Are We Afraid?

So today on CNN, there was an article about New York signing into law same-sex marriages. I had seen several other friends post things like "Way to go New York!" and decided I wanted to take it a step further and post the actual article. Which led me to thinking, "How many of my Facebook friends will be offended by my post?"

While I find that most of the time my friends have similar beliefs to mine, I also find there are times when I am VERY surprised to find out that some of my friends are keeping "secrets" about their beliefs. I know that not all of my friends would call themselves "Liberals," I don't know that I could even really say that (okay, I probably could on MOST issues) but I know that many of them would say they have liberal tendencies or beliefs. While one friend might say that they support a more conservative approach to taxes, that same person also would claim to be Pro-Choice. Then again, I'm also guessing that some of my Pro-Choice friends would say they are NOT for the legalization of gay marriage.

My real question is this- are we afraid to tell our friends what our beliefs are because we don't want them judging us? I admit that I did hesitate for just a second before I clicked the "post" button on the article. Was I going to cause some of my "friends" to get upset with me. I decided that anyone who really was my friend and disagreed with my opinion wouldn't be afraid to tell me that they disagreed. But they also wouldn't stop being friends with me just because I support gay marriage. I've never really been one to shy away from sharing my opinion, and I want to project that message to Max (and in 7 weeks Michael) that it's okay to share your beliefs with others...even if he decides his will from with his mother's. :)

Baby Love

Where has the time gone? I'm so grateful though that it's already the end of May and I'm only 9 school days away from being off until November 1st. I am completely ready to spend the summer with Max and then have Michael at home with me for several months before returning to work.

Michael is growing like crazy! He's already in the 82nd percentile for his gestational age. I can only imagine how quickly he will be past the charts and he's not even born yet! Max was only in the 65th percentile at this same gestational age and was 9 pounds 13 ounces and two weeks early! I sure hope those 0-3 month summer clothes I bought fit! We will certainly be surpassing all newborn clothes and diapers. And of course, bringing home a giant chubby baby. I get an ultrasound every 4 weeks to monitor growth. I am hoping for either an August 8th or August 15th delivery date. I'm thinking my doc will set that date in one of my early July appointments and not make me wait til the last minute for planning purposes.

Max is in love with his baby brother and he isn't even here yet! He talks about "Baby Michael" at school all the time. He talks about the things they will do together when Michael gets here (go to the zoo, play with the dogs, eat pizza, etc.). He kisses and hugs my belly and sometimes even talks to it like he can talk to Michael. He tells me that he will hug and kiss him when Michael is "outside of your belly". It is an AMAZING experience to see your first child start to connect with your second, even in utero. I'm so lucky to be having a second pregnancy. There were definitely times I felt like that would never happen. I just can't wait for Michael to get here!

The Terrible Teacher

So I mentioned in my last post that there is a teacher on our team that is TERRIBLE. She's new to the district this year and from day one, things have been weird.

"Miss Q," as I will call her, has a disability. It's a visual disability. She's legally blind. It's obvious. Her eyes go in two different directions and she can't look you straight in the eye. Now if she had just been honest with us from day one, I might feel a little differently. She has NEVER told us just how blind she is. As a matter of fact, she has never actually mentioned that she's blind. Obviously, we notice that there is something wrong. I'm sure she assumed that. But if she had just addressed the white elephant in the room from Day 1 and said, "Look, I know it's obvious that I have vision issues, could you guys help me out if you hear the kids are doing anything they shouldn't be in my rooms," I would probably respect her a little more right now.

Her vision issues do contribute to her ability to monitor a classroom. And while I am all for equal opportunity employment, junior high classrooms is NOT the right placement for this disability. Some examples of things that have happened under her "watch": (pun intended)

• A student in her 1st period class was throwing a paper airplane out the window almost every day until another teacher caught him doing it.
• Students in her 2nd period class stuffed the heater full of paper. It started spewing smoke and paper when the boiler was turned on this fall. She had no clue they were doing it.
• Two students in the same 2nd period class were getting up out of their seats and pushing the call button for the office. When the office would call to ask what Miss Q needed, she would tell them she hadn't called. They would then do it again. She had no clue what was going on
• Students in ALL of her classes raise their hands and never get called on when they need help. She will ask the room if there are any more questions and students will raise their hand and WAVE IT around. She says, "Alright, moving on then..." (This has been observed by other classroom teachers.)

These are just a FEW of the things she can't "see" happening in the room.

Other issues stem from her actual instruction of the content. She teaches the WRONG material. Or teaches it incorrectly and then has to reteach it the next day. The kids are lost. The other math teacher is actually pulling 25 of her algebra kids two days a week to review material that she has previously taught so they aren't behind for math next year. I've actually observed her teaching a class where the students are laying their heads down in frustration and shouting out that they don't understand what she's teaching them. She just pushes forward. I had to ask her to postpone her last exam because I had sobbing students in my classroom.

Additionally, she loses papers. Honors students who don't ever have a missing assignment are coming up with "missing work". They are very upset. Some of these kids are so upset that they come to our classes crying. Others have gotten angry. Some have their parents calling the school. Some are even photocopying their homework with parent signatures and dates on it each night so they can either turn that in when she loses it or prove that they've already done it. Now we know that some students are being manipulative and "claiming" that she's lost their work. But many of the kids are telling the truth. They can prove it.

Their parents are pissed. The assistant principal fielded 80 phone calls just last month about her. I'm worried that students are going to revolt and take over the classroom.

Then the bomb dropped: She told us today that she won't be returning next year. Which probably means she's been non-renewed on her contract. The weird part: She told us she might not be finishing THIS year. We're not really sure what this means. Is she quitting early and burning up her sick days? (She has enough to take the whole last quarter of school off.) Or is there something else we don't know? (i.e. She's been asked to resign early because things are SOOOOO bad.)

I hate to say it, but I'm glad she's leaving. I don't wish her any harm and I know in this economy it's hard to find a job, but she's TERRIBLE as a junior high teacher. She's just terrible as a teacher in general. She's living with her parents, so I'm not worried she'll be out on the streets. I just don't think that it was fair to anyone involved this year- students, parents or other teachers.

Life Has Gotten Away From Me!

So blogging is obviously not the priority that it used to be for me. A two year old, a job, a house and a husband have all contributed to having less time to write to you, my adoring fans. :)

Here is what has been happening in our lives since Christmas:

Max

• He is fascinated with what he calls his "back crack". Lord help us, he's also fascinated with OUR back cracks. Just this morning he tried to poke me with a bottle of soap. Kendall finds it hilarious. I do not.


• Loves the number 2. When you ask him how many of something are in a picture, his first number is always 2. Even if there is only one.


• He is refusing to wear jeans, cords, khakis. He only wants to wear "comfy pants" which are sweatpants and swishy pants. Sometimes we can convince him to wear "pajama jeans" if he is in a good mood.


• Also loves his pjs right now. He would wear pjs all day long if we would let him.


• Max now knows all of the basic shapes: circle, square, triangle, rectangle, star, oval


• He is still fascinated with Christmas. Wants to sing Christmas songs, sleep with his Santa blanket. Maybe it's because we still have a tree up in our front living room. Hmmm...


• Favorite TV: Dinosaur Train and Thomas the Train. I'm so tired of watching these shows.


• Favorite Movies: Cars & Madagascar (which he calls the "Animal Movie")
  
• Favorite foods: hotdogs, pickles and chips. If you ask him what he wants to eat, he will tell you this combination almost every time. Of course, he doesn't get this every time, but he still tries. In the morning he says pancakes. I've convinced him to eat oatmeal on a few occassions. :)


• He has named our baby "Bunny". No idea why. I'm pretty sure he understands the concept of a baby. I'm also pretty sure he has no idea this baby will be coming home to live in our house some day. :)

Kendall

• He seems to be getting a cough back. I have forbidden him to get sick again.


• Has started working out again. He's able to do most of his exercise routine without getting out of breath. The pneumonia really kicked his butt.


• Found out he's allergic to pigeon poop. And that it is the most likely cause for November's pneumonia. We have no clue....


• Is very busy at work. It's stressful sometimes.


• Has been doing an amazing job of taking care of me and Max. I'm just so tired at night right now.


• Is going to join a curling club at Hobart Arena in March. He's excited. I'm hoping he makes some new friends.

Me

• Hoping to feel normal soon. Well as normal as you can while pregnant. I graduated from my fertility doctor. I now just go to a regular OB/GYN for the remainder of the pregnancy. I stopped taking progesterone suppositories and am hoping my stomach starts to feel better soon. It seems to hurt after every meal right now. Not really sure why. Found out I have another cervical polyp (had one with Max). This will cause spotting throughout my pregnancy. JOY.
  
• Had a 6 day weekend with the ice storm at the beginning of February. I was ready to get back to work. The students weren't. I don't care. We're working.


• Went through a short spell where I actually DIDN'T hate my job. That hate has returned. It's mostly just because of a few co-workers. But it may get even worse if they don't fire the terrible new teacher on our team. I may just lose my entire work ethic if she gets to stay. I'll have to devote a whole post to how terrible she is.

Merry Christmas!

I don't have much to say right now. I could post all of Max's latest adventures and goofy behaviors and I could talk about work, but I'm not going to. All I want to say is that for this moment, life is good. The trees (all 5 of them) are lit, the stockings are hung, our tree skirt is filled with presents and I am at peace. I am going to enjoy my two weeks away from work. I will eat as much as I want. And I will lay around and do nothing as much as possible. And most importantly, I will celebrate the birth of Christ and be thankful for my family and friends.

Merry Christmas everybody! See you in the new year!

Disconnected

It's the time around the holidays that I really start to feel like our move to Troy has disconnected us from a lot of our friends. We're further north and no one seems to think about inviting us to things because we're just "too far away". Many of my closest friends now live at least 45 minutes to an hour away and we have kids and other responsibilities. I understand that. But I hate it.

I think even more frustrating than that is the fact that I've tried to make friends "up here". I just end up feeling like a stalker. I'll suggest that we get together and even offer up some dates we're available, and it seems like people are just too busy for us. I hate it. Am I unlikeable? Sometimes it feels that way. Maybe they're just more popular than I am and fill their calendars faster. That's the only thing I can tell myself so I don't feel like a total loser.

What I hate more than anything is that Max doesn't have anyone to play with. His cousin, Anna, is not interested in playing with him yet. And the friends that I've tried to connect with up here don't seem to have time for us. Or they're stay-at-home moms and their kids play together all day long. They don't want to have an evening play date. Which is hard too. Even the friends that live south of Troy that have kids seem to be sahms and it's the same scenario.

I get on FB and I see all of these fun pictures of kids together in front of Christmas trees and it just makes me want to cry. I feel so left out. It makes it even harder when I think about having another baby. Because that's the playmate Max will have. And the longer and longer it takes us to have a baby, the bigger the age gap will be and then he won't be interested in playing for quite some time.

Even Jessica hasn't invited us down to do anything. She's coming to Max's birthday party next weekend and I'm sure she will have to rush through because she has to get home to Callie or get Maddie down for her nap. I feel like we've lost touch. I know that its just as much my fault as hers, but seeing her pictures hurts more than anyone else's. I don't even know how to say anything to her about it. I know that she's having these get togethers during the day with her other sahm friends. So I can't blame her for that. It just SUCKS.

Sometimes I feel like the only person who makes any effort to come to Troy or at least INVITE US to their house is Karen. At the beginning of the year we made a great effort to see each other at least once a month. And she was willing to trade off the drive. It worked well until about October. The last few months have been hectic because of illness and holidays, but at least we are still trying to coordinate time together. And I appreciate that. We always have a good time and the kids seem to enjoy each other, even if they haven't seen each other for a month. Max STILL enjoys watching video of the time we took our bounce house down to play with Nicole. We blew it up right in their living room. It was hilarious. He laughs and yells, "Nic!" and "Max!" THANK YOU KAREN.

Does anyone have any suggestions on how I can meet other people that live up in Troy? I've tried my neighbors and Kendall's co-worker connections. There is supposed to be a group through church, but one of their activities is meeting DURING THE DAY. Grrrr. I just get so lonely sometimes.

Mixed Feelings

So this week has been quite the roller coaster of emotions. Here are the highlights:

Monday- Overwhelmed- I had to go in to work because I don't have that many sick days banked yet. I knew that when I used them all up with Max I would be putting myself in a precarious situation, so I can't really complain all that much. It was totally worth it to stay home with him for 4 months. But it also means I'm very selective about my days off. So when I went in Monday I was trying to catch up from two days of sub notes AND trying to plan for two more days of subs notes. The kids were pretty good and the subs didn't suck, so by the end of the day I felt like I had a handle on things.

Tuesday- Disappointed- I had taken the afternoon off because Kendall was supposed to be coming home from the hospital. It didn't happen. They wanted him to get a few more doses of IV antibiotics in his system before releasing him. So I had to come home and get the house ready for our cleaning lady (pick up junk, get out the cleaning supplies) and then I headed down to the mall for a few hours. I ended up not finding anything (I was hoping for some retail therapy) and the bras that I bought ended up being a failure. Overall, by the end of the day I was frustrated and exhausted. I spent a few hours playing Yahtzee with Kendall at the hospital and then had to come home and get Max ready for bed.

Wednesday- Encouraged- I headed to the doctor Wednesday morning to see if the cyst that had formed on my ovary was finally gone. It was another month of not being able to do any fertility treatment and I was ready for some good news. Fortunately, the cyst is gone. So I have ordered my drugs (let me tell you, 500 dollars on fertility drugs is NOT the way I want to be spending money right now!) and start my shots again tomorrow. We have decided to go back to the more expensive treatments. It's what worked for Max. We were hoping to get away with the cheap method. It wasn't working. So fingers crossed this works. Kendall also got to come home! I picked him up at 1 and we drove around getting his medicine and equipment that the hospital wanted him to use. Unfortunately, Max also developed a slight fever that day.

Thursday- Frustrated- Max woke up with a fever of 103. Poor kid was barely keeping his head up at 7am after a full night of sleep. Fortunately Kendall was staying home the rest of the week, so I headed in to work. I was worried about them both all day. Kendall didn't really get the rest he was supposed to and Max's fever still didn't go away. I had to run a bunch of errands and take out the trash, and I found myself thinking that I wouldn't mind a few days rest in the hospital....

Friday- Exhausted- After all of the errands the previous night, I had flopped in to bed. Because Max had slept so much of the day on Thursday, he decided to wake up at 3am. Kendall took him downstairs to watch tv for a little while and give him some more Motrin but I was still up and tossing and turning. So I was a little short on sleep. The day seemed to go by quickly, but I had many things to take care of for next weeks two day field trip. I'm behind on grading and feel like I REALLY need the Thanksgiving break. Max peaked a fever of almost 104. I hope it's not too serious.

Saturday- Impatient- Today I am getting impatient. I am trying to be understanding with Kendall. But I feel like he's milking it a little bit. Yes, he had pneumonia. Yes, he's still recovering. But YES, I have been busting my butt for two weeks. And YES, I want his help with a few things. I'm ready for this to all be over. And to just enjoy my freaking holidays. Hopefully this next week is a little more even keel and I can sit back and relax and enjoy my family and be thankful that they are all HEALTHY!!!