Monday, April 13, 2009

Shape Up


For the month of April our elementary school is participating in, Shape Up Across Oregon, a program that provides encouragement for children in meeting daily guidelines for physical fitness and nutrition. Shape Up Across Oregon was originally developed by The Oregon Governor’s Council on Physical Fitness and Sports in response to an increasing need for physical activity among children. Sounds a bit like a previous post about a program in the 60's called, Chicken Fat : ) but this program is self-motivated -- no one is turning on the phonograph (ooohhh-that sounds ancient!) forcing you to participate. Each day that you exercise (not to exceed 1.5 hrs.) you color in a square of an Oregon map that is provided by the program and "exercise" your way across the state.
My journey across Oregon is looking a little dull. A busy schedule last week kept me from my walks -- thus very few squares are filled in on my map. I've just returned from a fifty-minute walk. It felt good. I had my iPod on and listening to the soundtrack, Walk the Line gave a little lift in my stride. Of course, when the Ring of Fire came on I had to chuckle -- remembering Adam's version on American Idol : ) Anyway, on the last half of the walk I tried running four blocks and walking four blocks. The sudden rainfall gave me the motivation I needed.
Now to finish my day off ... turning on the fireplace, reading my Bible study lesson, and taking a little nap. Gotta love these days off ... the only one left on the school calendar this year is Memorial day. Such a long stretch .....

Easter

We enjoyed a fun day with family and friends. We celebrated the Germer family birthdays -- Walt's and Michelle's. Jason also had a cake for his 29th birthday which is today (happy birthday, Jason!) Both Matt and Tim will be on business trips this week and Brian is busy with tax season so we combined our party with Easter dinner.
What a fun, full weekend!
Credits:
Template: Lina's Layouts -Template 034
Wordart: Choukette -freebie wordart vol. 1 -english
Font: CK Ali's Writing, Lazy Day
Paper: Sarah Bennett -Eat Your Peas, pattern 6
Element: Crystal Wilkerson -Easter Chick

Easter Bunco


A day off work ... a nice opportunity to rest and recoup from the weekend festivities.
This morning I unzipped a new template and wanted to give it a try. I thought our Saturday Bunco night would be a great topic for this fun layout. The news story describes it all : )
What an enJOYable evening!
Credit: SG Newspaper Template

Thursday, April 09, 2009

Decimals ... Fractions ... Percentages ... Oh, My!

Many have asked ... where have you been????
My blog has been pretty quiet lately. I feel like I've been in another dimension ... a place where your brain is taxed to the limit ... within the pages of a MATH book.
In May I will be taking the "highly qualified" instructional assistant test in order to meet the qualifications for my position as determined by the No Child Left Behind Act. Since I feel my weakest area is math and considering that my last math class was 40 years ago ... I stopped at the public library and checked out most of the 513 section. If you are looking for any book on this subject, consider its new location on my bookshelf ... at least for the next three weeks. I have been cramming and reviewing until late at night -- then picking up where I left off solving math problems while eating breakfast before heading off to work. Math has been my world -- no scrapbooking ... no blogging ... no reading ... no FUN : )
Anyway, if you haven't heard from me, I probably have my nose stuck between the pages of a math book ... working on one story problem after another!