Best Job

This is for all the wonderful Moms in my world. Thanks for all you do, the love you give, and the support you provide!

New shoes every day?

Molly shared this article on Twitter. I just got around to reading it today after work. Fascinating!


Imagine Having To Buy A New Pair Of $60+ Shoes Every Single Day

By Connie Wang

The new short film "Pointe Shoes" documents the New York City Ballet and its relationship with the thousands of pointe shoes that outfit its dancers. Oftentimes custom-made and tailored specifically to each ballerina's tastes, needs, and shape, the perfect pointe shoe is imperative to a dancer's success, and includes a whole slew of rituals. Says principal dancer Megan Fairchild, "I always sew (on) a new pair of shoes for each performance. First, I step on the box, and I break the shank a little bit each way. And then, I like to put a little rosin on the tops and the bottoms and on the heel of the shoe."

Most interesting: All that breaking-in makes the shoes unwearable for more than a day, for top-level ballerinas, which means the company needs to supply a new pair of $67.50 pointes every single day. That adds up to nearly half-a-million dollars spent on pointe shoes each year. Now, we're no prima ballerinas here by any means, but with all our advancements in modern technologies, what's holding us back from creating a pointe shoe that lasts just as long as a pair of soccer cleats or running shoes? Watch the five-minute-long video, below, and imagine what your life would be like, if you could talk your boss into buying you a new pair of shoes every day.

From Huffington Post.

It's time ...

... for this year's annual Christmas/dog/shopping video. This one is really sweet ... and a tear-jerker, too!

Minners got her hair cut yesterday and when I was waiting to pick her up, I saw a group of 5 dogs that were there, looking for their forever homes. If you are looking for a dog to join your family this year, you should check out the adoption events at your local PetSmart. Such cute babies!

I still love him

Do you remember when I wrote a few years ago about how much we loved Matt Damon? Well, he's back ... and not afraid to say what he's thinking.

Matt recently attended a Save Our Schools rally in Washington with his Mom who is a teacher. He had this to say when a reporter accused teachers of not being driven to do a good job.

Watch out! I love watching the reporter's wheels start to turn as Matt defends the great teachers in this country!

5 days and 500+ pictures

I've been home from Carmel, CA for almost a week. I've been putting off this blog post because I wasn't sure how I could possibly sum up the trip or share my 500+ photos. Well, thanks to my friend, Jilly, I put the following slide show together! I know it's probably too long for the majority of my readers, but I wasn't sure I could narrow my pictures down any further.

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We fit a lot in the 5ish days we were there: hiking, wine, window-shopping, walking along the beach, cards, trip up to Big Sur, food, visit to Pebble Beach Golf Course, wine, 17-Mile Drive, laughs, Monterrey Bay Aquarium, wine, more cards and fun.

What a wonderful trip & get-away during the Kansas heat. I hope I get to go back again someday!

Telling stories

The last few days, I've been helping Molly & Erik at their new house. When I say "helping", I don't actually mean that I've scraped old wall paper from the walls, or pulled bags of weeds from the flower beds. I've helped by entertaining Ellen since there isn't much she can do in a big, empty house that is a construction zone right now.

To stay busy, we've picked up sticks in the front yard, watched bunnies in the backyard, colored in coloring books and told stories. Ellen has turned into quite the story teller. She remembers her favorite books well and has started "reading" to us when we come to visit.

This weekend when Ellen & I were coloring, she wanted to know about the story in her Fairy Tale coloring book. It was Hansel & Gretel and I did my best to retell what I remembered about the tale, using the blank pictures to help me. Ellen was fascinated with the witch and she's decided since last Halloween that ALL witches are "scawey". I agree, Ells. 100%. Oh, and clowns, too :)

Here she is retelling our version of Hansel & Gretel. I'd say she's ready to run her own classroom! Sit back and enjoy the story.

Not bad, huh? She insisted on watching herself on my camera multiple times that day. She likes to smirk at herself in videos, which is worthy of another video, too. If only I had multiple cameras and pairs of hands.

Sit back & relax

If you have 40 spare minutes, and you need a laugh, you should watch these clips from the White House Correspondents' Dinner last night. I thought Barack and Seth Meyers did a great job. The Donald Trump jokes alone are worth the watch!

Don't you think it would interesting to attend this dinner? I do!

Is this my next project?

Do we think I'm ready for stop-motion photography?

It took me a few seconds to really understand how this would have been done. Check out the clock, too. The comments on YouTube say that this organization took 13 hours. Amazing!

I think this video is absolutely lovely. I was thinking about the logistics of doing this video for days after first seeing it. The song is nice, too.

Something to work towards ... who wants to help?

Violet, you're turning violet, Violet

I thought this was pretty funny ... I'm just like these kids!

I mostly blame Jill. She's the one that made me get my MacBook Pro when I went to buy a new PC laptop ;) And then, I blame Apple for sending me a free iPod Touch and new printer when I bought my MBP with my educator discount.

However, I might be the only tech-y person I know that doesn't have a smart phone. I even went to the Sprint store this weekend since I was due for an upgrade on my phone. I was thisclose to actually buying something fancy, but Mike Teavee (do you see what I did there), was the salesman I was stuck with and he was so ADHD he couldn't answer any of my questions or look at me long enough to help me buy said smart phone. Therefore, I walked out empty-handed.

Enjoy this video, and then take me with you when you go shopping for your next Apple product. Ahem, Molly, ahem.

I needed this laugh!

Watch this one ...

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And then feel free to waste some time watching the other Walk on the Wild Side videos, especially if you're home sick and can't seem to move off the couch.

Don't let me go here ...

I might come back with everything I see!

Ha!

P.S. That baby in the drawer looks exactly like Minners when she was a puppy! So cute!

P.P.S. I laughed out loud at the saleswoman taping the tissue paper around that pug! Go back & watch again ... you'll laugh, too!

What are YOUR thoughts?

I was fascinated by this video for a few reasons:

1) The drawings are amazing! I could watch this for days!

2) I wondered if I'm one of those teachers that believes all students should be medicated.

3) I know the creativity is dwindling in my job.

4) The drawing skills are amazing ... do I have ADHD?

5) I believe standardized tests have made great teachers wonder what in the world they are doing in the classroom. And more importantly, why do we care about "1 test that tells what my students can do on 1 particular day"?

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What are YOUR thoughts?

Just another afternoon on the deck

Went over to play with Miss Ellen this afternoon ... and to get some photo help from Molly.

While we were waiting for Molly to finish working in the yard, Ells and I sat to have a little chat out on the deck. This is good stuff!

Worth a watch!

I've liked the band, OK Go, for a while. They became well known with their first music video, "Here It Goes Again" that involved a group of 6 treadmills. I probably watched that video 100 times. I bet you've seen it too!

Last year, they came out with another great video for "This Too Shall Pass" that was based off of a Rube Goldberg Machine. They had to do the entire thing in one take. I can't imagine just how many times it took to get it perfect!

Here is the latest video for "White Knuckles". I couldn't tell you any of the words of the song, and I probably wouldn't recognize it if it were played again, but I was glued to my computer. You'll see why ...

Pretty amazing, huh?

Can you tell what she's saying?

I figured out how to use my continuous shooting setting on my camera at Mom & Dad's on Tuesday night. It's a lot of fun, because when you scroll through the pictures quickly, they look like a movie.

Today, Jill helped me put this together with my fancy iMovie software! I have a feeling this is going to be my new, favorite tool in technology!

Just kidding ... .. .

Kristin, Emilie and I spent the majority of our visit in Chicago "being" Judy Grimes and then laughing uncontrollably. You can imagine how much Julie liked us by the end of her visit ;)

This one is good, too!

Here are a few more Judy Grimes videos if you haven't had enough, just kidding, you've had enough, you should stop watching, just kidding, watch me, just kidding, watch TV, just kidding, TV is bad for you, just kidding, TV is a great baby sitter, just kidding, babies are TV sitters, just kidding, just kidding, just kidding!

Who needs toys?

Just for the record ... if you are an Aunt and you have nieces ... don't EVER feel like you need to buy her toys.

All you need to do is show up with your purse in tow and let your niece play all she wants!

Here is Ellen, playing with my "walrus" or wallet, for those of you that don't speak 18-month old!

And here she is with her other new obsession, glasses!

Loving the Photo Booth program on my Mac!

Ellen is now talking up a storm. Here we are talking about Me-Mee (Minnie), sew (TV Show), Be-See (Betsy), and she must have seen something that was po-pau (purple) across the room!

I can't believe how big AND vocal she's getting!

I created a monster ...

... but at least it's a cute monster!

I remember when I first got Minnie and she was still a teeny, tiny puppy. I taught her how to jump up on the couch, using cheese as a bait. Mom scoffed, because I had created 2 bad habits: jumping up on furniture AND eating people food. Oh well! I like to cuddle with her ... and my neighbors LOVE to give her table scraps when we grill out!

Check out Minnie's latest trick! How in the world I have an athletic (fur)child, I'll never know! I don't even think that I could do this trick if I tried!

Next time you all visit, you now know that Minnie would be happiest if you had a handful of cereal in your pocket!

Talking up a storm!

Ellen spent all Tuesday with her Aunt Betsy! I took over 100 pictures during the day so that I can do another recap of our day like I did last June. It will take me a while to sort through all those pictures to pick my favorites ... so for now, here's a little taste of how we spent our day.

I learned a long time ago, that the Photo Booth program on my Mac is good for hours (okay, maybe minutes) of entertainment with Ellen! Yesterday, I used the video feature for the first time. The first video I took showed Ellen's sign language that she's learned, but for some reason the sound didn't record. This one shows some of the words & sounds she knows.

Enjoy!