ian needs to follow this advice in the middle of the night

on the back of a stall door in tennesse:

chimneys slideshow

featuring taylor and her daredevil mother, with a pretty little red head thrown in here and there.

mountain water

photo from the chimneys in tennessee. this water is a little over two feet deep. crystal clear, and extremely cold.

monday morning exchange with ian

ian loves bacon. turkey bacon, that is. i don't have to ask him what he wants for breakfast every morning because every morning is the same.

at any rate, as i'm fixing my coffee this morning, ian walks into the kitchen and asks if we can go to the movies today. "well," i explain, "the movies are pretty expensive. maybe we can go tomorrow when the theater has discount tuesdays."

quickly trying to change the topic, i ask, "so, what do you want for breakfast buddy?" (even though i already know the answer.)

"water," my poor little boy replies glumly.

"water???"

"yes." as if this is somehow going to increase my sympathy for this little fella who's stuck with a cheap and unfeeling mother.

"no problem, buddy. you want ice with that?"

ian offers a stunned and pained look.

fast-forward a half hour...

"mom, can i vaccuum?"

"sure!"

(a few minutes later after vaccuuming one room.)

"now can i have $5?"

"no."

ian sighs.

fast-forward a few more minutes...

"MOM!!! come here!!!"

ian, in his effort to clean and earn cash (which he erroneously still thinks he's gonna get), has now vaccuumed up a wii cord. if i can't get this ridiculous sweeper taken apart and that wii wire untangled, i'm screwed.

a new wii will cost more than the movie tickets, gosh darn it.

maybe, i should've said "yes" right from the beginning.

positively absurd

my sister, jill, told me about this clip. words fail me. enjoy.

b e n

my nephew, looking surprisingly innocent this evening.

bird poop and renegades

much to the chagrin of their momma and poppa, i climbed a chair and snapped these updated photos of our baby barn swallows. look how they've grown! i definitely count five heads, but i'm wondering if perhaps one more is packed in there among its brothers and sisters somewhere.

and, as you can see below, they're pooping up a storm. :(

also, i discovered this year's versions of "renegade" produce this afternoon. for the past two summers, we've had pumpkins and gourds sprout unexpectedly in our side yard. i'm almost positive these three little fellas are gourds. we'll just have to wait and see. even though we've (intentionally) planted pumpkins this year, it's always exciting when the unexpected occurs!

newfound gap

here is the first of several posts to come about the spur-of-the-moment, let's-get-out-of-dodge, girls-only vacation that julie and i threw together with kate and taylor. i've got a whopper of a story to share with you later, but for now, you'll have to deal with the obligatory pics of scenic stuff.

so here you go. this is a brief slideshow of our drive to newfound gap in the smokies, with stops along the way to view the chimneys.

at last

today felt like the first actual day of summer vacation. i think, for the most part, due to the combination of smells (i cut grass this morning), sleeping in, and heat. oh, and the flowers. things are actually growing around here.

this red verbena is an annual. the violet verbena is perennial. both are gorgeous.

i bordered my round flower bed with red salvia this year in honor of my grandmother. leo said he digs it.

and sprouting here are pumpkin seeds. last year's pumpkins fell prey to the horrific summer drought. i'm hoping these babies make it.

10th generation barn swallows

for at least the past ten years, barn swallows have made a nest above the light on our back deck. every year, after the babies fly away, and the nest is deserted, i power wash it down and clean the poopish what-not off my siding and deck. and every year, the swallows come back.


the only way i know these are barn swallows is because julie told us they were. (she's an ornithologist extraordinaire.) juj also explained the cloacal kiss to me this spring ~ i was always curious as to how birds actually had sex (uh, that sounded a little strange). at any rate, here are the little by-products.


last year, one of the babies had not mastered the art of flying, and died about two feet from the nest on our deck. i'm curious to see how long before all of our babies fly away this year. kate and ian are always a little sad to see them go.

"teaching is the greatest act of optimism." - colleen wilcox

i just received ohio achievement test scores for my kids today. (not kate and ian. i'm referring to the 15 LD and CD sweeties on my case load for the past year.)

wow. and i mean, wow. i am so proud of them.

math scores are incredibly important to our district and districts all over ohio. in the waverly city school district, students with disabilities are referred to as a subgroup, and our district's rating by the state is determined in part by how well this particular subgroup performs on the OAT.

long story short...13 of my 15 students passed the 8th grade math OAT. that's an 87%passage rate for my kids with disabilities.

oh yeah, baby!

after testing, i told anyone who would listen how hard my kids worked on the OAT. they are granted extended time -up to 6 hours- to complete a test that the rest of the students take in 2 and a half hours.) on the first two days of testing, my beautiful children worked from 8:30 in the morning until almost 2:00. we took breaks. we ate snacks. we walked and stretched and then refocused. i gave them pep talks and hugs and constant praise. they could have given up. they could have said they were just too tired and thrown any old answer down. but they didn't.

on that last day of testing, i loved them for what they had done. they had persevered.

and while some of our other test scores may not show it, their math scores offer tangible proof to what i already knew:

given the opportunity and the encouragement to be confident, these children can and do succeed. do they need a little nudge? sure. do they get grumpy and exasperated? absolutely. does their teacher get grumpy and exasperated? oh my...yes.

bottom line, i love those darn kids. and i love my job.

thanks God.

“Do not waste yourself in rejection; do not bark against the bad, but chant the beauty of the good.”

~Ralph Waldo Emerson

macro

i'm an incredibly inept photographer. point and click. that's me. and i usually point and click with shaky hands. for years, leo has tried to help me with the basics of taking a "good" picture, and i'll be danged if i just don't have the knack. it's become our own little joke...and after 17 years of marriage, if i take a "good" picture, leo sweetly patronizes me by saying, "you're getting better".

we own a little cannon powershot. nothing fancy, but it is an upgrade from our previous camera that was held together by masking tape after i dropped it the first time, and then died altogether on christmas eve when i dropped it for the last time. i now understand why that little wrist strap is there, although i still fail to use it.

so anyways, i was playing with the macro on my cannon last night, which is a pretty big deal for me, and these are what i came up with.

this poor bleeding heart. she's the last one to bloom, and the only one left to photograph. her color has faded, and she's starting to wilt. (can anyone identify?)

fishing with the lamersons

ted sweetly invited us to their family pond last night for an evening of fishing. we brought aunt jujy along too, since she is an expert fisherman! what a beautiful evening, and the kids had a blast!

an unfortunate truth

admonishment

What you don't see with your eyes, don't witness with your mouth.
~Jewish Proverb

better than christmas

today is "national doughnut day". (seriously ~ click here if you don't believe me!) i love, love, love doughnuts. and then, i love them some more. i'm certain that the world's most perfect food can be found at crispie creme doughnuts in chillicothe ~ round chocolate doughnuts with chocolate icing and creme in the middle. oh my.

god was having a good day when he invented the doughnut. fried food that's also sweet. i mean, come on, what could be better? i envision crispie creme's chocolate doughnuts hanging from trees when i get to heaven - zero calories, zero fat - just waiting to be plucked and eaten.

so, happy doughnut day, y'all. and if you're in chillicothe, eat one for me.

quotes from the counter-culture

well, from jim morrison, specifically.

oddly enough, i agree with jim on a few things...

*People are afraid of themselves, of their own reality; their feelings most of all. People talk about how great love is, but that’s bullshit. Love hurts. Feelings are disturbing. People are taught that pain is evil and dangerous. How can they deal with love if they’re afraid to feel? Pain is meant to wake us up. People try to hide their pain. But they’re wrong. Pain is something to carry. You feel your strength in the experience of pain. It’s all in how you carry it. That’s what matters. Pain is a feeling. Your feelings are a part of you. Your own reality. If you feel ashamed of them, and hide them, you’re letting society destroy your reality. You should stand up for your right to feel your pain.

*The most important kind of freedom is to be what you really are. You trade in your reality for a role. You trade in your sense for an act. You give up your ability to feel, and in exchange, put on a mask. There can't be any large-scale revolution until there's a personal revolution, on and individual level. It's got to happen inside first. You can take away a man's political freedom and you won't hurt him- unless you take away his freedom to feel. That can destroy him. That kind of freedom can't be granted. Nobody can win it for you.

*I think of myself as an intelligent, sensitive human being with the soul of a clown which always forces me to blow it at the most important moments.