Falling behind

I am such a blogging slacker lately! Life just seems to get crazier by the day. Zach is currently involved in piano, our church's Christmas musical, and basketball. This means that we are spending a lot more of our family's "free time" attending dress rehearsals or piano recitals or basketball practices or games. I'm finding it difficult to summon up the energy to blog. However, I'm seeing a light at the end of the crazy, extracurricular tunnel! Zach's big musical performance is coming up on Sunday. I hope to be able to post some pics or a bit of video of that. I just sat through the dress rehearsal tonight. It is such a cute program. And there are some talented children involved in it (of course, my child is one of those extremely talented)!

Quick story. On Monday, Zachary had a piano recital. He walked up on stage, sat down at the keys, played his song beautifully, and then my boy stood as though to take his bow. HOWEVER, he did not bow; nor did he walk down the steps to return to his seat. Instead, he J*U*M*P*E*D from the stage. Mike looked at me with an eyebrow raised and said, "He just did a rock star jump off of the stage." I could see the glint of pride in that fatherly eye! I just laughed because it was so unexpected! Funny, funny boy.

I realize we are now into December and I should be posting Christmasy sorts of things. But I am slightly behind this year! I've usually put up my Christmas tree and have the house all decorated by now, but I haven't done that yet either. My point? I'm belatedly posting a couple of Thanksgiving videos of the boys. They are too cute to overlook, even though Thanksgiving is now over and done. I hope your holiday of thanks was enjoyable.

Four Dollar Day

Yesterday morning I put on a sweater that I had not worn since last winter. As I zipped it up, I felt a crinkling in a front pocket. I pulled out four crisp, folded $1 bills. It was a fun way to start my day.

Later that morning, I taught my developmental writing course at the local community college. I have to admit that I wasn't very excited about this class when we started in September. But it has become one of my favorite groups of students, and one of my favorite classes to teach. Yesterday my students were performing group presentations on grammar principles. I sat, pleasantly surprised, as I listened to group after group present their assigned topics: past participial phrases, dangling modifiers, adverbials, appositives, and relative clauses. Pleasantly surprised because they actually had fairly firm grasps of these topics. Pretty pleased with myself already, my heart almost burst when one of my students came up to me after class and said, "I never thought I'd be able to explain how to identify a relative clause. But I can! I feel pretty smart, Mrs. Bishop." Coming from a developmental student, that was a huge admission.

To top off my great day, I received the following e-mail from a senior faculty member:

This shouldn't be a postscript, but I want to let you know that I received your folder of sample graded work and I'm very impressed

by the quality of your comments.

I especially like the way you build criticism into a framework of praise.

You're doing a great job.

It was a great $4 day!

Family Talent

I don't proclaim to be among the talented musicians in this family. It definitely comes from the Bishop side of the family tree rather than the Stark side. Nevertheless, I LOVE that my children seem to be as interested, and as naturally talented, as their father in all things musical. It's just fun! Zachary has a piano recital coming up in the next month. Alec is already asking for piano lessons, but we're going to hold off on that for at least another year. Mike says that children will learn to read music much better if they are already proficient at reading words. Anyway, I love that we have music in our house!

Fun with Fall Folliage

There's not much to add here. Photos say it all:

Ft. Hood

Have you seen the news about the tragedy at Ft. Hood in Texas? If you haven't, here's a link: http://www.cnn.com/2009/US/11/05/texas.fort.hood.shootings/index.html

I'm having a hard time blocking out this little bit of tragedy. It keeps popping into my thoughts, invading my normally hard shell regarding "news." I think of my husband working on a military base. I think of the security measures present on such bases. I think of the families living on Ft. Hood, of the patients who had been seen by this shooter, of the families of the dead and the wounded. Tragic doesn't even come close to an appropriate description.

What are your thoughts?

Frighteningly cute cuties

Halloween! This year we enjoyed our first ever trunk or treat at our church. Zach was a clone trooper from Star Wars; Alec was a red Power Ranger. They loved their costumes and they really had a good time with their buddies at the trunk or treat. The two cuties in the pic with my own kiddos are the children of some Harding friends that we've rediscovered here in Bartlett.

By the end of the night, my littlest one was so tired that he curled up in the back of the car with a sleeping buddy. He slept hard that night!

Fall

We made it out to the pumpkin patch on Saturday. Thanks to the rain, rain, rain we've been having here in the mid-south, the place was a muddy mess. However, we were undaunted in our quest for the perfect pumpkin. We rode a "hayride" (think smallish flatbed trailer hooked up to a smallish tractor) and we walked among the orange gourds. Enjoy the pictures. I love a good pumpkiny background in photos, don't you?

Fashion forward: Career Day

Yesterday was "Career Day" at Zach's school. He was supposed to come dressed up in the attire of the profession of his choice. Zach wanted to dress in a Navy uniform. He says he wants to fly Navy airplanes when he's grown up. So, Mike brought home his everyday jumper uniform. Zach thought it was completely awesome that he was wearing a uniform that said "US Navy" on one side of his chest and "Bishop" on the other side. He was super excited when he left for school. He was still excited when he came back home.

Zach and Daddy

Of course, Alec had to get in on the picture taking action.

F. . . um, ffffff. . . I can't think of anything clever today

I'm grading papers today. Oceans and deserts full of papers. Too many papers with silly mistakes and misplaced modifiers and comma splices and transitions in verb tenses. Too many papers with absolutely no coherent thought. Bleeeeeeeeeehhhhhhhhhhhhh. My brain is suffering.

Quick, someone tell me something funny and/or clever!

Fabulous Favorites: Top 25 Kids' Books

Here is my list of "Must Have" books for kids ages three to five. Thanks for all of your input; you mentioned a few books that I haven't yet read. Now I'll be on the lookout for your favorites. I had to limit myself to 25, and that was not easy. Also there are many books that I consider to be a must for a children's library, but maybe not for this age bracket.

1) Goodnight Moon (Margaret Wise Brown)

2) Chicka Chicka Boom Boom (Bill Martin, Jr.)

3) Llama Llama Red Pajama (Anna Dewdney)

4) Harold and the Purple Crayon (Crocket Johnson)

5) Papa Please Get the Moon for Me (Eric Carle)

6) The Belly Button Book (Sandra Boynton)

7) Corduroy (Dan Freeman)

8) The Very Hungry Caterpillar (Eric Carle)

9) Guess How Much I Love You (Sam McBratney)

10) Time for Bed (Mem Fox)

11) No, David! (David Shannon)

12) Good Night, Gorilla (Peggy Rathman)

13) Not a Box (Antoinette Portis)

14) The Kissing Hand (Audrey Penn)

15) The Napping House (Audrey Wood)

16) How Do Dinosaurs Say Good Night? (Jane Yolen)

17) Big Red Barn (Margaret Wise Brown)

18) Don't Let the Pigeon Drive the Bus (Mo Willems)

19) Puff the Magic Dragon (Peter Yarrow)

20) Duck on a Bike (David Shannon)

21) Owen (Kevin Henkes)

22) Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day (Judith Viorst)

23) Harry the Dirty Dog (Gene Zion)

24) Curious George and the Dump Truck (H.A. Rey)

25) If You Give a Mouse a Cookie (Laura Numeroff)

Well, what do you think? Anything else to add or anything on here that your family doesn't like?