Just your average day

A day in the life of your favorite principal

4th grader on bench with shoes in lap. Eye contact with 4th grader's teacher. Teacher replies "She is getting the knots out of her shoes"
Me-"Sara how did you get those knots?"
Sara-"I tied them, um ya and if I can't get them out I think I need to call my mom"
Me-"Good thing I am am a good knot untier"

Fast forward, 5th grade teacher shows me a picture, "Know what these are? Bats! Outside our door, we need to rescue them!"
So next step, get custodian to get ladder. Go to lost and found to get gloves, go to nurse's office to cover cloth gloves with rubber gloves. Ready to go. Meanwhile 5th grade teacher googles how to remove bats, directions say: Take a towel toss over and scoop into towel, shake to release. Use a kind quiet voice as bats have very acute hearing.

Bats rescued by hero principal and put in cage to take home (will be a hero mom as well)
After lunch come to office to find coffee can on desk, yep another bat. Brilliant idea to put this bat with others and when I shake the coffee can he flies out into the office. Hero principal once again, dress and  (thankfully flats today) climbes the counters to capture.

All in  days work.

If a dog could blog

My literary preferences aside, one of the earliest authors I secretly enjoyed was Stephan King. One of the first books I read was Cujo. I always enjoyed the dog's point of view in the story and I wondered if dogs really thought that way. You know like he called his owner "THE MAN" and the son "THE BOY" and so on.

I thought about this laughing in my head thinking of what Luna would blog about if she could. I know last night would have been about the (here comes the dog speak),

BIG SILVER BOX, that THE MAN puts the MEAT in. The BIG SILVER BOX burns like fire, had a burnt nose one time trying to the get the sticky stuff that leaks out of the BIG SILVER BOX. Ohhhhh the BOX, just need to get to the BOX. If I pretend to have to "go potty" I can sneak over to the BOX. But the WOMAN is smart, brilliant really and BLOCKS the BOX with those sitting things.
 The odor comes from the BOX for days and then the MAN takes it out to that other food area. The SMELL is overwhelming, just a few little pieces drop as the MAN chops and chops. If I wait nice he will toss me some, I LOVE THE BIG SILVER BOX.

There you are smoked pulled pork from the view point of THE DOG. At least she isn't thinking of eating us!

Soccer, losing, winning and exhausted

Here is the bullets of a whirlwind week...

• Mom here and and gone for the annual two week visit-it is always a roller coaster ride to say the least
• Teachers back into their classroom, needing this needing that and "one more question Cher..."
• Parents and kids back for open house...I think I whooed and smiled until my cheeks hurt and wore my work shoes until my feet were miserable
• Created the kick-ass kick-off speech I do for teachers with written story included. This one I worked on until midnight a few nights. It is kind of like blogging but ah, more professional
• Open house for my own middle schooler, once again smiling and whooing and then watching 13 year old try to open his locker-no much smiling
• THEN off to the wonderful dusty city of Gillette for both bmx AND soccer. I am telling you right now no soccer mom am I. It just isn't going to happen. Give me the dirty dingy bike track anytime.
•  I don't know which jersey to bring (thankfully the hotel was only 10 minutes away), have no idea about offsides, don't bad mouth the refs at every turn and really dislike sitting in a line of chairs as I was instructed to do when I went to sit off to the side in my own little world. Seriously, "Now, now come over here, we all sit in a row, that's  just what we do". Sigh. Conformity.
• Oh and losing, Small Fry losing 2 out of three games, last in Friday's BMX and last in Sunday's race. We can say discouragement and tears all around.

So I don't know why I put winning in there, because really I am just exhausted... and tomorrow 550 cherubs walk through the doors...better get out those work shoes. Oh and pack for Aberdeen this weekend.

And I should say Carey-as a sports mom, you rock don't know how you do it!

Mile 25 and Mile 76

So there is a reason you see all those smiling bikers at Devil's Tower. Devil's tower is at mile 26 of an 80 mile MS ride inWyoming. We are all smiling, because we have just conquered a huge hill and we have yet to know about the hills that await us. Smiles all around.

There are no pictures of mile 76 and the beloved tree my partner Deb and I stood under quite a long time. We debated, drank water, debated some more. Saw the SAG wagon go by and thought that THIS is what it means to be so CLOSE and just say screw it "PICK US UP!". We had laughed earlier at who the heck quits a race/ride so close to the end. Really, you can do anything for 4 miles right? This as we contemplated another rolling hill ahead, that really did look like a mountain at this point.

We promised each other, ride to the base and decide then.

I tell you sometimes that competitive and stubborn streak can come in mighty handy.

Ettie's Place

Sundance is small. Very small. So you ask your local motel clerk, the one who looks at a handwritten ledger for your name AND hands you a KEY (an actual key) where to eat. He promptly tells you Ettie's Place. Ettie's place is not very busy, but very upscale and only one waitress. The waitress could  be my mom's age and you know she has waited tables her whole life probably. We have to wait a long time, a very long time so they treat us with free wine and we tell them we are in no hurry. After all the night life in Sundance is not glamorous. When the waitress actually has two minutes to breathe we tell her we are in town for the MS ride. Her eyes tear up and she says "Thank you, thank you so much, my niece Hannah who just graduated college and got married and is 23, we just found out she has MS." She continues to say, "I should have just learned more, but thank you for riding for complete strangers and good luck to you".  And then there were no words, we all couldn't speak.

 And I thought about her as I pinned on my number and a sign that says "I ride for..." and it took me a split second, Hannah. I ride for Hannah.

24 hours

In 24 hours, we will be embarking on THIS...

I really hope I will be smiling like the lady in the picture is!

Back on the journey

Well here it is, officially summer is over (well almost, I don't really confront it until the boys step into THEIR school building for the first day).

I have to admit that while my friend Karen shares her mourning and sadness of our boys outgrowing us, I can say that my summer and closeness with both boys these last few months has been a gift. Also my mourning may be less because I have one other fry who is not even close to outgrowing me-yet.

 Now I can't say that it was perfect, and I believe I sent a few furious texts about everyone going to CAMP because they deserved it. I often contemplated how 10 years ago I couldn't wait to be the mom who could take a book to the park, the pool, the lake and sit and read while my kids played, a little jealous at these well coiffed moms in bikinis (because they HAD time to work on their bodies now) in their relaxation mode while I chased children, sunscreened children, hovered over children. I was horrified I am now THAT mom. I never dreamed I would be THAT mom, and here I am-still now well coiffed. At times it is sad, but when I reflect on the summer exurcions, road trips, camping, bike rides, and yes still butterfly and ladybug hunting I realize it is just where I am supposed to be and to enjoy the ride.

And guess what? I still didn't get to read a darn book! So there all you book reading pool moms!

Guess what friends???

He's back!!

Umm I mean this great historical show is back