Yes, the title of this journal is something we actually said tonight. He does the craziest things sometimes... like instead of putting change in his bank, puts it down the front of his pants. Many, many jokes could come from that - we know!

Roman was a sweet boy today, so got an "Icee Treat" after dinner. You know, those tubes of ice with flavored coloring in them? Delicious. He ate a whole one, orange flavored. It's been a busy 10 days, although it feels that little has been accomplished.

Last weekend I went to a "scrapbook weekend" with friends and my mom. Well, there were 29 of us there. I got 26 pages done in my 12x12 book and 6 pages in my 8x8 book about Russia, so I was pleased with that. Monday - staff meeting. Tuesday - haircut. Wednesday - department meeting, flu shot. Thursday - conferences until 6:30, Jr. Nat'l Honor Society induction (mandatory) until 7:30. I collapsed last night.

In my never-ending quest to figure out how to get more done at work without increasing the guilt of having Roman at daycare, I went in early (8am) and let Doug take Roman to daycare. I soon discovered why I am getting nothing done at school. It took me 45 minutes to take care of the little things - earmark things to copy, pick up things I had copied, return a video to the library, fill out a couple reports on kids, fill out a grade-change sheet, email a couple parents, put things away & get things out... no WONDER I am bringing home all my grading and lesson planning. It takes my entire planning period just to take care of trivial items! Not counting something that might actually come up during the workday. So the going-in-early is going to happen at least once a week now.

Roman is doing well. No more cough, and he seems to be understanding the Season of Giving (and Receiving) pretty well. He talks about presents, and gets that when we buy things at the store it's for other people. He still hasn't moved up to Miss Katie's room but he plays up there at least 2 times a week. We're pretty unhappy how this has been handled (I mean, within 3 weeks he's going to be there permanently so why figure out staffing?!) so we plan on writing a letter to management once he's moved up. And we definitely have decided that once he's potty trained (start of next school year) we'll be looking at a broader range of daycares. There's one next door to my school that is promising.

On the actual home-front, our house is falling apart. Big rains the other night revealed a couple new leaks in the roof, so besides calling the roofer out AGAIN to patch where the angle meets the vertical roof, we've tossed around the idea of re-forming the roof to be pitched on both sides. Our main toilet is leaking in the rear. (that's a funny pun, actually.) The amount of paint scratches and chips all around is beginning to annoy us. And lastly, we have to move up to a larger storage unit again.

Ah well. Christmas shopping has begun in earnest and since I teach all the way up to and including Dec. 23, an outline of a game plan is being developed for shopping. Because I am NOT traversing the mall with boy in tow on a weekend!