April 1

Love, love, love to snorkel!

April 2

My view from the airplane on my way home to San Diego:

Hiking Diamond Head Crater is on my to-do list for my next visit!

April 3

The doggies and I are back at our home, sweet home :)

April 4

Went to the driving range despite having stubbed my toe...

April 5

Woke up with a swollen, painful toe and decided to head to urgent care.  X-rays confirmed that I had broken my toe :(

March 23

After a long and turbulent flight, it was great to be on land in Oahu with my sister, brother-in-law and nephews.  I enjoyed a late afternoon/early evening walk with my family...the mosquitoes, not so much. :)

March 24

There's nothing like a pool/beach day to start off vacation mode!

March 25

We went to Sharks Cove in the North Shore to snorkel.  The water was pretty rough and there were lots of people getting scraped up and slammed into rocks, so we decided to check out the tide pools instead.



March 26

I joined my sister and nephews on a hike to see the Makapu'u lighthouse.  It turns out that pushing a double-stroller with a 4+ yr. old and a 1+ yr. old while hiking is quite a workout!

March 27

I played with clay dough along with my nephews at their playgroup today.

So fun and strangely relaxing!!

March 28

It's always such a nice day when you snorkel at the Ko Olina lagoons:

March 29

My nephew and I took a bus tour of Kualoa Ranch and were treated with gorgeous views of a stunning landscape.  It's not hard to see why it's a popular place for filming movie and television scenes.



March 30

We attended a memorial for 6 fallen soldiers, one of whom my sister and her family personally knew.  God bless our troops and their families...



March 31

We had a really nice time walking through Waimea Valley.  My nephew and I also had a refreshing swim at Waimea Falls.  Being outdoors here is incredible!

Just another beautiful day in paradise

March 19

I can tell it's springtime.  I have to remember to take some Claritin before doing any kind of spring cleaning, or else...

March 20

My herbs are looking better.  Happy first day of Spring!

March 21

Hawaii-bound!!!

March 22

I have mixed feelings about leaving my little ones while I'm away on vacation...

March 16

I promise I didn't try to convince students to write about their teacher.  While most kids wrote about a family member or a friend, it was sweet to see that a few kids think their teacher is worth more than gold :).  Looking at their drawings, I can see why my mom used to call me Olive Oyl (Popeye's girlfriend):

March 17

I had a nice time with my family at my nephew's first birthday party.  

Both he and my newest nephew are growing so fast!

March 18

I managed to have a not-so-bad-hair-day despite it being a cold and blustery day...

March 10

It was fun to be crafty and play with Close to My Heart's new card kit today:

March 11

Joe's right: I'm a sucker for pretty packaging.

In my defense, it was on sale and cost the same as the other Kleenex boxes!

March 12

Mike's weight and old age are causing some foot (paw) problems :(

March 13

I can't wait to see this movie:

March 14

An Irish Blessing:

March 15

You know you're dating a sports fan when you fill out a bracket and don't even watch basketball!

March 5

Rushed out to buy these after having to smell throw up in my classroom today.  Poor kids, one threw up in the morning, and another in the afternoon.  Felt sorry for them, but was also sorry for the rest of us who had to deal with throw up in our classroom!

March 6

Took a break from grading/report cards to take a sneak peek at some sandals.

No shopping, though, since I had to get back to work. . .

March 7

I'm definitely my dad's daughter. 

My love for tech gadgets comes from my dad, Mr. Gadget himself. :)  

Here I am having some fun with the iPod touch I got a few months ago:

March 8

Some kids make my job so much easier...love them!

March 9

My umbrella's print:

It wasn't raining, but the umbrella makes recess duty much more cheerful and less harmful to my skin...

March 1

Our school keeps running out of pencils, so I'm resorting to having to buy and sharpen them myself.

72 pencils seems like a lot, but they seem to disappear in my classroom :(

March 2

Thanks to a gift from Joe, my teaching partner and I got to be Mrs. and Ms. Cat in the Hat (as we were called by our first graders).  We had fun celebrating Read Across America...



March 3

A perfect day for golf:

March 4

Report cards are due soon and parent conferences are coming up, which means that there's lots of testing and grading to be done.  Reading and math having been taking care of...just have to grade 51 writing tests!