Am I the Only One?

I am struggling right now. It seems that I am surrounded by people who are excited to announce that they are expecting. You would think that I would develop a thick skin, but that just isn't the case. Recently, there have been more announcements than I can even believe myself...

1. Good friend and co-worker of mine. Adore her and she was the sweetest when she called to tell me.
2. and 3. Chris' coaches- one was an announcement some time ago, the other more recently. My favorite part- the actual statement "Why aren't you excited for me?" Yep, that was actually said to Chris. He later called and told her we were in fact excited. (Not sure that is the word I would use... but I am bitter)
4. This week- Another coworker's wife. Now, he hasn't actually told me. One of my amazing friends told me so that I had the time to adjust before the "big announcement"
5. I walked into class last week... new professor, new class. Professor is VERY pregnant and likes to talk about it all through class. Good fun!
6. A friend of a friend... not sure if this even really counts, but seriously, am I the only woman in the world who wants to get pregnant and can't? Did I miss some meeting about how this all works? I really thought I was well versed on how babies are made...


Of course, I am happy for each and every one of these families to be. (Some I am more happy for than others...) But I can feel the sadness deepening too. All but one of these women are younger than me... most by SEVERAL years. Have I lost my chance? Am I really just too old?

What if I really am the only one that never has children? What if I am the only one who is not part of this secret society? What if I am the only one who has NO plans for Halloween... too old to go to a party myself and don't have any children to worry about trick or treating. What if I am the only woman who doesn't have to go to Toy's R Us for the must have toy? What if I lose touch with my friends because I simply can't relate to potty training stories day after day? What if I am the only one at the millionth baby shower who has nothing of any value to add to the conversation because I have never given birth or spent any more than 8 consecutive hours with an infant? What if I am the only one who sees what an amazing father my husband could have been but never got the chance?

Ok... enough melodrama. Must prepare for an entire day in one room with twelve 12 year-olds who have both Trick-or-Treating and a Dance to be excited for. Will be a LONG day tomorrow....

Another Monday

Where does the weekend go?  Before I know it, it's Monday again!  Of course our weekends are usually busy, so that doesn't help at all.  I did get some time to work around the house on Saturday, so that was nice.  There is just a sense of accomplishment that comes from having all of the laundry done. That only lasts for about 30 minutes, but hey... it is something to be happy about!

Nothing new here.  Chris bought a new car.  I don't have a picture of it to show you, but it looks a little like this:

 

Except ours is more green that this one.  He is happy, it has what he wanted so I am slowly getting over the concept of a car payment again!  We rented one of these (its a Chrysler 300) in Florida once and Chris has been in love with the car since.  The one he bought has a hemi, which I am told is a good thing.  :-)

School is good... finished the 2nd class this week, so I am now officially 18% done with my master's degree!  :)  The next class is content area literature which is focused on middle and high school so that will be a nice change.  I should be doing reading right now...

Chris bought me an early Christmas present... a Wii... and I am in love!  We have a playstation 3, but the games are just too hard for me!  We also bought the Wii fit, and I love that too.  I have worked out on it a few times.  I hate that they make your Mii reflect your BMI.  While I know that I am overweight, I have never agreed that my BMI put me in the obese category.  I hate that my Mii looks like a weeble.  I suppose it is supposed to motivate you, right?!  We'll see.

Must go grade notecards for Biography Day.  That is a big deal in 6th grade.  Each student selects a famous person and reads a biography about this person.  They then dress up as this person on Halloween and give an informational speech.  I do enjoy it... but it is a lot of work on my part.  My students are just not independent enough at this time of the year. So now I must look over 12 sets of notecards before tomorrow.  

Chicago Marathon 2008

Once again Chris made me very proud...

 

Once again the weather was less than ideal... this time way too hot to run 26.2 miles, but he did it!  He had really hoped to finish under four hours, but ended up finishing in 4 hours, 10 minutes.  He is happy with his time considering the heat and the many people who didn't even finish.

I was lucky enough to have some friends with me through the day chasing him across the city!  

 

We were able to see him at 3 miles, 11 miles, and the finish.  I had really hoped to see him one more time, but we wanted to see Steph, one of his swimmers that he has trained with.  Her pace was slower than Chris' so I ended up missing him at 16.5 where I had hoped to see him.  But it was fun, and HOT for us as well.  I didn't plan well and wore jeans... way too hot for the day!  I intended to put on my Nike+ on my ipod to track how much walking I did, but forgot.  I figure I walked at least 10 miles over the course of the day.  Not 26.2, and not running, but still a lot of walking for me!  :-)

Chris gave me a little scare at the finish as he couldn't keep anything down... not even water. 

 

He is must better today and is only moderatly sore...not nearly what he was last time he ran it.  He trained really hard this time, so I think it all paid off.

Here he is coming up to the finish.  I think this is my favorite photo of the day:

Last time he ran, I didn't take more than a single photo.  This time I handed off my camera to a friend who took almost all of these photos.  I am so thankful!

My fall break is just about over... It has been nice to have some time with Chris, but now I must go back to reality.  I am glad that I had Thursday, Friday, and Today off... Saturday and Sunday were packed with the Marathon and there is no way that I would have been able to jump right back into work.  Now I need to go write a paper and grade some papers...

AOL Journal Import

I started a journal on AOL back in 2003 when we started all of this. AOL journals is now closing down but I was able to transfer all of the posts here. I have been meaning to do this for some time, so it was nice that I was forced to do it.

So, there are now posts all the way from 2003 here. I am not going to go back and read any of them now as I think it would depress me at this point.

If you want to read them, you can find them through the archives on the right -->

What happened?!

This is how I feel this morning... What happened? How did the team with the best record in the National League end up losing all 3 games in the first round of the playoffs? I am just sad...

Happy Birthday Megan!

Happy Birthday to my dear friend Megan!

Megan and I met through work- We both taught at CSMS until last year. Megan got her dream job at a new school and left us. I miss seeing her every day. She is a good soul and is my voice of reason. We've tried to talk at least once a week since school started. Today is her birthday and a few of us sent her a cookie boquet shaped liked birds... this is only funny if you know that she is terrified of birds. :-) Hopefully she will get a laugh and think of us all today.

Week in My life...

So I was all excited to be starting the Week in my Life project that Ali Edwards is running on her blog. She taught the class at CKU back when I went, but I chose another album track. I always wanted to do it, so when she had it posted on her blog this week I jumped on board. I haven't been taking many photos lately, and I haven't felt very creative. I needed a boost. I know that I NEED to take the creative time- especially when I don't seem to have the time. It keeps me grounded and makes my spirit happy.

So I got my camera all set for Monday so I could capture my day in photos. I charged up the battery and put in the memory card. The memory card acting a little funny at first (wasn't recognized by the camera) but then it was fine. I went on my merry way taking lots of photos. Last night I was just too plain lazy to come upstairs so I didn't "dump" the memory card last night. This morning I was running late, but I remembered to grab my camera and took photos on my drive in and throughout the day just as I did yesterday. I was so proud of myself.

I finished my homework for class tomorrow and decided to dump the photos onto my IMac. Put the card into the card reader....... AND MY MAC FROZE! It has NEVER EVER EVER done that. :( Had to reboot. So I put the card back in and everything appears to be fine.... until I realize that photos are MISSING... like 50 or more photos! Of all of the photos I took yesterday, only SIX made it on my computer. I could scream. From today, there are tons missing too. They aren't even all in order... it is a few here and there. I AM SO MAD! I was so proud of myself and now I don't have the photos I wanted. So what do I do? Do I try again tomorrow? Do I scrap the whole project? Is this a sign that I have too much on my plate right now to even consider this? I really feel that this will be good for me- it will let me see my life from the outside and reflect on what is going on right now.

Ok, whining over. Here are some of my favorites that did make it onto my computer...

These are the books/notes that I should be reading right now


My darling Patches.. whining to go out for the 100th time tonight. She has recently found some spunk and has found her naughty side. While I am happy to see her active, she is making me a little nuts with everything she is getting into. But then I remember that my days with her are numbered... she will be 13 in December!
Then there is this face.... how can you not let him walk all over you? Wait, it's me that he walks all over! Yes, they still have on their 4th of July collars... it's too early for the Halloween ones and by the time I was ready to switch them, I decided to just wait a few more weeks and put them in the Halloween ones.

Ok, I will try again tomorrow. I have a different memory card in the camera now and am charging up the battery. Maybe my camera is finally starting to go wacky... it is an original Digital Rebel from 2002 and I have been drooling over the smaller, more advanced versions... A girl can dream, right?

Off to do some reading... maybe I should have some idea about the content for class tomorrow!