several good things

Hola amigos. It's been a long time since I rapped at ya, but I got a lot on my plate these days.* It's report card time, which has meant a lot of soul-searching, a lot of procrastinating, and a lot of time in the over-heated Silent Study Room at the local library. I'm not done, not by a long shot, but I managed to continue my unbroken streak of reporting semester marks by the end of the semester (for my first three years, I was still frantically marking term work after the exam was written. Not no more. It took four years of bumbling around, but I finally got on top of this. I feel pretty good.)

Things are going well these days. Why?

• We've almost paid off one of the Boy's 3 student loans, which would leave our debt load under 30,000 for the first time in 2 years. (This is exciting if you want to save money and, I dunno, move out of the freaking basement).
• The Boy possibly-maybe has a job until June, which is also excellent, and he's going to get a summer job (hopefully at Old Navy, or some other mall store where he can be supervised by my students.)
• Blake has shown some progress on potty training as long as he is forced to run around bare-bottomed.
• I started a knitalong that is gaining momentum even as I tap away.
• My mom asked me to make something for my grandmother, which is a big deal, because my mom ignores my knitting as much as she can. (The downside is that she wants it made out of eyelash yarn, the upside is that I have some freeloading stash that fits the requirements.)
• I've "earned" $30 this week for taste-testing pre-market foods (iced tea and snack crackers), which I've spent on empanadas, exciting Patons yarn, and lots of books from the perpetual discard sale at the library.
• Speaking of which, I'm so chuffed. One dollar for this, this, this, this, and this. The first two were audio books that have lost their CD and are otherwise in good shape (rare for used children's books). The third is a gorgeous magical realism story set in downtown Toronto with recognisable (but not touristy) landmarks. The fourth is new, and a story I enjoyed when I was younger. The last is a gift for a girl who appreciates her Degrassi High. A dollar! Exciting.

We've been having fun with the Munch book since it came home yesterday. Both the Boy & I speak highschool French, which is enough to navigate most children's books (we discovered this when the Boy brought home a bunch of hand-me-down books that included "Attention, Leon!" by Richard Scarry.) Blake has always been a strong auditory learner; we've known this since he started to enjoy and then recite the poetry of William Blake and Edward Lear. For his it's not so much the meaning of the words, since he's still building his vocabulary anyway, it's the interesting sounds and the quality of the story. And Robert Munch is Robert Munch, no matter what language he's in. We're having a blast.

* (c) the eerily-similar-to-my-first-boyfriend Jim Anchower

Labels: basement, bat masterson, blake, family, the boy

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- Rocketbride's adventure of 1/28/2007 08:19:00 p.m.