Living in Munchkinland

This Thursday, my mama flew in for a quick weekend visit. We had professional development day on Friday, so I worked a half day and then we loaded up the kids and drove up to Beaver Creek. I had used our free Hyatt globalist night at the Park Hyatt and gotten a second night for a ridiculously low rate. I had guessed and hoped and prayed that this weekend would fall in peak leaf changing season and I think I was right! The leaves were spectacular. Colorado took the first day of fall very seriously and changed our 80 degree and sunny weather on the 21st to 50 degree and rainy weather on the 22nd. But we didn't mind. The hotel had a lovely spa and Suzy had sent me a link to a groupon for facial or massage there so we all indulged. It was great. We sat by the giant fire pits and the kids ice skated and made s'mores. We played mexican train in the gorgeous hotel overlooking the village. Samuel has been struggling with a migraine all week and it got to him half way through Saturday....

In the last 15 months we have completely re-done our lemon of a house. We have built an entire BAR area downstairs, put on new gutters, bought all new window shades and treatments, put in almost all new lighting fixtures, fixed the sprinkler system, built a little patio in front of our back gate, had our gate re-done, put in two dog doors, fixed the garage door, painted several interior walls, re-finshed our table, put in ALL NEW doors and windows (fancy double paned ones), cut back our front tree, pulled out our dying backyard tree, planted two new trees, planted landscaping, pulled out ALL of our old floors (except my bathroom), put in ALL NEW carpet and ALL NEW LVT planking, put in new baseboards in many rooms, pulled off old nasty lumber off indoor trim, moved the kids room's downstairs and basically shuffled all of our furniture in the house, had our heater and A/C tuned and updated, pulled our old deck off the back of the house, had new siding and new trim put on the house...

I love teaching. At least, I love teaching theater. I love the kids and I completely get off on sharing some amazing new skill or idea about theater with them. I'm engaged. I care so much. I'm exhausted. I love our school. It is the most unique, exciting school I've heard of. It's a free charter school that focuses on innovation. We do backwards design from a PBL model. The kids are presented with a problem that they can engage in and work through their skills by solving the problem. This way they are invested and take ownership of their learning. Homework is not busy work, but an extension of skills. We are on block scheduling and this gives us huge chunks of time to teach and explore and reflect. Davis and Samuel respond well to this school. Samuel loves it because there is very, very little teach from the front of the classroom. He is on his feet, or working in small groups or creating almost all the time. He also loves the technology as he struggles with the physi...

Last Friday, Michael picked us up from school and we drove up to Estes Park for the Scottish Festival. We stayed at Jellystone again, this time in a loft cabin which was much more enjoyable than last year. Friday evening, the kids played at the playground and arcade and then we watched Back to the Future 3 in our little bedroom. Saturday morning we drove out to the festival grounds and had a wonderful time. It was warmer this year than last and so it wasn't quite as magical, but we still had fun. We met with our family clan (the McLeod clan) and I spoke with national president and it was so interesting! We watched the professional athletes compete. We ate festival food and listening to celtic rock and watched the dog agility show. Sam spent lots of time in the renaissance armory and both boys enjoyed shopping for swords and playing on the big rock with all the other kids. Unfortunately, our time at the festival was caught a bit short when it began to rain. We ran to the car and t...

We drove up to Aspen on Friday after school. The drive was incredible beautiful and we stopped at Independence Pass on the way. It was truly awe-inspiring. I felt like I was on top of the world. We stayed in a cute Wyndham condo called Woodrun Place that we found in VRBO. We shared it with Suzy and Jason and their kids. It was nice and in a good location. It was oddly situated though, in that it was on four different floors that started three floors up. Lots of stair climbing was required. Saturday we got up and leisurely made our way to Maroon Bells. We took free public transportation which meant transferring lots and finding our way. I enjoyed this tremendously as we saw lots of interested and different people and places and the getting there was half the adventure. We ate amazing eggs benedict in Aspen and finally made our way to Maroon Bells. We saw a yellow bellied marmot (whistle pig) and gorgeous aspen (already changing!) and had a nice tour guide. At the top was the most bea...