awwww

Tara said I should post some more puppy pictures on here so everyone can see them. We're down to seven puppies and three more are leaving later today.

This is Fred Rogers charging the camera.

Another Christmas picture

This is right before Geronimo left with his new family. They were going to keep him a secret until Christmas morning. Yeah right.

This is White Fawn. She wasn't where I thought she was going to be when I pressed the button. Oh well . . .

before

Here are a couple of "before" pictures of my room. These are actually more "in progress" pictures. You should be able to see a slight difference when I post the "more or less finished" pictures in the next couple of days.

This is a new wall we put in to get rid of the awful wood paneling that was there before. Believe it or not, the previous color blind owners had a pink border with that nice mustard-colored wall!

Some of the fun work to get all of the drywall joints properly taped and covered with joint compound.

Here's the other end of the room with some more of that paneling. This end had the lovely surprise of containing an ant colony that we evicted. We put drywall in this end too.

I'm awake . . . what more do you want?

I actually got out of bed before noon today! What an accomplishment . . . If I wasn't reading such a good book, I'd probably get more sleep. I'm reading Memoirs of a Geisha, on Tara's recommendation. Plus, I want to see the movie after I'm done reading.

I have baseboard trim in my room now. It's in, the holes are filled, and I sanded and painted them yesterday. I would be totally done with my trim painting if my window's stain didn't keep coming through the latex paint. Now I have to use KILZ to stop it. Ew. So I'm pretty sure that by the time I leave, it will somewhat resemble a normal bedroom. I'll post pictures when it's done and clean.

Well, I'm off to rearrange stuff in the attic. If I'm not back in 2 days, send a search party.

Christmas puppies

This worked until one puppy figured out that it could jump off the swing.

7 weeks old

my new sleeping bag!

are we there yet?

I'm not sure how such a "short" week can seem so long. I'm sure I will feel like everything has gone too fast when I get to my Flowering Plants & Ferns test tomorrow morning and realize I should have started studying earlier. It's comprehensive, so I should already know most of it, right (assuming I studied sufficiently for the first 4 tests) ? We actually have used a lot of the information relating to plant anatomy while classifying and identifying lab plants. At least that has been an ongoing reinforcement of terms...

That's about all the time I have to devote to writing on here.

2 more days!

Things left to do:
teach Pre-Algebra tomorrow morning
Flowering Plants & Ferns Final Wednesday morning
go shopping at the VM for mom
pack
clean
turn in all the half-done assignments I have saved on my computer
go to nursing dedication & graduation
LEAVE!

Hark! The Herald Angels Sing

Hark the herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!
Peace on earth and mercy mild
God and sinners reconciled"
Joyful, all ye nations rise
Join the triumph of the skies
With the angelic host proclaim:
"Christ is born in Bethlehem"
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

Christ by highest heav'n adored
Christ the everlasting Lord!
Late in time behold Him come
Offspring of a Virgin's womb
Veiled in flesh the Godhead see
Hail the incarnate Deity
Pleased as man with man to dwell
Jesus, our Emmanuel
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

Hail the heav'n-born Prince of Peace!
Hail the Son of Righteousness!
Light and life to all He brings
Ris'n with healing in His wings
Mild He lays His glory by
Born that man no more may die
Born to raise the sons of earth
Born to give them second birth
Hark! The herald angels sing
"Glory to the newborn King!"

6 days left

I'm pretty sure this is a good representation of how I have slept this semester. (Each peak is a break, by the way.)

I passed my First Responder written and practical finals yesterday. Thanks to that class, I now know how to treat all of these injuries. (Click on the picture to see it full-size).

Christmas

Lindsey drove all the way down to see us this past weekend so we could have Christmas with the girls. It's something we've done every year since we've been at Southern. We've done everything ranging from a huge pile of presents opened in the middle of January to painting ornaments at Clay & Stitches. This year, we each got a collective group gift. We rented Love Actually and Christmas With the Kranks and drank Mexican hot chocolate. It was great!

We got Tara lots of things to help keep her cool (moisture-holding bandana thing), warm (long underwear), and bug-free (another bandana thing) while she's trekking around New Zealand next year working with ADRA's Adventure Plus Team.

We got Jaclyn two sets of the Corelle dishes she wanted. She knew we were getting them for her, but since I got them in NC where the sales tax is lower than here, I decided to get two. She said it's scary to think those are the dishes she will probably have for the next 20 years!

They got me some really nice scrapbooking shape cutters from Creative Memories. Mary Jane's sister in Montana sells the stuff, so they got it from her. Hopefully I will go get some of these pictures printed and make a scrapbook page of Christmas. They got me some stickers too so I can finally finish the pages about my broken nose and about our ornithology trip to Dauphin Island from last school year. Those can be my goals for Christmas break.

Lindsey's newfound love of the outdoors inspired us to get her a gift certificate to her new favorite store, REI. She was very excited. Now she can get a nice sleeping pad for her very nice sleeping bag.

Opryland

The Opryland Hotel. We went Friday to the NSTA convention in Nashville. The hotel was SOOO cool! I just took pictures of the building and the three "greenhouses."

If you want a better view of the pictures (I'm trying to save space) just click on them to see a big view.

The concierge desk's cool stained glass ceiling.

The Delta river. They actually do boat rides through this.

The Christmas tree

The Delta Island - little shops and restaurants set in the biggest greenhouse

The Cascades area - each balcony is a room opening into the greenhouse.