Happy Birthday, Mom!

It's my mom's birthday today. Join me in wishing her a happy birthday and an even happier new year!

Mom, here is a birthday poem just for you.

Pat:

Pretty
Always helping others
Trips often (seriously, this is where I get my clumsiness)

And here is a fun memory of us hanging out up north in the sunshine (this should bring some warmth during this snowy winter night!).

Facebook page

I created a Facebook page for the Center for Spirituality & Healing.

You should become a fan!

This makes me happy

Happy holidays from me and Liam. Too bad Ang didn't send this to me sooner. I could have made official holiday greeting cards with this pic. I wonder how many long lost family members would have been confused had I done that... :)

Round 2

Here are some more pics from this fall--some from Halloween, my bday and our trip up to Grand Marais for Thanksgiving weekend.

On Halloween, Eric and I were quite excited to carve pumpkins and pass out candy at our new house. We bought pumpkins from a farmer who trucked in tons of pumpkins daily and sold them out of a church parking lot down the street from our house. Here are our pumpkins (and click on the link to see all the Fall pics):

From Fall 2008

For Thanksgiving, Eric and I drove up to Grand Marais and spent the weekend hanging out with the Stone fam. We played a lot of games with the nieces and nephew, ate a lot and also went hiking at Cascade River State Park. Here is one good one of Eric, me and his dad. Click on the link to see all of the hiking pics.

From Thanksgiving Up North

Catching up: up north pics

From Girls Weekend Up North

Remember how I went up north with some friends a few months ago? Well, here is a link to some pictures that should have been shared back then. Due to the end of the semester and due to the fact that we've hunkered down and are not leaving our house because of a crazy snow storm, I'm finally catching up on things like this.

Also notice that I'm now uploading images to Picasa instead of Kodak Gallery. I'm moving up in the world, people! Thanks, Em, for introducing me to the world of Picasa.

The Mother Letters

I came across this blog today and had to share with you.

After last Christmas, a family decided that they were not going to buy Christmas presents next year; they were going to make presents and then use the money they would have spent to donate to a charity. Well, the husband's idea turned into a blog called The Mother Letters. On the blog, he asks mothers to send letters with advice, words of encouragement, stories, etc. Then he is going to compile all of the letters into a book and give it to his wife for Christmas. That is one of the sweetest, most thoughtful present ideas I've ever heard. It sound like it would end up being kind of Chicken Soup for the Soul, but less edited.

Anyway, if you are a mother and feel so inclined to share a story for this man's project, feel free! And maybe let me know what you write!

We need more stories like this around the holidays (and other times of the year too, for that matter).

Now I just feel all warm and fuzzy inside. :)

2 hours

Last night around 4:30 it started snowing here in the lovely Twin Cities. I left work and got to the bus stop around 4:45 to wait for the bus. I waited.....and waited....and waited....

No 144s in sight. Actually, I probably only saw about 3 city buses total for an hour. I saw several Campus Connectors, which wouldn't help me out at all. Yep, I waited for over an hour. During that time, 4 route 144 buses should have gone by. One finally came at about 6 pm. Was it an extra long one? Nope, just your standard size. But thankfully the bus driver let us all on and people were standing illegally in front of the yellow line and even on the stairs leading to the door. I was practically stradling some guys leg with my backpack slung around the front of my body to make more room for people. It was crazy.

I finally got home at 7 pm. So it took 2 hours to get home in the snow last night.

Today, I drove and parked on Como and hopped on a different bus. I'll be staying on campus later tonight to take my last final and then celebrate the end of the semester at my friend Sharrie's house. So hopefully I'll miss the crazy rush hour snow storm fiasco if it snows again tonight.

I still love Minnesota. But I would love to have those 2 hours back.

Ode to Cancelled Finals

I heart cancelled tests
So much, I could hug my prof
Thank you Ben Munson!

This haiku is dedicated to my phonology professor for cancelling our final that was scheduled for Monday morning. Awesome.

Another baby!

I just found out that my aunt Katie and her partner Rae are expecting a baby next August! They have been trying to get pregnant via in vitro, and this was the third try, so they are very shocked and excited. Katie said that it is still very very early, but they wanted to share their good news so that there could be more people thinking good thoughts and sending positive energy their way. I couldn't be happier for them and really hope that all goes well with the pregnancy.

Congrats Katie and Rae!

A snippet of my week

Today is Wednesday, my long day of the week. I have class from 8:30-11, then I work until about 5 and then I go to class from 5:30-8. Then I hop on the bus, get to my car and drive home. Tonight, I need to stop at Target for a few little essentials (more cups, napkins, plates and balloons for the upcoming baby shower and some wax paper for a Music Week craft for preschool group on Saturday). Then it's home to finish cleaning for our weekend guests. Oh yeah, and I should probably study some more for my neuro test tomorrow.

Tomorrow, I'll get up and drive to Brooklyn Park to do some hearing screenings (you know, raise your hand when you hear the beeps), and then I'll drive close to campus to hop on a bus to get to class on time to take the neuro test. Then I'll go home and greet Alyse and Jeff, the first visitors to arrive for the weekend of baby shower fun! We will use Eric's Sam's Club membership to go to Sam's and order the shower cake and then I need to get some food to make for dinner and also just to stock the cupboards for our lovely house guests. Then dinner at our house with Stacy and Taylor, and then at about 10 pm, Dad and Beth arrive.


Friday, I will get up and try not to disturb the house guests while I get ready to leave for campus again. I have a clinic meeting at 9, class from 10-1 and then clinic clients from 1:30-3:30. The kiddos in clinic should be looking forward to such fun activities as: Making your own superhero to work on /s/! and Digging in the rice bin to find exciting toys to talk about using our good /l/ sound! There's only one more week of clinic left after this, and I'm sure they'll be so sad and miss me so much.... Well, two of them might. But one won't -- he hates speech and actually may or may not have pooped his pants last week during our session... Anyway, Friday afternoon, Kate arrives and we get to go pick up the cake and flowers and just hang out with the fam a bit.


Saturday morning, I am leading preschool group in the morning with a music theme. I'm super excited about it. I'm bringing in a guitar, drum, cowbell (!), triangle, xylophone and maracas. We're doing some pattern repeating, listening to different music genres, reading a really cool book called "Punk Farm" and then making kazoos out of toilet paper rolls, wax paper and rubber bands. After that fun, I'm heading home to get ready for Stacy's baby shower. Should be a crazy busy day but really fun! I'm really looking forward to that afternoon. After that, we're doing a faux-Thanksgiving dinner at Stacy and Taylor's.



Sunday and Monday will be days of rest hanging with the fam. I plan on sleeping in then.