It's been a while... (scroll down for pics)

I really would like to keep up on the blog. I love teaching, but the last thing I want to do is come home and get on the computer. No promises on how much I'll post, but I will start posting more in the coming weeks and months.

I wanted to show off my new haircut... I don't think my hair has been this short since I was five... but I like it. I needed something new, so why not?



Teaching seventh grade has been great. I'm really enjoying getting in to the groove of my new career. Every day is an adventure... not quite as adventurous as Bosnia, but everyday has it's own surprises!

Skoobi is doing well... I'll put a new picture of her up here next time I sign on. I actually have a video I want to upload, but for some reason, it won't take. Let's just say she is quite fond of Dunkin' Donuts!

Besides teaching school, I've been busy at my new church attending a ladies Bible study on Tuesdays and then teaching middle school girls on Wednesday nights. It's a lot of fun, and I am so glad they asked me to involved with the youth. I am team teaching with a wonderful lady named Liz. Her and her husband took me out on their boat a couple weeks ago. It was SO much fun! I can't wait to go again. I put some pictures down below.

Liz does a ministry to the nursing home on Mondays. A few weeks back, she met a very downcast lady at the home... as they began talking, she told Liz her family was from Serbia! She has never actually been there (she's in her 70's, I think), but her family spoke the language when she was growing up. It was very fun to be able to go to the home to speak to her before we went on the boat. My language is so rusty at the moment, so it will be nice as I stay in contact with her to practice some. Liz and I plan on cooking up a little Eastern European something before we go next time. That should be fun!

In September, mom celebrated her 60th birthday. We decorated her office, and had a really nice day for her. No one had to wonder how old she was since we put the "Hoppy 60th birthday" sign outside her door! Yes, it's "Hoppy" since she collects frogs, remember.

A few weeks ago, two of my friends from Bosnia were here - Tiffany and Sladjan! It was really fun to catch up with them. We went to Downtown Disney, and had a nice and relaxing afternoon.

The most fun thing that has happened in the last two days was after 31 years of living in the same house, in Florida, by canal... we finally had an alligator in the yard! OK, it wasn't more than two feet long, but we finally had an alligator in the yard! It was so cool!! Mom was out walking the dog for me (I tend to come home from work and fall asleep on the couch for an hour) when she suddenly was at the window, yelling in a loud whisper " YOUR CAMERA, GET YOUR CAMERA NOW! THERE'S A GAToR OUT HERE!" And I'm thinking "Save my dog...! And yourself, of course!" :) So I grabbed the camera and ran out to find the sweet gator I aptly named Fred. He is pictured below... we haven't seen him since, but I'm more concerned about meeting Fred's Momma! :)

OK, well, I am back to blogging! I hope some of you are still out there! Drop me a line and let me know!

Just a couple pictures from my day on the boat. I loved being out on the river and the ocean. The ocean was very cool with all the waves. I would put a video on here, but it's kind of embarrassing hearing myself yelling "woohoo" the whole time :)

Tiffany and Sladjan show their true colors!

We had fun on Mom's birthday! It's great working at the same school together.

The sunrise over our canal and dunes the other morning... apparently this is where Fred-the-Gator was born!

Can you find Fred-the-Gator's eyes? Look smack dab in the middle...

There is Fred right before he went in the water. I tried to video his move, but my camera battery died! AARGH!

And here is a close-up of Fred... what a cutie!

First Day and Fay...

The first day of school was Monday. I think it went very well. I enjoyed my first day as a teacher. It seems that I have many good students. However, we have yet to have second or third day of school! While Fay was only a tropical storm, she was full of water, and our county is flooded. Thankfully, we don't have any damage, but some friends of ours, only about a mile away, have a foot of water in their house. Most of the streets are impassable. We don't know if the schools will be able to open tomorrow since the people who need to go out and inspect them (like my dad) aren't even able to get to most of them.

One thing we need to work on is getting Skoobi to go potty in-between feeder bands :) She did fairly well, but did need to go out once in the middle of some good rain and wind. I'll put some pictures below for your viewing pleasure. As soon as that's done, I need to go and revamp all my lesson plans. No matter when we head back to school, it's going to be the first day all over again!

Just a quick video from our back window yesterday afternoon

(the video wouldn't upload, so I'll try again later)

The back yard beginning to flood... The neighbor's was already flooded.

This plant is supposed to be standing straight up, but it looks like a giant stomped on it!

More backyard pics

Skoobi loved the wind

The front of the house usually floods with more water than this, but it's still raining so you never know.

While not liking the river or ocean, Skoobi seemed to have a fascination with the really big puddles.

Skoobi's nemesis checking out the storm from inside her cozy room

The canal next to our house rarely has water in it... you can't really tell, but it's about 3/4 full... probably about 4 feet of water or so.

The backyard water started to receed this morning, but has kind of stalled. It will probably be there a few days, beckoning many mosquitos as it stands. Uugh.

Skoobi had to go outside at 11 last night. There was just so much water, the fire ants were floating around everywhere, and both Skoobi and I got bitten. The fun just never ends :)

More Chandler Pics and Video Proof...

Here are some more pictures (in random order) of Chandler's last few days with us... his flight just took off from Orlando... Skoobi and I will miss you Chan!

Chandler and his grandpa Shaq doing some sort of freakish water ballet. It was such a beautiful day on the beach. Florida does have some perks!




Dad and Mom and Chandler at dad's birthday and Chandler's going away lunch.



Me and the boy last night after dinner



Chandler and his cousin Skoobi got along very well. Skoob already misses him... and all the treats she won't be getting anymore :)


Back to Cracker Barrel and a mean game of checkers


Chandler and 2/3 of his grandparents...

Hahahaha... who doesn't love the Cracker Barrel staff singing happy birthday? Ok, so he specifically said he didn't want the singing... I have a lot of missed birthdays to make up for! I suppose i'll have to start paying rent now...


The Fam...


Oh, and by the way, my heels were closer to three AND A HALF inches... as you can see from the above un-touched photo. No wonder my feet still hurt :)





And last but not least, I took the above video for my dear sister Jean in Oregon. It's a little hard to hear, so make sure you turn up the volume!!

A morning at the beach - blog post #200

We took Skoobi to the beach Saturday morning. I've been wanting to do it for a while, but the dog beach is about a half hour away (the people beach is only about 10 minutes away) and I just haven't wanted to drive that far. It's also funny to me that the dog beach is directly across the road from the nuclear power plant... hmmm... But anyways, Saturday morning was beautiful, so off we went. As the above picture shows, we got there just after sunrise. Next time we'll try to get there for the sunrise.

I was hoping Skoobi would just want to jump right in (like the other two dogs that showed up after a while). But alas, she just doesn't seem to be a water dog. I think she is afraid of the noise the waves make when they crash. She's lucky it was low tide otherwise I don't think I could have gotten her this close to the water

There she is not liking the water too much. It's amazing how fast she could move when the waves came in. Maybe she's just a spoiled diva who doesn't want to get her precious paws wet.

Yep, she was not at all into the water. I'm not going to force her, we'll just go maybe once a month or so and hopefully she will get over her fear.

She did like the seaweed. Thankfully there were no jelly fish or crabs on the beach, or we probably would have had to stop by the vets office on the way home. :)

And there are her paw prints gracing the shoreline - at least till the next wave comes and washes them away.

Below is a video of Skoobi on the beach. I think I finally figured out what she is... part Dalmatian, part sissy-chicken! :)



Thanks for sticking with me through 200 blog posts... wow!

You Ain't Gettin' My Donut...

We try to take Skoobi to the river for a nice long walk 3-4 times a week. It's about a 7 minute drive to the inlet and is much more scenic than the neighborhood. We went Saturday morning, and as usually there were quite a few squirrels running around. Skoobi saw one before we did (as she let us know by doing her new 'squirrel dance and whine') - it was really blended in to the tree it was sitting by. As we got closer, my mom and I finally saw it and noticed it was eating something. The squirrel kept one eye on us and the dog, and one eye on the food she was munching down on. We finally got too close and the squirrel made a break for it up the tree - with a whole donut in it's mouth! It was so funny watching the squirrel scramble in circles up the palm tree with a whole donut in her mouth! We just laughed and laughed - we couldn't decide if Skoobi wanted the squirrel or the donut more! Ad that squirrel was NOT letting some well fed spoiled dog even get a sniff of her precious donut. It was really cute.

Besides walking the dog, I've been cleaning the two bedrooms I'm living in. They aren't "dirty" but they have turned into storage units for me and my brother and sister. I found a dress I haven't seen in 4 years, some CD covers I knew I didn't throw away, my birth certificate and some medical papers I've been looking for for years. The good news is, I think I'm on my fifth garbage bag of stuff. That's liberating. I also have a lot for an upcoming garage sale and a pile for Goodwill.

I've also been volunteering a couple days a week at my mom's school. I helped at the book fair last week. My proudest moment was when I talked a boy out of buying some plastic bracelets and into buying a book. My least proud moment was when I tried to give kid change from a twenty when he only gave me ten. But he immediately pointed it out "Uh... I only gave you a ten." So, I gave him a free pencil since he was honest. I really enjoyed interacting with most of the kids. This week, I am observing/helping out in an autistic classroom for the morning on Wednesday and then on Thursday I'll be helping the kindergarten classes decorate cakes for Mother's Day. That one should be fun!

This coming month I'll be filling out job applications, visiting friends and supporters, and doing some babysitting. I'll continue to clean out these rooms, do some volunteering and a bit of traveling to visit people. I'm attending a good Bible study and trying to do some reading. It's still very strange being back, but I decided to take it one day at a time and "be still and know He is God..."

So where is the unwelcome friend?

I took Skoobi out for her walk this morning. I wasn't really paying attention, just looking around the yard and trying to wake up when I looked down...



Snake skin in and off itself doesn't bother me, but it was just the startle factor of not expecting it that kind of helped me shake off the "just woke up" groogies. I have no idea where Mr Snake went, but I really hope he doesn't feel he has to show me his beautiful new skin. There's a big difference in looking down and seeing shed snake skin and looking down and a seeing brand new skin on a live, slithering snake (or even old skin for that matter). Especially when you have flip-flops on... And even more especially when you know super-dog will want to go forward and investigate it while all whimpy-master wants to do is run in the other direction!

And if you hadn't noticed, it's a pretty long snake!

**Update a couple hours later...**

I hate Mr Snake.  He did decide I needed to see his pretty new skin.  I guess if I liked snakes, I would say he was quite pretty.  Very black, very long, very fast.  Skoobi didn't see him, thankfully.  We were just outside  and about to go over to the side of the house when he stuck his pretty little head up out of the grass about 10 feet ahead of us.  I froze, then with no shame, I freaked out.  "SKOOBI GET IN THE HOUSE!" as I drag her to the door - poor thing doesn't even know what's happening.  All she knows is that if I want to get in the house that fast, there must be something good going on outside!  :)   

Now I know black snakes are our friends and they can't hurt us and (according to my neighbor I just called to tell him about the snake) eat the poisonous snakes.  I just don't like snakes...  especially if they are long, and super especially if they are fast.   I just hope it doesn't get in the house.  That's never fun.  

I'd love to be sitting outside with Skoobi now.  It's a beautiful day.  And Skoobi really hasn't gone to the bathroom yet.  I really need to teach her to pee in the tub...