What Kevin and I did for Valentine’s Day (because I know you are dying to know):

Nothing. But we never make a big deal out of Valentine’s Day.

What the Kindergarten class did for Valentine’s Day:

We made a banner for the school secretary listing all the reasons we thought she was great. (The list included reason’s like “she gives us band-aids”, “she helps us when we are in trouble”, “she tells us if we have inside or outside recess”). We hung them outside her office, asked her come out to the hallway and said “surprise.”

What the rest of the school did for Valentine’s Day:

When 98% of the school is Somali and 100% of the school is Muslim, Valentine’s Day is not a holiday that most of the families celebrate - honestly, I don’t think the kids really knew what it was until we talked about. We tend not to focus on the love part, we put most of the emphasis on appreciating someone or friendship.

Anyway, most of the classes made Valentine’s for their reading buddies or for other teachers and delivered them throughout the day.

Best reaction to a Valentine:

When Maryama (6th grade) delivered a card to Mohamed (kindergarten), Mohamed, in the most dramatic voice imaginable, yelled for the whole room to hear, “Oh man! I can’t believe I got one from a girl!”

My three favorite valentines:

From Warda:
“I appreciate you because I like the way you to your class.”

From Mumtaz:
Deer Ms. Abby Thank you fore teaching me how to rite gud end teeching hou to reed iksrshen. Lev Mumtaz*

*translation: Dear Ms. Abby, Thank you for teaching me how to write good and teaching how to read English. Love Mumtaz (Mumtaz was in my kindergarten class last year)

From Hafsa:
Dear Ms. Abby Your very nice and won I was at kinnagrden you was nice to me I was happy and you clas is nice and you are nice alway I wish i was in kinnagrden. Hafsa*

*translation
Dear Ms. Abby You’re very nice and when I was at kindergarten you was nice to me I was happy and you class is nice and you are nice always. I wish I was in kindgarten. Hafsa. (again, one of my girls from last year)

So, that was my Valentine’s Day. How was yours?

It’s about 4 hours away from 2008. Lexi’s asleep in bed, Kevin is in California and I’m in my pajamas blogging and doing laundry. Sounds exciting, doesn’t it? Funny thing is, I never even considered finding someplace to hang out and ring in the New Year. It just seemed like way too much work and a really long night. Lexi and I did go to Target and she wished lots of people a Happy New Year.

As for the tradition of New Year’s Resolutions, I gave that up a long time ago. Partly because I would either a.) quit my resolution 20 minutes into the new year or b.) make it something ridiculously easy like not letting my car get to empty before putting gas in it. I don’t remember when I stopped making resolutions but I do remember what my last official New Year’s Resolution was. My former boss (read: nutcase) forced us all to make resolutions and share them with everyone. My resolution was that I was never again going to make resolutions.

A couple of years ago I did make a list of 50 Before 50. And I’m not doing too bad on it. At last count I’ve done 17 out of the 50. I’ll let you see if you can figure out which ones I’ve done. A couple of them just won’t happen - we caved and got cell phones, I won’t be starting a kindergarten program at my daycare because I don’t work their anymore ( I teach kindergarten, does that count?) and I won’t be finishing grad school (if you haven’t heard why I quit and really want to know, e-mail me).

Here’s what I’m looking forward to in 2008:
1. Turing 30. I think when you are 30 that’s when you officially become a grown-up. Or something like that.
2. Watching Lexi go from toddler to preschooler.
3. Bringing home our baby from Ethiopia.
4. Traveling to Ethiopia.
5. Seeing how much my kindergarten class has changed from September to June (and believe me, this group has gone through huge changes.)
6. Starting another school year.
7.Painting a few more rooms in my house.
8.Friends from far away places moving closer to home.
9. Kevin coming home from California.

Happy New Year.

Christmas Eve Lexi got sick - the gross, throwing up all over, all she wants is to be held kind of sick. Christmas morning she seemed to be doing better - just tired. Then on the way home she got sick again. The car still has a funky smell. Well, I think I caught whatever she had because last night I spent most the night in the bathroom. (I’ll spare you the details). I’m feeling a little better - but not “good” by any stretch of the imagination. Kevin was supposed to leave for LA tomorrow to write an article on a conference out there. Right now, he’s in bed sleeping after canceling his flight, etc.

Stupid sick.

Kevin has blogged a lot about the common-place-ness (is that a word?) of adoption. Once we started this journey I felt like I was seeing and hearing about adoption everywhere. And international adoption seemed to pop up all over the place. I feel like I can’t go anywhere without seeing a set of parents pushing kids in strollers, carrying babies in slings, etc and it’s very obvious that the children are not biological. I don’t know if it’s just a common thing here in Twin Cities or if it’s all over, but it’s very reassuring to know that when I go to the mall or out to eat our kids will see other families that look like ours.

November is Adoption Awareness Month and if you haven’t heard the news, we’re adopting! For the month of November Kevin and I will be blogging about adoption. We are doing this for several purposes. First, to keep you updated on the process of our adoption, how we are doing/feeling about and to answer any questions you may have about our adoption. Second, we do want to raise awareness about adoption.

Some things you should know about our adoption - we want you to ask questions. If we think it’s too personal, we will simply tell you that - but really, there’s not much we don’t want to talk about. We are adopting from Ethiopia through Children’s Home Society. We have been talking to Lexi about a new baby coming from Ehtiopia but she has no clue what is going on. Our adoption will be as “open” as possible, meaning we may get a chance to meet some of our child’s birth family and they may or may not want on-going contact.

And just a note about these blogs. Kevin’s blogs will be well thought out, probably pretty educational and gramatically correct. Mine, well, mine won’t be. Mine will probably be typed with Lexi climbing all over me, kindgarteners resting on their mats and my blogs tend to ramble and follow my train of thought - which derailed a long time a go.

It seems everyone is doing lists on their blogs lately. (It’s a good think nobody tried to peer pressure me in high school or I would have been screwed.)

So here is a little of me, in list form.
1. I was born in MIlwaukee
2. I moved to Green Bay with 3 weeks left of 8th grade.
3. It was tramatic.
4. I met a kid named Josh.
5. He loaned me a pen.
6. He was the only other person from my high school who went to Bethel.
7. He and Kevin were roommates freshman year.
8. I married Kevin.
9. I lived in Green Bay.
10. This does not make me a Packer fan.
11. It doesn’t even make me a football fan.
12. Although I enjoyed the day off of school when they won the Superbowl.
13. I like hockey.
14. Specifically the Detroit Redwings.
15. Kevin is from Detroit.
16. He likes hockey as much as I do.
17. I liked the Wings before I met Kevin.
18.I’m a teacher.
19. I like to teach in places most people don’t.
20. Right now I’m teaching kindergarten.
21. My kindergarteners have taught me how to speak Somali.
22. I can count to 20 and say about 10 words in Somali.
23. I have a daughter.
24. Her name is Madeleine.
25. We spelled her name the same way Madeleine L’Engle spells her name.
26.We call her Lexi.
27. I own almost all of L’Engle’s books.
28. I own a lot of books.
29. Really, it’s a lot.
30. I own a book signed by Ceasar Millan.
31. I waited in line for 2 hours to have it autographed.
32. He made it out to Speak and Maize.
33. It’s supposed to say Speak and Mazie.
34. I train dogs part time so it was cool to meet Ceasar.
35. He’s really short.
36. If I hadn’t married Kevin I’d probably be a crazy dog lady.
37. If I had my way, I’d have at least 5 dogs.
38. I’m lucky I have 2.
39.I’m re-reading all 6 Harry Potter books before #7 gets delivered to my house.
40.I’m only on book 1.
41. Book 7 will arrive July 21.

More lists to come.
Thanks for playing.

For what seems like forever, Kevin has been telling me of the joy that is Web 2.0. He’ll tell me all about the cool stuff and what it can do and how it works and who it connects you with and….and….and….and….and….and I usually respond with “uh-huh. that’s cool. i guess.” Basically, I wasn’t interested. I don’t use Facebook, I can’t stand MySpace and the other stuff Kevin has described (but I can’t even remember what it is - that’s how not interested I was - sorry Kev.) didn’t really seem useful to me. Until now.

I am totally addicted to Geni.com.

Kevin has always been interested in family trees and family history - his grandparents have kept really good records - and has wanted to find a way to put it all together. Geni does that. It lets you create a family tree with parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, cousins, stepkids, ex’s, in-laws, pretty much anyone you could ever be possibly related to in any way. It’s really easy to use and you can invite other people from your family to use it so they can add their side of the family as well.

We’ve only been on the site for a couple of days and I think we are over 300 family members although that does include in-laws and their families as well.

I can’t wait to get my hands on my grandma’s geneology book. That should add another 200-300 people.

Since Kevin gave out the answers to his quiz questions, I figured I should give out the answer to my questions.

1. What 3 countries have I traveled to?

Answer: El Salvador, Mexico & England. El Salvador and Mexico were mission’s trip and I went to England during the J-term in college.

2. How many times have I been to Mexico.

Okay, this was interesting. When I made the quiz, I actually checked the wrong box, but the wrong answer I gave as the correct answer was the one every one picked - so technically, all of you got one more wrong. According to the quiz, I’ve only been there twice, but in reality, I’ve been there 3 times. I went during spring break sophomore, junior & senior year of highschool.

3. In highschool, I worked at which store?

Answer: Shopko. I was hired my sophomore year of highschool and finally quit the summer after my freshman year of college. I worked in every single department (except the service desk), had 8 different assistant managers (1 of whom I made cry), and when I finally quit, I think I had 58 points on my record. (Shopko gave you “points” every time you screwed up - late for work, took too long of a break, etc - when you hit 15 points you were supposed to get fired.)

4. Not including college, how many times have I moved?

Answer: 7. Moved into 44th St., 44th St. to 53rd St., 53rd St. to 48th St., 48th St. to Dakota St., Dakota St. to Somerset Dr., Somerset Dr. to Minnehaha, Minnehaha to Seminary. Or Milwaukee to New Berlin, New Berlin to Green Bay, Green Bay to St. Paul.

5. Where was a born?

Answer: Milwaukee, WI

6. How many dogs have I owned?

Answer: 3. Cinder - a black lab/springer spaniel mix, Speak - pekingese/poodle mix, Mazie - rat terrier/corgi mix.

7. In highschool I did my homework…

Answer: During passing time. I think the only time I brought my books home was the first night of school when your assignment is to cover your books, and the night before a test to cram as much info as I could onto the assigned notecard, but even then I would usually just wing it. I do remember one year setting the low end of the curve in my A.P. History class. I scored a total of 4. Lexi better pick up her dad’s study habits.

8. When is my birthday?

Answer: September 22.

9. How far is my commute to work?

Answer: 5 minutes - if I hit all the red lights.

10. In highschool which of these things should I have gotten in trouble for but never did?

Answer: All of the above. We hid from the cops for 3 hours because we decided to rearrange those orange construction cones late one night. They were originally running down the center of the rode. We moved them so they went across the rode - curb to curb. Someone in a nearby house must have called the police because the first car to come crashing through was the sherrif’s car.

We did TP the band teacher’s house but at our school having your house TP’ed at homecoming was a good thing. This particular teacher was a well loved and respected teacher who had just retired and we all missed him.

Skipping 8th hour for a year - it’s not as bad as it sounds - I had a permanent pass out of study hall so I spent that hour sleeping in the yearbook room or the choir room.

11. Which dances did I attend in highschool?

Answer: I only missed homecoming my freshman year. For this one, people picked that either I went only to prom or that I didn’t go to danaces. Nope, sorry - I loved the dances in highschool. Not only did I go, but I had a date for all of them (except Senior Ball) and I even went to homecoming 3 times at a different school.

12. What’s my part-time job?

Answer: Dog-training. I currently train the Level II class at AllBreed Obedience. It’s one of the best part time jobs I’ve ever had.

So, those are the answers. Probably more about me than you really wanted to know, but oh well.

It’s opinion time.

Kevin gave me a couple of links to easily change the look of my blog. It involves no “techy” work at all, which is good, because I don’t really care that much about the tech part of the site. I don’t like dealing with the code and programming and all that (every time I link to something I make Kevin tell me the code for it). All I really want to do is have a place to ramble.

So here’s the deal. I’ve been looking through some of the skins that people have created. Some of them are sort of fun looking (all though I am sure that the graphic designers of the world are sheilding their eyes, but whatever), some of them are cutesy looking and some I can’t decide if they are so ugly they are cool, or if they are just plain ugly. I’ll probably switch the look of my blog several times before I decide on one, so if you have any input on the look, now is the time to speak up. I won’t be offended if you can’t stand it since I didn’t design it. So, tell me what you think.

In August, Kevin, Lexi and I were supposed to go to L.A. Kevin needed to go for a business trip and Lexi and I were going to go with for a little mini vacation but then I found out that teacher-training starts the same week of the trip so now Lexi and I are staying home.

I’m disappointed that we can’t go to L.A. but things are working out pretty well for me too. My mom is coming to take care of Lexi while I have to work and then staying for the weekend. It will be fun to hang out with just her. I can’t really remember the last time I got to hang out with only my mom. The last 2 times she has come here there have been a ton of other people here and when we go back to Green Bay for a visit it is usually for some event so there’s always a house-full of people around. I do like hanging out with the big groups of people and seeing friends and family and all that, but it’s rare that it’s just me and my mom for an extended period of time. So, even though I can’t go to L.A. I’m still looking forward to the mini-vacation at home with Mom.