work woes

This is how I've felt this month. Although I enjoy all 3 of my jobs...I have been a little over run with work lately.

• At school, I am bringing in some new material into my classroom, which means...more lesson plans to make, more quizzes, tests, and assignments to create, and that, of course, always leads to more grading. Plus I am preparing for my eval for next week, which tends to cause me to panic and work as hard as I can, even if I was already doing a good job.



• At Barnes and Noble, they have decided that it is better to have too many hours for too few people than too few hours for too many people. This may be highly considerate for their employees who do not have another job, but for me it means days at PACS, and nights at B&N. I'm working 3-4 nights at the store, when 1 night a week would be ideal for me until summer. Other than just being exhausted, this is cutting into my church time, my husband time, my puppy time, my family time, and my friend time. Sorry to you all....trust me, I rather be with you!



• While my days are at Prince and my nights are at Barnes & Noble, my weekends occassionaly (as in this weekend) will be with my most fun boss, Melissa! Although working weddings with Melissa and Anthony are always a blast, and I come away with many funny stories and new dance moves, they still involve a lot of work. A good stressfull wedding day can be quite exhausting, much more so than teaching all day or working a long shift at the B&N. I am looking forward to the summer when I'll be working with Melissa more!

A couple of years ago, Matt once quoted me saying "All work and no play makes Katie a bi-otch." And friends, I'm afraid its true. To remedy this, I rewarded myself with a bit of a shopping spree, much to Matt's dismay. I purchased a nice stack of books (on discount, I might add) and I bought myself some much needed new clothes. There is nothing like seeing the fruit of your labor to get you over the work woes.

guess what I had to do

Among my many jobs, I get to do some pretty interesting things. And this saturday was no dissappointment. I went in early for a morning shift at the good ol'B&N (barnes and noble) and was grabbed by my co-worker Emily who took me to a large sealed crate in the back room. Days like this USUALLY do not start out well, but I went along with it. She then stated: "Guess who you get to be today during storytime!!!" I wasn't sure I wanted to know, but due to my fear of masks and especially mascot costumes, I agreed that it was a better idea for me to be the "man behind the mask"rather than the woman who ran away from it. That's right...I was to be Curious George for all the little children at storytime.

I got to wear a fat suit underneath and there was certainly no seeing out of that head. Emily led me around by the paw as I proceeded to knock several books off the shelves. But when the children approached me, I froze! I had no idea what I was supposed to do! What if I walked towards them and they screamed! So when the first child walked up, all I could think to do was shake their hand like I was some cheezy politician. My co-workers got really tickled and its a miracle that I didn't shout out, "Hey, shut up, Emily!" I was also really afraid to move around too much, because we were not too successful at securing my over-sized head, and I was worried it would fall off and terrorize some poor child, much like I was probably terrorized in my youth, leading to this irrational fear of masks.

Kelley slumber party

That sunday evening, our power was off (with no hopes for revival) so we stayed the night at chez Kelley! It was like a winter wonderland!
First, me and Bethany made snow angels! Here's the action shot...we literally just fell straight back into the powdery snow. Rougher landing than we each expected, but still fun.

Then we made the perfect snow man! Which was more work than we anticipated, and my pants literally froze to the ground...

Our snow man was SOOO classy, with his top hat, pipe, glasses, bowtie, and scarf! Jason, Snowman, and Matt strike a pose.

Snuggle time with Snowman!

Next we had a snow ball fight which I failed to get pictures of due to the fact that I was under the line of fire. We also strategically waited outside for Chad to arrive home from Macon and ambushed him with snowballs. Needless to say....he demonstrated his anger by using several choice words.

Afterwards, we banded together for some much needed hot chocolate and band practice!

After midnight, Chad and Matt had the brilliant idea to make Chad into one of those GIANT snowballs. This is the two of them attempting that.

The next morning, we all awoke to no power at the Kelley's, and times got desperate fast! Chad was starving and began raiding the pantry for non-perishables. Bethany, Matt, and I quickily finished off all the milk before it could go bad and Chad ate cold Beef o'roni straight out of the can! Just as Matt was starting to auction off my arms as dinner...the power came back on! Phew...that was close.

snow dogs

House covered in snow....in March. I doubt I will ever understand Georgia weather. These pictures are actually right after it began to snow, so we ended up with a lot more than this in the end. But here's our little house, and us enjoying the pretty flakes with the pups!
Bunny, who is scared of all things, surprised us and absolutely loved it! Matt would throw little snow balls at her, she would try to catch them with her mouth and paws, and then would get so mad when they would fall apart. She really wanted to carry one around in her mouth.

Olive, on the other hand, did not like the cold and seemed a little peeved that we couldn't just curl up on the couch. She most likely was so annoyed because for some reason the snow seemed to form giant clumps on her feet and legs that we could not remotely remove....they just had to melt.

the after

Finished Product: Shelves, drawers, and baskets gallore!!!There's even some faux flowers, sachets, and an old picture of Matt and I from one of our first dates!

I even have a scarf and headband drawer and one for all my ballet stuff!

the before

So for my birthday this year, I really wanted to re-vamp my closet. There wasn't a ton wrong with it, but having a super organized closet sounded like heaven to me, and putting ikea in charge of that made it that much better. Matt was not thrilled (to put it mildly) at his new assignment, but reluctantly obliged. Here he is beginning to put the unit together. He hates all things IKEA, and wishes they would die. Me, on the other hand, says "Long live IKEA!!!"

Here are some before shots of what we were working with. Our closets are in a small hallway connecting our bedroom to our bathroom, so it was tough to get any full shots, but as you can see...things had gotten a little out of hand.

After a lot of work (mostly on Matt's part) the clothes were out and about half on their way to goodwill and the shelves were out! This certainly put me in a right foul mood because the rest of my clothes scattered our bedroom floor for about a week.

sorry...

Okay....so I know I'm WAY behind...but here is what is to come....hopefully there will be some posts tomorrow...

• Closet renovations
• Something crazy that happened at the good ol'B&N
• Fun in the Snow
• And a recent slumber party!

for Jill....and any other HP fan

This is really a toughy. Only a true fan could get this, and only with careful thought and reflection.

Name the horcruxes in the order in which they were destroyed. On your mark, get set, go!

more trivia

Bummer. Last night we were in first place the whole game, until the last question and we bid too much, missed the answer and ended up in third! Rarr! The question was:

Q: What alcoholic drink did a Dutch professor produce on accident while trying to create a blood cleansor?

Chad and I were strongly guessing Absinthe, so that's what we turned in, you know because that was the only one we could assume was actually Dutch (because of Van Gogh's influence on absinthe). But oh no....Matt suggested it was Gin, and Bill sided with him. And they were right. Better luck next week.