Pep Pep Peppy - but pass the Pepto Bismol

At least, that's what my tummy was saying just before I had to walk out with the yearbook and newspaper kids during the Winter Sports and Activities pep assembly today.

Seriously - it takes a lot to make me nervous. I'm normally a pretty confident person. I can stand up in front of a room full of teenagers and try to impart knowledge in an entertaining way. I can stand in front of a workshop audience of 50-100 people and talk high school journalism. But, my heart was racing and my stomach was in knots when that music started playing today.

One of the senior StuCo members chose songs for each of the activities that sort of went along with what they do - ours was "Paperback Writer" by the Beatles. It was pretty cute. I only had to do a quick 1-2 minute spiel, so basically I mentioned the senior editors, and congratulated the yearbook staff for being ahead on their current deadline and the newspaper staff for working on their current issue. My opening line was something like: "Here are some of the hardest working students at BVHS, you just might not see them altogether outside the classroom working as a team...blah blah blah."

1,500 sets of eyes it a little overwhelming. Granted, I'm sure that half of those people were either a.) talking to the kid next to them, or b.) texting a kid across the gym from them.

It's a bad time for us to do an announcement like that because our competition season is the spring. Regionals in February, State (hopefully) in May. Most of the other activities have been to competitions and performances, stuff like that. Oh well, all the kids said I sounded good, and they said they couldn't tell I was nervous. My voice wasn't shaky or anything, they said.

Anywho, it's bedtime. As you know, I was up late last night, and I didn't get home from school tonight until 8. Just enough time to watch the Office, Earl, and check the blog.

Nighty night.

Week 9 Champs - Team That's What She Said

We rocked the Extreme Team Trivia tonight - no one came close. We've already qualified, but now we get a gift card so we can eat and drink for free at next week's.

Not areally exciting post, but as you can see by the time posted, it's WAAY past my bedtime.

More later.

J

Late night with Jill Chittum

So, the blogging will most likely be on the light side this week. Tuesday is yearbook work night, Thursday is newspaper work night. I guess this is where I pay the price for doing pretty much absolutely nothing during my wondrous five-day break. It's karma, I tell you.

BUT, we did send 18 pages to the plant today, so we're still ahead on submissions. Luckily, the editors and I are on the same page here - let's stay ahead for as long as we can, so that if we hit a horrendous deadline in the spring, we'll still have some padding.

Picked up the yearbook staff shirts today. We had nicknames put on the backs of all of them. On Thursday, there's a pep assembly, and activities will be recognized (instead of just athletes). I guess I'm supposed to parade the two staffs in front of the entire school, and say a few words.

A few words? How about "Oh. My. God. I really have to speak in front of the entire school?" I'm sure ours will be short and sweet. A couple of the girls are working on a banner for the staff to hold as they walk by.

A big week, indeed.

At the risk of pissing off half my blog readers...

It's happy dance time! KU will not end this season undefeated! Not a huge Mizzou fan, but I can't take smug KU fans.

Okay, that's all, I promise. I don't want to rub it in or anything.

•••

Now, I've got to log in to ABC.com so I can watch the "October Road" from Thursday night before it's on again tomorrow.

Did anyone else notice that Bree's daughter from "Desperate Housewives" played an unwed mother on "Private Practice" last week? What's up with all these TV stars hopping shows? My peabrain can't take them being more than one character.

Two of my faves from "The Closer" have recently been spotted on other shows: Sgt. Gabriel was on "Private Practice" a few weeks ago, and Sanchez played a prisoner on "My Name is Earl". At least "The Closer" is on hiatus right now, so they're just working on the side. I can't believe ABC would double cast someone like they did with the girl who plays Danielle on DH. I know the writers are on strike, but I'm sure there's no shortage of young girls wanting TV roles in Hollywood.

Weekend in photos- Random is the word

Well, I don't have a lot to SAY about the last few days, but here are some random photos from the weekend's events.

As you will see, when we were walking around on the plaza, I got on some sort of photos of windows kick.

Of course, it's Thanksgiving weekend. It's Kansas City. It's 20 degrees outside. Let's go look at the Plaza Lights.


Amy and I ran around all day Friday. We did yarn stores, thankfully avoiding big-box MegaLo Marts and thus, avoiding crowds. We at lunch at d'Bronx on Bell Street. Great pizza. Here's a photo of some random people eating there.

I saw the other day that they're opening a d'Bronx at 103rd and Metcalf. Weird. Again, the suburbanites want to feel urban without leaving the friendly confines of Johnson County, I guess.

I stopped for coffee after an hour or so of walking around on the plaza. Here's Adam holding my coffee.

As I said, Amy and I only did yarn stores, so it really as Yarn-O-Rama.


Help me out here. I don't "get" Urban Outfitters window dressings. Everything is crossed out, Xed out, edited looking, but when you read the un-edited words, they don't make sense. What are they trying to tell us here?

Other bloggers posted turkey photos, so here's Adam's. He did a great job all by himself on dinner for six.

After turkey dinner, we played Tiger Woods Golf on Wii.

After 15 holes (about two hours) of Tiger Woods Golf, I gave up and started knitting. Joshua had to take over for me (I was Annika Sorenstam). Okay, the game is fun, but it starts to get a little boring and frustrating, especially when Annika wasn't having the round of her life. Although, I did get a couple of birdies and one eagle. Too bad the "exceeding the stroke limit" on the other holes completely negated those.

Oh, we also did Extreme Team Trivia Wednesday night. Our team, "That's What She Said" qualified for the big money no whammies final round in two weeks. So much to say about that adventure, but it'll have to wait until I can post the photos and video.

I love it when Tuesday is not a school night

Watch out, world - teachers all over the country are letting their hair down for a few days.

Last night I went out with the goils. Adam works with all these ladies, so I got invited to their GNO. We had dinner and wine (so. much. wine.) at Spin. It's a pizza place similar to Il Vicino, for the Wichitans on here. It's kind of funny, though, because it's in a strip mall in Leawood (119th and Metcalf, behind Cheesecake Factory) but they've totally done the fixtures like it's in some reborn industrial cavern, with exposed cinder block walls and exposed duct work on the ceiling. Ooh, pretty darn edgy for Overland Park-Leawoodites. I guess you can be urban without going to "the city."

It was really nice to have a social group of women to hang out with. Seems like Adam and I are still trying to get our social lives moving up here.

Mitzi, Betsy and Amy. There was a whole LOT of photo-taking involved in the evening.

Looking at photos that were already taken.

Betsy's comment card on the wines she tasted. You'll notice, her first wine says "Free Wine." The restaurant manager had a little thing for Miss Betsy. She was the first to arrive, so while she was waiting on us, he bought her a drink. Then, throughout the evening, he proceeded to "help" the server work our table. Miraculously, ManagerMan always worked the table from Betsy's end. He was mighty touchy feely about the whole deal, as well. I used a simple 1-10 rating system for my card, Betsy was definitely more creative. By the end of the evening, we were trying to figure out how to spell "woot! woot!" (you have to say it out loud to yourself).

Yum, wine through a (I mean, four) straws.

A few of the wines we tried. My favorite was a Riesling by Polka Dot. It came in a tall, thin, bright blue bottle.

Everyone except me works at the elementary school with Adam. Their school stories are pretty damn funny. I don't know how they do it everyday.

We shut Spin down. They had the whole place closed and cleaned around us, but ManMan let us stay two extra hours because he was doing inventory. So, I guess you could say we did benefit from his little crush on Betsy.

I had a great time. It's a little nerve-wracking going out with people you don't know for the first time, but by the end of the night, I was feeling pretty comfy with everyone. They're all super nice and friendly, and I'm sure the copious amounts of wine tasted helped, too.

What a difference a day makes

Yesterday, the girls at school were wearing short shorts and flip flops. It was 75 degrees when I drove home.

Today, snow is falling.

It's just started, but the flakes are big and wet. Not much is sticking just yet. This makes me glad I've decided to make this day off from school a Do-Absolutely-Nothing-Work-Related Day. I brought home grading and some other things I need to work on, but it's going to have to wait.

Snow falling outside the sliding glass door makes a perfect sit and knit day. Just grabbed "The Holiday," "Blood Diamond" and "Running With Scissors" from the clubhouse.

•••

Here's Alice's finished bag. It shrunk up quite short when I felted it. Amy had the same experience with the Noro yarn. It felts much more vertically than it does horizontally.

Okay, Cat People - listen up

You must go look at Crazy Aunt Purl's blog right now. She did a cat sweater contest, and the winner photos are on her site. They are freakin' HI-larious.

A few of the winners are featured on the post, but then if you click on the gallery link, you'll see TONS of crazy photos.

It's pretty good for a laugh. The only thing I kept thinking while looking at the photos was "Gracie would scratch the fingers right off my knitting hands if I tried to cram her into one of those things." I guess other people's cats are a helluva lot more chill than mine.

I think I can...I think I can...

Now that I think about it, that little phrase really fits in with many aspects of my life.

Running: I think I can run four miles today. (Yes, I did that!)
Knitting: I think I can figure out this crazy stitch pattern I've never tried before.
Teaching: I think I can find some new and exciting way to engage 20 kids for 53 minutes at a time.

The Jacksonville marathon training is officially off. We think one of the Running Chittums (not I) has a stress fracture in his left foot. The only "fix" for a stress fracture? No activity for six to eight weeks. In a way, it's probably a good thing, because we really shouldn't be spending what would probably be over $1000 bucks on the trip. Flight, hotel, race registration makes it an expensive proposition. I'm going to continue training, and start looking for an event that is within driving distance from KC.

As I was trying to organize and do a little housekeeping on the blog yesterday, I looked back at my original post. It was something about Resolutions, and one was to run 750 miles this year. I had started, and done a decent job of keeping track, but in all the craziness of moving, changing jobs, life, etc., I stopped keeping track. I think I'm going to add a spot somewhere on here where I just add up the miles each time I run. Maybe I could turn it into some kind of challenge.

You might have noticed that there are now Google Ads on TheChittumFiles. I've decided to try to make this blogging thing a bit of a business. I'm already doing it, it doesn't take any overhead, and it's something I enjoy. Might as well make a little dough in the process. Each time a reader clicks on one of the ads, I get paid for it. Okay, so I thought it would be like a nickel a click or something, but I've had it on my site since the beginning of November, and I'm on pace to make over $50 this month. Not bad considering reasons previously stated. What I'm hoping is that I can use that money to bolster savings for eventually starting my own business. (I'm sure yarn and knitting needles will be somehow involved in said business.)

It's kind of funny, though, how random some of the ads are. Google crawls my site and decides what relevant ads to post. When I was posting from Philly, they were advertising apartments in Philly, restaurants in Philly. Of course, usually they are knitting-related ads. But, once, and I can't even remember what I posted about, one of the ads was for "Gay-Friendly Autos." It's nice to make the extra dough, but it's also interesting for me to see what kind of content I drive...

Two days of school this week. It will be nice to have a break. We're doing the big turkey day at Mom and Dad's, but Adam will be doing the cooking. (It was either that or Mom picking up the "Festive Turkey Dinner" from Dillon's.) I think we all can agree we went with the better choice.

Saturday On The Move

Phew. Yesterday I was all over the place.

Mom and Jayne picked me up about noon, and we went to a couple of craft sales and two yarn shops I haven't been to yet.

The first craft sale was in a church, and we went because Mom knew that the woman who had sold us basket-making supplies was going to be there selling her work. Her work is amazing, especially since I've now attempted basket-making and I know how time-consuming it is.

She made all of this, and it's just a fraction of what she has to offer. She's got teeny, tiny baskets, all the way up to baskets that would hold a sack of potatoes (in fact, Mom bough one yesterday that is made for holding potatoes).

Unfortunately, she's going to be getting out of the business by the end of the year, she thinks. Yesterday, everything she was selling was 30 percent off regular price.

Look at that lighthouse. Isn't it cool? And it has a tiny battery-operated Coleman lantern in the top that actually lights up when you turn it on. I think that would look really cool in a nautically-themed home.

She was in the process of making this basket, featuring feathers, when we were shopping.

I'd love to be able to sell handmade goods at craft sales, but there is just no way to make a living out of it (at least not for someone like me, who doesn't have retirement income yet...). When you factor in materials and time it takes to hand-make something, there's no way you'd earn the money back. Plus, at the church sale, it was $110 just for a booth! I mean, I guess once you pay that, you get to keep the money you make selling items, but you'd have to sell an awful lot just to make the $110 back.

For example, after the chuch sale, we went up to Oak Park High School, in North Kansas City, for a huge sale. They had tons of tables. Most of them were selling beaded jewelry, but there were a few knitters and seamstresses. I bought a hat for Adam (see the photo below).

A little older lady was selling them, and I bought it for $4. Four dollars! Can you believe it? It looks exactly like one I would make for him, but I couldn't get the yarn for it for $4. Plus, I love the way she did the striping. It's very stylish - I can't believe it was knitted by an older lady!

We also stopped in Parkville, to check out a yarn store I'd heard of before - Florilegium. They had beautiful hand-dyed yarns. I didn't buy anything there. Parkville was pretty cool. I'm going to have to drag Adam up there some weekend. It's a cute little downtown area, with all kinds of specialty shops, and they have a restaurant and brewery so maybe we could have lunch there after doing a little shopping.

On the way back south, we stopped at MisKnits, a new store in KC that I also hadn't been to yet. I liked her store. A LOT. It's definitely on the list for Amy's and my knitting extravaganza next weekend.

We did go to TigerFest, but just to do a once-over of all the merchandise up for auction. I'll be interested to see if my knitted goods sold for anything. Guess I'll find out later this week.

After TigerFest, we ate at Jalapeno's, a cool little Mexican joint in Stanley. It was packed. It very much had the feel of being the only restaurant-bar in a small town on a Saturday night. Families were there, people on dates were there, and people were just hanging out at the bar watching football. The food was good, but not overly spicy. I like my Mexican food to have a little bit of a kick to it.

THEN, (see, I told you I was all over the place) we stopped in at Dean & Deluca. Seeing as how we're both in education, which means we never have extra money, we would never shop at D&D on on own accord, but we had a $10 gift card. So, Adam got some gelato ($3 for about three tablespoons) and I got a piece of key lime coconut cake ($4.50 a slice). Pricey stuff, but damn, it was good.



Once we got home, we watched some more college football, and I finished Alice's purse. Felted it this morning, but I'm not going to take a photo of the finished version until it's totally dry and I can take it outside.

Woo-hoo! Donut Crew!

Everyone loves Krispy Kreme donuts, right? Everyone knows that high school students love food - LOVE it. I don't know about other subject areas, but pretty much every time you attend a yearbook/newspaper workshop, one of the strategies advisers are told to use is FOOD. And let me tell you, it definitely works with publications kids.

Funny thing though. At my old school, I always felt sort of clandestine on "party" days, like if an administrator walked in the room, I was going to have to say "We're practicing team-building activities, which speaks directly to state journalism competency standard 'Works well with a team.'" Rewarding students was practically unheard of at DHS, because so many days, we were pretty much just fighting to keep our heads above water.

Not so now. And I'm talking about on the level of the entire school. This week, we got news that BVHS received the Governor's Award for being in the top 5 percent of schools in the state for reading and math scores. The principal spoke over the intercom as soon as he found out, shared the news, and let everyone know there would be donuts on Friday during first hour. Seriously, you should have seen the kids.

So, Friday, while my kids were preparing for the current events quiz, one of the assistant principals delivered our box of donuts, providing us with a nice little snack, a break, and a chance to just "be" for a few minutes while they ate mass quantities of sugar and fat. Those times are fun for me, as a teacher, because that's when you get to see the kid behind the kid. One thing I like to think I'm pretty good at is connecting with students, but sometimes we get so caught up in getting things done, getting material covered, that it's nice to have a short break and learn a little more about this teenage alien life form.

And, I gotta tell you, it's amazing what a difference it makes when the students are invested in the school improvement process. They have their own goals for the school, for themselves, and they want to know that the adults in the building take them and their input seriously.

Sometimes, teachers can get frustrated about the way things are going (and trust me, I've been there). You feel like you have no support, you don't make enough money, kids just don't want to work, etc. But we can't let those feelings overtake the good, because that's when things really start to go south. Working in a building where teachers are collaborating, friendly toward one another, and students have the goal of making their school the best in the country is a pretty cool feeling.

Tonight is TigerFest, the big fundraiser for activities. Haven't decided yet if I'm going to go, but if I do, I'll let you know how it goes (and how much money we raise for journalism!).

Check out Amy's blog

For some more Philly photos.

Maybe she'll even post the video of me running up the Rocky steps in dress clothes. Someone needs to do a study of people in vehicles approaching the art museum steps. Is it an involuntary reaction to start humming the theme from "Rocky"?

Judging by the tour bus of journalism advisers we were on, yes, it is. Almost everyone joined in on the chorus of "buh-buh-buhhh, buh-buh-buhhhhh...duh-nuh-nuh-nuh-na-na..."

Finally, Tigerfest scarf is an FO!

Okay, so it's not the greatest photo, but we shot it during commercial break of "Private Practice" so it is what it is.

The Tigerfest auction scarf is finally complete. It's a Lion Brand Reversible Cable Knit Pattern, knit with Paton's Soy With Stripes yarn, in color 70310. It's self-striping wool with a little soy mixed in. It looks deceptively short in the photo, but there's a lot of it hanging to the back. I wanted you to be able to see the end.

I think someday I might try to knit and felt a bag using this yarn. Since the rows would be longer, the stripes would be a lot thinner. Judging from the felted swatches I've seen at Michael's though, it'd probably have to be double-stranded to be thick enough to be a purse.

•••

In other news, since gas is now officially at a bazillion dollars a gallon, Adam is going to be riding his bike to work. We only live about 2.5 miles from his school, so it should be fairly easy to do. Tonight, he installed a headlamp, and back light on it since he'll be riding in traffic. Usually we just ride on the trails around here.


I'd like to say that the whole reason he's doing it is to "go green" which is a fringe benefit, definitely, but honestly, we're just hoping to save a little dough.

Last of the TravelBlog

Here's just a few more photos from Philly. (Don't worry, none were shot in the bathroom of my hotel room...)

We spent a long time Saturday afternoon walking around Old Philadelphia. I'm not gonna lie, I kept thinking about "National Treasure."

Here's the Rocky statue in front of the Art Museum. You'll have to see Amy's blog eventually for me going up the steps. I was in dress clothes, because we did it on the way to the Jostens dinner.

I really think I actually could have made it up the steps had I been in running clothes and not feeling like total shit on Sunday morning.

My good friend and traveling companion.


This is Ben Franklin's burial place. I really liked the epitaph he wrote for himself (which wasn't intended to actually be used).


More photos from the Christ Church Cemetery. Can you believe some of these tombstones have been here since the 1700s? Four signers of the Declaration of Independence are buried here.

I found this interesting. It looks like she's praying, but I think she's actually copying the information about the woman buried there into a small journal.


Self-portrait in front of Independence Hall.

PhilaHellphia

I was supposed to be back at school today. Instead, I slept in til 9, laid on the couch and watched all of the TV shows I DVRed while I was at convention, and knitted up a storm. I had cream of wheat for breakfast, drank diet 7Up and Gatorade, and chicken soup for lunch.

I awoke at 3:30 in the morning Sunday, with what I thought at the time was a raging case of food poisoning. I had eaten out for breakfast, lunch and dinner on Saturday, so it could have been any number of things. Thing is, Amy ate almost exactly the same things I did, and she wasn't sick. It must have been a stomach flu of some sort.

I feel really bad for Amy, since basically she woke up at 3:30 a.m. also. Pretty much the worst time to be as sick as I was is when you are sharing a hotel room with someone. I was getting up just about every 15 minutes for some sort of trip to the bathroom.

Normally I love to fly, travel, stay in hotels, etc., but Sunday was pretty much the worst day of my life. I hate being sick away from home. And I don't get sick very often so I'm pretty much a wuss about it. I had originally planned on sharing a cab with Amy, and trying to go standby on an earlier flight so I could get home before 7 p.m. Couldn't do that in the state I was in. Luckily, I had packed almost everything on Saturday before I went to bed, so I didn't have too much travel prep Sunday morning. I got to the airport pretty early (my flight wasn't scheduled to leave until 2:30 p.m.) and the ticket agent told me I couldn't check in/check my bags until 12:30. It was 11 when he told me that. Sick as a dog, I was carrying a backpack, totebag, purse and my rolling suitcase. I went back to the agent, asked if I could go on an earlier flight, and he said it was oversold.

But, as the tears started to well up in my eyes, he must have taken pity on me, because he allowed me to check in at 11:15. At least I shed the backpack and the rolling bag, so I only had to schlep my totebag and purse to the gate. I hadn't eaten anything all morning, and I had been up since 3:30. I could barely walk I was so worn out. At this point, I still had two hours until departure.

I laid across the chairs, hooked my tote straps under my arms, and put my purse under my head like a pillow, and slept. And slept. And slept some more.

Finally, we got to board the plane. I fitfully slept in my seat (in the fully upright position because it was in the last freaking row and wouldn't recline) until the flight attendant came with beverage service. Stupidly, I asked for a Diet Pepsi. I hadn't had any caffeine at all and thought it might help my headache. About 2.5 seconds after she handed it to me, I knew I didn't want it. All I wanted was to sleep, and I didn't want it spilling off of my tray table and on to the girl next to me. (Poor schmuck, I hope I didn't contaminate her.) I was so tired that I actually asked a kid who passed me on his way to the bathroom if he would throw it in the trash for me, because I couldn't wait for the flight attendant to come back. Thankfully, he did, and I went right back to sleep.

I had an hour and a half layover in Milwaukee. Still felt like crap, but at least I got a little knitting done while there. Once I FINALLY got on the plan bound for KC, I slept again - the whole flight.

I have never been so happy to get home in my life. And, Adam had the house all cleaned, stuff put away, new sheets on the bed - the whole nine yards. I wonder if he'd been working on that the whole time I was gone, or if he started when I called him from the bathroom floor of my room in the Downtown Philadelphia Marriott at 4:30 in the morning?

Days 2 and 3 - Philadelphia

I meant to post something about my day last night. Really I did. Problem was, once we finally got back to the room, I turned on the TV, and there was a Biography about Mama Cass, and I totally got sucked in. I was so tired, that all I wanted to do was lie there and watch that show.

We spent our Maestro day Thursday at the Reading Market. It was certainly an interesting place - the students found great story ideas and worked very well on their page designs. Lots of sights, smells, flavors. But, by the end of the day, our clothes and hair smelled like we'd spent all day in a fish market/butcher shop/Chinese restaurant/Mennonite Bakery/Flower Shop, etc.

The smell in our hair and clothes kind of reminded me of the old days at the Eagle when we'd go to Ty's for lunch. Everyone in the office knew where you'd been for lunch before you even said so.

Here's a few photos from Thursday.

While the kids were scouting for stories and doing interviews, we had a tiny bit of knitting time interspersed with walking around time. (By the way, Hi! to those of you linking from Amy's blog - sorry I didn't get this posted last night)

We had lunch at Rick's - I think this is the place I saw on "Food Detective" on Food Network. Adam DVRed it for me about a week before the trip.

Chocolate cigarettes? Really? They still sell this kind of crap? I remember even when I was a kid my mom and dad wouldn't let me have candy cigarettes.

Here's a closeup of our lunch. We shared a Philly Cheesesteak.

Hmmmmm...yummy.

The market is interesting - lots of business types, tourists, locals, homeless, and these little old Mennonite ladies who run the bakery.


And, we go from the little old Mennonite ladies to...

A clandestine photo of the weirdest adult store I've ever seen. This photo was shot out of the back our cab on the way to dinner. The store looked like it was once a Rainforest Cafe, and it was a cross between a Spencer Gifts, an adult video store and Priscilla's.

On the way home from dinner, I almost got a nose job. Our cabbie was a friggin' maniac. After speeding up to about 50 mph in a one-block span, he slammed on his brakes. Of course I wasn't wearing a seat belt, and I seriously came about 1.5 inches from slammin my face into the divided between the front and back seats.

Can you believe all this stuff happened to me yesterday and I was too tired to blog about it?

•••

This morning, I got up early and ran five miles with a sophomore from Snoqualmie, Wash. She's training for a half-marathon and needed a running partner so she wouldn't be on the streets of Philadelphia by herself. We ran to the Philadelphia Art Museum (cue the Maynard Ferguson), but I didn't go up the steps yet. That's on tap for tomorrow. Trust me, they'll be photos.

I kinda felt bad for the girl I was running with - I'm sure she wanted to go much faster, but she was very nice, and she said she was just happy to have someone to help her get the miles in. I'm telling you - being a runner really helps you get a feel for the strange city you're in when you're on the road. I saw so much before 8 this morning that I hadn't gotten a chance to check out yet.

The first convention session I went to this morning was on improving writing in high school yearbooks. The teacher used a song from "High School Musical" to demonstrate the details students should be reporting. It was a great strategy, and I'm totally going to steal the idea when I get back to school.

Then, it was off to the Asian bistro, Mixx, for lunch. We shared a bento box, and I had sushi. No sushi for Amy, though, since she's "in a family way."



The last thing I did tonight was spend six hours judging high school photography write-offs. It's interesting to see the varying levels of ability and subject matter that students are working with.

Don't we all look really excited to be there? This was one of the last categories.

I'm sleepy. I need to go to bed. I've got to teach a "Basic Camera Handling" session in the morning, and then I've got to run those steps, and we're going to hopefully see the Liberty Bell and some other cool things.

Cheese Steaks, Cream Cheese and the Liberty Bell

Life on the road makes you tired. But, I'm so glad to be hanging out with Amy again. I've been looking forward to this trip, since we don't get to see one another so often anymore.


Posting from HQ on the 10th floor of the downtown Marriott in Philadelphia this evening. I'm so glad the convention hotel is a Marriott. They have the softest beds, best pillows and down comforters. They make it really hard to get out of bed on time in the morning.

I must say, though, how UNexcited I was to read a feature story in today's USA Today: "Sleep Tight, Don't Let the Bedbugs Bite." The story was all about how bedbugs, once thought to have been eradicated, have infested all major cities and every state in the U.S. Dis-gusting. Thank God we're staying in a Marriott, and I haven't seen any telltale red spots on the bed. I love to travel, but reading a story like that makes me want to stay home.

Remember that big pile of yarn? Here's it's evolution:

On the first leg of my trip - the flight from KCI to Milwaukee. I flew Midwest Airlines for the first time. Every seat is like a first-class seat - nice and wide, and some sort of pleather-ish upholstery. AND, they bring you warm chocolate chip cookies during the flight.

Here it is once I got to the room, next to a bag of the same pattern that Amy is working on. I love the colors in her bag. It'll look great when felted.


Tomorrow, during the Maestro project, we'll have teams of kids reporting and photographing at the Reading Market. It's right across the street from our hotel. You've probably seen it featured on Food Network. We ate dinner tonight at Maggiano's, which I've also seen on FoodTV. My eggplant parm was pretty tasty, but it was too sauce-covered.


We're takin' it easy in the room for a bit. We've got a meeting here in a few minutes.

Hmmm...Now I get it...

If I want people to comment on a post, I have to write about bubies! (YES, I meant to spell it that way. I don't want the ad feed that I'm now featuring on my site to pick up the the real spelling and start running ads for, ahem, inappropriate material.)

Tomorrow I'm leaving for Philadelphia for the Fall HS Journalism Convention. Luckily, my flight doesn't leave KCI until around noon, so I'll be able to leisurely get ready to travel in the a.m.

Lots of time on a plane coming up? I see muchas knitting in my immediate future. Thank God they let you take knitting needles on planes. All I need is my iPod, a few balls of yarn and some wooden sticks and I'm a happy traveler.

On the trip, I will be working on turning this:


into a nice felted tote bag for my Aunt Alice, aka my Yarn Sugar Mama. I'm using the same pattern that Amy used for her felted bag.

Tonight, before bed, I've got to finish the Tigerfest scarf. I had to buy one more skein of yarn this weekend, and it is SO close to complete. Tigerfest is Nov. 16. I'll try to post a photo tonight since I get to stay up late (don't have to get up at 5:30 - Happy Dance! Happy Dance!)

By the way, a big public thank you to Kat - the very first official paying customer of HotWater Knits! She bought the Patient Zero bag!

26.2 with no freaking sports bra?

The celeb sites and blogosphere is abuzz with the news that Katie Holmes (registered under a fake name) finished the ING New York Marathon in 5:29. Of course, hubby Tom and daughter Suri were there to cheer her on.

My question is: Does Scientology have some sort of magic potion that makes it so your ta-tas don't hurt after banging around for more than five hours without a trusty sports bra? A strappy tank is fashionable, and might be functional for a session of Pilates with your personal trainer, but not the best choice for running a marathon. I realize she's young, but those'll be some saggin' Maggies when she gets old if she keeps that up.

My love-hate relationship with Daylight-Saving Time

It's 8:30, but I'm ready for bed. My body thinks it's 9:30, and on school nights, I usually hit the hay about that time.

I hope that my posts don't take a decidedly depressing turn, now that it will be getting dark a 5 p.m. I don't mind the crisp fall air, the leaves changing colors, wearing jackets to work, but I abhor the shortened days. My body just wants to take 'er easy when it gets dark. I'm pretty sure I have seasonal affective disorder. At least we got a few extra days of daylight-saving time before we had to change the clocks.

In the mornings, though, at least for the first few days of standard time, I love it. It felt like it was 6:30 this morning when I was waking up at 5:30 for school. It's just a few days in the year when I actually can try to be a "morning person."

I'm so not.

Every time I typed a time in this post, I hit the shift key for the first number, so I had to go back and delete on every one of them. I told you, it's my bedtime.

Okay, I'm out there.

I've officially put up three bags for sale on this website. It's incredibly rudimentary, though. No clicking to put in cart, no ordering online. It's pretty much only my friends and family who read this thing anyway, so if one of you sees something you like, and you want to be able to say "I gave her her first dollar" someday, just comment or e-mail me and let me know what you want.

Mom and I had the sweat shop going last night. She was the machine seamstress, I was the hand-stitcher. She doesn't, ahem, trust me with the sewing machine. I don't blame her though, since I really haven't used a sewing machine since seventh grade home ec class.

I am really proud of the Red-Eye bag. I love the shape of it, and how we problem-solved to create the long straps that I wanted. It's officially the first thing she and I have designed on our own.

Check it out:

I really like this bag. The sweater was a beautiful color that lent itself to felting really well.


Here's the first one we made. Most of you have probably seen it before.


Here's the back view.


I promise - this isn't going to turn into a shopping website. It's just that right now, it's the easiest way to show off the work.

•••

In other news, we did our nine-mile run today. It's Adam's longest run ever. It took about an hour and 40 minutes. We're doing six-minute bursts with one-minute walk breaks in between. I think next time we do a long run, we'll move the bursts up to eight minutes. Our plan is to run 10 minutes, walk one minute during the race.

We did a couple of major hills today, because we took a new route. Running along a Florida beach will seem like a cakewalk - I think the race website says there's a total elevation change of just 25 feet during the entire race. Piece of cake (I hope).

I'm sure we'll be a little sore tomorrow, but it's worth it.