Lost With a Cause

Unfortunately, I have kind of fallen off the grid lately thanks to school starting back up. With that said, a few other cool things have been going on, and I finally have a second to stop, breathe, have a cup of coffee, and catch up with all of you lovely people.

Chiefs season is officially underway with pre-season match ups! As we all know, this is my favorite time of year, and we won the first game!

On August 12th, my old high school hosted a charity basketball game in honor of the old coach who was recently diagnosed with progressive cancer. It was quite the night! There were hundreds of people there and they raised over $10,000 at the door alone! It was such a cool thing to see an educator be honored by former students, colleagues, and people from the community with such an enormous amount of support. 

Last Wednesday was 26th birthday. It was fantastic day spent mostly with my family, making it even better. My mom bought me a Keurig and a supply of coffee so that I can make coffee for my morning commutes, and I am in love. Ben and I also made our biggest purchase since moving in together and invested in this gorgeous 49" beauty of a big-screen television! It's perfect, and we got it just in time for Criminal Minds to be added to Netflix streaming!

School started for Cameron R-1 on August 14th, and it has been a whirlwind. Between student schedule changes, teaching schedule changes, and a million notifications to send out to my caseload students, things have been crazy busy. Even so, Ben and I carved out some time to take a quick trip to South Bend for the weekend to see his mom show her pottery in their annual art festival, Art Beat.

It was a quick weekend, but we had a great time visiting with everyone. Plus Ben's mom gave me this GORGEOUS hand-thrown bowl for my birthday!!

Here are a few other random shots from the recent weeks: mama bought me a new phone case, I worked my first concession stand at a Cameron football game as co-junior class sponsor, and I had a yummy Saturday morning breakfast and watched Secret Life of the American Teenager because I'm an adult.

Chiefs play the Vikings tonight at Arrowhead; I'm looking forward to spending time with my favorite people. Tomorrow will assumingly be filled with resting and special services paperwork. Catch y'all on the flip!

4 Years Ago

In honor of August 10th, I've broken a number of grammatical rules by writing my title as I have. I've done so because August 10th is a pretty special day to me. You see, four years ago today, I went on my very first date with Ben.

Now four years, three graduations, many trips, many weddings (including our own), living away from each other, medical issues, fights, blunders, bumps in the road, and many little moments that make it worth it later... here we are. We have been through a lot, Ben and me, and I'm anxious to see what the future holds in the next four and forty years.

Although August 10th isn't technically our anniversary anymore, it will always hold a special place in my heart. After all, it's the day that Ben and I went to Thai place, he claimed he was a vegetarian so I ate tofu, and then he ordered and ate beef spring rolls. :)

I love you, Ben Duvall - even if this isn't our anniversary anymore. <3

Sundays

I truly wish I could say that my life has been filled with exciting events. The truth is though I've been relishing in time with my husband before heading back to work tomorrow. We've seemingly started to figure out this whole "marriage" thing, taking moments to enjoy each other's company before our schedules become opposite.

Last Sunday we took a quick trip down to the city market. We split an Italian sandwich and bought a ton of fresh produce. Honestly, Sunday's have sort of become my favorite day of the week together. Sunday mornings mean coffee or tea together and spending real time. This Sunday meant donuts too!

 

Last week we took all of my classroom supplies to Cameron, where I was able to get most of it unpacked. Here's a couple snapshots of that:

I also had a my first few days of training for the district. The fun-filled days of learning IEP software and co-teaching strategies. While things seem pretty overwhelming to me now with this content-area switch, I'm excited to get into things and get the ball rolling.

In other news:

• I survived my seventh tax-free weekend at Old Navy
• My hair growing out nicely
• Chiefs football is back on Thursday!!!
• I turn 26 (officially closer to 30...) next week
• THS alumni game to benefit Coach Broughton's fight with cancer is on Tuesday