Four Years Ago Today

We said, "I do."  

What a ride it has been!  Todd and I have been through more in our four years than most married couples experience in decades or a lifetime.  However, I can't imagine going through any of it without my husband.

Happy Anniversary, Todd.  I love you!

TIREd

My birthday weekend started off with me tutoring my little lovelies until 6:00 on Friday evening.  I was looking forward to heading home for some R&R after a week full of more misbehaving children than not.  Even the good kids were getting in trouble, so you know I was spent.

As I got in my car, I looked up to the reminder that I had a tire in need of some air.  I headed to the nearest gas station to buy some air.  (I won't get started on that!)  It was after paying $0.75 for some secretly-special tire air that I noticed my tire was LOW.  Dang.  Being my own (s)hero, I used my tire gauge and filled the tire for what seemed like forever.  I studied the tire and soon noticed not one, but TWO nails in my tire.  Since it was after 6:00, I knew that Discount Tire would be closed.  My plan was to carefully head home and go to Discount in the morning to get the tire repaired.  That's when I felt the wind blow . . . from my tire.  There was a puncture wound in the sidewall of my tire that was quickly spewing forth my special seventy-five cent air!  Crap.

RIP - Stupid Tire

So . . . here I was, fifteen miles from home and still WAY too close to school for my own comfort . . . and in need of a new tire.  Rather than simply change the tire and spare it home, I made the decision to be proactive and head to buy a new tire at the local Sam's Club.  It took over ten minutes to be acknowledged in the store.  After a quote of $180 for ONE tire and (instead) a commitment to put on my spare in 45 minutes, I left pissed.  I'll never contemplate buying tires from them again.  I then drove to another suck of the Sam Walton empire - WalMart.  With $140 for a tire with a 30-45 minute wait, I told the dude that I'd pay him to put on the spare so I could get home.  After about an hour, I finally left with a pissed-off attitude and my spare in place.

Thankfully, my awesome team bought pizza and salad for lunch and made brownies for dessert.  There was enough left for dinner, so I didn't even starve to death.  :)

Bath Time!

Have you ever tried to bathe two big dogs in a small bathroom with a camera in hand?  You wind up with some not so great pics of wet dogs, wet floors, wet cabinets, wet doors, and a wet towel or two.  Prepare for excited dogs, wet dogs, sad dogs, and lots of towels.



Bath time wasn't easy, but they smell ssooooo much better!

ABCs of Me

I'm copying this from Rebecca (thanks, RB!) because school has us too busy to do anything that is blog-worthy!

Age: 42 years and 359 days

Bed size: King

Chore you hate: Mopping the floors

Dogs: YES!

Essential start to your day: cold bottle of water

Favorite color: depends - black, pink, white

Gold or silver: Silver or white gold

Height: 5'7"

Instruments you play: I played the alto saxophone for two years and the tenor saxophone for another year when I was in junior high.  Then I quit because I was the only tenor sax in the band, and my teenage self-esteem didn't like playing solo.

Job title: fourth grade teacher

Kids: Hopefully someday . . .

Live: Or is it Memorex?  Or did you mean live?  That answer would be in a house.

Mom’s name: Pat (Patricia)

Nicknames: my last name,my maiden name, Kris, kekis, others that probably aren't nice

Overnight hospital stays: One in high school after surgery

Pet peeve: People who are intentionally mean or cruel to those less fortunate

Quote from a movie: "I speak Jive."

Righty or lefty: Righty.

Siblings: Two younger brothers, two older sisters

Time you wake up: 6:00am

Underwear: I have some.

Vegetables you dislike: peas, cooked carrots, brussel sprouts, cauliflower

What makes you run late: My exceptional ability to procrastinate.

X-Rays: So many that it's surprising that I'm not radioactive

Yummy food that you make: My mom's husband swears by my chicken pot pie.  ha!
Zoo animal favorite: I always enjoy the monkeys/primates, but like anything not a bird or reptile.

Rationale

Tonight after dinner, I found Todd digging in the pantry for a sweet treat.  (No, I was not in the pantry - haha!)  He found a box of Girl Scout cookies, looked at it and said, "It says on the box 'Courage, Confidence and Character,' so I'll have two."  He cracks me up!  A man's rationale . . .

Homebound

We have been snowed in (well, iced in) since Monday night.  No school Tuesday, Wednesday or Thursday this week and more bad weather is expected.  No telling when we'll return.  The weather hasn't been above freezing for almost 48 hours, so roads are still a mess.  We've been lucky to not be chosen as a part of rolling blackouts and hope it stays that way.

While the respite has been nice, we're all a bit stir crazy and COLD.  The pets wanted to say hi, though.  No pics of Todd and Kristin since we're having yet another pajama day.

Click for Full View

To make you laugh (or cry if you're Steve), here is a photo of Big Boy's rope frozen in the ice.

You can tell Steve has TRIED to dig up his rope.  Poor guy.

From Us to You

Sorry to neglect the blog, but we were so busy over the holidays and now full into the throes of our crazy time of the school year.  I did want to share our Christmas - turned New Year's - almost became Groundhog's Day - card.  :)  You can click to see it in full view!


Our last name (which I removed) was shaded behind our names, so you may notice some flaws around "Kristin, Mindy, Pippin".

Also included was our annual "year in review" on the back of the card.  Again, click for full view.

We hope your 2011 is starting off well and wishing you many blessings along the way!