Funny letters

Okay I promise this is the last time I’ll post today.  I had my students write some letters to our principal this week for their writing center.  Here are some of the funny things they wrote:

Dear Dr. P,

I have some ideys to make Henry better. Make the play gerows (grounds) biger. have more books in the library. make the bthday ribins priteyer (birthday ribbons prettier).

Love, A

Dear Dr. P,

Do you have a radery (reindeer)? If not it is ok. Do you have a kid? ok. I love you Dr. P.

Sincerely, E

Dear Dr. P,

What do you do all day as a principal? What is your favorite thing as a principal? how long have you been a principal? how old are you? I love going to this school. I hope you have a stupendis Cristmas.

Your friend, Z

Happy Hanukkah!

Friday night was the first night of Hanukkah.  We were excited to have Mike here to help us light the first candle. 

Where have we been?!?

I realized I’m way behind on posting.  As you can tell, I’m trying to get caught up from the past several weeks.  Life has just been super busy lately!  We’ve been mostly busy with work and traveling.  At the beginning of November, Jonathan went on a boy’s trip to New Orleans with several friends from St. Louis.  They had a great time, so I hear!  While he was gone I went to Oklahoma for the weekend.  Jill was having a cocktail party on Friday night, and Megan helped me plan a surprise for the girls since they had surprised me last month.  It was really fun to see everyone and hang out at Jill’s new house – which is super cute!  Then I headed to Tulsa to spend Saturday night and Sunday with my mom.  After that we made our two Thanksgiving trips (see posts below.)  Since we’ve been back, I’ve been frantically trying to get ready for the holidays.  Last weekend I got the house cleaned up and organized before putting up the Christmas decorations.  On Saturday night we had my work holiday party, which is always a good time.  Henry teachers and staff sure know how to party! 

This weekend Mike is in town helping us fix some of the electrical issues in our house.  Oh, the joys of owning an older home!  He and Jonathan have been busy changing out the switches and receps (look at me…I’m learning new vocabulary!)  Apparently our house has aluminum wiring instead of copper, and that’s not a good thing.  But Mike is so incredibly nice to come up and help us get the upstairs fixed.  I’m just so happy that we finally have all matching “toggle” switches (what most people have) instead of a mixture of “toggle” and “paddle” switches.  We’re moving up in the world, people!  On Friday night we went to eat at our favorite Italian restaurant, Cunneto’s.  On Saturday, while the boys were hard at work, I made a mad dash to do our Christmas shopping.  I had done NOTHING before yesterday, and I probably looked like a mad woman with my list and the crazy look in my eye.  But I am very happy to report that I got all but 3 things!  That’s pretty incredible, I think.  I would’ve finished had I not needed to come home and get ready for a party.  That night I went to our church Christmas party where I helped the kids make gingerbread houses.  Super fun, but very messy!  Today we went to brunch with Sarah, Dave and Samuel.   It’s been so fun having Mike here.  Too bad he can’t stay longer…

When Jonathan and I bought our house, we definitely could see the “potential” in it.  When we first moved in, we painted EVERYTHING upstairs and did a few decorating-type renovations.  Next we renovated the basement a couple years ago and have loved having the extra space.  Recently we’ve been looking online and driving around St. Louis looking for new homes.  Mostly we just get irritated with some of the “issues” of our older home.  I finally, however, had the epiphany that we have a great house that we should be so thankful for.  We’ve have more than enough room for now, and we really do like a lot of things about it.  It’s also not the best economy to try to sell a house, especially when we put a lot more money into our basement than I’m sure we could get back at this point.  So, with all that being said, we’ve come up with some new updates we’re going to try to accomplish in the next few months.  They include the electrical issues (finished this weekend…yea!), painting and changing all the hardware on the interior doors, replacing the carpet throughout the upstairs, new kitchen countertops, and finishing the crown molding and replacing all the baseboards upstairs.  So if I don’t post for another few weeks, I guess you’ll know where I am. :-)  Home projects…here I come!  

Playing in the Leaves

While we were in Tulsa, Samuel had fun playing with Savta (Judy) in the leaves.  It was pretty cute…

Thanksgiving in Oklahoma

We came back to St. Louis to work for 2 days before leaving again for Oklahoma.  We got to Tulsa on Tuesday night and stayed until Sunday.  It was so nice to have all that time to spend with family!  We have spent the last 4 years having Thanksgiving in St. Louis, so it was a special treat for us to go back home this year.  Jonathan always spent Thanksgiving in Kansas City when he was growing up, so this was his very first time to be in Oklahoma!  We spent the first part of the weekend at Jonathan’s parent’s house in Tulsa with Mike, Judy, Sarah, Dave and Samuel.  We got to see some of Jonathan’s good friends on Thursday and enjoyed hanging out and catching up. 

On Friday we took some photos with my best friend, Melissa, in downtown Tulsa.  We needed a good one for our Christmas card this year, and she was so nice to fit us in while we were on town.  After that we headed to Bartlesville on Friday to see my family.  We enjoyed relaxing and eating even more Thanksgiving food with them.  On Saturday we went to Megan’s parent’s house with some of our friends and their families to watch the OU vs. OSU game.  I honestly never imagined that OU would play as well as they did, and it was a little bit hard to be happy about it when so many of the nice people there were rooting for Orange.  But don’t kid yourself…deep down I was cheering as loud as I could! 

Overall it was a wonderful Thanksgiving break.  We are so thankful for all of our family and friends.  I honestly never imagined being so lucky to be surrounded by so many great people in my life.  It’s incredible to have such close relationships with many people who live far away.  Every time I’m around our Oklahoma family and friends, it’s like we’ve never missed a beat. I’m also so thankful that Jonathan and I both have great jobs that we love and wonderful friends that we’ve made in St. Louis.  It’s hard to believe that we’ve been here for 3 full years!  It really feels like home to us these days and I am so grateful for the friends we’ve made here also – they’re our family in St. Louis for sure!  (Along with the Glassers, of course.)  Alright, enough with the sappy talk.  On to the pictures…  

  Samuel doesn’t sit still much these days, but he did snuggle with me to watch the Thanksgiving Day parade on Thursday for a good 30 minutes.  It was a perfect way to spend the morning!

Watching the parade with Samuel – I explained all the important parts to him

Uncle Jonathan and Samuel playing Dr. Mario…old school style

Jonathan, Sarah and Dave

Before Thanksgiving dinner with my hubby

With mom and dad Teal…I love my in-laws!

Judy, me and Jonathan

Samuel with his olives…mmm!

Side note…I don’t have any pictures on my camera for the Bartlesville visit.  I’ll have to get some from my sister and post later!  I promise I love them, too. :-)

Thanksgiving in Kansas City

The weekend of November 20th, we headed to Kansas City to celebrate Thanksgiving with Jonathan’s family.  Side note: The Friday night before, I went to see New Moon with my sister-in-law and one of her friends.  It was AMAZING!!!  And I’m completely in love with Edward.  It’s all Sarah’s fault for getting me addicted to this craziness.   I do, however, think it’s fun to have something to get excited about, even if it is teenage vampires.  I’m such a sucker for love stories.  Anyway, since we were busy that night with the movie and dessert afterward, Jonathan decided to head to KC early to hang out with his parents.  Sarah and Dave were planning on driving separate cars, so it worked out nicely that I could ride with her and discuss every detail of the movie all over again on Saturday.  (Plus Dave and Jonathan didn’t have to listen to us – that’s just a win-win situation if you ask me!)

The whole family got together for dinner at Bube and Zayde’s house.  It was really fun to see everyone and spend time with them.  Plus Bube called me a “hippie” for wearing torn jeans, so that just made my day!  She’s so funny.  Here are a few pictures Sarah got from the weekend:

A picture with the whole family

Jonathan and Bube 

Samuel loved playing with Uncle Jonathan in the leaves

Our favorite little guy

Samuel came to visit this weekend, and he even stayed the night. Friday was Sarah and Dave’s 5th Anniversary, and we thought it would be fun for them to have a night off.  Samuel got here around 5:00.  We had a yummy dinner of burgers, tater tots, baked beans, and some steamed broccoli.  Samuel mostly ate broccoli and pickles.  He saw the pickles when I got some out for my burger, and he was relentless in asking for them.  He would say, “ckles” over and over until we gave him more.  I’m just glad he didn’t get a dirty diaper while he was here – I can’t imagine what it looked like after all that green stuff.  Ewww!  Next we played Legos and colored until it was time for bed.  He went down around 8:00 and only cried for a couple of minutes.  Luckily he only woke up once during the night, too…he definitely made parenting look easy.

On Saturday morning we were up at 7:00.  I think that’s a new record for us!  But it was nice to be up early for once.  We made some pancakes and then went to the playground at the elementary school by our house.  Samuel had fun playing, but I think Jonathan and Lola had the most fun.  Jonathan took her down the twisty slide – I was so worried he would hurt her.  But apparently she loved it because she went again all by herself.  What a weirdo!  She’s such a funny dog.  Maybe we could train her to do that and make some money off of her…ha ha!  I just wish I had taken the camera with us.  Oh well.

It was kind of sad when Samuel left that morning.  We had so much fun hanging out with him!  Come back soon, Samuel, and Happy Anniversary, Sarah and Dave.  We love you all!!!

Asking Uncle Jonathan for more “ckles”

It was so cute having this little man eat dinner with us at the table!

 

Coming back from the playground.  At one point he was carrying 4 sticks.  I’m sure they were treasures in his mind!

Brian and Amy's Wedding

On Friday we went to Brian and Amy's wedding. The ceremony was in Amy's parent's backyard, and it was absolutely beautiful! The weather wasn't exactly cooperating before the ceremony, but it cleared off just in time! The leaves were gorgeous and they had twinkle lights and lanterns hanging all over them. I didn't get any pictures of the ceremony, but maybe I can borrow some from other people to post later.

After the ceremony we headed to the banquet hall for their reception. Amy has just started her own wedding planning business, and you can tell that she will be wonderful at it. Everything was beautiful...down to the last detail. I just loved the fall colors and decorations.

Congratulations, Mr. and Mrs. Snyder! We are so happy for you both.

The happy couple

Jonathan and the groom

Amy and Missy

Me, Mallory, Michelle, Kim, Heather and Jen

Brian and Jonathan

Me and Jonathan

Mallory and Brian

Jen and Tim

The candy bar

Yummy cupcakes

The cake was amazing - a cake topper with cupcakes

The crossword

One of Brian and Amy's favorite things to do together is crossword puzzles, so they gave each of us a personalized crossword. Everyone was very intent on finishing it before the new couple arrived, but I mostly had fun taking pictures of it. I did find "I love you," though. So appropriate!

Photo Shoot

On Saturday morning I got to take some pictures of Kevin, Catherine and Kylie at Forest Park and Wash U. Kevin is one of our P.E. teachers, and Catherine worked at Henry last year. Sweet Kylie is almost 7 months old, and she is just a doll! She has the most gorgeous eyes ever.

It was really, really cold, but we still managed to get a few good shots. (For some reason, whenever I upload photos to my blog, they end up looking blurry...does anyone know how to fix that?!?)

The late bloomer

This gerber daisy has been on my front porch since, oh, the beginning of May. It hasn't bloomed all summer, but apparently it picked the month of October to finally appear. We read a book in first grade called Leo the Late Bloomer, and I'm thinking about calling this flower "Leo."

Here are some of the flowers in the backyard. I just had to take a few more flower pictures before it freezes and I don't see them again until Spring...

WONDERFUL Weekend!

This weekend Jonathan and I were supposed to drive to Tulsa for a wedding. On Thursday evening he told me that one of his best friends - who lives in China - was coming into town and would be staying with us Friday night. Our plan was still to leave on Saturday morning to get to the wedding, but Jonathan was rather vague on all the details. (This isn't a surprise since he's not known as the planner in our family.)


On Friday Jonathan went to the airport to pick up his friend and was supposed to meet me back home by 5:30ish. I ran a couple of errands and came home to make sure everything was cleaned up. Jonathan called to say that the flight was delayed and they would be home around 6:30. Since I hadn't had time to do it before, I started packing and trying on dresses for the wedding. When I heard the door from the garage open, I quickly changed back into my regular clothes opened the bedroom door to go meet our guest. All of a sudden, Megan and Jill - two of my best friends in the entire world - came around the corner! I was in shock! I was totally NOT expecting to see them! And I couldn't figure out where Jonathan's friend was, nor where everyone was going to sleep. I also kept thinking that it was going to be so rude when I had to leave to go to Tulsa the next morning for the wedding, especially when my girlfriends just got there. So many funny things went through my mind, and I think it took me a good hour or so to figure everything out. A little later we all went back to the airport to pick up Hollye. By that time I'd learned the whole plan, which was for Jonathan to fly to Tulsa on Saturday for the wedding, leaving me with the girls for the weekend!!! Woo-hoo! I honestly have never been so surprised in my whole life!

On Friday night we dragged Jonathan to Nippon Tei with us for dinner, than headed home for some girl chat. On Saturday we took Jonathan to the airport, ate a LONG breakfast, and went to the Galleria for some great shopping. (We were there for 5 hours - I think that's a record for us!) That night we went to our favorite Mexican restaurant for margaritas and more girl chat.

I cannot even begin to explain how much this trip meant to me! I have been going through a rough time this past month, and I didn't even realize how much I needed my girls until they got here. We talked, laughed, cried a little, and talked some more. I just love those people who know everything about you and just let you be yourself. The ones who you can have the really hard, honest talks with and still respect and love them completely. I am so blessed to have these girls in my life, and I don't know what I'll ever do to repay them for taken time out of their busy lives to come see me!

Our only picture from the weekend, at La Carreta

I also wanted to tell Jonathan thank you SO much for such a special weekend! I know he doesn't completely understand my relationship with these girls (who would?) but he knows that I need them, and that's what matters. He did such an amazing job of coordinating with them and keeping it a surprise from me. I honestly had no idea. He made a cake for us, waited for over an hour for their flights to come in, and even emailed to tell them they'd need to bring warm clothes for the weekend. So cute! I am the luckiest wife in the world!!!

Class Photos

We went on a Shape Walk today around school. The kids took pictures on their "cameras" while I took some on the real camera. I tried to snap a few group pics while we were out. Here are the results...

The "funny" shot

Almost everyone is looking...

Taking a picture of me taking a picture of them

I just adore these kiddos!

Three years ago today...

we were doing this!!!

Yes, that's right. We were tying the knot! I can't believe it has been 3 years. Time really does fly when you're having fun. :-) I am so lucky to be married to my best friend and the person who makes me smile every day. Someone at work told me last week that I smile every time I say Jonathan's name. I hadn't noticed that before, but I think she is right. I just can't help it! I feel more in love with him than I did three years ago - and I never imagined that was possible. This past year we have been through many difficult times together, but I would do it all again to be with my soul mate. I love you, J! Happy anniversary!

And, for your viewing pleasure, a few more pics from 9.29.06...