And the Best Husband Award Goes to.....Sam!!!!

I just have to say, that I have the BEST husband EVER! I was totally having a bad day today (parents are SO the worst part of my job!) and I was just cruising around on the internet this evening, while I'm listening to the music on our blog. Then the song "Love of my Life" comes on. Sam walks over to me, pulls me off the computer and slow dances with me! It TOTALLY made my night! He really just knows how to cheer me up! I'm so blessed to have such an AWESOME support in my life! I LOVE SAM!! :)!

BTW- I just find any excuse to post more pictures of our England trip whenever I can! :)! This pic of Sam is in the gardens at Hampton Court Palace (King Henry VIII's castle) in Surrey, England.

I got TAGGED!!

So I've been putting off this tag (sorry Tina!) because I REALLY don't know what to say that most people don't already know. We'll see how this goes.

Here are the rules:
1. Link to the person who tagged you. Tina
2. Post the rules on your blog.
3. Write six random things about yourself.
4. Tag six random people at the end of your post by linking to their blogs.
5. Let each person know they have been tagged by leaving a comment on their website.
6. Let your tagger know when your entry is up.

1. I HATE to drive. I guess it stems from the fact that I always had older siblings to drive me around, but I really don't enjoy driving. I'm very content being a passenger.

2. I am ADDICTED to children's books (surprise, surprise!). My classroom book orders and book fairs are very guilty pleasures for me. I mostly enjoy picture books (some of the pictures are AMAZING!), but I do enjoy some good chapter books (Sideways Stories of Wayside School, Chronicles of Narnia, The Twits, Harry Potter, etc).

3. I was just nominated (by my principal) to be our Technology Lead Teacher at our school. With this I get to fix everyone's technology problems at our school and in return I get a minimal stipend. YEAH FOR ME!

4. I really don't like doing the dishes. I'd much rather do the laundry, clean a toilet, or vaccuum. The sad thing is that we have a dishwasher, and I just can't get myself to enjoy putting the dishes in the dishwasher. Sam is the appointed one to put the dishes in and out of the dishwasher. (I really don't understand my problem with the dishes!)

5. I am a perfectionist (especially when it comes to my classroom). Sometimes it's a really good thing, but most of the time I stress myself out because it's not perfect. Oddly enough, I never expect perfection out of my students. I always seem to get these great ideas to do in my classroom and then I get frustrated halfway through the project because it doesn't turn out the way I wanted it to. For example, last year I made my students DVD's of pictures throughout the school year. I worked on that DVD for 5 hours one night because I couldn't get the music to match up just right. I eventually just burned the DVD's the way they were.

6. I'm terrified of bees. When I was in college, I was stung by a bee and I developed an allergic reaction to the bee sting. Luckily, it wasn't too bad of an allergic reaction, but I always run away everytime I see bees.

OK I'm FINALLY done! This was seriously the hardest post that I've ever done!

People I'm tagging: Emers,
Kyle and Amanda, Tiffany, Christi (it's payback!! Haha!), Margo

Our Mammoth Lakes Trip!

Sam and I just can't resist going on trips to the mountains! We just got back (ok, we've actually been home for like a week now) from spending 3 days in Mammoth Lakes with my family. My family rented a condo and we had a good little time. It was a QUICK trip (cursed Sam's lack of days off!), but it was well worth it. Here are just a few of our pics from our trip.

Kyle and Amanda had the privilege (heheeh...aka, they were carless) of driving around with us for the weekend. Here are the two love birds as we're parking to go run into a store (we had a catastrophe...one of my rubber bands broke on one of my pigtails as we were driving to Mammoth Mountain.... so we had to go find a store!).

We took a gondola ride (which was pretty scary, I might add) up to the top of Mammoth Mountain, with an elevation of 11,000. In this pic, we're looking down on the Mammoth valley from on top of the mountain.

This is a picture looking at the mountains that are near Yosemite National Park, from on top of Mammoth Mountain. After we took numerous pictures, we also had a nice little picnic with quite a view!!

Ah! The ever wonderful close-up of the photographer.....ME!! Notice the pigtails are all in place, thanks to the rubber bands we found at a local store!! Woohoo!! This was taken from Mammoth Mountain.


**Caution! This picture may be too hot for some of you to handle!**Here Sam is flexing his muscles. I think the mountains make him feel all masculine. Nice hat dear! Men and their sense of fashion!!

After we went to Mammoth Mountain, we went to Devil's Postpile. Here they have the oddest looking hexagon shaped rocks! Oh well! It makes for an interesting picture!

Sam and I are taking a break from hiking in Devil's Postpile. We found a cute little bridge and stream here and so we wanted to take some pictures by it!

My parents resting in the shade at Devil's Postpile. I think Sam's odd fashion sense is rubbing off on my Dad. My Dad lifted the edges of his hat up because he thought it looked "cool", and you KNOW you can't argue with a lawyer (did ya like that joke Dad? Hahahaha!).

On our second day in Mammoth, we went to Yosemite National Park for the day. It was beautiful, but I don't think it was the right time of year to go. Most of the waterfalls had already dried up and it was close to 100 degrees in the park. We're hoping to go earlier in the summer next year to see the waterfalls and the nicer weather.

All in all, it was a great trip. Alas, my summer has come to an end. School starts tomorrow and so that'll be the end of our trips for a while. But, what a good summer it's been!

Lake Tahoe!

Sam and I had the opportunity of going with his family to Lake Tahoe for a few days this past week. We had a good time, but boy was it crowded! His parents have a cabin up there and they usually go up there every year. Most of Sam's brothers and sisters and their families came up. There were 14 of us in this cabin (and it's not a very large cabin). We had fun though. Sam and I and some of his siblings slept out on the deck under the stars. Gosh, it's amazing how clearly you can see all of the stars up in the mountains! Anyway, here are some pics of our trip!

Here's a pic of the cabin. Yes we did fit 14 people in there!

Our first day there, we went to the beach at Lake Tahoe. The water was FREEZING!! I heard someone say it was 60 degrees. Sam and I went into the water briefly....and then we just relaxed on the beach.


Another picture of the lake. Look at how beautiful the water is!




On the second day, Sam and I went to the river behind the cabin. Well, it's suppose to be a river, but with their lack of rain, it was more like a stream. We had fun tromping through the river and just enjoying the beautiful scenary!



Here's another picture of the area around the river.

Here we have Sam's sister Megan, and her 3 kids (who we NEVER get to see....so I was excited they came up to Tahoe).

Sarah (Sam's sister) and I relaxing by the river while our husbands are gallivanting around in the river (what's it with men and their need for exploration??!?!)

On our way home, Sam wanted to go the "scenic route". It was quite scenic and we got some good pictures, but the road was sure twisty and twirly. At least the pictures turned out nice!

Well, that's all of our pictures of Lake Tahoe......until next year!

Mama Mia!

So I gave in to the hype (I'm not a big movie watcher) and saw "Mama Mia" today with my Mom. I thought it was a cute movie....a bit provocative, but good. I had a fun time rocking out to the songs (I even went and bought the soundtrack right after I saw the movie). But what I was THOROUGHLY disappointed in is what happened to Colin Firth's (a.k.a. Mr. Darcy's) character!!! MR. DARCY, SAY IT AIN'T SO!!!! Now nobody could possibly be more handsome than my husband, but I feel like the 100 hours of my life that I've spent watching "Pride and Prejudice" was all a waste! *sigh* Oh well, I guess I'll continue rocking out the soundtrack (is it any surprise that I'm listening to it right now as I'm typing this post!! Hahah!) and wish that it had happened to Pierce Brosnan, who was also in the movie!! On the bright side, I thought Meryl Streep looked gorgeous in the movie, considering that she's like 60 years old!! What did everyone else think of the movie?

What are people thinking?!?!

Ok, so being a teacher I have come across some crazy names. One year I had a Fabrece (yes, it's pronounced like Fabreeze). In fact, one of my Spanish speaking kids said, "Mrs. Evans, isn't his name like the air freshner?" I almost burst out laughing. This year I had a girl named Blessing. She was born on Christmas, and so I guess she was a blessing. This week I came across an article on MSNBC where people write in about the worst kid names they have seen. I thought the 2 names I had were bad, but some of these other ones are just hillarious!!

My husband and I had a deal. I'd name a girl and my husband would name a boy. We got a boy. His name is Judas Christian. I've relaxed about it, but several members of our families hate it.--Anonymous, Vancouver, WA

Orangejello (pronounced or-on-ja-lo), and Lemonjello (pronounced lay-mon-ja-lo). Jell-O was the only thing she could eat towards the end of her pregnancy.--Anonymous, Winston Salem, NC

Violence is the name of a child born here in Howard County, IN. The doctors and the social workers tried talk them out of the name, but to no avail. --Anonymous, Kokomo, IN

A local official in Parkersburg, WV was named Harry Pitts.--Anonymous, Parkersburg, WV

A cousin of a friend of mine named her daughter Tyranny. My uncle (a police officer) locked up a woman named Sh*thead, only without the asterisk- pronounced Shi-TAYd.--Anonymous, Baltimore, MI

About 20-25 years ago I knew a man who gave his son the name "Alias." His girlfriend, the mother of the child, apparently thought the name was pretty cool so there is a man now walking this earth named "Alias." This must raise some eyebrows when he fills out a job application or experiences a minor traffic stop. I don't even want to think about an encounter with Homeland Security.--Anonymous , Wilbraham, MA

Brock Lee. I'm not sure what they were thinking! Or even if they thought about it until after the fact.--Lisa Stricker, Clarksburg, WV

Pajama (pronounced pay-jeh-meh). [The mother] mentioned she was looking through a Sears catalog when she was pregnant and the name jumped out at her and she knew right then and there, this was to be her daughter's name. I asked her how to spell “Pay-jeh-meh” and she replied P-A-J-A-M-A. . I thought to myself, oh no! Her poor daughter is named after Sears catalog sleepwear. --John Panzella, San Diego, CA

A friend of mine told me about a girl on a soccer team named "Levitra". Seriously. People were yelling, "Good job Levitra!" --Anonymous, Dublin, CA

In grade school there was a boy in my class named Rusty Nail.--Anonymous, Stephens’s city, VA

I was once at a national park and heard this fake-blonde, trophy wife was yelling at her daughter. "Cascade! Cascade!" I knew she had thought the name sounded cool, trendy, and upper class. All I could think was, "great. You named your kid after a laundry detergent!"--Sandra Trisdale, San Diego, CA

My son has a friend named Cole. That is not so bad, but his last name is Deggs. Now say his name together Cole Deggs. The kids all called him Cold Eggs!--Teresa Walls, Ransomville, NY

My Coworker was pregnant and I asked her if she had a name picked out yet. She said no, but she wanted to stay away from weird names, like the one her sister had given her niece. The name? Felanie. Like Melanie, but with an F. If there's such thing as cursing your child, I think that may take the cake.--Catherine Sullivan, Anchorage, AK

I don't wanna grow up!

Have you ever been so lazy that you become busy being lazy? I think that's what happened this week. I had NO desire to do ANYTHING this week, so I didn't get too much accomplished, yet I remained totally busy this week. I don't really know how this happened, but it did. I did go shopping like every day this week (Sam's REALLY looking forward to me going back to school next month so that I don't have the time to go shopping!!). Anyway, I was suppose to make this post this past week, but I was of course too lazy, so I'm going to post it now!!

Last weekend, Sam and I REALLY wanted to go camping! We looked at the cost of gas plus Sam's lack of vacation days, so we decided revert back to our childhood days and go camping in our backyard!! We had a lot of fun sleeping out under the stars in our backyard. Unfortunately, we were awakened at 7AM to our cat, Oliver. He had climbed halfway up our tent and was just hanging there meowing for us to let him in. I wish we could've gotten a picture of that. However, we did take a picture of our tent!! Notice our cots bulging out of our tent! Now that we have these awesome cots (thanks Emers), I think we need a bigger tent!