SIGH....

Sigh*…my brain is beyond fried this week. There has been so much going on (mostly work related that is boring and I won’t get into), my brain feels like it has been moving nonstop…I can tell because I’ve been having lots of dreams and waking up throughout the nights. Take a rest, brain! It’s the weekend. Ohhh, it’s a busy, busy weekend…sigh*, maybe another time.

*Quick side note- I realize that much of the busy-ness is my doing and I love it. At moments it feels overwhelming, but I wouldn’t want it any other way- Occasionally I just need to sigh a little bit.

First, let me tell you how last week ended because I think it is worth noting and appreciating. Remember how I was commenting on how I don’t know that I would make caramel apples again because of the mess still a-waiting me in my kitchen- all over my kitchen? Well, right after work on Friday I had to go to a training at 826…it was an hour and a half long. Brian picked me up after and we stopped at Mr. Gyro’s for dinner and then went to the new ice cream place on Greenwood (which I actually didn’t totally love…boo)…then we went to my house. AND…Brian had cleaned the whole kitchen while I was at my training! Whaaat! Oh my gosh…what a SUPER fantastic and awesome surprise! Then…I walked further in the living room and there were my favorite flowers in a vase on the table! Yes! I actually felt a little sorry for the flowers because normally I would be so incredibly excited about them…I LOVE flowers…but I was just so thrilled about the clean kitchen, the flowers didn’t get the attention they deserved. Thanks Brian- you’re swell!

This week…

Another 826 field trip…a third grade class this week. It was crazy to me how different this class was from the second grade class last week. Since this is only the second field trip, it might have just been the particular classes versus the age…not sure. But the third grade class was like PULLING TEETH to get anything creative out of them. Every idea they came up with was just like ordinary life…the main character was a Bunny, he lived on a farm with other animals, liked to bounce and was looking for carrots. The volunteers worked hard to spice it up with the carrots being magical carrots that granted wishes, and the bunny can jump over tall buildings and long distances, etc…the kids seemed much more focused on what the other kids in their class were doing…many of the illustrations they did for their story was exactly the same as their neighbor. Do kids start losing that imagination and start worrying about what people think in between second and third grade? I asked my mom about it and she said she guessed it was just the particular class. I guess we will see next time.

On Tuesday night we went to a Theology Pub…one of our friends was giving a talk on Dante’s Divine Comedy. I thought it was super interesting. In the past few years I have been making an effort to read the ‘classics’, knowing that they are classics for a reason. Dante has been in the back of my mind for a while (ever since I encountered ‘Dante’s biggest fan’ in Florence who spends all his days reciting the Divine Comedy to whoever stops to listen), always seeming a little bit too intimidating. But hey, I read The Brothers K, which was SUPER intimidating, and actually liked it…so I think I can give this a try. Especially after the talk, and kind of having an idea of what to expect. I also really enjoy theological discussion in general, though sometimes think it can get a little bit pretentious… Gabriel handled all of the questions that came at him really, really well and never made it feel that way.

I am still on a bit of an ice cream making kick. Well, gelato…I still can’t bring myself to use full on heavy cream. This week we had another batch of the pumpkin- always a Fall favorite, nutella (chocolate-hazelnut) which tasted an awful lot like a frosty, and ‘harvest peach’…which was a bit of an experiment without a recipe. We wanted to do a fruit flavor and Brian suggested peaches…we got a can of peaches, I added a little bit of the juice from the can to the base mix, and then cut the peaches up into small pieces. Added some of the pumpkin pie spices, and called it Harvest Peach. It ended up being my favorite.

I had my first basketball practice with my 2nd/3rd grade girls team last night. Oh my. First of all, chaos. CHAOS. Everybody practices at the Boys and Girls Club (when I played, we practiced at different elementary schools), which means there are up to four teams practicing in one gym at the same time…so we only get a quarter of the court. And it is so loud. Basketballs flying everywhere. And…two of my girls got in a fight with each other. WHAT?! Oh my gosh, I was shocked. But overall, I think it went pretty well. We huddled up at the end and talked about what their favorite drills were, and they seemed to like just about everything. We all gave lots of high fives. And I gave them a homework assignment- to try and use their left hand at home as much as possible…eat with your left hand, brush your teeth with your left hand, etc…we want our left hand to be just as strong as our right hand. One girl refused. Oh well.

That’s this week’s report…have a super fantastic weekend!