Girls' night in

Nick and Dave went to the baseball game (NO THANK YOU) and so I went over to Emily's house for a girls' night in. Well, girls and children. We had fun playing with the kids (I beat Alexa in Candyland and then both the kids at Memory -- they have to learn sometime) and eating yummy Chinese food. After they went to bed, we "watched" Dear John. I put watched in quotes because it wasn't like watching a movie with my husband, the one with all the rules. All the rules get thrown out the window at Emily's. She graded papers, I played online, and we chatted throughout the movie. Both of us left the room at one point or another while the movie still played! Nick would be flabbergasted. I wouldn't say we got a whole lot out of the movie, which is really sad since we both read the book as well and still couldn't really tell you the plot, but it was an enjoyable evening anyway.

Friday night movie night

Last night we watched two movies, Yankee Doodle Dandy for our AFI project (post coming soon) and Clash of the Titans. I made the mistake of letting Nick go to Blockbuster by himself and using the words "surprise me." I brought it on myself in a way, but he still owes me two movie picks for this one. Ugh. This movie was a definite must-NOT-see.

The Hills are Alive

My friend Stacy and I went to the Fox Theater to see "The Sound of Music." Neither of our husbands were interested in the least in seeing a musical, so they were all too happy that we wanted to go with each other. We went to Mary Mac's Tea Room for dinner (a Southern restaurant which was very yummy), got caught in a monsoon going back to the car on our way to the theater, and finally got to the theater a little wet but still excited. We were early, so we explored the theater for awhile and then enjoyed the show. It was really a great play and now I'm singing all the songs in my head! "High on the hill was a lonely goatherd..."

Here we are before heading out and before we got soaked head to toe!

Book Review

My Name is Mary Sutter by Robin Oliveira

I read this book recently on the recommendation of someone (not someone who reads this blog, though, so don't worry). I was intrigued by the plot summary and loved the cover, so I picked it up and began it. It started off well enough: a woman named Mary Sutter who lives in the pre-Civil War era is an accomplished midwife but desperately wants to be a surgeon. She knocks on door after door of doctors and hospitals trying to get someone to train her, but is rejected over and over. Of course, she can't be admitted to the colleges because she is a woman, and no one takes her seriously. Then war breaks out and everything changes. She joins Dorothea Dix's staff of nurses on the battlefields and works to prove herself in horrendous conditions of sickness and death.

This could have been a great story, but I found myself getting bored. Mary's character was likable and intriguing at first, but she flattened out at the story progressed and I found myself disinterested in what happened to her. The author brought in real historical figures (John Hay, Abraham Lincoln, Clara Barton, George McClellan to name a few), but instead of adding to the story, it halted it in its tracks and I found myself having a hard time getting back to the story about Mary. It was stilted in places and the dialogue felt forced, and I felt the conversations between Lincoln and his advisors were badly placed and irrelevant (obviously not irrelevant to the real life events, but it detracted from the story about Mary). It also went into GREAT detail about some of the medical procedures and horrors that Mary and her fellow medical workers faced while treating soldiers. This book is not for the weak-stomached.

Overall, I don't really recommend it, though if you are fascinated by the Civil War time period or medicine, you will probably find it more interesting than I did.

Here it is:

The last day before school starts. My pencils are sharpened, my copies are made, my lessons are planned.

Just for fun, here are 10 things I did this summer, both productive and non-productive.

1. I watched my younger sister get married to a great guy!
2. I went to the beach and enjoyed a week of relaxing in the sun (and saw my husband go out IN the sunshine for about the first time ever).
3. I organized my pictures, deep cleaned each room of my house, and got a LOT of junk out of here (though there is still more to go through, as there probably always will be).
4. I read 22 books that had nothing to do with school.
5. I traveled to St. Louis for a wonderful roommate reunion with my college friends.
6. I went to two baseball games and lost 6 pounds during each of them with all the sweating.
7. I saw the premiere of "Eclipse" in the theater a couple of times...ok, 3 times.
8. I celebrated several birthdays with family and friends.
9. I exercised WAY less than I should have due to an injured leg and extreme laziness.
   
10. And, though I haven't talked about it on this blog yet, we started the process to adopt a baby! (This should really be #1 in importance and in the sheer amount of time and effort I've put into it this summer...)
    

It's been a busy but very good summer, and I think I'm ready for school to start tomorrow.

Today, though, I'll be having my last pajama day of the season and won't be leaving the couch for most of the day!

I heard

on the news last night that we've had a record 64 days of +90 degree temperatures in a row. In a typical summer, we get about 40 +90 degree days.

Can I get a collective groan?

Disgraceful

I've only written 5 posts in August, which is just disgraceful. (I'm sure other months have been as bad if not worse, but that was the one I saw.) I don't really have anything all that interesting to say, necessarily, so I'll just post 10 reasons I can tell summer is on its way out.

1. While it is still hot and miserable outside, it is not quite AS hot and miserable as it was through most of July. I'm enjoying the relief.
2. The days are getting shorter. I'm sorry, but 9:30 is WAY too late for the sun to still be shining.
3. Halloween decorations are out in every store, and Christmas is making an appearance (which is all utterly ridiculous, but at least makes me excited that they are coming).
4. Our electric bill was not over $300 this month like it was last month.
5. The school buses have begun their loud morning and afternoon jaunts past my house.
6. There is a whole lot of football talk on the TV and radio around here, which means football season is nearly upon us. Time to get out the Alabama flag for the front of the house!
7. The mall was nearly empty yesterday while Emily and I shopped, and usually the line for Chick fil A is HUGE (no school kids shopping!).
8. I'm completely sick of all my summer clothes and can't wait to wear pants and long sleeves again.
9. Our pool closes next weekend. Boy, will I miss it. The two times I went this summer were so memorable.
10. My pedicure is starting to look chipped and old, which definitely means that closed-toe shoes are on their way back soon!
    

New hair

Please excuse the no-makeup, red eyebrow, old T-shirt look. But I got my hair cut today and quite like the change. And it must be good because the girl that did my eyebrows was shocked that I was old enough to be heading into my 9th year of teaching school. No one EVER thinks I'm younger than I am. She was probably just trying to get a better tip out of me (it worked).

School already??

Well, not quite. But tonight is our parent orientation so I have to go and talk to all the parents of my students about what this year will look like. I'm not ready!! I do still have two more weeks (from yesterday) before the first day of school, but already my brain is starting to be in that mode. It doesn't help that for the last week and a half I've seen the school bus rolling through our neighborhood in the afternoons. The county schools have been back to school for over a week now.

I guess the good news is that it means I'll be back to my normal schedule (and you all know how much I like schedules) and that fall is on the way. It DEFINITELY doesn't feel like it yet outside, but I know it has to come eventually!

More baseball

Though I swore I was done with baseball for the summer (one is plenty), I ended up at another game Wednesday night. This time, though, no rain (yay) and the players looked like this:


rather than mere specks on the field like they usually do. Our seats were five rows up from the field, so having that perspective was pretty fun.

It was STINKING hot, though. We weren't in the sun but that didn't stop the sweat from pouring -- gross.

If you look carefully right in the middle of this next photo, the man with the camera in the khaki pants and mauve shirt was my education professor at college. He's retired now and works for a local newspaper covering the games. I've never seen him at a game before, but there he was taking pictures at the dugout!

Despite my whining, though, it was a pretty good game, with three home runs and a win! So that part was fun.

The reason we went was to celebrate Barbara's birthday. Here's the whole group after the game. Excuse the dripping sweat.

Of course no baseball game is complete without a crazy person trying to solicit money on the train on the way home which we got to endure. Good times.

Family reunion

This weekend was my family's annual reunion. Typically, it is held several hours away, and we usually can't attend (the last time I went was before I was married). But this time it was held nearby at a retreat center, so Nick and I went. We had a good day visiting with relatives and playing games. Oh, and taking pictures (some goofier than others):

August

It has been the hardest thing to find decorations for August! I really wanted red peppers for the color, but haven't been able to find them anywhere. I thought about school supplies, but decided it would be harder to arrange in the vases and might look funny. Plus, I've still got 24 days until school starts, so I'm not really ready for that yet! So I decided to go with shells for one last grasp at summer vacation. This might have been more appropriate for June when we went to the beach, but it's still summer in my book!