I’m joining Jen’s group today to give you 7 Quick Takes from my week. Hop on over to
Conversion Diary . . . after you've read mine!
-1-I’ve never been an athlete . . . or a photographer . . . but I sure wish I had had a camera with me when I visited the 5th grade gym class this week. Parents were invited to come play volleyball with their child’s class during gym time and, of course, I was summoned by the queen. I couldn’t even come up with a lame excuse to miss this one.
So there I was with the 5th grade class and three other
suckers parents playing volleyball with a huge, soft, colorful volleyball. And it was fun, by golly. It was fun! The kids got such a kick out of us “old folks” trying to hit the ball and not get hurt. Thankfully, I didn’t fall down or embarrass myself too much.
-2-The same cannot be said for a couple of other times this week. On the way over to the elementary school for the holiday program I wiped out—with an umbrella in one hand and a bag holding Maggie’s shoes and my video camera in the other hand. Quite unflattering and embarrassing. AND I pulled a muscle in my arm. Oh help me.
Then, yesterday morning, on my way out to the garage with an armful of packages to return to various stores, I wiped out on our driveway. Unfortunately, the Nordstrom bag didn’t fare so well, but thankfully my knees survived.
Let this be a lesson to all you new drivers out there (you know who you are!), snow on top of an inch of ice makes for VERY slippery conditions.
-3-Costco. Christmas season. Need I say more?
I think, yes.
How on earth can a parking lot with probably 2,000 parking spaces in it be completely filled up? It just didn’t seem possible—and with a week to go until Christmas. But, friends, I’m here to tell you that it IS possible.
Yesterday, on my last day to do errands, I needed a couple of things at Costco. O.K., “needed” is a relative term here--I had coffee cake (have you tasted their coffee cake?!) and croissants on my list. But when I could barely even squeeze the ole’ mini-van into the parking lot, and then, after driving around and finding nary a parking space, I decided that coffee cake and croissants would have to wait. I’ll just have to improvise. There is NO WAY I was going to tackle the store if I couldn’t handle the parking lot, so I turned around and left.
-4-Is anyone else as paranoid about gift-giving as I am? Just wondering, because every time I buy a gift I think, “I have no idea if this person will like this.”
I wish I could change that about myself.
-5-I got home from my big day of errand running to find the strangest sight in the middle of our street—packages strewn about . . . in the middle of the street! I wasn’t sure what to do, but I stopped my car and opened the door to check them out. Both were being shipped through FedEx and both were being delivered to the same street in our town. One box, I could see, contained a ham because the box had broken open and the ham was falling out.
Obviously the FedEx man had taken the corner a little too quickly; I’m guessing the back door of his truck may not have been closed.
So, being the good citizen that I am, I put the packages in my car, pulled into my driveway, and took them into my house. Both of the names on the packages were, thankfully, in the phone book, so I called both numbers. (I did NOT want to have to deal with FedEx!) The one person who called me back was so happy to get her package from L.L. Bean that she had her husband drive over immediately to pick it up.
He took the ham with him and was, I think, going to deliver it to their neighbor. Unless they needed something for their Christmas dinner.
-6-In case you hadn’t heard, we had a snow storm last night. Well, it was kind of like a sleet storm here—I woke up all night to the sound of little sleety pelts hitting the window. So, no school today for the kiddos, which is a true bummer because the older two were supposed to finish up finals today (now they have to wait until the day after break) and my youngest was supposed to have her Christmas, oh—excuse me—holiday party at school. Youngest is obviously sad; older two are obviously rejoicing (until January 4 when they realize they have to study for finals again!).
So we’re dealing with snow and ice and REALLY cold temps over the weekend. GRRR. (Note: I don’t want to fall into the I’m-constantly-complaining-about-the-weather-on-my-blog thing. It’s just an anomaly, I promise.)
But would someone please tell my family in Dallas to stop telling me it’s going to be 75 there today?!?! Enough already!
-7-We absolutely love our little elementary school; it is the most precious place. It’s the smallest elementary school in town with only two classes per grade, so we pretty much know everyone there. It’s two blocks away from our house, so all of my girls have spent countless hours walking to and from school. And it is filled with the most wonderful families and teachers you could ever ask for.
Anyway, this has been a year of “lasts” for us since Maggie is in 5th grade. The last first day of school. The last Halloween parade. The last curriculum night. And this week was our last Holiday Program.
I have to admit that, as I listened to the kids singing “Up on the Housetop” and as I watched some of Maggie’s dearest friends dress up as elves to do a dance, I got a little nostalgic for that dear place. And I was especially thankful for our music teacher (and for our principal who allowed it) who finished up the evening with everyone singing “Silent Night.” I had tears in my eyes as I saw my neighbors and friends (some of whom are Jewish and Muslim) singing about the true meaning of Christmas. Hey, it is what it is—there should be no denying it. The spirit of unity was amazing, and our common love for that sweet little school brought us together.
We will certainly miss it next year when Maggie leaves that place.
