Do not look for me at Thanksgiving

So Nathan and I just booked a trip to Paris and Rome with our friends Julie and Dennis for this Thanksgiving! I am so excited. I have not been out of the country for a while, I think it was 2003 when we went to Germany. Anyways I am so excited I am going to rent those travel videos by Rick Steves. I was thinking about getting Spanish tapes this summer, but maybe I will change to Italian, although Spanish would come in more handy here in the U.S. It has always been a fantasy of mine to go to a forgien country and be able to communicate with them in their language. It would certainly help dispell the stupid American sterotype that is out there. I have been to Paris twice before so I think I have a pretty good handle on what to see and do. But if you have any pointers about Rome, I'm all ears.

Free at last!

I had my last day of school yesterday! (well for a while anyway) I do have to go back this next week and do some curriculum writing for our 7th and 8th grade general music program. We are going to be moving from a lecture based program to a lecture/activity program. We are going to cover fewer composers and pieces of music, but learn about them more indepth. I will also be teaching summer band starting the week of July 16th, but other than those two things I am going to take some much needed time to recharge. My plans consist mostly of going to the gym, sitting in the sun, napping, and reading for pleasure now that I have no more grad school books to read! Nathan enjoys me on summer break too, I cook a lot more and I take over all the cleaning. So everyone wins when summer comes.

Plants

I have a theory that you should not have kids until you can keep a pet or plants alive for a period of time. I have done no research to prove my theory, but I do think it has merit. Kids certainly take a lot more work than a bonsai tree but it is better than having never tried to keep anything alive first.
I have never had much of a green thumb, although my mom is great at it. Go figure. I wanted to get a puppy, but Nathan said no way, which brought me back to plants. For the last three summers I have tried to keep some flowers alive on my deck in planters without much success. In my defense the first summer was ridiculously hot and my little plants could not take it. Last summer I got them to survive, but they looked pathetic, very twiggy, and not many flowers. This summer I was determined to have pretty flowers. I did some research and found a type that loves tons of afternoon sun and I splurged and bought the expensive Miracle Grow Potting Soil with moisture control. So far my flowers are looking fantastic. I wish I could take all of the credit, but I do think the expensive potting soil helped quite a bit. So if you are having trouble keeping your plants looking good try that stuff out. Just to prove my plants are looking good I took a few pictures of them last night, enjoy.