two more weeks two more weeks two more weeks

I keep chanting that little diddy to myself. First it was 8 more weeks 8 more weeks 8 more weeks and it has progressively shrunken over the weeks. What this diddy means to me is that in two more weeks I will be done with "classroom" school forever. I'm at the point of no return in which I DETEST SCHOOL WITH A PASSION. I'm glad it happened my last quarter and not my first quarter or else I would have never survived. I am taking three classes this quarter and I hate hate hate one of them (the worst I've ever had in my grad. school experience including the teacher), like one of them but find it tedious but at least the teacher is nice, and love love love one of them including my favorite teacher (Law & Ethics I love you). My teachers know there is something wrong with me this quarter. I go to class with literally a grimace on my face and make annoying noises under my breath and roll my eyes a lot, it's as if I was in high school again. I'm just so done. Unfortunately, all my classes have seemed to save all the assignments for the very very end and packed a lot in at the very end so I find myself with a gazillion papers and presentations. I can handle the papers but what I hate more than ever is group presentations. Here at Seattle U, and I rarely criticize it, they tend to do a lot of this and it is something I consistently rate them on. My advisor told me that if you are sick of school then you are ready for internship. Oh yes, bring it on and NOW please. I start in three weeks. It's about f-r-e-a-k-i-n' time already.

It's real

It was a good mail day today. I received a check in the mail from some random thing, I received Better Homes and Garden Magazine and lastly Jim and I received our first wedding gift. There was this giant box from Target and I tried to remember what I had ordered but low and behold I had not ordered anything. It was a wedding gift! I opened the box up and in it was a beautifully wrapped package from some old friends of the family. Now I don't know what to do with it. Do we open it now? Do we wait until the wedding? And if I open it now when do I send the thank you card? I know what Martha would say but what do you say? Do we open it? What I do know is that this wedding is really happening and SOON!

Gotta love this kids creativity

I saw this on fail blog and thought it was so awesome!

Book Stamps and Senator Kennedy

I love reading. I love libraries. I love staying up late in my bed reading with my head lamp on. I am currently taking a literacy class and just read a chapter that made me want to jump out of my chair and write this blog. I've always been an avid reader. I loved the babysitter club series growing up and Amelia Bedelia before that.

I was amazed to read that the average middle income family has about 199 children books at home and the average middle income school holds about 392 in each individual classroom. Compare that to lower income families where there are just 2.6 children books in the average home and 54 children books in the average classroom. Contrast that with the lowest income home with just .4 books for kids at home and just 47 books in the classroom. This is absolutely ridiculous! I found this hard to swallow! I can't imagine not having books in the home. Heck, Jim and I's favorite date nights are going to half price books or Barnes and Knoble.

I then remembered legislation that Senator Kennedy was working on. He had introduced federal legislation that would have provided children from low-income families with books stamps to exchange for books at book fairs and bookstores. This effort, which was modeled after the federal Food Stamp program, unfortunately was not funded. Can you imagine allowing children from low SES backgrounds to be able to "purchase" books. What an incredibly awesome idea! I'm going to see where this legislation is at and see if I can't support it in some way.

Kids not only need to read a lot, but they also need lots of books they can read accurately, fluently, and with comprehension right at their fingertips! They also need access to books that entice them, attract them to reading be it Junie B. Jones to Captain Underpants to Harry Potter to the Twilight series!

Preparations

So things are well underway in the land of wedding planning bliss. Bliss probably isn't the exact word I would use here...maybe something more along the lines of "chaos personified" works better. Once the invites go out I will be feeling much better. BUt to get that done there have been many little pieces to them. I have been scouring the ads of late using every coupon I could possible convince the cashiers to use. Next on my list for invites are custom made stamps and ordering of the other half of the pictures. Breathe. However they are slotted to be sent out on the day I move into Jim and my new place. So packing, moving, taking three tough classes, working out with a trainer, and planning a wedding have been a little taxing as of late. Plus this hot weather makes me want not to do anything at all. My body has been waking up (read-WIDE AWAKE) at about 5am or so, so I'm going on about roughly 4-5 hours of sleep a night which my body isn't handling well (read-summer cold/horrid sore throat). Plus a horrible sun burn was blessed upon my body when I procrastinated homework and went to the lake with family for two hours. Really that was my fault though, due to me not applying sun screen.