Paul McCartney Can You Spare a Dime?

Well you may be wondering about this title. And let me say a lot has gone on since I last blogged. First off we moved on 3-14-08. It went well and we were thankful for the help from our friend Bryan, my brother Ed, and my cousin Rick. They all worked really hard to help us pack and unpack our portable storage unit. We are also thankful for the help from my parents, especially my mom who finished cleaning my old house while I was closing on the new one. So things were going fine,continuing to put stuff away and unpack boxes. I was on Spring Break and the kids were riding their new bus to school and a back. Then came the RAIN. In St. Louis it rained non-stop for about 48 hours. Heavy rain, pouring rain for 2 days. During which time my new house's basement flooded. Yes that's right, a mere 4 days after we moved in the basement with it's nice family room, 4th bedroom and extra bathroom proceeded to flood for about 24 hours. And guess what the previous owners claim they NEVER had water in the basement ever before and insurance doesn't cover HYDROSTATIC water pressure. So we are out of luck!! Our basement is wet, the laminate flooring in the boys' bedroom is ruined, the baseboards had to be taken off, the carpet is soaked and a restoration company charged us $2500 to remove the water. Everything will need to be re-painted, the bedroom needs new flooring, we had to move out all the furniture. Adam's dresser got wet and may be ruined. It is literally a nightmare. And now just when I thought I may have an answer in the form of FEMA, they are only giving assistance to public agencies in the affected flood areas. Not individual households. So WHY DO I HAVE INSURANCE?

All this may lead you to wonder about the title of my post. Well I heard on the news that Paul McCartney finally settled his divorce and had to pay his former wife $48million after only having been married to him for 4 years. And thought to myself, wow what a rip off, AND how can I meet Paul McCartney, after all he is my favorite Beatle. Then another idea occurred, maybe Paul would loan me the money to have the repairs made to the basement which is probably going to include a new sump pump system which is the neighborhood of a $10,000 project at which time they have to tear up the entire basement. So Paul, Mr. McCartney, if you happen upon happen to read my little blog, and you would feel it in your heart to loan a few dollars to a poor St. Louis teacher and her equally poor policeman husband, just comment, or call, or send a telegram or a wire. THANKS!

For Tricia

As you may have seen I am a fan of a blog called Confessions of a CF Husband. I am posting this list for Nate's wife Tricia who is awaiting a lung transplant and just gave birth to a preemie girl 2 months ago.


Mommy things to look forward to:

* Dropping her off for her first day of kindergarten and having the tears cloud your vision as you drive away.
* Her first great hit at a softball game that makes all the other parents cheer and give you high fives
* Selling Girl Scout cookies to the next door neighbor, dressed in her Brownie uniform
* The first time she comes home with a boy's name written on her hand with a heart under it.
* When she slams her door and yells "You are the worst mom ever!"
* Hearing her say "Hi Mom!" as you walk in the door at the end of a really long day.
* Watching her play the same UNO game with her little brother for the 14th straight time just because he wants to.
* Shopping for her first training bra.
* Checking in on her at night to find her sleeping peacefully with IPOD headphones blaring in her ears.

Isn't Motherhood amazing!

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Teachers Gone Wild

Here is a sneak peek at the wild side of the Monroe teachers. More pics to come as soon as my friends email them to me. But you can see from these shots that we teachers had a BLAST at Kristen's Wedding! WOOO HOOOO!





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TOO MUCH SNOW

Well we have had two more snow days. That makes a total of 4.5 snow days. There were record snows in St. Louis on Tuesday. It was crazy to see 10 inches of snow fall in 4-5 hours time.

I have to admit though that I am SICK of it. I mean, yes as a teacher, I usually LOVE snow days but this is getting ridiculous. We will have to go to school forever at this rate. Justin, Hannah, and Adam's school sent out an email that said that school will not be out until June 10th. That's 6 days longer than the old ending date of June 4th. We were planning a vacation that week which is the week before I would start teaching summer school. Not sure what SLPS will do about all the snow days. Hopefully they will take professional development days away. Because I mean really, honestly, teahers don't really do anything productive on those PD days or teacher workshop days. Don't let us fool you non-teachers into thinking we are hard at work on those days. WRONG>> it's really just a much needed break from students. However, I would rather give up those days now and still get out of school on May 30.
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My Talented Cousin

My very talented cousin, Rebecca, has created her own online clothing store featuring name brand apparel at discounted prices. She is also in the production phase of her own line of clothes. She will be featuring boys' t-shirts that are comfortable, good quality, eco friendly, with creative designs in early April. As soon as I can I will post a sample t-shirt. I hope that all of my readers (oh you few but faithful) will check out her store. You can find it at www.310apparel.com I will also have a link to it at under my side bar.

I am very proud of my little (1O months younger) cousin and hope that she will have much success.

FYI> Attended my friend, Kristen's wedding this weekend and had a blast with all my co-workers. Shower and wedding pics to come shortly!
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