Getting things done.

I had a day off today so I finally {FINALLY} got my booty in gear and cleaned/organized/felt better about life in our apartment.

Each one of these had a random assortment of things in it before I cleaned today; clutter be gone!!

 In other news.

1} In all of that cleaning, I cleared off the top of our loooooong dresser {there's a lot of surface space and it easily and often gets eaten up by Many Sundry items. The left side of it is still the home of my make-up/jewelry things but this little project really did a lot for the feng shui of our sleeping room.

2} My hyacinth has been perfuming our apartment with a delightful scent for the past week or so. Some of the petals are starting to wither a bit but I believe we'll have at at least another solid week of its glorious odor.

3} Mike is busy a few nights this week which would be not a good thing but I can {again, finally} get into Downton Abbey. I'm way behind the times on this one, even coming from a BBC-aholic family {Masterpiece Mystery!} and I've only ever seen the very first episode of the very first season via Netfilx. Tonight, my friends, episode number two.

4} I've got the coffee pot set, lunch made, and maybe an outfit ready for tomorrow.

5} Spring is coming! Spring is coming? It's going to be kind of a gloomy week here, weather-wise, but I still can't help but notice longer days and some different sunshine angles; yea!

Also, I had mentioned last week a menu-type thing. I'm still thinking about it! 

How YOU doin' reader? I hope that you're enjoying whatever it is that this week is bringing to you, though if you're on one of those "Ski-Week" vacations {certain California schools}, I'll at least admit my jealousy.
 
xoxo, natty ♥

Spring Fling

Traveling dog...

BEST FIRST DAY OF SPRING BREAK EVER! My day wasn’t as dramatic as I just implied, but I did have a lovely day. I slept in, got a latte, lazed around, did the crossword puzzles AND the jumble (“…on a dead end!”), finished save-the-dating,

Off you go little ones, do your job...

vacuumed (blech), watched “The Secret Life of the American Teenager” (shamelessly, mind you)(I’m on volume 3), ran, and took some backyard/garden pictures. I say the “Best first day ever…”so vehemently because with the advent of every vacation, except Christmas, there’s just too much going on there, I ponder how well suited I am to a life of leisure and not having to show up anywhere. I am totally content puttering around the house and straightening up our things or reclining on a beach or whatever it is that I do with my free time. The tricky thing, though, is that I can get quite crabby by the time my vacation time comes to an end. I really don’t think it’s because my happy time is coming to an end, I actually think it’s because I’m ready for the structure and community that work allows me. This happens to me at every vacation. It’s great, I guess, since it means that deep down I do like to be employed for reasons other than monetary ones; that I like what it is I do, even if it kicks my hiney all the dang time. However, being at the start of my break, I’m soaking up every second of it even if I’m just cleaning and taking care of life’s business…SPRING BREAK 2011 SAN JOSE WOO HOO YEA!!!! Minus the body shots…

I’ve been on a phone camera kick recently. As mentioned, my little computer is quite slow. Blogging and internet and such is fine, but loading up the camera takes a toll so this way I can just email the picture directly to myself. Hence the quality of the pictures isn’t as good as it could be, but ohhhhh well. I “snapped these shots”, though, because as much as I love summer, spring is just such a close second (something I have definitely mentioned before). It smells soooo good outside these days (depending where you are, I suppose, but you get it) because of the jasmine and other fine fragrances nature allows us (citrus blossoms! Etc.) and I LOVE how the day time lighting in the house has a tinge of green to it because of how many green leaves are outside the windows and just how concentrated that green is (not to mention the different shades of it: light-almost-yellow-green, deep-hydrangea-leaf-green, grass-green…). Today the sky was grey but the cloud cover was fairly thin, so the grey is very bright if you can picture it; this bright light reflects that green and I just can’t STAND how pretty and luminescent it all is and how it casts everything in this light. Plus the days are still getting longer…waxing, if you will, as in the opposite of waning, not the waxing that is painful…I digress. While summer woos me like no other, the green is not quite as fresh as it is now and once June hits us, the days technically shorten just a teensy bit every day, though one doesn’t really notice until later. So I would love the warmth and sunshine of summer with the beauteous coloring and promise of aforementioned summer; sprummer ifyoupleasethankyouverymuch.

Another thing about the gardens is that there's always a surprise. My decade old cousin and his neighborhood pal play in and around the yard/house/street/wherever. See if you can spot some of the evidence of their misadventures here.

I live by the kitchen door...

I do too!

Those green leaves I love!

Pretty and sweet-smelling trumpet flowers...these are a bit worse for the wear but they bloom often and smell soooo nicely!

How much is that doggy...

Hydrangea leaves and buds...soon to be flowers!

More hydrangea...

and more!

Backyard wisteria...

Backyard persimmon...

Backyard Japanese Maple...

Street sycamores...

Backyard view...

Anyway, this day has been quite nice. I’m sitting on top of clean laundry on a freshly made bed waiting to go to yoga (which hasn’t happened in quite a while, incidentally) and Mr. M and I are going to get a quick bite after so I’m excited for the night ahead. I have also mapped out a brief schedule for myself for the rest of the week so that I can pencil in grading. I find that I am really drawn to absolutely any other to-do when the grading piles up and that makes it necessary to make a list that includes the grading since I’m a slave to my lists…so...happy Monday (really!!)!  Post Script: I went to yoga and, as always, thought “Why don’t I do that every Monday?” 

Petroglyph

The scene: my aunt and uncle's house.
The time: late afternoon.
The season: middle of winter.
The reason: Superbowl Sunday, 2010.
The crime: I was eating wings, or a burger, or something of that nature. I had taken a plate from the cabinet, because we're casual like that. I had finished eating, presumably, or could have been going up for seconds, who knows. I was definitely, however, scraping stuff from my plate into the garbage. My hands slipped- the plate fell. Tears ensued. It just so happens that my grandmother had taken my at the time 5th grade cousin G to Petroglyph and my cousin had made this plate, which I broke, which couldn't be replaced. I had actually thrown out the plate, because that's what you do with broken glass/pottery and I was trying to console my despondent cousin and saying all sorts of things and this is what I got myself into to get her to stop crying: I had to fish out all pieces of the broken plate from the garbage and then take her to Petroglyph so that she can make something else as a replacement.

Time moved on and this cousin celebrated her birthday in May. Being in the throes of end of the year panic, I arrived sans gift to her fete and told her that her gift was that she could bring a friend along to Petroglyph. So, this was all cashed in last week. The event turned into my grandmother treating my aunt along with G, her three brothers, her friend and myself to lunch. Then everyone except the memawster crossed the street to paint their hearts out.

I took a few shots of everyone painting and then on Monday we collected our finished goods =)

My fleur-de-lis mug without a handle!

Last week I also had the pleasure of hanging out with Audrey and another good friend from high school who now lives on the east coast. We went to Trials one night and had a good ole time.

The east coast friend was supposed to meet me and M at the beach on Saturday but when we all got on Highway 17 it was PACKED, worse that I'd ever seen it. We stayed on for about half an hour, which took us about 1.5 miles away from home, and then made the decision to forget the beach. It would've taken us about two hours to get there and then we would get the same traffic on the way home, so we're saving that trip for another time. Anyway, we wound up at the YMCA because we already had our suits on and, as my friend said, we needed a body of water to sit by and splash in (no bother if it's filled with mostly people 10 or under). We did exactly that, played some Boggle, chatted and had a lovely time =)

We did our long run in the city again, I can't remember if I mentioned that already, and we met friend Z at the same taco place as last week. He lives in the LA area but was visiting up here. We also had some Indian food with him and his lovely and cute Chilean friend last night. It was a great night and especially good to use Spanish in a non-teaching context with people my age (the Chilean friend doesn't speak English). We took them to get some coffee after dinner since they were gearing up to make the trek back down to la-la-land last night. I had an awesome time and hope that they made it back awake and safely!

I can't remember the name of this appetizer bread thing, but it was SOOO GOOD! Our mango lassis =) 

Pals. 

I'm lounging around and need to run four at some point today. I also need to write some postcards to my new homeroom. I got some pretty pens and stickers to spice up the cards a bit, but I just haven't gotten around to it yet.

And then there was the Wal-Mart. I'm aware that there are more responsible shopping choices available to me but I had never been and wanted to check it out. It was an entirely overwhelming experience exacerbated, perhaps, by all of the remodeling, etc., they're going through currently. I was able to pick up a good load of back to school stuff. I'm picky about the markers my kids use. As older students it's not like they're coloring everyday or anything like that but they definitely make posters or brochures at least once a week, and being controlling like I am, I like the marker baskets I give them to be just-so. The school actually gives us supplies but they were so cheap and this way I just feel on-top-of-it. The funny thing is, it's all usually messy/sloppy within a few weeks, but starting out organized helps me out!

I captured some of my favorite images of the day, most having to do with animals, however, so feel free to skip on over them.

This was on a sleeping bag container and begs a few questions...why is he fully dressed? What is he drinking? Does he sleep under the stars? Why is it light out still but he's in "bed"?Who gets to sleep in the tent that's in the background?

Special!

Ferrets and a rhyme for your ears.

Bilingual marketing.

I'm still cleaning/organizing and need to run today and hopefully can get a head start on those postcards. We're going to Tahoe (woo hoo!) for our two weeks starting on Saturday and I'd like to get them sent out before that.

Happy hump-day all!