Friday, October 31, 2008

Happy Halloween

Well, the big day has finally arrived - and will now soon depart. It seems silly to do all this work for just a couple hours of enjoyment, but it's worth it. So here's a brief summary of the festive day's events:

The day started out bright and early - no, wait, that doesn't sound right. Oh yes - that's because I never went to sleep last night! As I may have mentioned before, I had a HUGE presentation due today in my Teaching Science Methods class. While I did have a partner, and we have been working on this pretty steadily for the last 4-5 weeks, there was still a LOT to get done last night. Turns out my partner was up all night, too. But we got everything done that we needed to, so that's good. ...Now back to the day.

Got the kids up a little early to get ready for school. Abby and Isaac were dressed in costume for the Halloween parade at school this morning. Danielle didn't wear hers because her class went on a fieldtrip to the Honolulu Zoo. It was nice to have a little extra time to get everything just perfect and still get Danielle to school on time so she wouldn't miss the fieldtrip bus. Needless to say all the kids were excited to get to school.

After dropping them off in their classroom, and making sure that everyone had all the things they needed (treats for parties, costumes all in place, know where to meet Daddy after school, etc) I headed back home to tie up a few loose ends for my presentation, pack it all up for transport to class, and most importantly to feed Miss Juliana - she's not a happy camper when she misses her morning meal. But the again, who would be.

Class started at 10am, and basically my partner, U'i (that's pronounced oo-ee for those non-Hawaiian speakers out there), and I had 3 hours to demonstrate different methods of teaching elementary school children about plants. It was really a lot of fun and everyone seemed to have a great time. We actually ran out of time and missed out on a few of the more fun activities, but it's all good. I think that it went well, but then again, we were both pretty sleep deprived at the moment, so we could have totally bombed and I might not have noticed (though I doubt that's what happened).

After class I came home and put most of the stuff away that I used for our presentation and then started to attempt to make Cameron's costume, the one I hadn't even started yet. But then I had to feed Miss J again and of course I totally dropped into a delirious coma as soon as I was sitting still. Well, I ran out of time for the costume, so poor Cameron wore his devil costume from a couple of years back - not that that was bad, but the rest of us had our Wizard of Oz theme going on. But he was really sweet about it, knowing that I've just had too much going on lately. He told everyone that he was the husband of the wicked witch who doesn't make an appearance in the movie.

Around 4pm we headed over to the party for our apartment complex - of course we won the costume contest (we won last year, too). $20 grocery gift card, not bad. Abby also won best costume in her age group - they really liked her red shoes. Oh, and as a side note, did I mention that we won "most creative" costumes at our ward trunk-or-treat on Wednesday? So cool. Needless to say - we looked good. (I know, I know, you want pictures! Well, if you're that impatient, just scroll down already. Otherwise, hang in there, we're almost done.)

After the party we went out for a little traditional door-to-door mayhem. Only for about 20 min, then we stopped by to say hello to a few friends and show them the costumes before heading home. We got back around 7:30. Then all the candy was poured into a huge bowl, a movie was turned on, and I just let the kids loose! No really, I did. They get 20 min to eat whatever they want and then the candy disappears (you all know it goes in the freezer). This method has worked out really well for us over the years and since we just dump in all in the bowl, that cuts down on the squabbling over whose is whose and what is better. They've actually lucked out tonight - they've had 35 min of candy time since I'm writing this. I'd better go put a stop to that soon:)

Well, that's about it. It was a fun day - and a tiring one. I'm hoping to get everyone in bed before I either collapse from exhaustion or hit my 4th (or is it 5th) wind and become an adrenaline junkie.

Ok, enough prattling on and on - here's the pics. Enjoy!












Well, the chiclets are in bed now and despite the copious amounts of sugar they inhaled all day, they seem to have passed out already. Time for me to be headed in that direction myself. 'Night.

Sunday, October 26, 2008

More Homework

For my Technology in the Classroom class we now have to put together a website. It's still in the works, but I've got a few things up (the things due for class tomorrow - hehe). Feel free to check it out:

Lisa's Educational Site

Saturday, October 25, 2008

A Sneak Peek and a really cool video

Well, the costumes are coming along slowly but surely. I have completed 3 and have 3 to go. I should be able to get them all done this week. Here's a few pictures for those of you who are anxiously waiting to see the finished products.

This one is of Danielle modeling Juliana's costume head piece as baby was asleep when I needed her to try it on.


Here I am painstakingly ripping off the skirt of Abby's costume, as I somehow managed to sew it on inside out the first time.


So far the costumes are so cute, I can't wait to finish the rest.

Also, I got this video link from my Aunt Leah today. It's meant specifically to encourage Catholics to vote, but I think it's terribly relevant and we can all benefit from watching it.




And check it out, I finally figured out how to get the video in the blog. I'm so proud of myself.

Hope you're all having a fabulous weekend.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

Help! I've fallen....

and I can't get out?

Check this out - Cameron is a local celebrity. Probably not in the sense that he would like, but we've sure had a lot of people say they've seen him on the news this week. Really it's kind of funny and I find myself chuckling about it, but it could have been serious, luckily it wasn't.

Here's the link - don't forget to watch the video clip at the top of the page!

Saturday, October 11, 2008

I've been tagged - Again

So I totally made fun of my friend Liz's favorite color (come on, white does not count!) and so she officially tagged me to answer these 31 questions with only one word answers. So here we go:

1. Where is your cell phone? pocket
2. Where is your significant other? snoozing
3. Your hair color? dull
4. Your mother? inventive
5. Your father? generous
6. Your favorite thing? scents
7. Your dream last night? none
8. Your dream/goal? happiness
9. The room you're in? messy
10. Your hobby? lots
11. Your fear? hurt
12. Where do you want to be in 6 years? Kindergarten
13. Where were you last night? out
14. What you're not? alone
15. One of your wish-list items? dishwasher
16. Where you grew up? everywhere
17. The last thing you did? learn
18. What are you wearing? jeans
19. Your TV? huh?
20. Your pet? gone
21. Your computer? Laptop
22. Your mood? pleasant
23. Missing someone? always
24. Your car? sandy
25. Something you're not wearing? earrings
26. Favorite store? Target
27. Your summer? short
28.Love someone? many
29. Your favorite color? green
30. When is the last time you laughed? earlier
31. Last time you cried? When?

As a rule I don't usually hand out tags, but as always feel free to play along - it's harder than you think, only using one word, and lots of fun.

Oh, and I posting my much anticipated video on my
Technology in the Classroom blog, so check it out!

Friday, October 10, 2008

My Fellow Favorite Bloggers and a Couple of Great Web Tools

I can't believe that I've been neglecting my blogger links! I had not added some of my great friends, and even my own sister! What was I thinking? I'm glad that my good friend Tonia (jokingly) wanted to know when she would get to be one of my favorites. You know you already are! But it's nice to be listed, isn't it. So take a minute to peruse the links to the right and check out the blogs that I follow.

Speaking of following blogs - have you guys tried GoogleReader? I used to just click through the links on my page, but that became pretty tedious. But then one day my friend
Audrey mentioned that she used GoogleReader to keep track of her blog reading, and I think it does news and other feeds as well, but I just use it to read all about you guys! Once you sign up for the service (just a google account, you know you all have one!) and enter in the feeds (blogs and others) that you want to subscribe to it will pull them up. Then everytime you open it it will only show anything that is new. Kind of cool. Check it out. There's only 2 things that I don't like about it, 1. I don't get to see everyone's cutesy blogs unless click in and actually go to the blog, and 2. I have a few private blogs that I read that I can't subscribe to (since they are private, obviously). But it's still a great way to keep up to date all in one place.

And I have to tell you about one other web tool that I absolutely love. It's
pandora.com I'm sure some of you out there have heard of it, but I just found out about it a couple of months ago. It's basically a radio station that you set up by telling the site what songs or artists you like and then it picks songs that have similar characteristics. It's been really interesting to see what music it plays for me. And while Cameron has tried it and isn't a big fan, I totally love it. It even plays songs that I used to love to listen to, but haven't heard in years, so as far as I'm concerned it works fantastically. I love to listen to it - especially while I'm doing the dishes or cleaning the house. There are no commercial breaks (since there are web ads on the page), you can pause it, rate the songs (it will move ahead if you click dislike), and you can skip songs, too (though it will only let you do that so many times in one session). Anyway, it's been fun and I feel like I have my own personal mix of songs to listen to.

Well, it's off to bed for me. We've had a busy week here hanging out with some friends from the mainland. Man, the sun just wipes me out and we've been to the beach and the Polynesian Cultural Center twice this week! I don't think my body's going to take much more. But at least the kids have been sleeping really well!

Saturday, October 4, 2008

Don't Vote....

For all the funky and cool things that I can do with my blog, I have yet to figure out how to get a youtube video on it. I know, I'm lame. But I've had my allotted technological moments for the day and I just plain don't care to figure it out right now.

So anyway - click here to go to my friend Liz's blog (you know the political maniac I mentioned in an earlier post) and watch the video, in it's entirety. Come on, you know you have a few minutes and besides it's cool, so take a look and pass it on - hurry, needs to get everywhere fast.

Make sure you're registered to vote - the deadlines are soon, I know here in Hawaii its on Monday. Do it now.