The Kohlmans

parently the natives get restless when I don't blog. Oops. Sorry about that whole "spending Christmas with you guys" thing. I must be better entertainment online than I am in person. I'll try to do better (or schedule more posts, at least) next year. ; ) Just kidding... maybe. And now, without further ado, the past week of our lives, four Christmases (isn't that a movie?! maybe next year we'll go somewhere tropical...):   (Click on any collage to make it bigger.)

December 20, 2009. All the Kohlmans came to our house. Enough said...

I haven't posted much about basketball this year. The record going into Christmas break is 1-3. It's been rough. The girls are young. Out of the first six varsity players, three are sophomores. Two of them never played a varsity minute until they started the first game of the year. They're learning - against some tough teams (Buhler, Andover Central, Rose Hill, Campus, if you're at all familiar with the AV-CTL), no less. I think they're getting better. I know they need the break, but I can't wait for some more games.

I want to celebrate with something special. But I don't know what. So I'm celebrating by scheduling a post in advance. Yep. It only took me 100 posts to figure it out. ;) This is our tree. Only one year in my life have I had a fake Christmas tree. No, I will not be kind and call them artificial. They're fake - that's all there is to it. It was pathetic. Of course, that may be due in part to the fact that we spent 25 Black Friday dollars on it. I hated that tree. I tried to find a picture, but I don't even have that. When we moved, we left it on the curb with a "free" sign. It was gone withing 24 hours. Again this year, we ventured out on Black Friday to search for a tree. A real one. We got this one at Lowe's, and it has held up really well so far. (We'll see what happens after we head to Lyndon for the next 5 or 6 days.) The ornaments are an assortment of things we have collected over the years, with a few extras that we bought to fill up the ...

I posted a few days ago about how Mr. Kohlman gets presents from kids he doesn't even know. Well, here is the final haul (minus a couple bags of candy).   We added up it. He has over $100 in gift cards right there. Apparently it pays to be popular.

How is it that I'm so many posts behind in only a few days?! Better get started... Our last day of school before Christmas Break is always chaotic. This year, it included a trip to the high school (about 20 yards away) for the band/choir concert, a Central Time party, staff vs. students volleyball, staff basketball game, locker clean out, and movie. All before 1 p.m. Two of my girls had these in their hair. They said that the pom poms were their easy buttons. I smiled, knowing (hoping?) that they do not know the multiple meanings of that word. Is that mean?   My friend Michelle always wears the afro. Isn't it great? We even had a few "chair" leaders. My school....

Ahem. Please allow me to get on my soap box for a little while, to hopefully humor you a bit while preventing you from making a major faux pas. The #1 thing to never say to a teacher... "It must be nice to have a two-weeks off at Christmas and/or three months in the summer." Really, truly never say it. Especially not during Christmas break. Or in the week leading up to Christmas break. We all make choices. Your choice was to do something that is not teaching. My choice was to become a teacher. There are perks, I'm not gonna lie. But I was thinking about some things that must be nice. And I can come up with a little list. Obviously not everything applies to every profession. Regardless, it must be nice... -to never have to deal with helicopter or indifferent parents -to, on those bad days, be able to just shut off the world from your little office/cubicle and growl at anyone who interrupts -to have an extra minute at lunch to run that errand -to be able to answe...

This was my desk yesterday morning when I arrived at school. I at least stacked the papers neatly before I ran out the door right at 3:30 the afternoon before. I do mean ran, although it may have been a few seconds before 3:30. The last week before Christmas break is rough. But we're now down to one day, and I can handle that. I did grade this stack of papers graded. More are done after today. And the rest will wait until Monday... or Tuesday... or any free time I have before grades are due on January 4. I thought about killing myself trying to grade 70 narrative essays before tomorrow at 1, but it's just not going to work out. Trust me: it's better this way. Little things like this make it all worth it. When we are working on a writing assignment, I make the kids fill out exit slips before they can leave. They write the greatest things. Oh, and yesterday evening, when Brad was at school working, I did this: That's right. The stair railing that we took d...

"I got my first Christmas present today." "Oh? Is it from a nice kid?" "I don't know." "What do you mean? Don't you have her for a reading group? Don't you have all the fifth graders for science?" "Yeah. She's not a fifth grader." "Oh. So it's a kid in a classroom close to yours, like a fourth grader? One you see sometimes?" "Nope. I don't even really know who she is." My husband is so popular  that he gets presents from students he doesn't even know... Does anyone else think that's just a little bit ridiculous?!

This might be a sad, nerdy, materialistic post, but I just have to share. The good thing about my life is that my birthday is less than a month after Christmas. So, even though people have probably already made their Christmas purchases, there's another very special holiday coming soon (yes, I still love my birthday that much. Although, the other day I forgot how old I am. I don't think that's a good sign). I just found these: Aren't they amazing?! Seriously... (picture from here, a blog I rarely visit anymore because even though it's all diy, it's a little too 'perfect' for me. no offense if you love it - it's just not my style. bookends from here. ) There could not be a more perfect design for bookends. Numbers one and two on my list are pretty solid wishes, just not actual objects (cash for the piano fund, Maurice's gift card). But these bookends are a close #3. Please don't bring up the fact that I already have two sets. One is o...

Here are small pieces of the beauty I behold. "Everything has beauty, but not everyone sees it." -Confucius      

Random thoughts: First things first. I'm almost to 100 posts. To be precise, this is 92. So soon I will be at 100, which I have to admit is kind of cool. To me, anyway. Unfortunately, I always miss these things at the moment. And later they don't seem as special. So I'm celebrating now. It is entirely too cold. Am I too young to have aches related to weather? Yesterday I limped around the house because my bad knee hurt. It does again today. I can only imagine what Wednesday, with its forecasted high of 18, will be like. Thus, I have decided that, when the high is below 20 degrees, we should all cancel work and stay home. How about? Wednesday needs to = pj day. On Saturday I made peanut butter bars, sugar cookies, and peppernuts. We had a party (not just because of the food) with our small group from church. Holy Smokes, it was fun! :) And now, the point, which I did now know was the point until I had typed the entire post.  I have long known that I come from two ...

One done. 28-59. These girls are young. And there are not very many of them. But they work hard and have fun. They are fun to watch, as hard as that may be to believe. (I told Brad - on the plus side, it's really exciting when we score!) They are learning, even through the first Friday night, as tough as it was. It will be better - hopefully sooner rather than later.      

Q. (The day after they took it...) Can we see our tests today? A. Um, yes. You can see the test that you handed in about 23 hours ago. Would you like to? It won't be graded, of course, because I did in fact sleep last night. Crazy. After all, it took you only 45 minutes to complete it, so divide that by five and multiply it by 67..... Q. My dad wants to know when you are going to update our grades again. A. As soon as I have time to grade the 12-inch high stack of papers on my desk (including those tests your buddy was asking about). Because it has been a whole week (half of which was Thanksgiving break) since I last updated grades, after all .... Q. I noticed M is behind in language arts. Why is this? A. M is so far behind because, hmmm... Oh yeah. She missed the last six days of school to go on a cruise with you! Me: Our next assignment is going to be writing a 5-paragraph narrative essay. We will go through each step of the writing process in class for the next week...

'Tis the season for my neighbors to put this up...It lights up in the evening! (I'm only laughing a little. I love these neighbors dearly. They're the only ones we know.) And for us to put this up... Did you know that Christmas tree skirts (excluding the bright red crushed velvet kind) are like $40?! Seriously?! Look closely. Notice the moose blanket. I improvise.   And (for a much longer time) for us both to devote many long evenings to various high school gyms...   Have I mentioned lately that I love this fantastic camera?! I still haven't figured out very many of the settings, but after half a scrimmage of trial and error, I think I have a good idea of what gets me the best pictures in a bright orange gym. Now for that zoom lens...

We had Christmas on Thanksgiving since Sarah and Jamie can't come for real Christmas. (Click on the collage to see the pictures larger.) I am happy to report that the monster did not destroy Vacationland.  Maybe you had to be there...

I love Christmas. Everything about it. Our lights and ornaments sit out in the living room, waiting patiently for this year's tree, a reminder that I am not waiting quite so patiently.   Our mantle... Brad really did choose his blue stocking. And it was great until yesterday when he saw a KU stocking at Target. This Willow Tree nativity was a wedding gift from my aunts and uncles on the Klaassen side.     In case you're wondering, the wise men are slightly separate because they don't actually show up until Epiphany. One year, in my mod, we had the wise men move around the room, closer and closer to baby Jesus, all advent long.   This carved nativity was a wedding gift from my growing-up pastor.    This is probably one of the most special gifts I have ever received. One year, for Christmas, five mysterious gifts showed up under the tree, one for each kid and one for mom, the labels scrawled in dad's unmistakable handwrit...