Sunday, December 30, 2007

Fast away the old year passes

I haven't posted recently, but I've been busy with holiday "fun" and with trying to rescue our home from a semester's worth of neglect.

I ended the semester with an A in Stats and a B in Theory. At least I finally got the damn B out of the way. I hated that I got it though. It all came down to lack of time to prepare a paper and the choice to just submit what I had. All the rest of my papers were fairly high As, but that one paper just sunk me. Oh well... I survived the semester!

Dad's wreck happened about 3 weeks before classes started and I traveled to Bama twice since classes began. I also went to a conference in Canada and for a well deserved trip to see my good friends in Maryland. I don't know that I've had a semester with THAT much travel ever!

Christmas was fairly uneventful. I was feeling guilty at not going to Mom's, but it turned out that Chloe had spilled the beans anyway at Thanksgiving! Oops!

Thanksgiving was pretty much a big bummer, so we really needed to go to Dallas so the kids could see cousins and have a normal Christmas. We had the same usual inlaw drama. Tom's brother lost his job, Tom's stepbrother was ignoring his son (but at least I got to see his son who usually lives in Florida - that was a wonderful surprise!). My mother in law was so stressed that she was no fun at all (despite everyone's offers for help which were shot down), and Tom's stepdad was his usual rude self. At least Tom's grandmother was pleasant and I got to see his other grandmother (Granny) who is one of my favorite people in the world! I also got to meet my brand new nephew and I got to hold him a lot. There's nothing like holding a sweet baby!!! (And yes, I really miss NICU sometimes!)

Another fun thing was going back to our old church. We hadn't been there in years and I got to see a few people who I literally grew up with. Mom had sent a special message for the Griggs family, so I was really happy to see them. Going through what we've had with Dad this year, it's been amazing to see how some people have just embraced us with love.

Part of the fun of going back to our church was playing guess who the kids are. There were so many teens running around. Thankfully their parents looked just the same, but I really felt old hearing that some were already in college!

I've missed posting a lot:
Our church did Little Bethlehem again, and we had a blast even though it was FREEZING outside! The kids got mini camcorders from Santa and they've been hard at work documenting all of our embarrassing moments.

Sunday, December 09, 2007

Winter Wonderland or something like that

Well with all the posting I've been doing, it's probably pretty obvious that I've been sitting in a nice warm house while the ice storm continues outside. This morning church was cancelled as was Chloe's orchestra concert. And we had shopped SO long for a dress that didn't look like it came out of Pat Benatar video. I mean, she's only 9, I was hoping to be able to dodge the slutty clothes for at least a little longer!

I found a really cute silver and black dress with a black velvet shrug. Then we hit the Gap and found the most adorable red satin skirt with a big bow and a white sweater to go with it. I'll try to get some pics on here sometime - it's just too cute.

Jonathan Davis - The Chauffeur [Duran Duran Cover]

I guess today's theme is unexpected collaborations? Wow - Korn and Duran Duran? But it works.

Wow

I remember seeing this on SNL years ago - didn't realize it was just a month before Chloe was born! I remember being just blown away by the combination. Enjoy!

Prayer requests

For healing and recovery (as much as possible) for my father.
For comfort for my mother.
For healing for Mom's cousin and close friend Mae who really needs to be transported to a higher level of care for her heart problems, but who is stranded in Marshall.
For comfort and relief from pain for Dad's cousin Ann who is in the final stages of her cancer.

Saturday, December 08, 2007

Anagrams and scandals

My entire name (first, middle, maiden, married) can be anagrammed into:

A Seventeenth Enrolls Kinkily

Kinda fitting, considering that my hometown hit the national news this week for having a pay-for-swinging-sex establishment in a local neighborhood!

Back for more

Well it's been quite a while since I've posted! I have been so busy with school, work, kids, and travel! At least a couple of trips were for fun. I visited my friends in Ocean City, Maryland and had a well deserved respite from life. A couple of weeks later I went to a conference in Canada which was very interesting and I met some wonderful people.

I took my husband and kids to Alabama over Thanksgiving to visit my parents. Dad is doing a little better, but he still has so far to go and I'm wondering how much is possible to recover. He's been making small amounts of progress here and there, but overall he is not communicating and not able to do anything for himself. Very sad considering how independent he was before all this.

In happier news, my classes this semester are over! This was probably my most demanding semester yet. I thought stats would be my hardest class, and was surprised that it wasn't that bad at all! My theory class was difficult, but my biggest problem was a lack of time. Tom started back to work mid semester and he has been so busy that he hasn't been as much help as he used to be. So working full time, taking 6 hours of classes, and trying to manage the kids took up pretty much all of my time.

Now I am free to plan Christmas, buy lots of stuff, and hopefully send out some cards this year. I feel like my life is finally manageable again. I'm signed up for 6 hours next semester and I wish I wasn't, but we have a damn residency requirement here that we didn't have at UTA. Which is funny, because I would have met residency there and here it's a struggle. Residency basically means that you have to have 2 semesters of 9 hours each or 3 semesters of 6 hours each. So this next semester will be my 3rd semester and then I will finally be free to cut back. I'm taking stats and a grantwriting class. Since I finally chose my dissertation topic, it should be a lot easier this semester!!!