"There is peace between your thoughts...

reach out and touch it."

Does anyone have any idea what this means? Neither do I.

I began taking a Prenatal Yoga class a couple of weeks ago. I thought it would be fun and I had never done yoga before, so why not?

I have decided after three sessions that I am not a yoga-type person. I don't relax well. I think I am too uptight, perfectionsitic and high-strung. I do what I am supposed to be doing (breathing, posing, etc), but I am always looking around to make sure I am doing to correctly. My mind is constantly going and I always think, "Okay... Now what? What's next?" I think that I am supposed to be concentrating on breathing ot harnessing my energy or something. I also look at my watch every 5 minutes; probably not yogi-approved, huh?

The terminology also drives me nutty. If our yogi (a very nice lady) refers to the floor or the conference room as the "earth" one more time...as in "let your hands grace the earth beneath you." Ahhhh.

So last night as we were wrapping things up, we were laying on our sides on our mats with the lights off and I hear, "There is peace between your thoughts; reach out and touch it." I tried not to giggle. Seriously, what does that mean?

Procrastination

My name is Karoline and I procrastinate.

As an educator who preaches the evils of procrastination, you would think I that I would heed my own advice. I do not. It was a bad habit when I was in high school. I thought I would have grown out of it by college, but there I was...starting term papers the night before they were due (or a week after) and slipping them under the office doors of professors. Logically I knew it was not smart, but I couldn't talk myself into getting things done before the deadline. So here I am. 28 years old and I still haven't gotten past this disease.

Last August I finished all of the courses required to earn my graduate degree, and I thought I was done. In mid-November, I received a packet with the information about our final comprehensive exam over the entire program. Somehow I didn't see the need to open it at that time. I had many excuses: 1) I was newly pregnant and not feeling very good. Who wants to do schoolwork like that? 2) I was getting ready to go to Arizona and visit the family; 3) I knew it wasn't due for a long time so why think about it already?

So...last Thursday (Yes, I know. January 24th) I got around to opening the information packet. I was busy watching come sort of crap TV and put it in my bag to read at school the next day. So, I started reading the packet on Friday and saw that it was due February1st. Phewy, I knew Lee was going to be out of town and I had a whole week to work on it. As I read more closely, I saw that it had to be postmarked by January 28th (yes, today). Uh-oh. That throws a kink in my plans.

I was a little frantic at this point. All of my hard work since the fall of 2004 had come to this point. So, my weekend plans were set. I want you all to be proud of me. I finished it last night. The final product turned out to be 12 pages. I proofread and edited today, and now I am all ready to send it in when I leave school.

Do they have a medication for procrastination? Possibly a 12 step program of some sort?

Brrrr

This morning as I got to school, it was a little chilly. When I checked www.weather.com, I found that it is -17 (yes, that is the actual temperature, not the windchill). If you just looked outside, you would see a crystal clear days with piles of snow everywhere, but one step outside and you will want to go inside and stay thee all day. I hope everyone's Thursday is starting off well.

Bundle up.

florida

Our first day of soccer dawned dreary and misty. The girls and their parents were in good spirits ready to play and defend their 7th seed.

Although the Iowa Ice (the team name) did not perform as well as they have in the past nor as well as Coach Lee had trained them to play, they had fun. As it turned out, we had to play the number one seed (and 3 time defending champs) in the first round of bracket play. For all of you non athletes, let me translate, "we lost and and were done early."

In happier news, two of my children have begun to nap together. This makes me smile. I think Lord Helmet has a slight crush on Petunia. Tuni laid down to take a nap and soon enough, Helmet was there to curl up and nap with her.

Even if you don't like animals or used to love your animals, you have to admit they look cute sleeping together...

Also, I haven't thrown up since the 14th! Hurray! Thanks for the prayers.

Updates

I have been puke-free since Monday. Hurray!

The 14 year old freshman girl who asked about swallowing during the sexual health speaker is 8 weeks pregnant.

I leave for Florida this afternoon. Lee is coaching soccer and we couldn't pass up the free trip. The girls are ranked #4 in the nation. I hope they do well. Try not to miss me.

16 Weeks 4 Days and Counting...

***If you don't want to read a story about vomit, stop reading now***

So...Monday morning I wasn't feeling so hot before school and threw up about 7:20am. I thought I was feeling better so I had about half of a chocolate protein shake. I got to school and was okay for awhile.

About 8:25am, I started to wonder if I had to throw up again. I started to leave the classroom and hurry down the hall, but about halfway down the hall, I felt it coming up. I caught most of it in my hand and kept moving toward the restroom. I turned the corner into the restroom and threw up right there on the tiles in full view of the class across the hall. I kept moving toward the toilet, but only made it as far as the sink.

I threw up a little more in the sink and turned on the faucet to wash it down...oh wait, I had just throw up into my hand and now got the whole faucet soiled. EWWWWWW! I tried to splash some water on the sink to hide my grossness.

In my flustered state, I ran down to the office so they could call a custodian to clean up my mess. I didn't know what else to do, so I went back to class and tried to regain my composure.

About 20 minutes later, I felt the urge to visit the restroom one more time. This time I made it in plenty of time. But really? What is wrong with me? I mean really...three time in less than two hours? I am silently cursing all of those people that told me I would feel better after the first trimester was over. Ugh!

Warning! Not 100% Appropriate...

But neither is my job. I just want you guys to have a glimpse into what my daily life is like teaching at a public school.

Story #1
Currently, I have a horrible headache. I believe I got a contact high from the stench of pot in my classroom. Can I identify who it is? Nope. It is strongest around a certain girl, but she is wearing the coat of another student. Is the the student or the coat? Seriously, my head hurts. I have left the room twice to get some fresh air. I also have on my room's air purifier.

You might ask your self why my classroom has an air purifier in the ceiling, but there is a perfectly good explanation. My classroom is the old smoking lounge from the 1980's. From what I have heard, teachers would congregate and smoke and when the door opened into the hallway, a huge plume of smoke would follow.

You also might ask yourself, why doesn't she call for an administrator to come and help? Well, we have two lunch shifts here and all administratrs are down in the lunchroom and unable to help.

Story #2
This morning in my ninth grade English class, we had a guest speaker. She is an RN that comes once per year and talks about sexual health. So, today was our day. Things were going well, until she started talking about transmission of STIs (FYI VD=>StD=>STI; it is more PC now, can't you tell? Calling them infections instead of diseases is less scary...). The speaker said something about everything being transmittable through oral contact as well.

A girl in class asked, "What if you swallow?"

The speaker responded that it made no difference whether or not your swallowed, because you were still coming into contact with a bodily fluid. Unfortunately, she didn't respond fast enough or loud enough, because another girl in class (sitting in the front row) turned around to the first girl and said, "Do you swallow?" Needless to say, all of the other students started chattering/giggling.

As a teacher or a speaker how do you quiet the kids after that comment? The longer I teach, the more I want to home school my children.

PS My head still hurts.
PPS Sorry if I offended anyone, but I did warn you that it wasn't appropriate, didn't I?

chunk

During the holidays, my best friend, Chunk, and her family were in town and stopped by for a visit. She has two boys. This is what Nanny's play room looked like with 4 boys ages three and younger.

This is a happy family shot...

Oh wait...that was Scott who wanted to be in the picture. This is really their family portrait while visiting Nanny and Papa's house.

Chunk and I have a long tradition of taking self-portraits. Come back to Iowa, Chunk! Please!

On the AZ family's final night in Iowa, the kids made the most of it. After days of playing, they were still having some crazy fun. Jumping (from the ottoman to the couch) was the game of the evening.

After all of the jumping, we moved on to some drumming. After the drumming it was time for some good-byes. As sad as it was to say good-bye it was a fun time that we didn't think was going to be possible this Christmas, so we were grateful for the time we had.