Health and Weight

I have been pretty successful with my healthier diet so far this year. I started making changes last May when I gave up Coke. I switched to orange Fanta, but gave that up around the holidays. Now I mainly drink water, wine,  juice, milk, or sweet tea if we're eating out. Tonight at our favorite pizza joint I accidentally picked up Eric's diet Coke and took a swig. The carbonation was overwhelming and if there had been anywhere to spit it out, I would have! When I want a snack I usually reach for an apple instead of my chocolate covered pomegranates. I don't usually want junk food much anymore. In full confession, I did eat some cheesy popcorn one evening last week. But I didn't feel bad about it because I never committed to giving anything up, just to adding healthy choices.

If any of you have read up on Audrey Hepburn, then you know that she never let her weight get above 103. Some say that she didn't look healthy and that weight shouldn't be emulated. However, up until 2007 my weight fluctuated between 99 in the summer and 105 in the winter. In the last eight years I've stopped losing my winter weight and slowly climbed up to 122. (I only weighed 128 when Sadie was born!) So far this year I have lost 4 pounds. I am going to use Audrey Hepburn's 103 as my goal. Since she was 5 inches taller than me, this weight won't look as pronounced on my frame.  I am not going to attempt to get her 21 inch waist! My waist was 25 inches when I got married. I measured today and it was 25 1/2, so I'm not worried about that. My extra baggage is in my rear end. Big sigh.

We've had a pretty mild winter and been able to get out and walk most weekends. Today we hiked on Lookout Mountain for a couple of hours. Adding more exercise to my routine is also part of my healthier diet plan. It's nice to have something beside work to think about all the time.

How's that for a very candid post?

Casserian Engeri

All the children are well.

This is the greeting and response that we learned at our annual back-to-school professional development this year. Each year the director of elementary education for our district gives each of us a phrase to hang up somewhere to remind us of our mission. Last year it was "Mess with my pigs" in reference to the Bible story of the pigs who had the demons driven out of them and went over the cliff. There was actually a practical application in that for us, and boy did they mess with our pigs last year!

This year we are seeing the fruits of our labors. I posted an article on facebook in anticipation of our mid-year universal computer screening and the dread that will accompany it as we begin to wade through the mountain of data it will create. I hate thinking of my students as "numbers". But if I have to, it is good to know that they all are where they need to be. Only one student missed the cut scores. That is incredibly good news.

Along those same lines. We had a literacy cadre meeting after school this week and our principal shared the reading level data for our district. Our school had the biggest gains in first grade of any other school! My principal was almost in tears. It is pretty amazing the progress I'm seeing this year. I can only take some of the credit, as the kids are the ones doing the work.

A Lunch Date

We had lunch in Knoxville with Madeleine and then she played the tour guide around campus and town.

This is the checkerboard pattern under the clock that UT is famous for.

I don't remember going up in the Sunsphere when we went to the 1982 World's Fair, but we went up today.

It is a lot bigger on the inside than it looks. (Kind of like the Tardis! haha) I think there are 4 floors, but only the first one is open to the public (for free!) on a daily basis. There are good views of the city and campus as well as the surrounding mountains. It is almost impossible to take pictures inside because of the lighting.

A little bit of trivia. The world's largest Rubics Cube is on permanent display in Knoxville. It turns by motor, but not in every direction and you can't touch it. When it was first placed, it worked like a regular Rubics Cube and you could touch it. It is a leftover from the World's Fair, although I don't remember it from then.

The only thing I remember from our trip there in 1982 is following another woman who looked like Mom from behind, until I realized I was lost from my family. I quickly found Granny and I think we were in the Chinese (or Japanese) pavilion. I also remember staying in our motel and Amy being excited by the beer commercials on TV. Ah, good times!

Celebrate Good Times!

I have been complaining about my job almost since the day I was hired. I have been frustrated with curriculum changes, endless testing, and more than my fair share of behavior problems. However, the past two days have been wonderful. Granted one of my little friends has been suspended and won't return until Monday.

One of the things we did this week was take a spelling inventory. This is like a spelling test, but then you give them points for things like initial sound, vowel sound, blends, etc. So they can get several points for one word and when you tally the columns up you have an idea of which spelling level they should be working on. All of my friends have made huge gains in their spelling ability since they took the inventory in August. I was most excited by one of my lowest students who has caught up with the rest of the class! Yay!

On the home front, Sadie has been accepted into the Masters of Accounting Program to begin this summer. We knew she would be, but it is fantastic to hear that it is official. Double yay!

Resolution #3

It took me a few days to come up with a third, and final, resolution for the year. There are all kinds of specific things I need to work on, but I want to keep everything sort of general this year. So my final resolution is to do better at keeping up with this blog. That sounds specific, but the general idea behind it is to keep everyone informed about what is going on around here.

That means I might be writing more about my other kids.

Or I might just be writing about horsing around the house.

Although my life seems pretty boring to me, some of you may be interested in what we are doing on a day-to-day basis. And if not, then no one's forcing you to read this!

In the meantime, I have been keeping up with my other resolutions so far (as of January 3!!!). We have all been getting better at chess, I finished one of Madeleine's books she had to read for school last semester, and I've made quite a dent in our supply of oranges.

Well, back to work on Monday so we'll see if I can keep up with the resolutions once I step back into real life.

Resolution #2

Eat more fruits and vegetables.

I am going to concentrate on which foods I am adding to my diet, instead of which foods I should take out of my diet. Over time I hope there will be a natural shift to overall healthier eating habits.