Hodgepodge – 9/3/2014

 

My baby girl is at preschool this morning (K-4) … and I have a few quiet moments.  I am avoiding vacuuming and laundry, so here I sit!!  I figured I may as well write up a Hodgepodge post as opposed to just rambling away as I tend to do sometimes.   😉

Well, OK, I still may ramble just a bit!!

1.  What’s something you wanted to do this summer that you never got around to actually doing?

We really wanted to go to Colorado this summer.  BUT alas, I started too late into looking for a resort within the time share organization that we are a part of … and I couldn’t find anything to accommodate all 5 of us in an area we wanted to visit.   And that’s how we ended up in Texas this summer.

Next summer, Colorado:  here we come!!

2. Share a favorite memory of your own back -to-school days as a child?

My mom did do the “first day of school picture” at least during my elementary years, so I do have a picture of me with my teacher (in my lovely 1970’s style clothes!!) from those early years.

2nd grade:

3.  What’s one chore or daily task you prefer doing ‘old-school’ ?

As much as I hate washing dishes, there are certain things I feel like aren’t really clean unless I wash them by hand instead of throwing them into the dishwasher.  Especially pots and pans – not a fan of my pans being in the dishwasher.
4.  Share something you’ve learned in life through the ‘school of hard knocks’?

I feel like I often learn things “the hard way”!!!  Story of my life!

Sometimes you win, sometimes you learn.  I have learned a lot.

Most of the things I know about God right now, it seems to me like He had to knock me over the head with.  Things like the fact that HE LOVES ME (yes, He loves everyone … but that He would want to have a personal relationship with ME still blows me away).
5.  As a child, did you mostly bring or buy your lunch for school? What was your favorite thing to find in your lunchbox?

The metal lunch box with its matching thermos was such an important part of my elementary life!!!!  I remember having a Muppets lunch box – with ANIMAL on one side (only because they didn’t put the Swedish Chef on lunch boxes or the 2 sarcastic judges, those guys were actually my favorites!!).  My mom packed my lunch most days – bologna was a big favorite back then – with mayonnaise (it is a wonder I never got food poison!) or peanut butter and banana slices.

My mom is German so the whole lunch box concept was foreign to her for at first (German children usually are done with school by lunch and go home … at least when she was a child).  Anyway, she’s put my sandwiches not only in a plastic baggie, but she’d often wrap that in aluminum foil as well!   As if I was gone on some long journey and my food needed extra preserving – probably why I didn’t get food poisoning with all that mayo I ate!)
6. Football season is upon us which has me wondering… how big of a sports fan are you (not just football) ? On a scale of 1-10, with 10 being ‘I scream at the players through my television screen‘ and 1 being ‘is knitting a sport?’ where do you fall in fandom? 

I am about a 7 or 8 in sports … I grew up in a college town (Knoxville – GO VOLS!!!) and now live in a college town (Fayetteville, AR – WOO PIG SOOIE!!!), so I think it is just part of me.

My husband is a sports fan – mostly baseball (St. Louis Cardinals) and the Iowa Hawkeyes (he’s from Iowa, obviously) – so those are the things I have to know a little bit about or else I sometimes can’t follow his conversations!

7. Share a favorite quote you think might inspire students of all ages at the start of a new school year. 

8.  Random Thoughts for today:

I have been taking a free on-line course in something I never dreamed I’d even be remotely interested in – but it is about “Career Development”.  As a 40-something mom re-entering the work force, I realize I am so out of touch about how to get a job, how to promote myself (do I have anything left to offer??!), and such like.

Anyway, the first chapter of this course has been somewhat of a therapy session for me!  It is all about “making a new start”.  And for those of us who are older and “starting over”, it takes us through all the “stages” of change as they define them:

1.  grief/loss

2.  uncertainty

3.  break-through!!

4.  excelling!!!

I think I am still at stage 2, but I sure have worked my way through stage 1 in the last 2 or 3 years … It was just reassuring to read/learn that this actually is somewhat NORMAL!  AND my instructor wrote me a nice note that he really appreciate my “real life” experience sharing in the assignments he gave about experiencing these stages.

I am now ready for stage 3!!  Any time now!!  🙂