for the year. in some ways i’m ready to be finished, but in other ways i’m not. i know i’m ready for a little time to enjoy my hobbies, and i’m really, really, really hoping we can sell our house and move during the summer!

mission accomplished

my goal for this weekend was to catch up on my grading. i’m proud to say that i actually made it! i’m arriving at school tomorrow with nothing to grade (well, other than the 15 late or missing assignments kids haven’t handed in yet.) of course, i’m giving a Bible test first hour, so my pile will begin again quite quickly! but, in the meantime, i’ll enjoy the feeling of freedom.

there are definitely other things on my list of things to do for school that are in desperate need of attention. so, that will be the goal for tomorrow. including…calling GVSU and getting back on track with taking classes for my teaching certificate. not one of my favorite things to do

it’s off to bed early for this girl tonight. i’m tired, and my eyes are buggin’ out of my head! i wonder why?

open houses

we had another open house this morning. of course, we haven’t heard anything yet. but, i really hope someone falls in love with our “little house in the woods”. we like it here, but we want a bit more space. in fact, the houses that we like the best have large backyards with woods or land behind them.

we’re going to look at a few houses this afternoon. we’ve looked at a number of houses already. it’s been fun and discouraging all at the same time. places don’t always look as nice in person as they do online! we’re not under any pressure to find a house, but in the meantime, it is fun to look around and narrow down what it is we really want.

it felt great to come back home to a very clean house this afternoon, but i’m not a big fan of the constant attention to cleaning and picking up! it’s good thing, i know, but it’s not usually a top priority to me with the insanity of school in may.  three weeks of school left, and they are the busiest of the year. speaking of school, i should probably be grading papers instead of surfin’ online.

quite simply, just random stuff

where have the last three weeks gone? life has been insanely busy. but, i know that’s the way many people around school are feeling this time of year too. and, i’m guessing that based on the lack of updating on blogs that i read, lots of others are feeling the same way!

we’ve had several showings and an open house in the past few weeks. we dropped the price this past week as well. tuesday was a realtor tour; we’ll hopefully get the feedback papers in the next couple days. there was no information yet about the showing that happened on friday morning. we’re curious to see the information in the responses, and what we can do to help sell the house. we aren’t in a hurry, other than it would be ideal to move during the summer months. we’ve done a lot of driving around looking at different neighborhoods, here on the north side of holland. we’ve looked at 5 or 6 six houses, and have a short list of others we’d like to see. but with no activity on our house, we are not under pressure to find another one.

speaking of houses, last summer our next door neighbor’s house burned down in the middle of the night. it has been a work in progress since then to rebuild. a very, very, very slow work in progress! well, it’s may and she has still not moved in, but it looks like it may be soon. the house that burned was quite honestly a dump. unfortunately, we’re not too excited about the new house either. it looks so out of place in our neighborhood. it’s a big, pre-fab or modular home that sets up on a high foundation. i’ve been inside, and it’s actually quite nice. in fact, i love the floor plan! she asked me for some advice with choosing the wall colors. one suggestion was a more neutral taupe than the gold she was thinking about. i’m quite curious to see what all she decided.

we’ve taken time to enjoy a couple afternoons in downtown holland to celebrate tulip time. this afternoon was quite nice as we watched the tulip time parade and ate icecream cones. we sat right on the curb with one of ty’s co-workers and her family. last weekend we walked through centennial park for the arts and crafts fair. we ate carnival food that afternoon — corndogs, french fries, and fresh squeezed lemonade. it was all quite tasty — greasy, salty, and sugary! yum!

i am really enjoying using google reader. i do still go and visit actual blog sites occasionally.  i like the personalized feel of the blogs, versus the almost newspaper format of google reader.  but, it sure has saved me a lot of time!

an organized disaster

(i actually wrote this on monday, april 21, but i forgot to post it. i discovered it just now when i sat down to update my blog )

last week monday when i arrived at school, my desk was neat, clean, and organized. by friday it was literally piled a foot high, from edge to edge with books, binders, papers, etc… i don’t think it has ever been that bad. it was ridiculous! a couple colleagues commented that my desk was actually worse than their own, and a few others just looked at it and laughed! i always have a pile or two, but this was so bad i could no longer function. i told ty that i was so overwhelmed that even when i had 15 minutes, i couldn’t get anything done. which, of course, only adds to the problem as then i’m even further behind!

i’m perpetually looking to be more organized at school. i chuckle because my students think i am so organized, and so often i feel very unorganized! i always know where something is, it just may take me a minute or two to find it. (i think i inherited this trait from my father :)) well, i spent six hours this past weekend at school working on my organized disaster. i’m very good at putting papers on piles, and not so good at filing them away. so, i now have a very clean desk area! i filed a very large pile, rearranged a few bookshelves, put a couple more units into 3-ring binders, and left feeling very satisfied with my accomplishments. unfortunately, i didn’t get anything graded. but, this morning when i arrived at school, i was able to sit down and work! wow! it felt amazing to be so productive first thing on a monday morning. now the trick is to keep it this way.