Monday, December 8, 2008

A Little Bit Of This/A Little Bit Of That and a REALLY COOL AND FUN LINK

We toured a college today with my daughter, who is a junior in high school, and we dragged my freshman son along - we figured it'd be good for him to see some of the same schools she's seeing - sort of killing two birds with one stone. While in the summer we saw my Alma Mater, St. Joseph's University, I was not thrilled with it and it just didn't seem like a good fit for her. The college we saw today, I absolutely loved. It's smaller than she would like but it has a lot to offer her as far her possible major and her interest in music. We'll see. I know she's thinking she'd like to be a bit further away from home but I have to get the point across to her that whether she is 20 minutes or 4 hours away from us, she will still be able to fully participate in campus life as she will live wherever she goes and mom and dad will not be there breathing down her neck.

Yesterday we put up the tree and baked gingerbread cookies. The cookies still need to be iced and I spent about $45 yesterday buying all I need to ice them. The kids want to ice them tonight so I hope to get some pics of that. Friday/Saturday I decorated and then Saturday I went to the high school's production of "Annie" - my daughter was in the pit orchestra - the kids did a great job - a very professional performance.

Had a bit of a disappointment over the weekend - had my feelings unexpectedly hurt but they were hurt just the same. I'm the type of person that when this happens, it just gets stuck in my brain and I have great difficulty getting past it. I find that the first 24-48 hours are basically miserable for me no matter how hard I try to let it go or give it to God! It feels as though the hurt is a ball on the end of a hi-li paddle and hard as I might hit it away from me, it bounces back quick and hard. It's an exhausting weight to carry around too. However, by yesterday afternoon I had gotten past it and put it behind me. We had such a great family day with baking and decorating. I am blessed in that I have two teenage kids who are still into family traditions.

I will post photos from my laptop in a bit as I still have to upload them. However, I wanted to share a link to a really, really fun site I found the other day. It's called Cubecraft and even my almost 15 year-old son wanted to try.

I'll be back with photos of the weekend in a bit!



Ghost of Christmas past, present, or future?? Your guess is as good as mine.




8 comments:

uberrhund said...

Glad you had such a good time with the kids checking out the colleges.
I remember when Ayleen was a Jr. and we toured a lot of schools in the middle Atlantic states on up to Boston MA.
She loved a couple of them and some she thought would be really great were just not for her at all.
In the end she was accepted with a full ride for tuition (not housing) at schools in Minn. New Hampshire and Here in Southern Calif. .
She spent 4 years at Chapman in Orange CA , lived on campus 1 year and commuted the other three.
She decided that snow and ice were just not for her and Chapman had all the classes she ever needed or wanted.
Touring schools in person makes a world of difference.
Have fun with the cookie decorating!

TheOneAndOnlyNora said...

What instrument does your daughter play? I loved band & was in the concert & jazz bands. I played the soprano/alto/tenor sax & the clarinet.

I know what you mean about getting hurt. Whether intentional or not, it effects me deeply. Hurt is very closely related to Trust for me, and it's very hard for me to get over it.

Dot O said...

Thanks Janis! Colleen will be staying relatively local. I told her that if she were interested in some special major, i.e. marine biology, that only some school far away had, then she would need to consider going further away. At this point, the major she is interested in is offered at many of the more local schools so there is no reason (nor do we have the $$$) for her to go to a far-away school.

We will hit one or two schools in January when she's got half days of school.

The cookies are delish, btw!!!


Nora, she plays clarinet and is learning alto sax. My son plays alto and bari sax. Both are in the marching/concert band, jazz band, and my son is also in the sax ensemble.

The college we saw in the summer had no music program at all. The college we saw yesterday has a variety of them!!!

As far as the hurt goes, I'm doing fine. It all boiled down to someone's oversight.

Rick said...

That's the ghost of seeing the credit card bill after Christmas.

Dot O said...

Rick - hysterical!!!! But you may just be right!

Christina said...

That's great you're getting an early start on visiting colleges!

Amy @ Living Locurto said...

Great post. I love your gingerbread cookies! I wish my mom had taken me to visit colleges... especially that young! Get them thinking about it now.

angie {the arthur clan} said...

I love seeing your children get into the Christmas traditions with you! My fear is that my kids won't want to do any of that when they are older...yours give me hope. :)

So sorry about the hurt you had to deal with over the weekend. That always cuts deep, but I'm glad you were able to move forward from it.