It’s OK to be jealous of me. Really. I understand. I mean, I have this totally awesome life.

Take last night. After eating dinner (later than usual), we spent about an hour re-digging the trench in our backyard/garden area. The one for the irrigation system that we totally had dug out to the required 12″ depth and then promptly ignored for 2 months, allowing rain and erosion to wreak havoc on our progress. We got it dug back to the 12″ all the way to the spot for the new spigot, which is also the corner where the rhubarb used to be and the place where the lines will make a 90* turn to run along the south side of the house. If I had pictures, that would make a lot more sense, but the sun is starting to set much earlier these days (and rise, too – I do not care for it being dark-ish when I get up in the morning!). even dug out the post hole for the spigot, we threw the post in that hole, and he re-buried it. Major progress. Sidenote: dusk (that is, the time we were outside digging, between 7 and 8 pm) is a terrible time to be outside, with all the gnats and mosquitos and lingering daytime heat; must remind self that at least it was only 80* yesterday, and not 95* (which, for Minnesota at the end of August, is entirely possible).

While this was going on, I was also responding to emails about some stuff I had posted on Craigslist. The end result of that was a big fat nothing, as somebody bowed out at the last minute (thankfully, the did email me, so I didn’t stay at home waiting for them to show up). I think that someone else will be picking said item up tonight, but I’m not holding my breath. It is, after all, Craigslist.

Next up was a trip to Target, where I learned that you can’t buy a rotisserie chicken at 9 pm. Who knew? So, I’ll be stopping on my way home from work tonight, because I’m making enchiladas, and that’s the easy (and tasty) way to do that. Bonus: I’ll get to have chicken on my salad this week, instead of hard boiled eggs. Also, I was unable to find white wine vinegar anywhere. Why is that? I am desperately in need of some.

By the time I got home, it was nearly 10. The highlight of the evening? Perhaps the bag of microwave popcorn and can of root beer I had before bed.

In summary: my body was not built for digging trenches (however, I don’t seem to be sore today, just very tired); trying to sell stuff on Craigslist can be frustrating; and, you cannot get rotisserie chicken at Target at 9 pm (you can, however, get ice cream).

If the sun chooses to show itself later today, I might get enough pictures taken to have something to share with you tomorrow. We’ll see.

The rest of my plans for the week include more digging, some homework, and making plans for out-of-town family to visit this weekend. If you are feeling overwhelmed with jealousy, just come on over to my house and I’ll let you do some trench-digging for a while. It’s not fair for me to hog all the fun.

Yesterday, I met with my advisor to clear up some things. I had stated we needed to talk about student teaching, as that’s what I’d been told to do. But, since I am not yet admitted into the program due to… who knows, office mix-ups? incompetent staff? someone forgetting to push a button?… we had to take care of registering for classes, too. Well, first we did a progress report. Good news: I’m exactly where I thought I was, progress-wise. Still need to take my two state tests (content and pedagogy), coursework is mostly completed with an appropriate GPA, etc. Duh.

Then I was told I needed to do my student teaching goals myself, and that my advisor would help me edit them. Since I’d come prepared to do that at the meeting, I figured this wouldn’t be that bad to do by myself later.

Advisor: “Is there anything else I can help you with?”

Me: “Yes, I need to register for classes. Because I’m not in the program yet.”

Advisor: “Wha?”

So I showed him the letter I received that outlined the paperwork I still needed to complete for admission (it was blank… so either someone forgot to fill out the form, or someone messed up). Five minutes later, emails had been sent to registration to change my status (so I could register myself) and to an office staff (to clear up the admission to the program thing). I have little hope for that second part – he has sent similar emails every single semester for the past two years, to the same person, and I never get any follow-up.

Back at home, I pulled up my school email to see that the registrar’s office had, in fact, taken care of things as requested. So, I attempted to register for classes. Now, I have a really light course-load this semester. One 0-credit course (practicum)  and one 3-credit graduate course. I had no problems with the 0-credit course, even though I should have (since it should be taken concurrently with a class that I’m not taking). But, the 3-credit course? Full. Funny, I’d checked a few days earlier and it was only half full. After a bit of panicking and talking angrily to myself, I decided to deal with it later.

And then we stained our new dining table. Did I mention it was 90* outside? So very hot.

This morning, after explaining the situation to my co-workers (about the full class) and getting some advice, I sent off my emails to try to fix the problem (registrar’s office, professor, advisor). While things aren’t fixed yet, it looks like they should be taken care of before class starts tonight. There are 24 seats on the graduate class that are full, but of the 24 seats in the undergraduate class (which is taught at the same time, by the same professor, in the same room, so… it’s the same class), there are 5 free seats. I pointed this out to my advisor, who got on the phone with the professor, who then emailed the registrar. I’m just waiting for confirmation that I am, in fact, registered.

This was no small amount of stress, though, seeing as how it’s the only class I need to take before student teaching, and I couldn’t even take it at another university if I needed to (Foundations of Urban Education isn’t exactly a core class at most institutions). We’ve already begun planning the joint graduation party in May ( graduates then too – party at my house!), and besides, I didn’t want to have to wait another semester to finish this program. I’m ready to be done. Plus, I’ve already bought the textbooks.

In other areas of life, I have most of the top of ‘s quilt completed. There are 7 seams left (attaching rows to each other). I should have about 20 9-patch blocks completed by the weekend. Hopefully I’ll get some sewing done on Thursday. is going to his brother’s new house to work on wiring (or something… I’m fuzzy on the details) that night, so no house projects to work on, and I’ll save homework for the weekend. My brother-in-law is moving on Saturday, so we’ll be busy doing that all day, and then Sunday we plan on poly-ing the dining table, so hopefully it can be revealed next week.

And now I have to go work on my student teaching goals. They need to be concrete and measurable, and “behavioral,” whatever that means. Here’s what I have so far (in bullets, not actual clear or observable goals):

• Differentiated instruction
• Assessment
• Parent-teacher communication
• Classroom management
• Lesson planning and dealing with change

I know there are some teachers reading this. Do you have anything to add? I need 5 goals total.

Yesterday, while was out on a long run (2 hours), I did Pilates. Or, at least, I watched a “beginner Pilates” video and played along. There were lots of breathing instructions, most of which I got wrong, always inhaling when I was supposed to be exhaling. Though it didn’t seem like much of a workout, today my abs hurt, and the only way I could have done that was Pilates. My arms hurt too, but that’s probably because of our impromptu weekend project.

Remember on Friday when I said we were picking up a new-to-us dining table that we found on Craigslist? Well, we did, and it’s lovely, but we decided to change its color on a whim. OK, not really a whim – a good 10 minutes of staring at the table trying to weigh all the work that would need to be done with the end result. I have no “before” pictures, so you’ll just have to believe me when I say that it was a nice wood color, but a bit too orange-y for our dining room. So we spent the rest of the weekend applying stripper, waiting 30 minutes, scraping and then steel-wooling, repeat ad nauseum. Four legs. Two drawers (yes, drawers!). Table top. And then there is the apron (the “frame” that the top sits on). That apron might be the death of me.

As of last night, all of the legs and drawers had been stripped, re-stained, and are sitting in the garage “drying.” The stain we use requires some drying time before applying the poly, though it claims this is not necessary (but we’ve seen what can happen when we don’t wait). We bought new handles for the drawers, and our favorite metal-worker () will be recruited to bend the leg caps back into shape. It will look good when we’re done, but there’s still a ways to go yet. It’s hard to get excited about another coat of stripper on that apron… (I’m thinking that my Google search results referring will reveal some funny things due to that last sentence).

While we were waiting, I did a lot of quilting. I have 5 rows left to piece on ‘s quilt. I made it 2/3rds of the way through a big pile of 9-patches (to add to my collection – some day I’ll make a quilt out of them, or something). The four rows of ‘s quilt that I pieced together took forever (I’m aiming at 2 rows/day, meaning I assemble each row, and then sew the two rows together, so I have pairs of rows laying on the living room floor instead of blocks), as they were the longest rows (the rows go diagonally across the quilt, since it’s technically “on point,” so the middle rows are the longest at 17 blocks). The rows I have left have 11 or less blocks (decreasing by 2 blocks each row), so they should go much faster. Then I just have to assemble the pairs of rows, and the top will be done!

No apparel sewing, or any other fun crafting. Really, the dining table project kind of took over our weekend. I’ll post pictures when it’s complete, along with the buffet we bought (also on Craigslist).

Tomorrow, I have a meeting with my advisor, in which I will (hopefully)  get everything taken care of that should have been taken care of already but couldn’t be because administratively speaking, my university gets a D-. Then I should be attending class Wednesday night, assuming the right people push the right buttons (or keyboard keys, as it were). This semester’s class is something about philosophical foundations of urban education. I remember enjoying Foundations of Youth Ministry (much more so than the intro classes), but I’m nearly done with my program now, so I’m not sure how I’ll feel about this class. I believe it’s being taught by one of the professors in the department that everyone knows but I have yet to meet (perhaps he’s supposed to sign off on things for me, because perhaps he’s the social studies person – I could have that wrong, seeing as how things get a bit confusing in my program… all the time). The bummer is that it is not at the Minneapolis campus, which is right up the street (40 blocks, but a straight shot) from my house, but is instead in St Paul (though not at the main campus… basically in the middle of Nowheresville, St Paul). The bright side of that is, no paying for parking this semester!

And now, I think I’ve rambled on long enough. What color should I paint my nails tonight? Orange or teal?

It seems like everyone I’ve talked to had a busy weekend! Did you?

Friday night, the bug in my bonnet got too loud to ignore, and we cleaned the house. We followed that up by promptly re-messying the house on Saturday. Of course. But, we are 95% done painting trim for the family room, and 100% done painting the built-ins. Now it’s on to the poly phase, which will take a while. I think if we work on it for an hour every single day, we will eventually get it done. At least four coats, plus a coat on the back for waterproofing/general protection…. we should be done by Thanksgiving.

We also picked out and bought the router bits we need to make the cabinet doors – we saved $40 with our coupons, which was super awesome.

Sunday we worked on making the outside of our home look acceptable again. (Swept the driveway free of acorns, which is a major project at our house. I also mowed the lawn, did a small bit of pruning, and watered the lawn. Fancy stuff, I know.) Our neighbor across the street gave us the update on neighborhood crime – despite checking the paper every week for the police blotter, I never see any news, but he gave us the down-low. There have been nearly 10 car thefts or break-ins, and at least a few garages were broken into. Did you know we have our own little gang in our town? I didn’t. Apparently they never take too much, so the running theory is that it’s some kids in the neighborhood. Conveniently, we just replaced all the locks on our house (and I’ve been a bit paranoid about making sure all of the deadbolts are locked all the time), we found a temporary “fix” for ‘s garage door issue (it’s now a manual door – no remote or power or anything), and the alarm on my car is super sensitive (evidenced nearly weekly by my setting it off for absolutely no reason whatsoever). Also, the neighbor across the street is always home, and I think that helps.

So, not really an exciting weekend, but we did keep ourselves busy. There’s only one more weekend left before the fall semester begins, but I only have one class this fall, so I think I will still have plenty of free time to enjoy life before student teaching. Speaking of which, I still need to make an appointment with my advisor… (in my defense, today is the first faculty day for the fall semester).

Tomorrow, I am looking forward to the downtown farmer’s market – I’ve had salad every work day in my lunch for the past week and a half, and I have now run out of vegetables other than celery to include. I need to restock.