Check out this fun site where you can make yourself in Lego! The wedding rehearsal and dinner were this evening and we are all abuzz about my brother Charles and his fiancee Kim's big day! Only a week to go!

Today is my wedding anniversary! I have been married to Ethan for eight beautiful years!

Today is the last day of school!!!! That means for just over two months....

• No students will sigh heavily when they find out I'm they're sub for the day
  
• No entire class will burst into applause when they find out I'm they're sub for the day
• No other subs will condescend to me (that happened a lot this year - I don't understand it)
• I won't be Mrs. Powers
  
• I won't have to listen to 25 recorders in a small classroom
• I will not discuss homonyms or onomatopoeias
  
• I will not be acutely aware of what I didn't learn in 4th grade math and have to teach myself things quickly
• I won't say, "Line up!"
• Chances are no one will call me before 8 o'clock and if they do, I won't be waiting for their call
• No one will ask if I have super powers
• No one will try to convince me to get certified to teach
• I will not make kids I've never met before cry

Ahhhhhh summer!

My second altered monogram - this one was for Esme's nursery school teacher. She and I share a love for purple! Now my mom wants one. I feel funny making her an E though - I'm trying to sell her on M.

My goddaughter turned nine this week. She was the first baby in my adult life and I can't believe how big she is! She is the only person that can get me to try new rides at amusement parks. She got me to go on a water one recently that I'd been too scared of before. Luckly for me it wasn't too bad - just the right amount of thrilling. Thank goodness she's still too little for the really big roller coasters.

First time out on the inflatable boat.....

With her godparents...

Some swimming photos....

Sophia posted a challenge on 2 Peas today to blog what inspires you.

There are two women I go to church with who both inspire me all the time. They are both named Joan. Joan D. is a super powerhouse. If anything needs doing for our church, she does it. If you need information about the church and Joan doesn't know it, you might as well give up because it doesn't exist. She has a very busy life but finds so much more time to give. She was the first person who ever reached out to me from this church, right after Esme was born.

Joan S. is not only an amazing person who has devoted uncountable hours to her community and her church, but is incredibly generous and helped me even from her bed in a long term care facility. Plus she is an extremely interesting woman who I feel I have a lot to learn from. I feel enriched every time I have the opportunity to be in her prescence. I feel so lucky to know these women and I am inspired by both of them!

I can't wait to get this book into my hands. It contains my second published page, and I heard from a few scrapping friends that the book is really good.

Tomorrow my baby will have her last day of nursery school. And at least for a while, it will be her last day of "school" because we are about to begin our homeschooling adventure. I am both excited and apprehensive. She is very much looking forward to learning to read, but asked me yesterday if I will still read books to her.

EDITED TO ADD: The book has arrived! They did a beautiful job and it's definitely a book worth looking at! My layout is on page 109.

Three years ago I taught high school for half a day and decided I never wanted to do it again. During the last few months I've been giving it some more thought and after successfully keeping 4 to 11 year old in control for these three years, I decided I would give it a go. Today I taught my favorite high school subject - history. And I survived! Hooray! Lucky for me I had mostly honors classes, and those kids are the most studious. I am going to do Health on Wednesday.

Today is Kim's shower and I made my first altered clock as her gift.

Life has been crazy the last couple weeks!

End of the year subbing is not so fun. Lots of hot, cranky kids do not want to be in school and some of the teachers are getting fussy as well. Last chance to earn an income though so I am trying to work as much as possible. I am even giving high school a chance next week. I usually only do elementary and I am likely to be eaten alive - pray for me on Monday and Wednesday. I love my job in September. Not as much in June.

We have been out on our little boat a couple times now. Went once to the Mount Tom Reservation and once to Hampton Pond in Westfield. Bray Lake at Mount Tom was fun, but Hampton Pond was wonderful. That is my new favorite place. Unfortunately on Memorial Day some teenagers threw a bunch of fireworks into the pond and killed a bunch of fish, and the poor dead fishies are still washing up on the beach. It's gross and sad. Won't want to swim there for a while yet.

I finished reading Robinson Crusoe (love Defoe, loved it), A Tree Grows in Brooklyn (very good story of a young girl growing up in Brooklyn in poverty in the early 20th century), and Fun Home (a cool graphic novel with very strange family relationships that I identified all too well with) since I last updated my blog. I was talking to a lady at church who said she isn't much of a reader and I said I have to be to stay interesting to my husband. She told me that was a very smart way to think about it. Actually Ethan and I have been reading a lot of the same books lately and he is very interesting to me! We read Treasure Island together and he just started Robinson Crusoe.

My baby's last day of nursery school is this coming Thursday. I have very mixed feelings about this. I am so sad that she is leaving school and won't have the fun little kid experiences I had. On the other hand I am extremely excited and hopeful about staring our homeschooling together.

I am off to worry about the last details that I am responsible for for my sister-in-law's shower. It's tomorrow!!

I just finished altering a big wooden letter for the first time, and I had so much fun doing it, I think this might become one of my standard gifts. I used Anna Griffin supplies for this one - I loved how the one pieces paper was both pink and black and white. It's a gift for our church secretary, who I have come to realize has had a pretty thankless job these long months that we haven't had a rector. I really appreciate her and sympathize with her, so upon the new rector's arrival I suggested a staff appreciation week. It's so important to tell workers how much you value them - a pretty crummy job can get so much better with just a small thank you. Hopefully I'll get to chair up the appreciation committee.

Just finished this page for one of this month's projects at Scraptalk. This is my first time using Crate Papers and I loved them! And with this page I am celebrating! Esme and I have had great difficulties at bedtime since I starting putting her to bed, and as of tonight I am OFF for the summer! Hopefully in the coming months Ethan can get her back into a good routine and teach me how to do what he does! I would be so happy to leave that drama behind us.

On Saturday I got a big box of my grandmother's photos. There are some amazing things in this box, including one this one, which is one of my favorites. The happy couple coming out the door are my grandparents. I am so love photos of people I love, and old photos of my ancestors are one of my favorite things ever. I am my family's historian, and I feel so lucky to have this gift.

I survived two weeks of teaching the gym and science class! Phew! I am not used to working full time and I am WORN OUT. Even though I love that class i am so glad it's over. Now onto my busy weekend! Tomorrow I'll go see my mom and Sunday Esme and I will have the day all to ourselves.

Our new rector has finally arrived! I was on the Search Committee for over 18 months and I was thrilled to go to her first service on Sunday. Then I got to have a church school meeting with her on Tuesday, and I got to go out for a night on the town with her on Wednesday. She is a very nice woman and a pleasure to be around. I am so looking forward to working with her!

Just completed this layout - my first one for my second Pink Lady term! I am loving these Creative Imaginations patterns. I need to find a store that sells this line and buy it up.

Yesterday I had to do lab reports with the second graders. They had to examine fossils and then write several sentences describing them. Most of them wrote about texture, feel, colors, smell, etc. One kid wrote as his last sentence, "it smells like dicks." I was sitting there grading and came across this and was like COME ON why is this kid doing this?!?! Augh! Kids write obscene stuff all the time to see if we're really reading it, but then they have to be in trouble, deservedly so. So I took it to the teacher and said, "Please tell me this is a misspelling or not what he really means." She was disgusted and took it down to talk to him. She said, I love the way you set up your lab report, you did such a good job, now could you please read it to me? He read it to her as written. She said nicely, what did you mean by that last sentence? He said, "Dicks. Where they sell the basketballs." There is a store near here called Dick's Sporting Goods. The teacher laughed all the way back down the hallway, and then photocopied it and passed it around to the other teachers with the story.

We have the NICEST friends and family. While we were at our nephew's birthday party this weekend my best friend offered to take Esme for the night. Hearing that Ethan and I had the chance to go out my brother offered us free movie tickets so that we could go out and do something fun! Hearing that we were going out my mom insisted on buying us dinner! Due to the generosity of 3 people that love us, we got to have a great evening all to ourselves. This kind of night is very rare for us, and it was just so nice to spend a casual evening with my wonderful husband. One of the best things about my life is the people I am surrounded by. I am so incredibly blessed.

As a bonus, I happened to have my camera with me, so I got to get some shots of Ethan and me.