Belle's blog

Take a guess

2008-06-16T16:00:00.000-07:00

Here's the website for the online guesses. Don't just look at it - take a guess!

We don't know what it is, although some people are pretty sure they do (or they are very clear about what they want it to be).

take a guess

2008-06-10T09:30:00.000-07:00

I thought I would post a recent belly pic so that if anyone wants to guess the baby's gender they can. This is 34 weeks 4 days. I should take a new picture because I think it's changed in the week and a half since this pic.

Here's 27 weeks for comparison. HeeheeI love it. My belly is so small in this picture!

ok, ok I'm getting ready

2008-06-09T04:08:00.000-07:00

Early in my pregnancy I signed up for a couple week-by-week e-mail calendars. So each week I get an e-mail telling me what's going on with the baby, with me and articles about things I may be concerned about at this stage or things I should/shouldn't be doing. For the past 2 weeks or so I've been getting e-mails telling me it's time to install the car seat. As far as calendars go I'm supposed to have about a month left, although the doctor will let the baby come anytime after next Friday (it's weird to be able to say it like that... next Friday). So I'm wondering why do I need to put the car seat in so soon? Why do I need to pack for the hospital now? People will laugh at me. Actually the opposite has happened. When I tell people about these e-mails and how I think it's too soon they disagree and say actually you probably should be pack already. I still think I have a while left because it's my first and because my belly doesn't look as huge as I thought it would when I reach full term. But Jason went ahead and installed the infant carrier in my car. It looks good.
I packed the diaper bag for the baby with an outfit and onesie, diapers, wipes, vaseline (want to know what the vaseline is for? When babies are born their first couple of poops are like tar. I have personally changed these types of diapers and you need a scraper to get this stuff off. Apparently if you put vaseline on their little bottom the tar won't stick so bad and will be easier to get off. Here's hoping!) baby nail clippers and a pacifier. I guess I might get little hand covers b/c apparently babies nails are super long and they scratch themselves.
Now as for my bag... um, well, hmmm. I've thought about it. I should pack it and leave it in the car because if I go to a doctor's appointment and she sends me to the hospital I can't run home to pack my bag. I live 30 min away from the doctor and 45 min away from the hospital. So adding an extra 90 minutes of drive/pack time might not be smart. Again I think I'll be late or have to be induced, but only time will tell. So maybe I'll start packing my bag today. :P Maybe. One good thing about packing early is I can add things as I go because I know I will forget stuff.
Ok well sorry for the long, boring, pointless post. Have a good week everyone!

Oh btw - some people have asked and no, we do not know if the baby is a boy or a girl. We tried to find out and they actually told us both at different points during the ultra sound. Then they said they just couldn't tell. So the little one is keeping it a surprise until d-day. Guesses are welcome!

baby stuff

2008-05-18T19:47:00.000-07:00

Here are some things we received for the baby. Since the baby is not here yet, the baby's bear, Stitches (made by Mommy and Daddy) is modeling the new stuff.

some baby stuff

2008-03-21T20:13:00.000-07:00

Here's the crib all put together. It's getting kinda real now :o
I love the froggy hat :)

1st day of vacation

2008-03-21T04:49:00.000-07:00

and I'm awake. The one thing I have been looking forward to about being off of work is being able to sleep in. Yet here I am awake at 6am. Plus I've been up for a while. Now I'm hungry so I should eat and then try to go back to sleep, but I don't feel like making anything b/c then I'll wake up even more and won't be able to fall back asleep. :P So I'm online and no one else is. I've looked at all my usual web sites and there's nothing new on them. -sigh- Oh well. Here's what else I have planned for my exciting day off: do laundry, call about lamaze class, possibly get a pedicure (I'm actually excited about that one), hmmm... I think that's about it. I wish I were going somewhere for spring break. Two other teachers at my school are leaving for Italy today. A bunch of people I know are going to Florida. I'm going to do laundry. -sigh again- Ok I'm going to get offline now before I start talking about strange pregnancy experiences that you really don't want to know about. Hope everyone has a great day!

Latest baby blanket

2008-03-09T18:45:00.001-07:00

Thought this pattern was cute for my little July firecracker.

Tuesday

2008-03-04T20:12:00.000-08:00

Ok So it's bedtime but I don't want to go to bed yet. I'm in a really funky mood. I'm annoyed with something that shouldn't even bother me but it does. It's frustrating. rrrr
Pregnancy is... interesting. I knew that my belly would change and that some body stuff would change. But it's like every, even random, thing has changed on my body. I don't feel a whole lot of kicks yet, but I know the baby is moving around because I can feel and see where it is on the outside of my belly. And boy has it been exploring the past few days. It has been up to my belly button and down to my bladder and every place in between. Over on the left, over on the right... It's crazy. I guess it better enjoy the freedom while it can because in a couple of months there won't be any room left!
Ok I'm taking my crazy preggie brain to bed. Night all!

finally!

2008-02-16T15:00:00.000-08:00

We finally have the internet!!! Woo hoo!!!!! I am so excited. It was a pain in the butt to try and get the wireless hooked up. My extremely old laptop was on the internet before the newer one was. I kinda had to go a round-a-bout way to do it, but it works now and hopefully it's secure.
I guess this means I'll have to post more often :)

Happy New Year!

2008-01-12T06:45:00.000-08:00

I know I'm 12 days late but I've been busy. Plus I wasn't sure if anyone was reading this so I thought, why post? But I did get one comment on my last post (thanks Julie!) so I thought I'd post again.
Hmmm let's see... what's new. I saw National Treasure last night. It was decent. I like the 1st one so I thought this one would be good too. In my opinion (and my aunt's) we think there's definitely going to be a 3rd one. They all but said it in the movie.
The was the 1st week back to school after vacation. It was a full week in every sense of the word. I'm so glad it's the weekend and I wish weekends were longer.
I got my hair cut this week. 11 inches off! It's still long b/c before I cut it it was ridiculously long. It was boring though. Plus I would get headaches b/c it was so heavy. And I can't tell you how many times I would try to lift my head to turn over in the middle of the night only to have it yanked back down b/c my arm or Jay's arm was on my hair. ouch :( Of course when the hairstylist did my hair it looked awesome. It was exactly what I wanted. But when I tried to mimic what she did it looked awful :P I guess it serves me right for trying to be stylish. I need to learn that I'm just a plain Jane.
Ok well that's it for now. Have a good weekend!

hello?

2007-12-23T10:25:00.000-08:00

I'm shocked that I remembered my password. I just wanted to see if this still works!

calculus

2007-03-01T11:18:00.001-08:00

Calculus midterm tonight

Wish me luck :(

icky day

2007-02-28T07:35:00.000-08:00

I'm tired today. I didn't stay up late or get up too early, but I'm just tired. I wanted to stop and pick up some coffee/breakfast this morning because I don't have a lunch or breakfast today. But I got caught by a train and it was moving so slowly that it took about 15 minutes. After that I had about 10 minutes before I needed to get to school, but that wouldn't have been enough time to get somewhere, wait in line and get back. So now I'm munching on an apple because I bought a bag to keep at school for the week. According to the "fact of the day" on the radio school here at school, apples are supposed to wake you up better than caffine (sp?). We'll see.
I want this semester to be over. Not because of teaching because I'm loving that, but because of classes. I had to redo my paper twice because of stupid little things wrong. The prof is not specific on what she wants, but after you turn stuff in she tells you what you did wrong. :P Plus calculus sucks. I have a midterm tomorrow and I know I'm going to fail. Not just I'm struggling and not going to get an A type of failing, but a real F. I mean it. Yes I'm concerned. Yes I'm studying. Yes I'm going to tutoring. Yes I bought the Complete Idiot's Guide to Calculus. It helps, but I'm still confused on how to get started on problems. Once I'm started I'm great. I fly through the algebra parts.
Ok well enough of that. I gotta go get my kids. Have a great day! (=

Upon further review...

2007-02-27T07:40:00.000-08:00

Gatlinburg was not that bad. I think we just had a bad experience. I realized this because I've been wanting to be back there all week. I think if the traffic wasn't so bad on the way down and if we would've actually been able to stay in the cabin we paid for, then it would've been a much better experience. If I go back I would only go during the week (to avoid the weekend traffic) and I would either stay at the hotel Wendy got us into or maybe a different cabin company - not sure about that one.
So I changed my opinion - the park was pretty and I would probably go back, but under different circumstances.
(=

response to Cindy's blog about cooking

2007-02-26T06:33:00.000-08:00

For some reason I can't sign in or post a comment on your blog, so I thought maybe you would see it if I put the response here:

I was going to say it's probably chipotle, which I'm pretty sure is dried/smoked jalapenos, if you're thinking of the spicy on your tongue feeling. Or possibly horseradish - if you're thinking of the vapor that clears your sinuses kind of kick.

Gatlinburg

2007-02-23T07:33:00.000-08:00

Except for getting to visit with Tony and Wendy which was great, my vacation sucked. First of all it took over 13 hours to get there. The roads in Indiana were horrible - snowy, icy, slippery. We saw an awful accident - pickup truck on its side, Expedition crashed in the front end and a small car completely destroyed. Then there were semi's jack-knifed (sp?) in the median, cars spun out everywhere. It was bad. You may remember I was in an accident last year and I was driving on these crappy roads, so I was a little less than calm.
So then we finally get to the Gatlinburg area and traffic was stopped from before Pigeon Forge all the way through Gatlinburg. I can't imagine what traffic must be like in the summer or fall.
So anyway I'm not going to go through every bad thing but here's a recap: the cabin had wasps in it, they wouldn't refund our money, stayed in a nasty motel where I had to clean the toliet off before I could use it. Tony & Wendy couldn't get up or down the mountain they were staying on.

The rest of the trip was ok. We got into a much nicer hotel (thank you Wendy) and ate at some nice places. What annoyed me overall was when you walked up and down the strip, there were basically in-person telemarketers on the street trying to stop you and talk to you. It was incredibly annoying.

I did like the Old Mill restaurant and the one waterfall we saw at the National Park. But I don't think I'll go back to Gatlinburg. If we continue to take winter vacations I'm either going to go on a cruise or to Disney or make it an all out winter vacation with skiing or snowmobiling.

Woo-Hoo! February is here!

2007-02-01T09:06:00.000-08:00

February is the best month because my birthday - and a lot of readers and friends' birthdays- are in February! It's a short month plus we get President's Day off and I'm taking a couple days off around then to go on vacation :) Well a mini-break as Bridget Jones calls it. And a mini-break means true love, lol. Well anyway I love this month.
But what I don't love is calculus. It sucks. I hate it. Yuck. I bought The Complete Idiot's Guide to Calculus and I'm going for tutoring today. I have to leave at the earliest possible moment today to try and make it to tutoring on time. I think I'll be a little late, plus I don't know where the room is. But I will find it, even if rabid bunnies attack me. And I will conquer Calculus!

Gatlinburg

2007-01-24T08:20:00.000-08:00

Hello all. I know it's been a long time since I've posted here, but I've been using my myspace page to blog, although not very often. I wasn't going to make a myspace page, but actually I kinda like it. I've found some old friends on there and it's a different way to keep in touch.

Anyway I know that some of you have been to Gatlinburg on vacation. Since my brother is ditching me and going skiing over our birthday (boohoo) I thought I'd find a mini vacation of my own. Gatlinburg seems like a nice place to go. If you've been there - where did you stay? Did you like it? What did you do? Any places to definitely see? Avoid?
Thanks for any info! (=

Cute Christmas bulletin board

2006-11-29T12:47:00.000-08:00

On a happier note :)
I am putting up a really cute bulletin board at school. Each student is bringing in their favorite Christmas picture and a paragraph describing why it is their favorite picture. I cut out squares of construction paper (representing a gift). The students decorate their squares to look like wrapping paper then tape their picture and paragraph on it. I have bows to attach to the top and we hang them on the bulletin board. It looks great! I love the pictures. Some are really funny: one boy has a picture of him at about 2 or 3 screaming on Santa's lap. Some are really meaningful: one girl has a picture of her whole family at Disney World. It was important b/c she survived a huge car wreck and had to have surgery - this was the celebration afterwards. It's really awesome. I can't wait to see the rest of the pictures. I think I might put one up too.
(=

It's that time of year...

2006-11-09T11:35:00.000-08:00

No I don't mean Thanksgiving or Christmastime... It's parent-teacher conference time! Since I'm taking classes and can't miss my "How to teach junior high math" class, I had to reschedule a lot of conferences. That means beginning conferences at 7:00am. Fun! That's ok though. Today I only go until 3:00pm (if they don't run late) and then I have class. But I miss the free dinner we get :P oh well. And of course my kids are so great that my conferences are going very smoothly - even ending early! So that's that.
Yesterday I had another midterm. It was hard. I really studied for it, but everyone was upset because there were things on the test that the teacher specifically said would not be, plus the questions were very poorly worded.
Yesterday was also my "nephew"s 4th birthday! I made him a Lightning McQueen birthday cake. I'll post a picture as soon as I can.
That's about all there is to report. One strange thing is that my boyfriend from high school sent me an e-mail yesterday. The last time I talked to him I told him I never wanted to talk to him again. That was about 8 or 9 years ago. Believe me it wasn't just a bad breakup I don't want to talk to you. We had actually broken up at least a year before I said this to him. Anyway Not sure how to respond to his e-mail.
Ok well I guess I should do something more productive between conferences. Like work on projects or grade or crochet. I'm teaching my kids how to crochet and they're doing a great job! I'll post pics of that too when I can. Have a good weekend!

Who knew a little white bug could be such a problem?

2006-10-31T12:39:00.000-08:00

You're not going to believe this. I'm on vacation for the rest of the week. Yes, today is Tuesday. Why? Well the little white bug I'm referring to is lice. We've had a little problem with it in our school. I'm not sure what the total count is as of right now, but it's not small. So they're closing the school so a professional company can come in and fumigate it. Today we had to clean out all the desks and lockers and take everything home. Before you get too jealous let me tell you that more than likely I"ll have to make up these days at the end of the school year :( Especially if we get snow days. But for now I'm happy :) I get to catch up on sleep, get healthy because I've been fighting a sinus infection, and work on all my grad school projects that I haven't had time to do. Hopefully I will stay lice free. It's not hard to get rid of - just use a special shampoo, but I don't even want to begin to think about everything I would have to clean. Sheets, clothes, more sheets, coats etc etc etc.
Anyway I'm gettin outta here. Happy Halloween!!!
(=

Rent - the musical

2006-10-25T05:59:00.000-07:00

This is mostly for Caryn because she's seen this musical so many times. I just watched the movie for the first time this weekend. Everytime I saw Idina Mentzel I thought "Elphaba" but she's still awesome in Rent too. I haven't seen the end of it though. My friend Kelly had it Tivo'ed and so I thought I would watch it while the boys were taking a nap. I got to about where Angel dies and then it just stopped. The timer said I still had 30+ minutes left, but it was just a blank screen :O So yesterday I got home and was eating a snack and saw that Rent was just starting. So of course I watched it. But after an hour and a half I realized I had a lot of work to do b/c report cards are due this week and I have a midterm tomorrow, so I stopped watching. So one of these days I'm going to have to buy or rent it and finish it. The music has been stuck in my head since last Friday. Right now The Tango Maureen is playing. I especially like all the harmonies since there are so many main characters.
Basically this post had no point and I've just rambled on. But if anyone has any thoughts about Rent I'd love to hear them :)

2006-10-18T10:35:00.000-07:00

It's been so busy around here. I'm on my lunch break. Usually I eat downstairs with the other teachers, but today I've been going non-stop, so I decided to just sit in my classroom and have some peace and quiet. I should be grading or trying to sort through all the papers on my desk, but I just need to relax for a few minutes.
Last week I had a presentation due in my psychology class. It was on Albert Bandura. In case you wanted to know he did a famous experiment with Bobo dolls (the inflatable dolls with the weight on the bottom that you hit and they bounce back up). It was to determine how much children learn by example. Anyway That went alright. For my Thursday class I had to turn in these "Teacher created Manipulatives". I took plywood and cut it into 9in x 12in pieces (actually my boyfriend did that - I probably would've chopped off a couple fingers). Then we glued these foam sheets on top of each board. On those I drew a coordinate plane and you can use pins and yarn and pipe cleaners to graph lines and parabolas, etc. I also attached a plastic sheet protector to each board that you can write on with dry erase markers. This way I can put graph paper in there, dot paper, geoboard paper, worksheets, etc. etc. I only have to make enough copies for 1 class b/c you can erase. Saves paper and time.
This week I have to "teach" in my Thursday class. I have to have a guided discovery lesson which means I don't teach the topic. I give them manipulatives and a problem and say "Go for it!" In my real classroom I would give a little more explanation, but for this class we can't. I was hoping I would get some new teaching ideas out of this class, but so far... notta. Of course I don't suppose I should expect much because I have more years of experience teaching jr. high math than my professor does.
The Algebra class that I am teaching this year HATES using manipulatives. The buzz right now is to use hands-on activities to teach concepts, not just paper/pencil with the teacher at the front talking to the chalkboard. Everytime I try to do something different with them, they freak out. They would rather me show them how to do something, then give them homework. Forget trying to visualize a problem.
Ok I have to go get my kids. Have a good day! (=

phew

2006-09-26T09:29:00.000-07:00

Hello It's been a while since my last post, I know. I had a draft written but never finished it, so I'll start a new one. Today is high school recruitment day. I'm exhausted. I took papers to grade - I finally got caught up on those - and I took 2 textbooks to review/find activities for one of my classes. Plus I was babysitting all the 7th & 8th graders making sure they were paying attention and not goofing off etc. Now I have a 15 minute break so I'm blogging. I'm also signed in to mygradebook.com but so far I haven't entered any grades. Maybe later.

Anyway Things are ok. Just really, really busy. I'm trying to get some projects done for my classes but this weekend was shot. As some of you may know I had to take Deacon (my dog) to the emergency vet on Sunday. He's doing well in case you were wondering. That was $300 that I don't have but what are you going to do? I had to take him in; he's worth it :) In my next life remind me to choose a career based on money not on helping other people. I was so upset about having to take him to the emergency vet. I dont' know what I'm going to do when I have kids.
Ok back to work. Hope everyone is having a good day. It's absolutely beautiful outside.

camping

2006-09-14T08:42:00.000-07:00

I'm sitting at my desk as a wonderful 7th grade class finishes their snack and works on their warm-up for the day. This year is going really well so far (knock on wood) and I owe some thanks to Harry Wong about procedures. The kids know exactly what they're supposed to do when they come in, how we grade papers, how we collect papers, how we take notes, when to sharpen pencils, when they can leave the room and how to sign out, etc. I know this probably seems like common sense to most people, but for kids, they need to know exactly what's expected of them. I'm sure there will be a monkey-wrench thrown in sometime soon, but for now I'm happy thinking that my personal life may be chaos, but my professional life is going well. (Inhale deep breath of fresh air and exhale with a content sigh)

Anyway Back to the original topic for this post. Last year we had the big camping excursion in October. I've heard that the football schedule is busy this year and that there probably isn't going to be a camping trip this year, but I thought I would ask. Is anyone interested in taking another camping trip? I was looking at pictures from last year and pics from my trip to Yellowstone and Glacier. I've been camping quite a few times this summer, but not tent camping. Let me know :)