Author Archives: Jo Hawke

42/365: Dum-Dum-Da-Dum (alternatively: Valentine, Be Mine?!)

Getting Valentine’s Day cards ready for Monday, Lucas helped check off the names of the kids in his class until he got check-happy and checked half the class before making their cards.

That’s when I stepped in and marked with a line each one we’d already made as he called out the names.

It was interesting watching Lucas decide which card (and which flavor Dum Dum) to give to which of his classmates. He wrote all 17 of them. Pretty neatly, too, if I may add.

Atticus picked out a few of the cards he’s taking to Susie’s (our sitter/preschool teacher) but was distracted as usual, so I got to pick out most of those and write all of them.

And by the time Kevin came home with dinner from Pizza Hut, we were done.

Lucas, pointing to the box: It says, “Dum Dum Pops.”
Kevin: Don’t say that! They’re probably pretty smart.

;(

41/365: Cough Drop Pep Talk

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I wonder how many of these cough drops I went through before noticing the sayings.

At the very least, half a bag.

Admittedly, I usually unwrap without paying much attention. Today was the exception.

And after reading “Turn ‘can do’ into ‘can did!'”? I have to admit that I was wishing it hadn’t been.

40/365: Hands-On Diagrams

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The work of an English teacher is never done … until summer (and not even then, if you’re me).

Village Murals

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We were headed toward Washington Square Park, guitar in tow, ready to play some music for our favorite black squirrels.

Or at least we meant to be headed that way. Even after six NYC visits together (and two before that for me), we still find it quite easy to find things we never meant to see on the way to someplace we think we’re headed but really aren’t.

And then, we saw this awesome trio of murals, which were painted by Rico Fonseca, “the artist of Greenwich Village.” (It’s on West 3rd Street at MacDougal. Here’s a picture of the whole set.)

Here are the other two:

And here’s a video about the artist:

38/365: To Mommy

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I love-love-love getting pictures made especially for me!

At left is “Happy Alien” by 6-year-old Lucas, and at right is “Snake in the Water” by 4-year-old Atticus.

37/365: A Retina-Burning Sunset

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One of the many things I love about my DroidX is its awesome built-in camera app. It’s easy to use (just click!), has a number of scenes to choose from (like macro, steady, and night scenes), and it takes good pictures (as good as my Canon digital).

I’m getting into the habit of taking pictures more and more, too. (Of course, this commitment to post a picture every day hasn’t hurt any. I try to keep it handy, and if I have the feeling good photo ops are coming up, I’ll open the app and hit sleep, so when I push the button, the camera is ready.

One day last week, we were stopped at the light at the corner of Witt Road and Highway 29, headed home after picking up the boys from our sitter, Susie’s, and — BAM! — there was this eye-blasting sunset behind the trees. I had just enough time to snap the picture before it calmed into a blur of still-beautiful color.

You can see the rosy spots on the picture. They make it seem like that flash of light was just too much for the camera.

It reminds me of really early Aretha Franklin recordings. She’s belting it out so big that the recording equipment just can’t contain it. Chills!

36/365: Green Water

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I had this issue that involved a lot of (probably debatable) needs, but primarily consisted of these two:

I need to drink more water.
I need to stop using so many plastic water bottles.

We live in the county, so our water comes from a well. To some, this may sound like a good thing, but I’ve never had much luck with wells. The water has always tasted metallic, like iron. YUCK!

And since I haven’t been drinking water regularly (um, many days, none :(), it takes a lot for me to get a taste for it.

So I’ve been thinking for a while now that I should find a filtered water bottle, but I haven’t put much effort into the search until the last month or so. I was specifically checking out the Bobble and the Power Bottle. I just hadn’t decided anything.

Fast-forward to the other day.

Kevin and I were at the mall. In the sale shelves near the upstairs Belk entrance, I found this water bottle. It’s perfect! It’s filtered and it has a freezer stick that unscrews. And it was on sale!

I used my handy-dandy barcode scanner to make sure it was a good deal. Yep! I got both the bottle and two replacement filters for less than $14. WIN!

My goal right now is to drink at least one of these bottles a day. And then I can work up. Three bottles would be more than the recommended eight eight-ounce glasses.

In the picture, you can see Atticus’ amazing Towers of Blocks. He calls them cake.

And you can see one of my major activities of the day: sorting through my Gmail inbox. I had dozens of emails from teachers requesting tests, quizzes, and other materials via my teaching website in the last month. Now, I’m down to 14. (Sorry, guys!!)