Thunder and Ice?

It's amazing how clean my kitchen and office are today! I'm grateful for the quiet day at home, but I'm now up to three ice days to make up in my schools. Poor little Kirbyville seems to get slammed every time we get weather. This picture was posted on our local news by a photographer in Nixa. I still have a huge walnut tree cracked over on my roof. I guess I'd better get someone out here to lasso it off. I wish I could figure out how to do that myself.

Kathy, I'm so glad that you and Susan were at least together on the road yesterday. Do you follow each other, or was that mere coincidence? Well, at least you're home safely. I wonder if most of us are really at home today...I'm also glad you'll do a "tutorial" to get Susan signed on!

So...from me and the blog team, stay safe!

Sliding for Home

Barb,

I'm so glad you now have "heat" in your life! Funny how we don't think about some of life's "conveniences" until we don't have them. With the weather like it is, those conveniences transform into necessities rapidly! Susan and I both ended up in Farmington last night b/c we were scheduled to work in Bonne-Terre and Desloge today. The weather changed those plans and we ended up driving home in the snow/sleet/rain/ice. We experienced all kinds of weather and driving conditions on the way and were relieved to arrive safely at home (after almost 6 hours of driving 30-40 mph). So... we both have an unexpected planning day tomorrow--best gift ever! :) I hope you are safe in your travels or keeping warm at home with your new furnace. Take care out there in trainer land.

Kathy

Next time I see Susan, I'll help her get logged on. I didn't know she needed help until I read your post.

Baby Steps: An Easy Lesson in Google Documents...I Think!

I opened my big mouth and talked about how easy I thought it might be to upload documents on our site here by either using google docs or something like that. Wouldn't it be nice to see other agenda ideas from each other - especially when you think you really had something great that worked - and we could access them here? (By the way, I posted what I thought might be convenient links we could use on our homepage, so let me know of other ideas.)

Anyway, here's an article I used with my schools when I saw that teachers had not thought of leaving the security of the rigid seating arrangement of desks in rows only! We read the article using a strategy called structured indexing and I was pleased at the response this got. Hope you enjoy it; let me know how it worked. Here's a sample so that you can see what it looked like in a history class with a piece about westward expansion.

OK...so all that I did here was go to my gmail account (which you created to get on blogger) and then I went to the tab at the top which read "documents." From there it was really easy...I hit "upload" and then "browse" in the next window and then I scrolled through documents I had stored so that I could hyperlink them here for you. (The hyperlink is the little symbol at the top of this new post window...it looks like a link and it is between the italics and the quotation mark...

I'll try to post now to see if it worked!

Let There Be Warmth...and Internet and cable!

Here I sit in my freezing cold office on Saturday morning of the WTL conference...but I have fabulous news...drum roll, please. A FURNACE IS BEING INSTALLED AS I WRITE THIS! The world is already looking brighter... and soon to be warmer, too.

After Becky's bday party last night, I took off for home, despite the good company, warm hotel room, cable TV/Internet. I learned that we are supposed to get a roaring thunderstorm this afternoon, and the nice young man (don't I sound old?) that I hired to put in a new furnace called to say he'd like to get at the job early. I'm relishing the thought of the warmth that is soon to come, but feeling kind of badly for leaving the warmth of friends so early. OK, forgive the schmaltz, but it really was uplifting to listen to all of you talk about your adventures this year. Susan, "mud" is a perfect word choice for me, too. Thanks! Seriously, don't we work with KIND and SMART people? Sometimes I really am washed over with that feeling of... I can't believe I am doing this... which I guess is better than...Am I doing this right? ... which sometimes hits me, too. It really can be kind of lonesome, though...

So, I really am going to look forward to hearing what's going on with all of you through this site. I'm sorry I didn't get to go through a "tutorial" with Susan on getting signed on. I'll send her an email, but in the meantime, if you see her (maybe Kathy?) would any of you help her find our site and get signed on? Also, Shonna, I know you are out there since you are now listed as a contributor. So let us "see" you in a post!

Love to you all,
Barb...or Katiedog...whatever!

WTL

Hey Barb--The latest email from WTL has us down for different rooms. Also I was thinking about that other cord that I didn't use. I think it's for audio. I don't need audio so it doesn't matter for. Do you need audio?

Hello all. I finally did it. This is great! Now when I come "home" to my hotel room, I'll be able to destress with people who understand what I'm talking about. Is everyone ready for the WTL.