Thankful Thursday

1. Several weeks ago I put the guinea pigs food and hay in a big bin on wheels in the living room (the guinea pigs are in a cage next to the piano in the living room). For the previous 18 months we usually had a trail of hay from the garage through the kitchen to their cage. Now the only place we have to sweep up hay is the living room.

2. The kids were able to sing in their choir in both services on Sunday.

3. The kids and I enjoyed seeing the production of Thumbelina on Sunday afternoon.

4. Nadia enjoyed the fall festival held for those in grades 4-8 on Sunday evening. She came home with candy, a large container of Oreos, and a jar of candy corn. She won the jar of candy corn because her guess as to how many were in the jar was the closest to the actual amount.

5. The kids participated in a Spanish class at the Milton library yesterday afternoon. My three represented half of the participants. The teacher taught them the alphabet in Spanish.

6. Paul and the kids enjoyed their tour, hayride, etc. at Rohrbach Farm on Tuesday. They came home with small pumpkins. I was hoping they'd come home with big ones that we could carve. It was a nice trip, but I doubt we'll do it again as it's farther away than where we usually go plus was a lot more expensive.

7. I met my friend, Cheri, for dinner on Tuesday night after I was done teaching. I drove about half-way home to a town that is close to where she lives. She picked a Mexican restaurant as she knows I love Mexican food and don't get to eat it very often. I'm thinking we will do this again before the semester is over because Paul and the kids don't get home on Tuesdays until 8pm so it's a perfect night for me to go out with a friend after work. Sometimes I have gone more than a year without seeing my friend, Cheri, and she's the only friend I have who lives within an hour of me that I ever do things with socially. Since my social life is very, very sparse, it was an extra special treat to have dinner with a friend! The only downside was

it meant I was away from home for 13 hours straight by the time I got home, which is exhausting for me, but it was worth it!

8. Our natural gas company was having a flash sale earlier this month, and I purchased a smart thermostat. Ours was almost 20 years old. I'm hoping in time the new one will save us money. Paul installed it this weekend, which was greatly appreciated by me! Now it means we own something in our home that "Alexa" (the dot) can control, ha ha! Actually I can control the thermostat with my phone even if I'm not at home, which can be rather handy if we're away and I forget to turn it down before we leave. I'm sure as the years progress more and more things in the house will be "smart" and able to be controlled by an app or a voice command.

9. Nadia kept saying she wished she could be with the 6th-12th grade group at BSF rather than the Kind-5th grade group. I decided to ask on Monday. I figured the worst they would say was "no," and they said yes. Nadia doesn't mind that the homework is more challenging.

She greatly prefers being with kids who are older than her to those who are younger than her. Hence why she gravitates toward Susie, Jenna, and Andrew when it comes to her cousins (who are between the ages of 13-15).

10. Today Paul and the kids went to the Landis Valley Museum. We went there in 2016, but the kids had really enjoyed the program, and since we are studying that time period now it seemed worth repeating. I emotionally struggled with missing out on the pumpkin patch trip on Tuesday. I've never missed the annual pumpkin trip with the kids before. It's usually a day where I take LOTS of pictures. Paul did take some with his phone. Today was easier (even though Ian kept asking me why I didn't join them which was hard) because I had been on the trip in 2016 (and Paul hadn't). He took my camera today, but it would have been much  better if he had just used his cell phone because there is a learning curve with using a DSLR camera and the pics he took were extremely blurry so I had to delete them all. The kids were wearing colonial costumes. It was the first time the boys wore colonial costumes. They are participating in a wax museum in February so I got them with that in mind. I also got Nadia a new one because the one I got her in 2015 is a bit too small. She wore the old one today because her new one came in the mail today. I usually only buy costumes at yard sales and consignment shops, but I deviated from that and shopped on Amazon for these. I paid more than usual, but I know the kids will get use out of them. Nadia has worn the colonial one I got 3 years ago many, many times. I just need to get Oliver a decent tricorn hat because the one that came with his costume was utterly ridiculous and went straight to the garbage. Paul also took the kids to their first trunk or treat for the year.  Oliver was Mr. Incredible, Ian was a character from Star Wars (can't recall the name), and Nadia was a character from Descendants. Our former babysitter took her kids on the field trip today and thankfully she got some pics that included our kids. I told my students at the university today that when I was a child Halloween was a one night holiday = trick or treating on October 31. Now it has morphed into a week long holiday it seems as the kids first event was tonight (which included free pizza from Domino's and free cookies from Subway in addition to lots of candy), and I think they have one trunk or treat or something along that line every day between now and October 31 except for October 29.

11. As of today I have completed 44 of 72 student teacher visits for the semester. That means I only have 28 to go! I think I can. I think I can. I think I can!

My 3 pumpkins

The kids were supposed to go to the pumpkin patch last month, but due to rain the trip was rescheduled for this week. Next weekend we should be carving pumpkins. For several years I've had a tradition of taking the kids pictures in a pumpkin t-shirt. We went from summer to winter weather and seemed to have skipped fall weather. So the kids were COLD when I asked them to take off their coats for a picture. This meant I didn't do my usual individual portraits. I just snapped the camera three times and hoped at least one of the pictures of all three of them would turn out okay. Oliver was complaining about how cold he was; the other two were urging him to cooperate. I hope I have a chance sometime in the next 10 days to take individual pictures of them in a costume (or costumes as they typically wear more than one as they attend more than one trunk or treat event). In other words I hope we have a day when it's at least a little bit warmer out (and I'm at home) so the kids will be willing to let me take more than 30 seconds to take their pictures. I also like to get pictures of them (in fall clothes) with beautiful leaves in the background. Not many of the leaves have turned colors yet. Last year I didn't get around to taking the fall pictures so hopefully I DO accomplish that task this year because I love my kids and I love the gorgeous fall leaves so that combination usually produces some of my favorite photos of the whole year.

Between field trips and me working away from home more than 2 days a week the past two weeks, when I exercised yesterday it was the first time I had done so in 12 days. I am thankful this week should be a normal week in terms of me homeschooling the kids three days and exercising four days. I hadn't read with Oliver in several days so yesterday (even though it was Saturday), I had him read me a story. I videotaped part of the story "The Pet Duck". He read the whole thing, but I figured the video would be too long. This week we'll be working on words with "nk" and "ng." This morning I recorded the kids singing in both services. I uploaded the second one. I liked the fact that this song included a chorus that was popular 20+ years ago ("I love you, Lord"). The choir is smaller this year (thus far anyhow). Hoping more kids will join as the year progresses. I'm thankful that Nadia's friend (Grace) is in the choir as I don't think Nadia would want to be in it because they are the only fifth graders in the choir, and there aren't any 4th graders in the choir right now. I'm also thankful that there is one other boy in the choir so my boys aren't the only boys in the choir. Paul's parents would have come up to hear them sing in church today, but I had tickets to take the kids to see Thumbelina at 2:00 this afternoon. After doing so much driving last weekend, I was grateful that aside from going to the hardware store and grocery store (in our town), the kids and I stayed home all day yesterday (Paul was at work).

Thankful Thursday

1. Earlier this fall I saw that homeschoolers could request a free (hardback) copy of one of the Rush Revere history books. After we got the book I received an email that if we uploaded a picture of one of us reading the book, we'd receive a free plush horse. The horse is about a foot long so it's not a tiny stuffed animal, and we paid not one cent for the horse (or for shipping). Now that Nadia has read the book she is to submit a paragraph about the book online to be entered in a contest to possibly win prizes such as an iPad! Our kids like books and stuffed animals, and you can't  beat free!

2. We have crossed the half-way mark in this fall semester! Last week was the mid-point for the classes on campus, and today marks the end of the first half for the student teachers. This means I won't be spending as many hours a day grading over the next few weeks as I have done the past 3 weeks. The intensity will pick up again as we near the end of the semester, but for now I am looking forward to a temporary reprieve.

3. The kids and I had a great four day trip to MD/VA this past weekend. This is one perk of the fact that I teach on Tuesdays/Thursdays. We couldn't take a four day weekend if I taught on MWF. The highlight for the kids was spending time with their cousins. My favorite moment was when we were driving to church on Sunday morning. I had my three kids plus three of their cousins in our minivan. We were listening to the local Christian radio station, and when one particular song came on, all the kids started singing together. It was so beautiful. I felt like crying happy tears to hear them sharing that moment together. We also enjoyed a few field trips over the long weekend including Ephrata Cloister (we're all very thankful our pillows are much softer than a wooden block), the Julius Sturgis Pretzel Bakery, a corn maze (which thankfully I was able to skip as it sounds like torture not pleasure to me), and Mt. Vernon. The traffic wasn't very pleasant, but we made it there and back safely, and it makes me appreciate the fact that we rarely encounter traffic where we live. Neither Paul or I ever desire to live near a city where there is so much traffic.

4. The Steelers won on Sunday! I actually watched the game because it was at 1pm (not past my bedtime like some of the games this season). It was an important win, and I was able to see the game thanks to the fact Joe has access to all the NFL games on his computer (so he can watch them in Turkey).

5. Paul was able to take the kids on a field trip to Ricketts Glen State Park yesterday. I had hoped to take them on that trip since it was on a Wednesday, but I needed to meet with student teachers. Between our field trips and me working the last two Wednesdays, I have only done a regular school day with the kids once in the last two weeks. I miss my kids!!! Thankfully I should be able to teach them three days next week.

6. Oliver is reading!! I know I already listed this last week, but it's SO exciting. He's even attempting to read on his own. For example at breakfast I will see him looking at the cereal box and trying to sound out words he sees on the back of the box. To me learning to read is just as exciting as a child learning how to walk, how to crawl, how to talk, etc.

Mount Vermin

This weekend we opted to miss art and gym classes on Friday, the ventriloquist show at our church on Saturday night, the rocket launch at Saturday Science on Saturday morning, music class on Monday, and BSF on Monday night so that instead we could spend the weekend with my sister and her family. I picked this weekend for three reasons: the Ephrata Cloister was having a special program for school children (mostly public school children) on Friday, Mount Vernon was having a Homeschool Day on Monday, and my sister and her family are headed back to Turkey next week. So it seemed the perfect weekend to venture down and see them one last time before they left. They weren't planning to join us at Mount Vernon, but some of their kids started asking them if they could join us, and that is what ended up happening - which made my kids very happy!

We spent six hours at Mount Vernon (which Oliver pronounced in a variety of ways including Mount Vermin). I suggested he just call it George Washington's House. During our

time there we toured the Mansion (and I forgot to take any pictures of the outside of it - oops!), visited their tombs, visited the farm, and Education Center. We skipped the Gristmill and Distillery. Usually when we attend a Homeschool Day event there are many special activities for homeschoolers and virtually no one else attends that particular day aside from homeschoolers. They did have some special activities, but for the most part I would say the main perk to going on Homeschool Day was the fact the tickets were a lot cheaper than usual ($10 for adults instead of the usual $20, for example). Joe and Yvonne only had to buy 4 tickets because I gave them Paul's ticket, three of their kids were free because they were under the age of six, and another man in line gave Joe two tickets. It rained on the way there, but thankfully it didn't rain while we were walking around the grounds. PTL! I carried my umbrella around the whole time to make sure I could protect my camera if needed, but the only time I used it was for a few minutes while we ate our packed

lunches outside. We spent the first two hours at the museum, tomb, and farm, and after lunch we spent closer to three hours in the Education Center. The kids loved it when "snow" fell on us during the winter scene of one movie about the Revolutionary War. We spent more than an hour in one room where you would learn about a specific incident in Washington's life (either as General or President) and then you would be asked to decide what you would have chosen to do if you had been the President/General. Then they would tell you what Washington chose to do.

All in all we had an enjoyable long weekend. I was exhausted when we arrived home at 9pm last night, in large part because altogether I had driven a little over 6 hours. It was supposed to take 40 minutes to get there (but took 60 minutes due to traffic); it was supposed to take 4 hours to get home (but took 5.25 hours due to traffic). I usually go to bed between 9-9:30 on Mondays because I am up at 5:30 on Tuesdays, but I was up until 10:30 due to unpacking, giving Paul the instructions for homeschooling today, etc. Today was a "typical" Tuesday which means I was at work, and Paul homeschooled the kids and then took them to gymnastics and the library. When the kids get home a little before 8pm, I need HUGS! I miss them when I don't see them for 23 hours. I'm thankful we live in this part of the country where we can easily visit a variety of historical sites, and I'm very thankful for George Washington's leadership of our army and our country 200+ years ago. 

A cloister, pretzels, chocolate, and a maze

Part of the reason I had to do observations on Wednesday was because I knew I was taking the kids on a few field trips on Friday. Originally Paul was going to join us, but this week he'll again be homeschooling the kids Tuesday through Thursday. This meant if had he joined us on the field trips Friday and tomorrow and time in Maryland with my sister's family yesterday and today, he would have been away from work for eight days straight. He hasn't been in this house in Maryland since December 2015, and it means he didn't spend any time with the Towfighis this year (the kids and I came down here three times over their four month visit to the US). The fact that I was out the door at 7am to observe student teachers and again at 7:00 on Friday to drive to Ephrata meant that I only exercised once this week - Monday. Once the schedule gets back to normal, I am sure I will get back to using the elliptical 3-4 times a week.

Our first stop yesterday was the Ephrata Cloister. We spent almost three hours there. It was built in the 1730's. We did all of the learning stations with the exception of "God's acre" (the cemetery). The tour of the Sister's House (where the women lived) and Meetinghouse was the most informative. Nadia always loves the time spent in a one room schoolhouse. We all decided we would *not* have wanted to become a member of the Cloister. They slept on a wooden bench with small wood block for their pillow. They slept from 9pm to midnight and 2am to 5am each day. They thought the Lord was returning during their lifetimes, and they thought he'd come between midnight at 2am, so they had a prayer service every night from midnight to 2am. Ian made the comment to me that when the Lord comes it will be a different time all over the earth. The other reason the kids said they'd never have wanted to join this group was because they only ate one meal a day. One of their claims to fame is that they published 1,000 copies of the 1,500+ page long Martyr's Mirror book, which was the longest book published in the United States prior to the Revolutionary War.

After we finished exploring the Cloister, we ate the lunches we packed as we drove to the Julius Sturgis Pretzel Factory for a tour. This is the oldest hard pretzel factory in the US; it was founded in 1861. We weren't able to eat the soft pretzel that we rolled and twisted, but they did give each of us a little bag of Tom Sturgis hard pretzels. I learned that pretzels are brown because they are dipped in sodium hydroxide, otherwise they'd stay the same color as they look in their dough form. The pretzel factory is in Lititz. There is a chocolate factory very close to the pretzel factory so we made a brief stop there. There wasn't a tour, but we were able to watch some candy being made and they give out free samples of their Wilbur Chocolate Buds (either milk or dark chocolate). They must have liked the samples because Nadia and Oliver used some of their money to buy more of them. Nadia likes white chocolate and dark chocolate better than milk chocolate so she bought dark chocolate ones. I myself vastly prefer milk chocolate to dark or white chocolate. The only kind Paul likes is white chocolate. Then we drove to Maryland. After playing with their cousins, we had dinner at McDonald's and then went to a corn maze. I don't like corn mazes in the daylight, and doing one in the dark sounded terrifying to me. Wesley (who recently learned how to walk) and I skipped the corn maze. Yesterday and today we stayed at the Towfighi's home all day (aside from going to church this morning). Tomorrow we're headed to Mount Vernon and then home sweet home.

Thankful Thursday

I haven't taken any pictures since Sunday, but I did take two videos yesterday of the kids practicing their verses for AWANA. It's the first (and only) time Nadia and Ian are in the same book in AWANA. It's Nadia's third year in T&T, and her 8th (and last) year in AWANA. It's Ian's first year in T&T. The last two years Nadia only passed the bronze level in her T&T books. I told Nadia and Ian this year they were required to at least complete the silver level each week. If they went for gold, they'd have to memorize about five times more verses each week; thus far neither have selected that option. I might require Ian to rise to that challenge sometime in the next two years because he memorizes verses very quickly. Silver only involves looking up more verses and answering questions about them in the workbook. Next year I will need to come up with a new plan for Nadia as far as Bible memory since she won't be in AWANA. Last night at AWANA they were supposed to bring in something from another country. Nadia wore a t-shirt I got in China that says I climbed the Great Wall. Hence the reason she's wearing a t-shirt that's too big for her in the video. It's my shirt. Right before AWANA Ian switched into a shirt I got in Aruba, and Oliver wore a Chinese shirt that one of my former Graduate students gave me. His was a bit on the small size as it's a child size 4, but we made it work for one night. Ian and Nadia have finished 1/4 of the AWANA book thus far. Oliver is off to a much slower start, but he's making progress. Within two weeks hopefully he'll be able to say the books of the New Testament. He learned them last year, but since we hadn't reviewed them in many months, he had forgotten some of it.




Today I'm giving thanks...

1. For AWANA, the children's program at BSF on Monday nights, and the Middle youth group Nadia sometimes attends on Sunday nights. Our church offers a program for kids on Wednesday nights, but I like AWANA so much that we send them to the Alliance Church for that instead of our church. Actually none of the three things listed are offered at our church. Not to leave our church out, I am grateful to be in the choir (rehearsals are Wednesday nights at the same time as AWANA) and an adult Sunday School class (when I'm not teaching in the children's department).

2. As of today I have completed 35 of the 72 visits to student teachers I will need to make this semester. By next Friday I should have done 40 of 72- more than half! Thus far I *think* I'll only have 5 student teachers in the spring. Given how much extra driving is involved, I am pretty sure if I return to the university next year I'm going to be part-time so that I can avoid having student teachers.

3. Paul was able to take the kids to a "We the People" musical in Wilkes Barre last Thursday and a Young Person's Concert at BU this Tuesday morning. Although the kids sing in a choir at church and take piano lessons from me, I have been trying to beef up their music education this year. I've been having them listen to more classical music (Tuesday they listened to Haydn for an hour for example), Nadia and Ian have been playing the recorder with me on Fridays (we'll skip that tomorrow due to the field trip), and we've been singing more hymns together at home (and reading about the individuals who wrote them). They are also taking a music class at Lycoming College for seven weeks and the eighth week presenting a small concert. They had their first class this week. Oliver is in a general music class (he said playing the drums was his favorite part), and the other two are in a choir. Over the course of the year there are three more goals I have for music - #1 taking them to more classical music concerts, #2 working more on music theory, and #3 teaching Nadia and Ian to apply the skill they use in reading music when playing the piano to reading music while singing, which seems to be a forgotten art now that churches just display words on a screen and hymnals are no longer used in most churches. Next year I'm thinking of having Nadia join the Susquehanna Valley Youth Chorale which meets on Monday nights because she will be too old for the kids' choir at church and too young to be in the adult choir at church. Once she's in high school she could join the adult choir with me.

4. I was able to take the kids to the Warrior Run Heritage Days event on Saturday. It's really nice when a field trip is less than ten minutes from your house! Some years we've skipped it due to rain; I'm also thankful it wasn't a rainy day. Today is a DRENCHING sort of day, but today's outing was for a reading circle plus bowling activity with other homeschoolers at a bowling alley. That event could be held rain or shine!

5. I am feeling less stress than I did at this point last year. I think this is primarily due to the fact that I had more advance notice so everything was planned out before the semester began and that these courses (elementary math methods, student teaching, and assessment) are far more in my comfort zone than the ones I taught last fall (reading methods, fine arts, and math/science in early childhood). It was my first time teaching the fine arts and reading courses. Nothing I'm teaching this semester is a new course for me, although it had been six years since I taught the assessment class. It also helps that Paul has been taking the kids to gymnastics, picking up the books I request online from the library, mowing the lawn, and sometimes cooking one meal a week. Although I have less stress, I still am far busier than I'd like to be, hence I'm praying for God to make it clear whether I should stay home next year or work 50% or 75% (I've pretty much eliminated 100% as an option to consider). I'd like to have fewer headaches for one thing, but the upside to this challenging schedule is that we will be able to pay off the retirement loan and truly be debt free for the first time in our 17 years of marriage (as I took out a mortgage 8 months before we got married and Paul came into our marriage with school loans).

6. Although the game wasn't aired in our area, the Steelers had a solid win on Sunday. Paul's game was aired on Sunday, but his game didn't have a happy ending. He'll be up tonight cheering for his team. I'll be asleep, as I am totally exhausted.

7. Our department chair observed me teaching at 8:00 this morning. It went well. I was observed regularly from 2003-2007, but then from 2008-2012 I wasn't observed at all because I was tenured. Tenured faculty are only observed every five years whereas adjunct faculty are observed every single semester.

8. OLIVER IS READING!!!! He has really taken off. I need to take another video because he's made so much progress. This is a huge relief. It won't be too long before he'll move to Level Two of reading and start Level One of spelling. Yahoo!

Almost half-way done

An academic semester at my university is 16 weeks long, if you include finals week; we also get a week off for Thanksgiving, which means for the classes I teach on campus we have fourteen weeks of class this semester. This is the seventh week of the semester, which means as of this Thursday my classes on campus will be half-way done. I am giving a midterm exam on Thursday in my assessment course. Most of my student teachers are staying in the same classroom for the entire semester, but those who split the semester between two classes, next week will be their last week in their first placement. The last two weeks of each placement I need to conduct a three-way conference with each of my ten student teachers. I had my first two conferences today. The conferences need to be held during one of their planning periods (ex. when their students are in art, gym, etc.). A few of my student teachers this semester have their planning period first thing in the morning. This is problematic for me because I also teach from 8:00-10:45 Tuesday/Thursday. Thus

far this semester I have been able to schedule all my student teaching visits for either Tuesday, Thursday, or Friday, but this week and next week I will also be heading out on Wednesdays. I couldn't schedule any this Friday because we are taking the kids on a field trip to Ephrata and then from there heading down to MD to see the Towfighis one more time before they head back to Turkey plus visit Mount Vernon next Monday as in the very near future we'll be studying George Washington in social studies. I was unable to schedule any conferences for next Tuesday or Thursday, which means I'll have more office hours than usual next week. This week I'm meeting with student teachers on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday, and next week I'm meeting with them on Wednesday and Friday. I will be able to do a little bit of homeschooling tomorrow as I expect to get home around 11:00am, but in light of our field trip on Friday, it means Monday was my only day to really homeschool the kids at home this week. I'm glad that's not the norm. Unfortunately the same thing will happen next week, but after that I should be back to teaching my kids on Wednesdays.

Preparing for the three-way conferences involves a significant amount of time on my part. I have to read each of their units (and each one is often 30+ pages long), look at a picture of their bulletin board or learning center, read their self-critiques they've written after watching a video of a lesson they taught, complete an online form for the PA department of education, and complete another form for our university which involves rating them in 21 different areas. I admit part-way through this weekend I was rather overwhelmed, but over the weekend I completed everything for six student teachers. I did one more yesterday, which means I have three left to do. A project was due in my assessment class today. I probably should not have scheduled that to be due at the same time as my "crunch" time for student teaching. If I'm feeling exhausted I'm reminding myself that I get a week off in November for Thanksgiving AND I get five weeks off in between the fall and spring semesters. I think I can, I think I can, I think I can!

In terms of my kids' school year, next week (on the 17th) we will hit the 25% mark for the school year (day 45 of 180). Because we didn't go to Virginia for a week in September as originally planned, we are a little bit ahead in some subjects compared to where I thought we'd be at this point. Yesterday the kids had their first music classes at Lycoming College. Oliver is in a general music class (K-2), and Nadia and Ian are in a choir (grades 3-6). The classes are taught by music education majors. In order to go to Ephrata Cloister on Friday and Mount Vernon on Monday, they will be missing one art class, one gym class, and one music class. Paul took the kids to a Young Person's Concert put on by the orchestra at my university today. This means we're 3/3 so far with field trips this month.

NOT their Grandma

My mom was asked on many occasions if she was my brother Maurice's Grandma. Because I was twelve years old when he was an infant, many people thought I was his mother and she was his grandmother. I used to get a kick out the fact that people thought I was his mother. My mom naturally wasn't fond of being mistaken as his Grandma. She turned 39 years old when Maurice was one month old. I was 40 when I gave birth to Oliver. When my mom was my current age she had more gray hair than I do, but even so evidently I look old enough to be my children's grandmother. My mom only had that happen regarding ONE of her children. I have had multiple people in the last week assume I was even Nadia's grandma. I guess I must look older than my age. If I had given birth to my first baby at the age of 21 (instead of 36), and my daughter also had a baby at the age of 21, that would still mean my grandchild would be four years old (not ten!). I guess as time passes this will probably happen more and more. The good news is that Paul and I will soon be at the age where we can start

reaping the benefits of "senior" discounts. Earlier this month I noticed that Colonial Williamsburg has a discount for those fifty and older, and Paul will be turning 50 in 15 months.

I went to bed at 7:15pm on Thursday night. That sounds like a geriatric thing to do. I may not be a night owl, but even that is early for me. I have generally been going to bed between 9-9:30pm because my body is currently programmed to wake up at 5:30. Sometimes I am able to go back to sleep and don't get up until closer to 7:00. Friday morning I got up around 6:15 which meant I had slept for 11 hours! I was exhausted. Even though Wednesday was an at home day for me, it was still a very jam packed day between homeschooling, cooking, grocery shopping, and doing work for the university (at home). Paul took a sick day that day, but he was up in the bedroom most of the day so his presence didn't lighten my workload at all. I skipped choir rehearsal so that I could go grocery shopping and write evaluations of my student teachers. Aside from the grocery

store, the only other place I drove that day was taking the kids to and from AWANA. Tuesdays and Thursdays are my most exhausting days because I often drive over 100 miles each of those days plus am gone from home for at least 11 hours straight. And when I get home those two days I usually eat dinner and then do more schoolwork until I go to bed. I have pretty much eliminated the idea of working FT next year from the list of options. At this point I am trying to decide between working PT (25%, 50%, or 75%) or staying-at-home. Right now I'm working 125% of FT, which is also what I did this past spring semester.

Friday morning I visited a student teacher while the kids were in art/gym class. Paul had to drop them off because I needed to leave the house at 7:40, and their classes don't start until 9:15. When I picked the boys up from gym class, we went into the playland while Nadia was in art class. I read a few chapters of Generation Z Goes to College until Nadia's art class was done. I am in a faculty book club, and we're discussing

the first few chapters of this book next Tuesday. According to the book Nadia and Ian are part of Generation Z. I'm not sure what is the name of the generation that Oliver is a part of. My sisters and I are from Generation X, and my brother is from Generation Y (more commonly called "Millennials"). Because I have a LOT of grading to do this weekend as I will begin conferencing with my student teachers on Tuesday, I decided to buy two large pizzas yesterday which means I didn't need to cook dinner yesterday or today. Normally we try to only eat out (or buy takeout pizza) once a week, and we had gone to Bonanza on Monday night for Nadia's spiritual birthday, but I decided to make an exception since I was feeling overwhelmed by my to do list. I am thankful I didn't stay up to watch the Steelers on Sunday night because they lost (again!). Their game isn't going to be aired in our area tomorrow so that means more hours for me to do schoolwork after church tomorrow.
This "Grandma" took the kids to the annual Heritage

Days held less than ten minutes from our house. I had to let out the seam from the costume I bought for Nadia to wear 3 years ago in Williamsburg. She has definitely grown several inches taller in those three years! I'm trying to get as much work done as possible this weekend in part because next Friday we have a field trip and then are driving to Maryland to spend one more weekend with my sister and her family before they return to Turkey the following week. We also are planning to spend a day at Mount Vernon while we're down there.

No matter how busy I am, one thing I always make time for is reading to the kids. Last night I read Ian and Nadia a book about Koko (the gorilla who used sign language). They really were enthralled and wanted to learn MORE about her. I started reading the kids chapter books in December 2012, and this week we finished books #400 and 401. We're also more than half-way through book #402, which is Indian Captive by Lois Lenski. I read a mystery to Oliver this week (Nate the Great), and Ian and Nadia are also reading mysteries in preparation for a books and bowling homeschool event next Thursday. They used to select specific books for the book groups, but now they are picking a different genre each month. Our homeschool group has been doing this once a month for many years, but this coming Thursday will be the first time we've given it a whirl. The February gathering is always also a Valentine's party. Paul will be taking the kids since I teach on Thursdays. This Tuesday he'll actually be taking them to the university where I teach for a Young Person's Concert the orchestra is presenting (primarily for public school children). So far October is getting off to a better start in terms of field trips not being cancelled left and right like they were in September!

Oliver has been showing improvement with his reading recently. For months he would sound out a word by saying the sound that each letter would make but then would just guess and say a word that had totally different letters than the ones he just sounded out. He asked to read today and asked to read a story later in his reading book. We haven't even done some of the lessons that precede this story (which is why he had no idea how to read the words "he" or "no" yet because we haven't introduced any long vowels yet), but I was very pleased with the progress he's made. Hopefully his fluency will take off in the near future! Progress is always a big encouragement.

Thankful Thursday

1. I've wanted to attend a Trans-Siberian Orchestra Christmas concert for many years. It seems this will be the year it happens! I know families who make it an annual tradition. I highly doubt that will be the case for us given how much it costs to buy 5 tickets, but I am very thankful we'll get to go at least once. We're going to use some free passes for Sky Zone (trampoline park) the same day we're up there for the concert. On Monday I bought ten boxes of Honey Nut Cheerios (on sale at a good price) because that translated to a $50 voucher from Ticketmaster which helped bring down the cost of the tickets some. In a similar vein, someday I want to take the kids to see the Radio City Christmas show in NYC. Paul and I saw it once before we had kids, but that's on my "bucket list" of places I want to take the kids at least once before they leave the nest.

2. I've had a little respiratory bug lately. Thankfully it hasn't morphed into anything too severe, and thus far no one else in the family has caught it. I have to keep popping cough drops when I'm teaching at the

university. I skipped ladies Bible study on Monday night and choir last night because I have been feeling under the weather and was trying not to spread myself too thin.

3. I met with an advisor from TIAA-CREF regarding my retirement accounts last Thursday. I was long overdue in doing that, and it felt great to cross that off my to do list.

4. The van passed the state inspection last Thursday. Paul took care of it while I was at work.

5. Paul ended up not going to work on Friday so he could go to the doctor for his back pain. Because of that I was able to have a more thorough visit with my student teacher because I wasn't trying to get back in time to pick the kids up from their gym/art classes.

6. The kids and I went to some yard sales in our town on Friday and Saturday. We didn't visit as many as we usually do, but we were able to get some of the things we hoped to get (like cowboy boots for the kids for next summer).

7. On Monday the kids and I all wore pink and strolled through our town for a free lunch - soup, sloppy joe's, hot dogs, cupcakes, brownies, chips, apples, etc. We might have been in the newspaper as a reporter took a picture of the four of us.

8. Yesterday was Nadia's 6th spiritual birthday! I took the kids out to dinner on Monday night at Bonanza. It's $2 for kids to have dinner there on Mondays. We hadn't been there since April, and it's their favorite restaurant! Yesterday morning Nadia opened her gift (last two seasons of the Brinkman Adventures CDS and three of Mandisa's CDs) before we ate our traditional birthday breakfast of donuts.

9. Paul is taking the kids to see a show called "We the People" today in Wilkes Barre. The educational shows at this venue are free for students! This means thus far we are 1/1 with field trips for October. Hopefully the track record will be much better this month than it was last month!

10. I am back in the groove of using the elliptical four times per week. Finally!!! I don't do it first thing when I wake up, which is why I am not doing it on Tuesday, Thursday, or Sunday as I am out the door early those three days.

Decisions

Life is full of SO many decisions. I've seen a wide variety of numbers used as far as how many decisions an adult (or a teacher in particular) makes in a day, but they are all large numbers (exceeding 1,000). Some decisions of course are very small such as what time to get up, what shoes to wear, what to eat for breakfast, which field trips to go on, what grade to give a student on an assignment, etc.. Other decisions are far more significant. Although I like having a choice when it comes to something like what flavor of ice cream to eat, there are times when making decisions can be difficult. Recent examples in my life would be regarding the new homeschool art class and which Bible study to attend. I had decided to sign Ian and Nadia up for the 5th grade MCS art class (Christian school at our church). After school had been in session for 2 weeks, I found out that the same teacher would be offering a homeschool art class. I wrestled with whether to sign none of my kids up for the homeschool class, just the boys, or all three kids. I ended up forfeiting the $50 registration fee I had paid for Ian and signed

the boys up for the homeschool art class. The teacher sent me an email a week or two later letting me know that the homeschool class would be far fewer weeks compared to the MCS class, and was I sure I was making the right decision for Ian? Who knows. Paul and I came to that decision together, and that's what we're sticking with for this year. The upsides are that Oliver is also in an art class and that with them being in art plus gym from 9:15-11:30, it means I can go visit one student teacher during that time span.

I also wrestled for a bit whether to sign up for an inductive Bible study at our church or a BSF study in Williamsport. I ended up picking the BSF study in part because they also have a program for kids and  because I had been wanting to try a BSF study since 1995 when my former roommate Kim (when I lived near Annapolis, MD) kept telling me how much she loved BSF. The other study I had been considering was on Tuesday nights, and it turns out I'll be teaching until 7:30pm on Tuesdays in the spring so it was good I didn't sign up for the year

long Tuesday night study of Revelation. I have to say that I am not super crazy about the BSF study thus far. I've done many different Bible studies over the past 20+ years, and my favorites have been those by Beth Moore or Kay Arthur (the inductive ones I've done lately). The good news is that the homework for BSF takes far less time than the other two, and at this stage in my life that's probably not a bad thing, but I am dubious I'm going to stick this out for an entire year. The kids are starting in a music class at Lycoming College on Monday nights (before BSF) next Monday. I'm thinking we'll stay in BSF at least until the music class is over (ends right before Thanksgiving), but unless I have a change of heart between now and then, I think that will be it. I'm hoping to be able to join an inductive Bible study at my church starting in January. If it looks like the ones being offered conflict with my schedule, I'm considering offering to a lead an inductive study at our church (that way I get to pick the day/time).

The BIG decision right now is what to do regarding my employment next year. Basically I have three choices - return to being a SAHM as I was from 2012-2017, work PT at Bloomsburg University, or work FT at BU as I have been since August 2017 and will be at least until May 2019. As of May 2019 I will be 40% of the way to the point when I would be permanent again (could happen sooner if they post a job and I am selected). If I return to being a SAHM or work PT, that would erase the two year investment toward permanency. I recently wrote a lengthy list of the advantages of each option. I won't bore you with all the details. Basically the two biggest pluses for working (PT or FT) are financial (orthodontic coverage, retirement plan, greater income, etc.) as well as that Paul gets at least 60 more days with the kids per year. The biggest pluses for me being a SAHM are less stress, exhaustion, and headaches (for me), I have more time with the kids, more time for other things (photography, Bible study, exercise, etc.), and I am able to do things (housework, homeschooling, etc.) to the best of my ability instead of feeling like I usually have to settle for "good enough." I've heard it said before that it's easier to make a choice if one option is bad and the other is good. It's harder when you have two or more "good" choices and you're trying to discern which is the best one. I'm praying that God will make it crystal clear which is the BEST decision for our family - for me to stay-at-home, work PT, or work FT. I will say at this moment I'm leaning toward SAHM. I also am praying that Paul and I can be of one mind in this decision. I think at the moment he's leaning toward me working PT or FT. This is one of those moments in life when I wish God would send me an email that told me exactly what to do. That isn't going to happen, but hopefully I can be sensitive to His leading in my heart. Not knowing makes it so much harder to make a myriad of other smaller decisions such as whether I attend various meetings and events on campus. Right now I am reading a book about Generation Z in preparation to participate in a book club with other faculty members. This semester is going better than last fall. I enjoy these courses more, I started the semester far more prepared due to having more advance notice, and Paul has taken over mowing the lawn. This has translated to me saying "yes" to the kids more whether that's playing a game of Sorry with Ian or finally taking the kids to the playground on Sunday afternoon (first time we walked there in many months).