Today was foggy and gray.  Yesterday was foggy and gray.  I am so sick of winter, I can barely stand it!  The Student Senate actually held an "I Hate Snow Day" last week where everybody dressed in summer clothes and played outdoor games in the atrium during lunch.  Now thats a dress-up day that I completely support!  I donned my fuschia sun dress (with a little cardigan, naturally), painted my toenails to match, and dug out my polka dot flip flops.  What a happy day, despite my freezing toes!

Example: SNOW up to your chest!
This is my sister on V-Day.  Yes, the snow was really that high.  Oy.

Example 2:  you can't drive anywhere to relieve your cabin fever because of the SNOW.
I took this picture driving back to Pierre after Valentine's Day.  I was supposed to leave the day before, but couldn't.  Guess why?  Blowing SNOW.  UGH.  I think 2010 wins for Worst Winter EVER.

Forgive my rant, I'm really wishing I lived somewhere else right now.

Part of why I hate winter is I just get sick of everything, including my hair.  I usually get a new cut about this time every year, this year was no exception!

My mom and sister have been begging me to post new pics of my haircut.  I haven't quite gotten used to styling it yet, so don't judge!

Last one is a bit blurry, yes, sorry, but you get the point.

To compare, here was my hair at Christmas.  You add 2 months of growth to this to get how much hair I just chopped off!
Yes, N, I stole your picture.  ;)

I was soooo not looking forward to doing laundry and cleaning my house this weekend.  I have yet to finish the cleaning part, but don't worry, I still have a day and a half of weekend left!  Most of all, I was dreading the overflowing sink of ginormous pots and pans awaiting me.  Then, I remembered these!

They're called gloveables and T's mom got them for me for my birthday.  It's much more fun to do loads of dishes when you have fun accessories to help and keep your hands silky soft!  (I just did an exfoliating sugar scrub this morning....)  I donned my gloveables, lit my all-time favorite candle:

and put on my favorite Pandora station (based on Debussy, Ravel, and Britten), and dug into my mountain of Calphalon.  I almost forgot that I hate doing dishes!

By the way, these were taken with my new svelte cherry red camera.  Not too shabby, eh?

Currently waiting for the tsunami to hit Hawaii.  Watching live feed on Fox News...

I don't know what's come over me, I just stopped blogging, didn't I?

Lots has happened, but I will be brief!

My choir performed for an audience of music teachers at SDSU.  It went really well, I kind of want to figure out a way to post a recording.  Maybe I'll figure it out this weekend.

The day before, we had a day trip for Small Group Contest.

We had another concert with completely different music the next week, which involved 2 guest conductors, massive rehearsal schedules, etc. etc. etc.  It also went very well!!!!!


This weekend T and I baked 7 dozen cookies for my choir kiddos because they're awesome.

Then there were conferences from 5-8:30 on Tuesday  night.  What a bunch of hooey!

I got a new camera, and have yet to post any pics with it!  (Thanks, mom!)

As you can see, my school days have been ridiculously busy.  This means that my home schedule involves getting home at 4, completely crashed for 2 hours, and then lethargically going off to my evening activities.  February has nearly wiped me out, friends.  On top of all of that, I got sick, too.

It's nice to be back to a less stressful life, a relaxed life, where I get to spend time with my husband, watch the Olympics (I am soooooo in love with the Olympics, it's ridiculous.)  and just be me!

The med school admissions committee meets this Saturday for their final decisions and we should find out a definitive answer next week about USD.  Please PRAY!!!

Has anybody else had a February like me?

Do you have any idea how I can post a sound file of our choir?  Help please!

People : An honorable invite - Capital Journal Pierre, SD newspaper since 1881

Woo hoo!  There we are.  :D  I heart my kiddos!!!!!

This is why I've been wanting to pull my hair out for the last month...

I came home from work early today because I kind of felt like throwing up.  There's been a weird stomach thing going on all day with me, and I could barely get through Concert Choir, so I came home to lie down for awhile.  After about 4 hours on the couch, I felt better so I got up and made a cake!

Since T is on his mission trip in Juarez, Mexico, I decided to have some pals over for German chocolate cake.  I've never made a double layer cake before, but I think it turned out pretty good!  Yummmm.  Here you can see it on my gorgeous Tiffany cake plate that we got for our wedding.  It's the first time I've used it, but definitely not the last!  Love it!

Wow friends, wow.  It's been an incredible day!  We were having a really great Concert Choir rehearsal when all of a sudden two counselors and the band director walk in the classroom with very serious looks on their face.  They said they needed to talk to me for a few minutes.  My mind naturally assumed the worst, like a bunch of my choir kids had been involved in some sort of serious disobedience or somebody died.  Needless to say, I was freaking out a little bit on the inside.  That is, until they informed us that they were the advisors for our school's chapter of National Honor Society and that they needed to deliver a letter to me on their behalf.  I opened the letter and read it to myself and suddenly exclaimed, "Oh my gosh, I'm shocked!"  The NHS voted me "Teacher of the Year!"  The kids all knew what it was about and as soon as I said that, they erupted into applause.  I was floored!  Those little stinkers.  I'm so honored!  Eeeee!

By the way, T fixed my red sparkly vacuum.  He said he had to pull a small cat out of the belt, or something like that.  Apparently it works fine now, and he vacuumed my rug just to prove it to me.  :D  T left today for a mission trip to Mexico with a bunch of men from our church.  He's never been on one before and I'm so excited for him.  I also wish I could be there with him!

I'm so excited to get out of town this weekend.  I haven't left since I came home on New Year's Eve.  Getting VERY stir crazy.  I'm supposed to go up to Minneapolis to see my sissy perform.  I was so excited to see my fam and see her perform, but alas, the forecast says freezing rain and snow.  Yuck.

Well, off to do some laundry.  Giddyup.

Well, my night is shot.  I had grand plans of cleaning my apartment, and it all centered around getting out my red sparkly vacuum and getting rid of the white flecks of fuzz on my black rug.  That is, until my vacuum started smoking while it was desperately trying (and failing) to remove all white fuzz.  Grrr.  T has vowed to fix my red sparkly vacuum tomorrow before he goes to Mexico for a week and I'm stuck with a fuzzy black rug for another week.  I apologize for the lack of pictures of the smoking vacuum, it just hasn't been my day.

Why have I not written since last week, you ask?  Well, dear friends, I have been out with some sort of freakish flu virus.  Why freakish, you ask?  Because the entire time I was waffling between shivering and sweating my body temp hung around a chilly 97F.  T told me that some people's body temp is normally lower than the normal 98.6F, but I don't ever seem to remember mine being that much lower than the "norm."  I'd say maybe my fancy high-tech digital thermometer had suffered a similar fate as my red sparkly vacuum, except that it isn't a fancy high-tech digital thermometer.  It's an old-fashioned one and I watched T take it from it's plastic package.  It's brand spankin' new.  Oh well, I'm feeling much better now.  No more sweating, rolling chills, achy skin, yadda yadda yadda.

Now for the real reason you're reading this post.  Yes, today is the day that T's med school letter almost came.  I rushed home as usual, opened the mailbox to find nothing but a letter from the NRA and a catalogue.  Boo.  I texted T and told him, then he told me to check his e-mail.  There it was.  The glimmering e-mail of hope or despair, I couldn't stand the wait.  Well, the committee reviewed his app on Jan. 30....yadda yadda...his app has been pended until their next meeting, Feb. 27.  We'll find out the first week of March.  YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING ME!!!!  Haven't we been put through enough agony?!  Hadn't I calculated the day the letter should come down to the day based upon December's committee meeting date?  Allowed for secretaries' dictation?  Mail delays?  Inter-office post?  Ack.  Well, at least now we know when to be expecting the letter.  The only thing that stinks is that FAFSA stuff is due mid-February.  Now we won't even know if he's in by that time.  Grrrrr.  Not happy.  Especially not happy because they sent an e-mail instead of a nice letter, you know, the kind with a stamp.  Double grrrr.

You pile all that up with all the crappy stuff that happened at school today (don't even get me started...) and it was a pretty crappy day.  Triple Grrrr.

I want my red sparkly vacuum back.