My other furball

I'm feeling a little guilty today. I talk all the time about my sweet little beagle, Gracie. Well, I also have another little furball. A fat cat I affectionately call Phoebe. I've had her since I was a sophomore in college. Phoebes was named after Phoebe on Friends because of her wonderful song, Smelly Cat. My Phoebe is the ultimate smelly cat. If you know Phoebes, you know she is really more dog like than anything else. She follows you around the house and loves to snuggle. The down side to Phoebe is she has recently taken to scratching the side of the couch and she is stubborn and demanding (she screams at you until you feed he, or pet her, or whatever else her heart desires). Nonetheless, I do love Phoebe, and now I don't feel so guilty for not bragging about her earlier.

Thoughts from a teacher, whose summer is 2 weeks from over

I am sitting on this beautiful summer day, not by the pool, instead, only because of my discipline, outside on the patio, with books strewn across the table, trying to write plans for the first week of school. Please don't even mention the fact that that last sentence was a run-on whopper. Mind you the first week of school is only 3days long and this discipline I speak of is also telling me it is ok to be blogging instead of working. I swore that I would work on this all summer, clearly I don't know myself as well as I should. I seem to have lost my planning mo-jo. I have gone through the first week of school for 4 years now, yet I can't seem to get the creative juices flowing. The teaching gods need to shine upon me. These are the thoughts of a lowly teacher, with too much summer left behind me, and not enough left to go. Sigh... maybe a trip to the beach would re-inspire me:)

TV addictions

Being home in the summer I have found I have some new addictions in the way of tv shows. I hope others have some of these same ridiculous additions. And because I heart lists I will give these new found additions in list form:)

1. Secret Life of the American Teenager: This show is.. well, there are no words to describe. The acting is not so hot and the writing is very unrealistic. I do not know why I watch it, but I will say I know I'm not the only one.

2.Deadliest Catch: OK this one I will defend. It is very intense and so fun to watch, but honestly it really is just about crab fishermen on the Bering Sea.

3. 16 and Pregnant: This is ridiculous. They find some "interesting" girls who are 16 and you guessed it, pregnant. It is so stupid I can't stop watching. I think things like, "of course it hurts you dummy, you are in labor- it should hurt"

4. Kendra: This is a spin off of The Girls Next door. It really isn't bad, but a definite waste of time. Kendra moves out on her own and gets engaged to pro football player, Hank Basket. On Sunday she will announce she is pregnant.

5. John and Kate plus 8: OK, I used to love this show, but now I just feel wrong watching it. I am thinking of trying to ban it when it comes back on the air from hiatus, but honestly I don't know if I will be able to do it I need an intervention!

4 years and counting

This is post number 100!! While I wanted to have something insightful to say in this 100th post, I don't have anything. Instead, I want to share with you a bit about last night. Last night was our 4 year wedding anniversary. We had plans to eat dinner at Oxmoor. Anthony had a reserved table for us outside- all very sweet. I had to go to Cincy yesterday and by the time I got home I had time for a quick walk and shower before I had to leave. I had noticed my muscles were sore on the ride home and from all the running around I was super tired, but I was looking forward to a nice dinner. The dinner was perfect and we had a nice, relaxing evening. When I got home however that feeling of being worn out was made worse. Long story short I ended up in pain for the rest of the night. My muscles ached and all I wanted to do was get sick. Which was exactly what I did (apparently the food wasn't a great idea). Poor Anthony got to spend our 4 year anniversary taking care of me. Well, here is to four years and many more to come... hopefully with a little less of the ending part of the night and more of the beginning.

My problem:

Here is my problem:

I know it doesn't look like a problem- but it is. This is the puppy I am trying to find a home for. I know it isn't a great pic (he looks bigger here than her really is) but he is adorable. About 4 months. A beagle mix little boy. He loks very much beagle, except he is a brindle color on his body. He is a very good dog- he likes other dogs and cats and especially people. I think he might have been abused.. he cowers a little. Anyway I can't keep him and need to find him a home...

Bernheim Forest

Since moving to Louisville I have found a wonderful place. Bernheim Forest. I love the outdoors and grew up hiking and camping, so Bernheim is the perfect place. It has tons of trails at different levels and lots of other interesting activities (I really want to try the full moon lit walk). Today I went with my parents and of course the beagle. It was a beautiful day for hiking- and sniffing for Gracie. We hiked 2 trails (Rock Run Loop and Iron Ore Loop) and had a nice little lunch also. If you haven't been to Berheim I definitely recommend checking it out.

*I have hiked almost all the trails there but my favorite is Rock Run Loop- very pretty!

Talin is here!

Yea! What a fun night. Tonight I got to meet Talin Michael Ridge. He was born today at 8:59, weighing in at 9 pounds 2 ounces and 22 inches long to proud parents Teague and Laura. Most importantly- he is so stinkin cute and of course even more fun for me, I am lucky enough to be the God mother to the stinkin cute bundle. Congratulations Teague and Laura. And welcome, Talin as the newest addition of the group.

Bible Study Verses

Here are some verses that I found throughout my 6 week Bible study that really stuck with me.



God will not allow your foot to slip, your guardian does not sleep. Psalm 121:3



I know that you can do all things; no plan of yours can be thwarted. Job 42:2



The Lord is your guardian; the Lord is your shade at your right hand.Psalm 121:5



Find rest, O my soul, in God alone; my hope comes from him. Psalm 62:5



God, I praise your promise; in you I trust, I do not feel. Psalm 56:5



The wisdom from above is first pure, then peaceable, gentle, reasonable, full of mercy and good fruits, unwavering, without hypocrisy. James 3:17

My Wii addiction

I have a new addiction. My hubby bought me a Wii and Wii Fit on Monday and I love it. Hence, the fact that I have not posted since before Monday. My favorite is the yoga, hula hooping, and the step class. It is way better than the gym. On a side note it earned my hubby some bonus points too:)

Cliche Pics

We went to the annual Oxmoor Country Club July 3rd Fourth of July Fireworks and Celebration. While I loved it, as usual (good food, good friends and good fireworks) I am not blogging about that. I am blogging about the cliche self-taken couple's photo. I know you all have them. They are the ones with the head shot- you usually can't tell where you are because you can't get all of the scenery in- and it always begins with one person's arm stretched to the longest point possible to take the picture. Now I know they have self timers on cameras but the self-taken, outstretched arm pic is what we all resort to when you have nothing to set your camera on to use that simple self timer, and don't want to bother others. And you know the best thing about the self-taken pic, they usually turn out the best. Here are ours for proof.

The view from the crown

When I was a senior in high school our senior trip was to visit NYC. There were lots of amazing experiences on that rip, but one that I remember clearly. It was visiting The Statue of Liberty. Back in 2000 you could take the tight, spiral staircase ALL the way up, up, up to the very top of the crown for a quiet, breathtaking view. Sadly, after the attacks on the United States on September 11, 2001 the Statue of Liberty was closed to the public. Well, today (July 4th) all of the Statue of Liberty was opened again to the public. Under tight security about 30 people/hour can visit the crown of Lady Liberty again. There could be no better day for this to happen. What a way to celebrate our country's birthday. I have also attached some little known facts about our Lady Liberty.

Spike That Fact! The seven spikes represent the seven seas and seven continents of the world, according to the Web sites of the National Park Service and the Statue of Liberty Club. "That's not true," says Barry Moreno, author of The Statue of Liberty Encyclopedia and the park's official librarian. The spikes are sun rays, he says, and the circle is "simply a halo or what in art is called a nimbus, showing she is divine." He adds that the Web site needs to be changed.

Weight, Weight, Don't Tell Me! The statue is fashioned from copper atop an undergirding of steel. The copper in the statue weighs 31 tons, the steel weighs 125 tons and the concrete foundation is 27,000 tons.

Do Not Torch The statue's torch has been closed to the public since the "Black Tom" explosions in 1916. German agents sabotaged a munitions depot on a nearby island on July 30, 1916, and shrapnel damaged the statue's torch and skirt. Today, members of the National Park Service must scale a 40-foot ladder to tend to the floodlights in the torch.

Winds of Change When the wind blows 50 miles an hour, the statue sways three inches and the torch shifts five inches.

Give Me Liberty and Give Me Death Though the statue symbolizes hope and optimism to millions, it has been the setting for at least three suicides over the years, says Moreno. He believes the first may have been in 1929, when a young fellow, turned down by his girlfriend, threw himself from the crown. In 1997, the New York Daily News reported that a 30-year-old man from Senegal plunged 100 feet to his death. "All indications are that it was a suicide," said Manny Strumpf, the National Park Service spokesman at the time. There have been no murders that Moreno is aware of, but there was a 2006 novel titled Murder at the Statue of Liberty — by Manny Strumpf.

Liberty Goes Hollywood The Statue of Liberty has starred in films since cinema's early days. Charlie Chaplin featured it in his 1917 film The Immigrant. And Alfred Hitchcock used the statue as a backdrop for his 1942 feature film The Saboteur.

The Statue's Trident Vandalism is a perennial problem, park service officials say. When the crown was open, people put chewing gum all over the place and wrote their names with lipstick.

Dangerous Boys

Some of you might know about the week long summer camp I did at school earlier this summer. I headed up a group of 20 boys (grades 1-3) in a class called "Dangerous Boys". It was super fun (and I'm not going to lie- a little exhausting). I always think boys are so much fun and so I really did enjoy the experience. The newspaper came out and did a story on it. I just found the article on Courier-Journal. It is funny to see the difference in the boy group that I had and the girl group that was being run just next store. Let's just say you could tell from the hallway by just listening where the boys were. If you have kids I highly recommend the books that are mentioned in the article. We used it to model the class and the kids had some good, old fashioned fun.
http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=2009906240336
these are pics from the week.
http://www.courier-journal.com/apps/pbcs.dll/gallery?Site=B2&Date=20090622&Category=ZONE09&ArtNo=906220822&Ref=PH&Params=Itemnr=10