He is a teenager!!! Heavy sigh...

So, Will has had a bad track record with cell phones. A very bad record. His first phone lasted 8 days before he dropped it into a sink full of water and fried the speakers beyond repair. What a shame! That was a NICE phone! The second one wouldn't hold a charge (it was a hand-me-down). The third, also a hand-me-down, went through the washing machine! Shockingly enough, after a month of air drying, it still worked! After time, though, it would only hold a charge for 1 hour.

So...after wheeling and dealing with the Verizon people, I managed to get him a brand new replacement for practically nothing.

This brings me to the topic of this post's title. I noticed that my bill this month was $33.00 higher than usual. After some research, I discovered that Will had been texting... a lot. I don't pay for unlimited texting because I don't do much texting and don't mind paying per use. I also don't believe my kids need to kill their time and conversation abilities on texting.

When we were all home that day, I pulled Will aside and grilled him about the texting fiasco. I took his phone intending to find out who he had been texting. He protested strongly until I reminded him that I have the right to read all texts and e-mails.

I can't say who the texts were to and from, because I don't want to break trust with my son. Let's just say that I was reminded forcibly that time is moving fast and he isn't my little boy anymore. He has become a young man and I am left wondering how to slow down the rest of the time I have with my kids before it is too late and they are grown up!

The afternoon drain

Why, oh why can't I force myself to the gym?! I am not enough of a morning person to get up any earlier than I already do. I planned to go in the afternoon when Helena is at ballet and Will is doing homework, but I am so drained by then that I just want to sit on the couch and relax.
I need a motivator. I need someone to drag me to the gym! What I need is a full sized mirror in my bedroom to remind me of why I need to go to the gym.

The first day of the term

Today was the first day of the third term of school. We are officially half way done with the school year!
Each term I get a new group of 9 classes to teach. This term is 6th grade and 4th grade. I am looking forward to the older grades because the projects are much more complex and way more fun. Last term I had 1st and 2nd grade. The little kids are so cute and loving, but the projects are simple. Older kids are a mixture of fun and frustrating. It all depends on the mix of kids in the class.
Most of the classes look to be a good mix. There is one 4th grade that is worrisome and a couple of boys in the 6th that will be a challenge. Even on the first day I had to pull them aside and caution them about behaviors! Usually there is a honeymoon phase before the bad behaviors surface.

You never see her smile...

She obviously enjoys taking her own picture. You will rarely see her smile, however, because she doesn't like to show her braces. If she would only wear the elastics like the orthodontist tells her, she would have had the braces off long ago!

Reconsiderning Jane Eyre as a heroine

I had better warn you, friend, that I am a passionate reader. Reading is my number one choice of leisure time activity. Give me a book and a comfy seat, and I am content for the afternoon. Give me a good book and the afore mentioned seat, and I am gone for the day. Give me an EXCELLENT book? I will purposefully stay up all night in order to finish it to prevent my family from suffering too much neglect!

Having said that, if you've no patience with books, I will forgive you for skipping the rest of this blog entry.

I always detested Jane Eyre. I had no patience with her. I thought her totally blind to the obvious red flags waving in her face. I was frustrated at her for failing to allow her curiosity to drive her to find the truth hidden in plain sight!
After reading it yet again, I have more empathy with her. You cannot judge Jane from a modern point of view. Any 18 year old today would have more street savvy and chutzpah to know that something was way off base. Modern girls have second-hand experience of life's hard knocks paraded before their view in mass media to educate them before their time. Jane was not a modern girl, however. She was young in more ways than one. She was innocence personified. Which, of course, is the point. She had no life experiences from which to draw in order to recognize the red flags. She had not lost innocent trust. She had nothing to draw from to prepare her for the vastness of dark and sinister fate.
I think many young people fall into Jane's trap. So blind in love that they don't see the red flags waving before them. It is truly amazing that so many stumble through the blindness of youth and still manage to make successful marriages! And yet, the divorce rate seems to attest to the many who remained blind.
But, back to Jane. I am reconsidering her as a heroine because of her poise and presence throughout adversity. She is ever kind, despite the way the world has treated her. A worthy role model, in my opinion. So, because of her gentle and loving perserverance, she has redeemed herself in my eyes and is now listed amongst literature's great heroines, at long last.

Little kids are so funny and cute!

After spending two weeks at home surrounded by teenagers and adults, it was refreshing to go back to being surrounded by 6 and 7 year old children. I gave my first grades classes the assignment of drawing a picture of their favorite memory from vacation, then let them wander the room with it, sharing and telling vacation stories to each other. One little girl came up to me with a sad look on her face saying that she couldn't find anyone to share with. I asked her to share her picture with me. She sighed and said, "It's just a picture of the beach."
I said, "Just the BEACH?! What did you do for vacation?"
"We went to Hawaii." was her reply!
Apparently, she was feeling down because everyone else was telling fun stories of sledding and snowball fights and she was feeling left out!
Little kids are so funny!

Personal Time?

I managed to find 30 minutes to myself today!!! I did some yoga and pilates in the spare room. The fact that I found any time at all is amazing since the weather was so bad that my chauffeuring time was doubled by the snow and ice.

Just a few minutes more...

before I head to bed for the last night of vacation. Tomorrow the kids return to school and I return to work. I teach visual arts to elementary school children, so I am not sure if that truly qualifies as 'work'. However, since I still have what I will term as walking pneumonia, I am dreading a return to schedules. I have really enjoyed this vacation. Not because we did anything extraordinary; we didn't. But I got to stay up and sleep in. I got to play games with my family and watch movies. I got to disregard the clock and the calendar! That last one was most significant for me. That completely disconnected feeling from time constraints is what I will miss the most tomorrow morning as I return to marking time.

Finally! I have a dining room again!

Today we moved my bedroom ensemble out of the dining room! For 9+ months, Bill and I have been making do with a temporary 'bedroom' while the basement was finished. Previous to the remodel, the 'master bedroom' was the only finished room in the basement while the kids enjoyed the main floor rooms. Now that the kids are moved into their new rooms, and their old rooms have been cleared out, we are able to move into the larger of the two main floor rooms to serve as a long-term temporary master bedroom. I hope some day to finish my remodelling plans and convert the two rooms and bathroom there into a master bedroom suite.

Speaking of cleaning out the rooms on the main floor; you never realize how much junk your kids have squirreled away until you start shovelling it out yourself!!! Helena gave 3 garbage sacks full of clothes to her cousin! All of it too small, but beautiful and in wonderful condition. Many toys were also discovered and given away. We filled the back of the Expedition and hauled what didn't go to family to Deseret Industries.

When I moved Helena's bed frame (which she no longer wants), I found a patch of mold growing on the floor! MOLD!?! I should state now that the kids are not allowed food or drinks in their rooms... which roughly translates to kids sneaking food and drink into their room, and mom and dad screaming about it when discovered.

Of course, she was shocked about the mold patch and couldn't imagine how in the world it could have come to exist. I made sure that she got the privilege of cleaning it up, though!

Okay! So it is a new year.

Yes, most people make outrageous New Year's resolutions, and I am no different. Some years I do amazing things and accomplish much. Other years I make them and promptly break or forget them.
This year my only goal is to force myself to get to the gym! I actually like going, I just struggle with allowing myself the personal time to do it! I sacrifice personal time for the good of my family. I need to stop doing that!!!

So I guess my true resolution is to value personal time more highly and not sacrifice it to my family! Maybe then I will also be able to finish the artwork that has been sitting idle on my easel for a year and a half!

I also have to give a shout out to my friend, Becky!!! Thanks so much for the visit on New Year's day! It was wonderful catching up. We shouldn't wait so long between visits next time. Oh, and I can't believe we both forgot to take pictures!

Doctor visits

Our son, Will, was born with a heart murmur that the doctors assured us he would grow out of. When he was 5 and still had it, they sent us for an EKG that designated it as an 'innocent' murmur. When Will went back for his 12 year check up, the murmur was still there; so the doc sent us to a pediatric cardiologist. This photo is of the EKG done by Dr. Mart from Primary Children's Hospital. Dr. Mart was certain it was a 'normal' murmur, but sent us to have an echo cardiogram to be sure. We did that this morning.
They found that he has a small hole in his heart between the two upper chambers. This apparently is a hole that exists purposefully in-utero, but that closes soon after birth in most people. Will's did not fully close. Dr. Mart says this can be found in about 25% of adults! He is not concerned. He said it is not something that is operable and should not interfere with a normal life. The only worry is that people with this condition (he told me what it was called, but darn if I could remember or pronounce it!) have a higher risk of stroke.
I am glad to finally have a definitive and positive answer that can now close the book on this! So glad he is all right!

More fun Helena images!

Well, it seems that I was wrong! Although she has her own camera, she still downloads her photos to my computer and tweaks them with my software. So, I still get to discover photographic gems like this! This is a photo of Helena's own eye edited with Picasa.