TGIF

This one's for Sam. Have a GREAT trip!

Well, I survived the week so far. Last week I had multiple union meetings on top of trying to get grades out as we tried to "facilitate" action on the part of the Board of Trustees that would help the district move to being able to move our salaries and benefits from the muck on the bottom of county comparisons and up into more the middle range. The community is very confused about what we have been doing (writing letters, speaking at meetings, wearing buttons and shirts and this week working contract hours, which means not babysitting their children before and after school for free). It's incomprehensible to them that the union is actually SUPPORTING the Board.

Last weekend was a three-day weekend for me because our district took advantage of the option of moving the Lincoln holiday to last Monday. I cleaned the heck out of my family room (DH said he was going to take a picture when he returned from D.C.) on Saturday and Sunday, then went to Disneyland on Monday. I did some things in DCA that I'd never done before. (Sam - don't miss "Turtle Talk with Crush", Imagination building in the Hollywood Backlot section of DCA. Amazing!) Took some pictures, danced along with the Parade of Dreams, did some shopping and was home before midnight. I didn't think about my work issues all day and was restored.

Fortunately, my students are working on a Civil War journal all week so I was able to finish entering grades for report cards on Tuesday. Wednesday was another union meeting and distribution of t-shirts until about 6:00, then last night the Board meeting where they took action. It got ugly a couple of times and their action didn't really get us where we want to be but the meeting was, at least, well run (last week's meeting was insanity) and they did move forward. Now we can stand down for a few days. I will attend next week's rep meeting and host an action meeting in my classroom the next day. It is my hope that we can step back a little until May, when negotiations for next year pick up again.

Through all this I've been trying to finish the little quilt for my mom's birthday. It was down to the binding and I didn't know when I'd get it done (her 75th birthday is today and we celebrate it on Sunday). Then, yesterday I got up early and tried to log on to read union email before I left for work. The server was down and it occurred to me that if I could machine sew the binding on the quilt, I could take it to work and do the hand sewing while the high school counselors did their thing with my students. I'm so happy to report that it is finished, the first finish for the year (and maybe for two years). I think she will be pleased with it. Oh, yeah, I can't forget. As I was removing the basting threads I noticed I have two short pieces of hand quilting to finish tonight. Hope I have a few brain cells left to remember to finish it!