Well, then.

I just caught up on Michelle, Erica, and Kim's blogs! Nice!

Also, the newies from immediate fam members! Woo!

So, I'm full speed into December tomorrow, as I'm sure we all are! YES LORD, yes Lord, yes, yes Lord!

My bball team is quite shakey right now - not learning very quickly. ARGH! I'll stay positive, it's only the 2nd practice after that long Turkey break!

First game next Monday at home (Dec.6)

Tonight I was thinking of how I'm going to get a huge, the hugest, peanut butter milkshake from the Merced Sonic on our way up north...FOR GOOD!

A farewell milkshake!

We'll take 99 to the famous I - 5 all the way to Canada, be homeless for a week straight and move into our new rented home in Alaska as of June 15th-sh 2005!

Our anniversary, Grampa's birthday! Alaska's new birthday in our minds!

Anyways, this week I'm slopping through The Scarlet Letter and To Kill a Mocking Bird lesson plans with only a week and a half until exams!

I must say I'd enjoy the storylines better if I wasn't forced to teach them at such a rapid rate, all the while dodging complaints of boredom and lathargic teenage whine.

On a good note, the Lord and I have been talking more lately. We were on a good cruise control enjoying life for a while there! It was good, this is better :)

Have a great first day of December everyone! Glad the 1040s are home!

Another day off! Ahh! Relaxing!

I've been enjoying online shopping (researching really) all last night and today, and that's fun!

Don't be bashful about posting your lists again...more intactly, thoroughly with old lists that is! (Like Matt, define "guitar accessories", or maybe I'm feeling timid on purchasing the right thing of those.)

And so shall I post some ideas for Casey and I's.

Casey:
1. Star Wars Trilogy DVD
2. Dukes of Hazzard Season 1 DVD
3. Dukes of Hazzard Soundtrack CD
4. Dirty Harry DVD Box Set
5. Fletch Lives DVD

Mary:
1. Goo Goo Dolls in Alaska DVD (usually at larger Best Buys)
2. Nice photo album that holds a lot of pictures (Target or whatnot)
3. Big cd case with sleeves for lots of cds (too many burned albums laying around :)
4. Vaccum Bags - for vaccum packing blankets and clothes
5. Earphones: fat, cushiony, complete ear covering ones (sony has some for $24/circuit ciy)
6. Speakers that plug into the IPOD earphone jack (for portable use/not plug in)
7. Gift cert. to gap, itunes, bestbuy, tower...

Do we want to do a sibling gift exchange? Limit $25, or just do whatever anyone wants to? Buy little for all? I'm game for either way! I get rich from tennis this Tuesday! WOOOOOOHOOOOO!

Talk to yous later!

I really enjoyed the Lake Arrowhead cabin and time with the fam this week!

It was so snowy, and yet beautifully sunny and pleasant! AND...SNOWBOARDING! YES!

YES, yes, yes!

I was impressed with how quickly Matt, Tracey, and Mike got into the flow of that sweet sport! You need to come up to the mts. by us for more adventure with that!

The cabin was neat. Odd. But, neat. I loved the crackling fireplace. It was a total prelude to our Alaskan dreams unfolding as we speak! 6 more months! WOW!

Mom, thanks for trying to teach us to knit. We were quite silly, but you were an amazing teacher. Again sometime? Or maybe I'll surprise you by teaching myself sometime? I wish....maybe.

Last night was fun, just laughing together and sitting around. I wish we could have had more time together. Have you watched the video of our game time yet Dad? I should have gotten up and set my new camera up for that too.

Right now, Casey is watching football and enjoying more vacation time like so. We got home in about 6 hours, and passed the time planning our cabin (with those fresh ideas of "what not to do" from the Arrowhead time).

It has come to my attention to have a side business of shirt making for local schools. I'm going to do more research on this topic - as far as screen printing, and even embroidering. That would be a fun thing! A side thing to teaching for a few years.

However, writing would the main goal in my mind this second! Wish we could have talked about this topic this weekend dad!

By the way, we absolutely love the camera and video taped some of the other storms and desert we drove through today!

I'm checking out my new music from Matt, Dad, and Mike. Talk to you Animalas later!

Well, YES!

Such a good life! I'll start by sharing the weekend festivities, then onto the higher % ideas.

Friday came about quickly last week, and it was a wonderous relief! Friday night Casey and I had a date to Baja Fresh and Sam's Club.

It was so fun getting all the Thanksgiving food for our excitement with the Edwards! I will email Tracey with the list, so you can figure the the rest :) So fun!

(hey, does anyone know if 2 spaces or 1 after a period is the accepted professional usage in typing? I was taught by Joan to use 2....)

As far as the trip, it consumes my mind today with glee! I'm packing my bags, and getting all our gear (kitchen stuff, warm clothes, blankets) around. Bo'ey is super cuteably ready as well! I pray for his joyful calmness to come along too :)

And right now, the 1040s are on a plane!

Saturday at Fresno Pacific and State Univerisities:
Had to leave at 8 a.m. to go up to an all area FCA Olympics event. Fifteen FCA students (and non-FCA ones) went up to Fresno Pacific - sister to Azusa of couse - to do wacky sporting and team work events. They competed for a FCA camp scholarship, but the point was sharing the Jesus!

Vanessa Vicruszk;akd (Greek last name), who was an Olympic softball player this summer was the speaker. She played for Fresno State and got the opportunity to play for Greece b/c her mom was born in Greece - and Greece needed players. They allowed anyone with Greek decent to come represent their country in this sport, a sport they don't or couldn't field themselves.

This girl was a normal softball girl, but not mirl ;), and she was really down to earth and loves the Lord. Her story was one of God putting unbelievable love in her heart for her teammates and especially sharing him with Olympic athletes this summer. One of her Greek/American teammates came to the Lord.

It was great to be encouraged to let God change your heart! Wow! I watched Bruce Almighty and one of his lines were, "MAN! God, you could change my life for the better in 5 minutes if you wanted to! SO WHY DON'T YOU!"

But the part I love is that he changes us, our outlook, or heart, our love, our eyes, NOT THE DUMB TEMPORAL circumstances. Thank you Almighty!

So today I slept and have hot wings cooking as Casey is about to come back from a baseball fundraiser and watch his video taped Colts win!

Now, two awesome things from Justin's Blog:
1)Rocky and Pillow
2)I praise God with my strength. I worship God with my weakness.

Thank you for your words Justin! Even that much more sweeter to be together Wednesday!

Dad, you had some great points as well! God is in everything we do and talk about!

I'll end on a quote from Tracey's blogs:
"Lord connects you, really knits your soul to someone else's, it is forever sometimes."

Can't wait to see you all! Mom I'm looking for a little craft project to do (today in Merced :) Matt let that work roll right out of ya, and then get up to the cabin asap! Mike or anyone, should we bring our PS2 or Justin splurging his XBox?

"It is true."

I like that statement from dad. I like that statement from God!

That concert sounded sweet J and Mike!

Dear Ohioans:

I would bring a sweatshirt, long sleeve shirt, gloves, and beanie/ski hat, and not a full blown parka/coat deal.

It's suppose to be sunny and 50/60 degrees all next week in Lake Arrowhead. And, I'm not thinking snowboarding will happen :(

Perhaps, even no on the gloves and ski hat - but you may want them for outside play (and of course Mom will want her new earmuffs! YAH!). Side bar for oddness: this California world gets darker so fast in the evening - therefore seems colder than it is...or something.

Otherwise, I'll bring some extra clothing, sweatshirts, winter socks, etc. just in case - for you cross country travellers.

Well, basketball:
It got a violent, "political" shove into a decision for cuts tomorrow. I now basically have to keep everybody, and that's annoying. Oh well, God's will be done. I will work for Him!

This weekend I'm helping the whole FCA group go to a "Olympics" competition outing of sports, and then we go to a Fresno football game! It will be fun, yet 8 a.m. to 11 p.m.

You heard right, p.m.! The last dealio I did like that was an 8th grade class field trip to somewhere long and far in a chartered bus...heh.

Okay, Sunday sleep it is! And Sam's it is for Turkey time purchasing! WOO! Later.

p.s. some new albums I delight in: Lisa Loeb's new one, Gwen Stefani's solo debut...and others I can't think of this second.

Thought I'd type a little bit before my meeting at school this afternoon.

Had practice already, on this half day of school. Our school is in the process of getting "accredited" like colleges have to - and this happens every 6 years.

Bla,bla,bla.

I've been the only coach coaching bball this and last week. It's been fun. I love that sport, as we all know.

But the non-fun part happens Friday morning, when I post the team! I have to cut 3 people, and want to get it over with a.s.a.p.

What else is new and good to talk about?

Well, I've been having fun with food lately! Some cool magazines and whatnot are helping me be wise and productive with food (as a workout necessity).

One of my goals to become more knowledgeable about food, so it is second nature. Second nature in my mind to eat and make!

For instance, HEY EVERYBODY! In case you didn't know, we should never go more than 5 hours without a meal or snack (except for sleeping time).

Our body has a fine mingling system of the right levels of things.

If you let your body go too long without fuel (food!) it overcompensates in many areas (hormones, metabolism, acid, and insulin levels).

In other words, YOUR BODY GETS MESSED UP AND CONFUSED! :)

It starts to take cells and fuel from other weird parts of your body - and muscle is the first to go - not fat! HEY! WHOA!

That's why so many people today are overweight, let alone getting issues like acid reflux. The body is overcompensating for the slop we put in it.

Well, some of you are no doubt bored, but I'm into it obviously!

I've been thinking about being a nutritionalist and/or fitness instructor. Perhaps even get my grad work in it...or not.

But I am definitely going to pursue this hobby more and more! It's fun to get healthy! Thank God for our amazing working bodies :)

Tonight's the big football game of the year!

Too bad, I don't care for watching it.

I'll probubly go to the second half ;) Casey and his teacher buddy (a new young teacher who coaches varsity boys bball) are playing ESPN bball on PS2 and then heading to the game. I would have befriended my teacher buddy too, but didn't want Casey's pal to think we were trying to match make :) HAHAHAHHAAHHA!

Plus, I'm thinking 2 and 1/2 hours of bball with students is enough time given to the school for today.

So, with this big game tonight - a big rival game and the last home game - I'm feeling like I'm living in the Hoosiers small town tonight. I feel like watching that classic movie tonight instead...

So Matt your blogs have been entertaining. That sweater guy is an odd ball of hilarity!

Guess what everybody, I found my Dido cd. I know, only dad will be happy about this. So I'm wondering why I don't have her other albums. So chill. Such simple enjoyment of music.

The POD shuffle is over as I bust that (Dido), and then Adrianne Serna from Northview High School in Sylvania. Yeah, picked up some local music at a sweet Mad Hatter like shop in North Toledo one solitude outing back in the day.

Last night Case and I watched "Grand Theft Parsons" with Johnny Knoxville. I'll give him props for actually being a good actor, but the movie is a 2 thumbs down bore.

Hmm...any recommendations for some other "good" rentals for this weekend. Again, I have to comment on how this is a sweet 4 full day weekend! AHhT! LOVE IT!

MIKE! I SO, so, so, SO did that too in my college classes. In fact, I filled up the most possible amount of journals as compared to any other part of my life, just by sitting through college classes and thinking, laughing at other students, mocking professors, writing, praying, planning, ...you know ignoring everything else academically.

I plan to go to grad school after we start a family. And it will be a grand pleasure to receive again! Ahh, receiving and formulating your own thoughts, as opposed to preparing all the right answers and spitting them out to high school kids.

Just so they can spit them back to me on a test. Hmm.....

It feels like Christmas break.

It's raining heavily as I type, and it's beautiful. HA!

I had one week off with no coaching. And it was slow. It was boring. I slept A LOT, and got less done.

It's good to be blessed with a job, though. An easy one. And then, a smaller job on top of it called coaching.

Man! Basketball is envigorating to my entire spirit.

Not persay the teaching, coaching, and running around of it all. Just the sport that I've played since 7th-ish grade.

As Matt referred to Springfield, VA, I remember having the impervious (what is that word?) basketball "unit" in P.E. I loved it! I never played it before, except shooting around on our 7 foot garage hoop, watching Matt and Matt Haslinger slam all over it, and us littles flying off a mini-trampoline trying too.

We had to play coed basketball in that Washington Irving Junior High gym. The only things I remember are some of the little 7th grade guys saying, "Hey you're good at basketball".

And I sluffed it off with super shy "I'm from Ohio" types of non-verbals.

How fun! Sports, I love them.

I don't want to play them for real any more (except adventure ones), but I do want to play with my kids someday and just have fun.

And coaching that sport especially is just too fun. I know too much about it. Such a student of the game I became at DC.

Well, that's all on that personal sports recollection. Glad you made it through that.

I'm able to think now that we have this mini-Christmas break, which of course was to celebrate those who have given their lives for our freedom.

I thank God for time off, and for those veterans.

Justin, your blog was right on. Straight to the soul of this history we're in right now. Noone will think too much of it 100 years from now.

But God is watching us. What are we doing? What talents?

Yeah, I'm encouraged by your words Justin.

Side note: Mom and Dad it was fun talking to you this week.

To bed now! Practice 8 a.m.

Muddy Buddy Report:

The first mile was STRAIGHT up hill and I pushed the bike, rather than ride it. I thought the rest of the race was going to be this difficult and started getting mad!

The runners were beating the bikers up the hill!

Tracey caught up to me and helped me push it!

After that, and a little more up hill, it was the funnest race ever! A lot of it was down hill, and me getting to do 3 of the miles on bike, IT WAS COMPLETELY AWESOME!

I was wondering if Tracey got to do any downhill fun, b/c I thought I was hogging it all!

Some of the gears I couldn't get working, so I was a little timid on the downhill. Other than that it was so awesome adrenaline pumping speed, with the wind watering my eyes. It was that fast! Think faster though!

There were 4 obstacles in between mile markers. One was a low net crawl (got our helmets caught on it every 2 seconds), one was monkey bars (the easiest), one was a triangle net crawl up and over thing, one was a high net climb on a blow up slide!

The last one was amazingly straight down on a slide after climbing quickly up the netted wall.

OH! I LOVED EVERY MINUTE OF THIS ADVENTURE RACE! And I know Tracey did too!

Don't forget that we had a foot deep mudd pit to army crawl through before the finish! OH! MAN! I absolutely loved last weekend!

Thanks for being my teammate Trace! And thanks to Matt, Kelly, and Spivey for cheering us on, and waiting forever through the clean up and awards/raffle deal!

I want to go over to this state park with Casey sometime, to bike it with him.

On a different note: I started basketball tryouts tonight!

It went very smoothly and nicely. It was just me and about 20 tryer-outters. I think I'll only have 11 players this year. There's not many young girls trying out, which is fine with me.

Only 2 more days of work for us this week! Veteran's Day Thurs, and a Friday off!

Great morning...AGAIN!

Encouragement to all, to get up just 15-20 mins. early than you need to!

It's really been giving a head clearing reality to me! HA!

Had a fun little breakfast creation again too. It was regular oatmeal with brown sugar, cinnamon, frozen berries - and all heated beautifully together.

Mmm, mmm, mmm!

I'm bringing HUGE pumpkin pies to the Thanksgiving excitement (from Sam's Club). Unfortunately last week they did not have cherry (Tracey :( But when I go purchase for real in 2 weeks, maybe they will have it. Other people's preferences? They have an amazing apple caramel one and pecan...whatever you all like, I'll get :)

I need to call Matt and Trace tonight, b/c don't forget everybody----OUR MUDDY BUDDY is finally this weekend!

Well, I can't think of anything else to write! Have a great Thursday :)

We have a President!

That was nice to see Ohio and Alaska pulling through for the guy!

Our high school "levy" went through as well. With projections of 1500 new students in the next 5 years, they are going to renovate and build new things and whatnots.

I've been sleeping a lot lately. Some sinuses came about, but I think the sleep sitch is b/c of the time change.

Today I even got up early, ran a mile, and did pilates. All with a foggy haze in my head. Last night, I just told myself: I'm taking control of my body and making myself get up.

What, with these 5 years of adulthood under my belt, I can get up if I have to...I could just never get up for myself.

For a workout. For a relaxing morning of taking my time, and even eating a slower breakfast. For some whispers from God.

p.s. Tracey, that magazine I got at REI had some amazing ideas for breakfasts. I'll bring it to San Jose and/or Thanksgiving.

I've been thinking about my parents lately. Just missing them. Just loving and appreciating what great people they are. Should call them later.

Can't wait to visit with my fam in about 2 and a 1/2 weeks.

Just saying hello!

Have a great Tuesday! Will write more later :)