All I want for Christmas

I visited with Santa and told him I wanted an all expense paid scholarship for graduate school... :)

Christmas is a stressful time of year for me.  So much to do with a deadline looming.  This season was made merrier for me by the most thoughtful gifts given to me by dear friends and family.  I wanted to share some of my favorites with you here.

My friend, Erika, always gives me the most quirky and unique gifts.  This year she gave me a calendar made out of Bubble Wrap.

How cool is that?!  I LOVE it!  Thanks Erika!

My brother made me a stable to go with the Willow Tree nativity that I have collected as gifts from my parents over the past few Christmas'.  He went into the woods on my parents land, cut down the best tree, hauled it back to the shop and crafted a stable from the wood.

It smells so good, like fresh wood.  It is the perfect size.  It is so wonderfully rustic.  I love it!  Thank you Jake!

I got a whole list of other great gifts.  If you don't see your gift listed here it is not because I didn't love it, I just don't want to make others jealous because of all the love that was poured out upon me this holiday season.  Thank you to everyone for the gifts and love I have received this season.  I love you all and hope you had a wonderful holiday.

End of the first Semester

As my first semester in grad school was coming to an end I was faced with several projects.  One of them was a huge, two part project, that involved analyzing a child's language sample.  It was very complex.  My partner and I worked on the first half for 4 hours one night.  The next night we tried to start on the second half but hit a wall.  We set it aside until the end of the week when we hoped a new book my friend had ordered would come and help us figure it out.  Through out the week, as we overheard other students saying they had asked the teacher about specific sentences, we would jot down the sentence and the code to go with it on a pink sticky note.

The end of the week finally came, bringing with it the new book so we got together again to finish the project.  The new book was little help so we turned to the sticky note for our answers.

One big problem...

the pink sticky note had been left at home.

Thankfully my friend (we'll call her Molly) had someone (we'll call him Cody) at her place that could read the note to us over the phone.  

Molly dialed the number and explained to Cody where the note was and that she needed him to read to her exactly what it said.

Here is the conversation that followed:

Molly: It probably won't make sense and it might be hard to read but I just need you to read exactly what it says.

Cody: OK, I can't read it.

Molly:  I know it is hard to read but I really need you to read it to me.  Just try really hard.

Cody:  Molly, I CAN'T READ IT.

Molly: I know it is really messy and hard to decipher but I really need it.  Maybe you could spell it to me or something.  Please just try.

Cody: I CAN'T READ IT.

Finally, after much frustration, Molly finally realized that since she and Cody both had iPhones he could take a picture and send it to her.

When the picture finally came through this is what we saw...

In case you can't see it, the first sentence on our trusty pink sticky note is "I can't read it".

We laughed until we cried.  Poor Cody tried so hard to tell us what it said. :)  I think Molly apologized later.

Just goes to prove that being a speech student doesn't make you immune to communication problems.

Thanksgiving Day Football in the country

I came home from running to the Dollar General for last minute Thanksgiving dinner stuff, the only store in Honey Grove...although as Aunt Sue pointed out at least they have a store... but I digress.  Ok, so I came back from the store and was told I had to go look out back at the "Goal" my brothers had created.  I was told it had fallen on Adam, but he was still alive and it also fell on a chair but it broke.  I walked out the back door and found this.

Yes, that is a trampoline AND picnic tables turned on their sides.  There were all sorts of rules like, if the ball goes over the chalk line it is out, if it goes between the legs of the chair it is in.  Most of the balls ended up in the chicken coop or next to the pond... which is also out of bounds.

Here is the whole gang "warming" their hands from the heat coming off of the spinning ball.  Awesome goal guys!  Adam, I'm glad it didn't kill you.

I got a job, I got a job, I got a job hey hey hey hey!

In case you missed it, I got a job!  It is technically a "Graduate Student Assistantship" position (which is hard to get and thus an honor...but I don't want to brag... ) but it pays real money!  The kind that will pay bills!  Can you tell I am a little excited about this new development?  Ok, here is the scoop.  I am working at the Denton State Supported Living Center (used to be called the Denton State School).  Here is a blip about it from their website:
Denton State School's doors opened in July, 1960, and within 1 year had approximately 1,700 residents. The majority of the residents were children and young adults with mild to moderate mental retardation. The school was designed to be a community within it's self. It had its own infirmary, beauty shop, education buildings, therapy departments, and four dormitories. The dormitories have since been converted to 40 apartments. Located on 200 wooded acres south of Denton, It is the largest of the 11 state schools in Texas and home to more than 650 individuals with severe and profound mental retardation. 

All of the residents there now are adults, many of which have been there their whole lives.  The few I have come into contact with have seemed very happy there.  I am working in the communication department and will eventually be working with the residents there to help them communicate whether by speaking or using some other augmentative device.  For now, because I have not completed the required training, I am not allowed contact with the residents to I am helping with the grunt work around the office.  Mostly I have become very familiar with the new shipment of communication devices recently delivered.  I get to open the box, plug in the device, make sure it works, then engrave it with an ID number before packing it all back up and putting it on the shelf.  So, for now, the picture of my work there is this...

Why did we keep...

I am way behind in my blogging.  It really slowed me down when the free internet I was piggy backing on decided to go password protected and didn't tell me the password.  So rude!  Anyways, that is my excuse on to the posting.

A couple of weeks ago I was trying to figure out how to come up with the money to pay my bills.  I looked around and decided I have a bunch of "stuff" that other people might want so I cleaned out everything that I owned that I thought might be of some value, mom did the same, and we posted a big digital garage sale on ebay, amazon, and half.com.  One of the easiest things to list was the DVDs so we listed a bunch of those. Later that evening, I was in the kitchen when mom yelled out from the bedroom

"Hey, Hope!  Why did we keep someone like you?!"


Ummmmm,


"what?" I responded hoping this was some sort of weird joke I wasn't getting and not my mother regretting having me as part of her family.  She repeated "Why did we keep someone like you?!" and I thought about it for a minute.  Just before I went off the deep end of despair I realized she was referring to the DVD Someone like you.  With a sigh of relief I yelled back, "I like that DVD!" followed by "you'll never guess what I thought you said!"

After retelling the story from my end we laughed until there were tears in our eyes.  Aubrey came in and I told her the story which just got the giggles going again.

Someone like you is a funny movie all about the new cow theory.  It makes me laugh but from now on I will giggle when I think of this movie because of the glitch in communication I had with my mother and the split second that I doubted I was wanted in my family.  :)

Mom, I know you're glad you kept someone like me around to share this story with the blog world.  Love ya!

RIP

My midterm week of stress ended with a death.  My oldest and dearest fish died.

I have had her for 5 years.  My beloved Beulah has been with me for 3 apartments, 6 roommates, and over 60 aquarium water changes.  I had a stressful week (huge understatement) with 3 major tests in one week.  I eat to deal with stress and I'm afraid when I eat I think my fish would like to eat.  So I ate. I fed my fish.  I ate.  I fed my fish.  I learned the hard way that fish, when they eat too much, can become constipated and die.  She had grown quite large from my years of stress relief eating.  I was kind of stuck for a min when I realized she had died.  I was afraid if I flushed her down the toilet she would clog it.  I ended up taking her down to the bushes at the end of my apartments.  I tried to throw her into the bushes but she stuck in the net and plopped onto the cement slab directly in front of my feet.  I didn't want to touch her to pick her up and throw her again so I left her there.  In case you are wondering, you can see her dead body from my front door.  I just make it a point to NOT look over there.  It is too painful...and gross.  Farewell Beulah.  You will be missed.

Brown Bear, Brown Bear...

A big "Thank You!" to everyone who tried so hard to help me find a copy of Brown Bear, Brown, Bear to use with my client this week.  I ended up making my own copy and then 10 min before my session began a classmate of mine showed me a hidden copy of the book on a bookshelf I had not looked at.  In the end I got the book that I needed.  I wanted to say thanks to all of you because I felt so loved.  Thanks guys!