Pebbles

Daryn's been dying for a dog, and I finally broke down and decided we could get one. This is Pebbles! As far as we've been told, she's a Greyhound/Labrador Retriever mix. We were also told she's about 6 months old. BUT, we went to the pet store, and a vet was there doing a vaccination clinic. He told us Pebbles is about 9 months old, and probably won't get a lot bigger than she is now.

I was just looking at pictures of dogs to adopt online, and saw a picture of her and fell in love. I've learned that her coloring is called "Brindle." She is so gorgeous, and VERY good tempered. She just sits or sleeps in the car, and though she's excited when first meeting people, she calms down pretty quickly. She licks Bekah a lot, and jumps a bit. Her foster home let her on the couch, so we have a bit of training to work on, but she's good at listening to me when I say DOWN!

Rebekah is very happy with her dog. :) Pebbles is pretty gentle with her, and Rebekah will randomly walk over to where Pebbles is sleeping, and just pet her softly. It's VERY cute. I'm excited to see these two little girls grow up together!

Only one accident so far... but I'm not surprised. She's in a new environment with new people. We just need to keep a good eye on her. Daryn agreed before we got her that he would be responsible for her messes, so I'm pretty happy with the arrangement.

Pebbles is Daryn's birthday and Christmas present from me and Rebekah.

Update! We finally got the Kennel Card info from the woman setting up the adoptions, and on that is says she's a boxer mix... I confronted the woman in an e-mail about mis-representing the dog and she said "The people at the pound just guess anyway" and that rather than mis-represent the dog, she put the breed that SHE thought the dog was. *rolls eyes* Really woman? *tsk* This wouldn't be a problem except that I don't think our apartment allows boxers. Pebbles is clearly part greyhound, so we're going to just print off the info we were originally given and show that to the landlord. I'm not entirely pleased with this, but I can't afford to pay to get her kennel card changed and we don't want to get rid of her! She's in the program we adopted from because she was on a pound euthanasia list. :(

Daryn is out paying our pet deposit right now, so we will see!

November's Pictures

Rebekah can't wait to drive! :)


Just our baby being the cutie she is! (I made the bow that's on her headband - specifically for the pants she's wearing. :) )


We thought this was hilarious. She wanted to drink from a cup, like Mom and Dad!





A delicious breakfast from my wonderful husband!



Playing at the park near our house. :)

November Outline

About November, so I don't forget! My poor Daryn - he's worked so hard to help me get through this month were I've had something happening almost every single day! And that's on top of doing his own school work. I adore my hubby! <3

Nov 2-3 Teach! Dead Computer
Nov 4 Jeanette's visit
Nov 5 Levi
Nov 7 Surprise Party, Study session
Nov 8 Daryn's new calling, Dinner & Bang!
Nov 9 407 Test
Nov 10 AEPA review, Graduation check
Nov 11 Bekah's check-up, No School
Nov 12 SERP presentation
Nov 13 Rodel Orientation, Dinner with Lyn
Nov 14 missed Baby shower, birthday party, went to Ben's farewell, Andrew's capture
Nov 15-18 Management Project, Research paper
Nov 19 SERP Final
Nov 20 Family Pictures, Soccer
Nov 21 AEPA Test, Merrick and Priscilla
Nov 22 Stake Conference, Picnic
Nov 25 SERP Portfolio, 404 Exam, Pack & go to Phx
Nov 26 Dinner at Kenny's
Nov 27 Black Friday! Kenny's house, singing
Nov 28 G'ma's house, visit Jess, Kenny's house, singing
Nov 29 CG Ward, HW
Nov 30 Hurry home!
Dec 1 Unit Plan, Minor Adviser, Late! for Student Teaching meeting

The Rest of the Rest of October :P

So after attending our new ward at 9 am (ugh, that was hard, church used to be at 12:30) we got a call from Merrick and Priscilla that they were going through Tucson and wanted to stop by! :) Priscilla picked up some adorable dresses and a jacket for Rebekah - now we don't need to get her a Holiday dress this year. And the jacket - it's a furry one, white with black spots. (Don't worry, the fur is too thick to be a dalmation's!) They also brought Rebekah her very own REAL toy cell phone (as opposed to a broken/not working cell phone that mom and dad gave her, lol), and a beach ball. Merrick also picked out an adorable dress with pink poodles on it (it's an inside joke w/ Daryn) and a bunny costume as seen here:



Very cute! :) Thanks Merrick and Priscilla!

On Thursday Oct 29 - Brittany's Birthday, BTW - Daryn made me this DELICIOUS breakfast, just because I said I wanted a hot breakfast. I was expecting the eggs, that was it!

I have to point out that I ate a small piece of bacon before taking this picture, or it would have been picture perfect! It certainly was delicious!

Then on Friday the 30, I skipped soccer to go to our new ward's Halloween party! It was great fun and we had fun costumes. :) Rebekah even enjoyed playing some of the little 'carnival' games to earn tickets and win little prizes. Trunk or Treat was good, too, and Rebekah enjoyed it. It was also a good test run for us to decide if we were going to take her out the next night.





Saturday, Halloween! We went to Arjay and Maggie's house. Arjay is Daryn's friend from school. He is also Candice's brother. Candice is married to Clay, who used to be in Millenium with me years ago. Clay's sister is Tania (sp?), and her husband is Lashley. Arjay and Maggie have a daughter, Allie, who just turned 1, and Tania and Lashley have a daughter, Sadie, who is around 18 months. So, we had 3 cute little girls go out for their first time trick-or-treating together. Arjay's neighborhood is very nice, and we took the girls up and down just one street. Sadie was really shy and didn't like it much, and Allie was okay with it, but not excited. Rebekah, though, was VERY excited and LOVED going up to everyone and getting candy. She was ADORABLE and said please and thank you almost every time.

At one house, the man giving out candy let the girls reach into the bowl themselves. Rebekah took a piece out, dropped it in Sadie's bag, took another out, dropped it in Allie's bag, and THEN grabbed some for herself, and then went back for more. :P Smart girl!




We had a great time at Arjay's and really appreciated the invite! :)

And THAT, my friends and family, was our October. Phew! Now I have a little over a week of November to write about, but it'll have to wait because I have some MAJOR assignment due in the next week or two.

Brittany's Birthday

Happy Birthday to my sister Brittany! She's 17 today.

Brittany is a very talented singer - Second Soprano, right? :) - and a talented soccer player as well! The lucky girl got to fly down to Phoenix and spend it with her friends for her birthday. Unfortunately I didn't get to go up and see her that weekend. I hope everything was a blast!

Also, my darling sister, I love sending and receiving random texts from you. We should talk more often.

Sorry, no recent pictures of Brittany! :( Maybe she should send me one! :P

The Rest of October

Oct 15 406B Research Paper and PowerPoint

So I had to write a paper about Reading and Writing in Mathematics. Fortunately, I took an entire class last semester that focused on Literacy in the Subject Areas. Before I post my thoughts on the subject, I'm curious what you all think - what place does reading and writing, or "literacy" have in the mathematics classroom? It is silly to read a book that isn't the math textbook in a classroom (and yes, I'm purposefully leaving 'what kind of book' vague)? Should students be writing paragraphs in math? Why or why not? :) Late I might just post my very poorly written paper... I'm not happy with it, but that's what I get for writing it in the 24 hours before it was due (at least I didn't wait that long to look up the research).

Oct 17 Lisa's Wedding

We went up to Phoenix after my soccer game on Friday so that we could make it to Lisa Rolland's wedding. :) Lisa was my next door neighbor in high school, and she also went to UA, where we would occasionally bump into each other. In fact, I met her fiance, Brewster, before they were officially dating because Lisa had me help her with a film project, and Brewster was also involved in the project. Congratulations to Brewster and Lisa!

The wedding was gorgeous - but I'm not surprised. Lisa did all the decoration planning herself, and she has very elegant taste. I very much enjoyed seeing old friends, too! :)



After the wedding, we were planning on visiting other friends, but Lyn had the Swine Flu all week, and so we appreciate her refusal to see us that day. Kat was going to visit with us, but most of her restaurant staff had the flu, so she was called in for work. We had a nice little chat on the phone on her break, though!

That night Daryn and I watched the movie he recorded the night before. We love taking advantage of the DVR at the Wright house, because then we get to see movies we don't normally see - V for Vendetta was edited for TV, so I finally got to see it. Quite the movie! :)

Oct 18 Ward Changes

On Sunday we were back in Tucson, and there was a special meeting that night to announce the new ward boundaries. I won't lie; I cried when I realized we were changing wards, and again when I shook hands with my former Bishop. I was particularly sad that we would no longer be in Grant and Carrie's ward - we really enjoy their company. Fortunately, we still get to see them plenty! I was also sad that Rebekah and Kevin are in the other ward, because we'd only just started a friendship with them, and Daryn and I are so busy during the week it's hard to schedule extra activities. I've told Rebekah I plan to call her as soon as I get things taken care of for school - though I might call her this week and see if she's interested in sitting for me for a day or two so I can get some work done.

Oct 19-23 2 Tests and a Midterm

The next week I had a Math Synthesis Test, a Math History Test and a Midterm for my Students with Disabilities class. I'm not a fan of that last class because my teacher is crazy. She's mostly been teaching graduate level courses, and she's never taught this particular course before. She's VERY unorganized, and our only grades in the class are the Midterm and Final, an oral presentation and our portfolio. She had us write an outline for the proposal for our portfolio, and then the proposal (which she didn't teach us how to do... and I've never written a proposal). There's a lot more to it than that, but it's hard to explain because she's crazy. :P

Oh, and that night was Enrichment for my new ward. I went to try and meet people that would be in my new ward, but most of the women there were going to a new ward, and came to say goodbye! I did meet the Bishop and his wife though - very nice couple. :)

Oct 24-25 Barbeque, Party, New Ward
Merrick and Priscilla's visit

OCt 24 was the stake barbeque. I think it was very well timed for being right after the ward changes - everyone got to see everyone else, old ward and new ward members all in one sweep. They had a bouncy castle, and a few 10 year olds would not get out at all. A few mothers of toddlers mentioned how nice it would be if the little kids could play in it, so Andrea (one of the moms that's kind of taken me under her wing :) ) and I went to the Stake President and asked him to clear all the older kids out and let the babies play. It was really fun to see about 10-15 children age 3 and under jumping (or trying to jump) in the castle!

After the barbeque we had a little game night over at Grant and Carrie's house. Steve, Chris and Emily were also there. It was great, b/c Emily doesn't normally get to make it to our get-togethers b/c of work.

Sunday was fun. I was pleased to see so many people that I already knew, but happy to know there were plenty of new people to meet, too. I'm not so great about meeting new people, but I think this will be good. I've been feeling like I've hit a bit of a plateau recently. I know that's really my own fault, but I'm glad that I'll have new challenges and experiences in this ward to help me grow more. :)

These last few pictures are because I LOVE that Rebekah loves playing with her books. She also enjoys moving things from one container to another, so what better activity than putting herself and her beloved books into a basket? :)

My Birthday!

So, after the Newcombs left, Jeanette came down for a visit. She was out of town when we went up to Phoenix for Ben's wedding, so she hadn't gotten her usual monthly visit with Rebekah.

While she was here (Mon and Tues), I took the opportunity to go to the library for about 5 hours and find all the books I needed for my research papers I'm writing this semester. Daryn took me shopping for my birthday present - a new mop! lol. It was a very nice and expensive steamer mop, the Shark. I love it! We bought dinner at Chick-fil'a, one of my favorite fast food restaurants (I got to pick between a more expensive gift and a cheap dinner, or a less expensive gift and dinner at a real restaurant) and then we had Jeanette and Rebekah join us for dessert at Claim Jumper! :) We LOVE to get their Ice Cream Sandwhich made with Heath Bar cookies, and topped with FUDGE and CARAMEL! YUM!

As always, Jeanette was a huge help, and we had lots of fun. She also gave me some money so that I could buy some new clothes - I need business casual for Student Teach next semester, and I'm seriously lacking in that type of clothing.

On Wednesday - my actual birthday - we went to Denny's for breakfast. Earlier that week Daryn had helped out a sister from church fix her computer set-up, and she rewarded him with gift cards to Denny's and Olive Garden. :) The rest of the day went well, too, though I was sad to have to go to school. My friend made things better by baking me some cookies! Isn't that so sweet? Thanks Erin B!