The new wave of drink dispensers

Sam and I were at Firehouse Subs for lunch the other day, primarily to check out the new soft drink dispenser by Coca-Cola. It's a computer screen with "ink cartridges" of soft drink syrup! You literally have a choice of every flavor of soft drink that Coke makes! Sam was more interested in taking a picture of the cartridges than the entire machine, so I didn't get a picture of the computer screen, but basically there is a computer monitor with a touch screen where you choose the drink (i.e. you hit the Sprite button and then have a choice of 8 different flavors of Sprite!! etc.), put your cup under the one lever on the machine, and voila! You have a customized soft drink. Now restaurants only have to stock the small cartridges of syrup instead of the huge bags of actual drink liquid. I was amazed and am excited to go back and try new flavors.

Pumpkin Patch time!

We took advantage of this gorgeous Saturday to visit "The MAiZE at Little Darby Creek" - a 9 acre corn maze with a pumpkin patch and activities for kids. When we got there, we realized it was another one of those times where having a "rent a kid" station out front would have been nice :) The activities were all aimed for little kids but I did manage to elbow my way to the top of the pipe slide and then promptly slid directly off the landing at the bottom....I'm positive it had everything to do with the slipperiness of the piping and NOT the unintended weight put on the pipe :) Ha! The 9-acre corn maze is what drew us to the farm in the first place, so that was a lot of fun. We spent about 45 minutes inside and still didn't make it through the entire thing. There were 2 phases and we completed most of phase 1 and some of phase 2, but only because we created our own "path" through the corn and happened to jump from a phase 1 path to a phase 2 path. Oops! There were little trivia "cornundrums" inside the maze posted on signs and if you solved them and turned in your paper with the right answers at the end, you were entered in a drawing for $100....well, the paper is still in my jacket pocket. Oops number two for the day! Hahaha!!

It's fall!

Part of the trail was a soft, mossy blanket. Very cushiony and nice :)

Beaver dam

Today we went to Clearcreek Metro Park with Sam's mom. We took a looooong hike (actually it was only 2.5 miles but it seemed twice as long because it's uphill for 1.25 miles!). I was thinking this was going to be peak weekend for the trees, but after the hike today, I think it's going to be next weekend. The maple trees in Columbus are beautiful red but as you can see from the pictures, there was still a lot of green in Lancaster. Quite a few yellow trees but not really any orange or red and those are the most beautiful in my opinion.

Home Sweet Home

WE ARE OFFICIALLY IN CONTRACT!!!

Funny story

My work days are either very awesome or unbelievably horrible. Rarely do I have a middle ground, which I guess is to be expected when you work with special needs kids. All of my kindergarten students have autism, along with some other secondary diagnoses for most of them. So, it makes sense that when these kids are focused on work and able to stay on task with little help from me, the day runs smooth and I feel an intrinsic sense of worth knowing I'm helping these special little kiddos function at a relatively typical level compared with their peers. On the other hand, when they are in full autistic mode, I leave the classroom ready to pull my hair out. Today was one of those latter days. I had one student throw a toy dragon out the window to see if it could really fly - it didn't; another one spent all day pinching any child he came in contact with just to see what other people's skin feels like; another one cried most of the day when he wasn't first to answer a question or the first in line; and yet another precious little one insisted on everyone calling him "Professor Quiggle" because he thought he was the character in one of his books. I think the funniest part of the day came from an older student in the building who was throwing a massive tantrum for getting "out" in a game of Hot Potato ~ as he was being "escorted" by a couple teachers away from the other students, he yelled "Don't you know I have autism?! This is what I do, so you better get used to it!"

Oh the joys of my job :)

Oh the absurdity!

The public has spoken and I am listening....my blog is being resurrected! Yes, after the outcry resulting from my previous post, I am going to summon extra energy and time in my hectic life to continue posting about my exciting life. They may not always be long detailed posts; there may not always be pictures with them; but I will continue to chronicle the days of my life right here on this very web page you are reading.

Wedding update: We have a church, reception venue, photographer, cake baker, wedding dress, and bridal party chosen. Honeymoon location is in the works. We registered for gifts yesterday at Bed Bath & Beyond! Wohoo!! Sam was in charge of the scanner gun (he thoroughly enjoyed his role in this endeavor!) and the first item scanned was.....drumroll please.....a crystal candy dish! Our love for sweets continues to roll over into every aspect of our lives :) Sam's number 1 item he liked: a glass pitcher with a hole in the middle that acts as a handle. It's quite cool. My number 1 item I liked: a Kitchen Aid stand mixer in electric red. Ta daaaa!!! Imagine a beam of light and chorus of angels signing right about now.

Life update: We made an offer on a house today! Will know an answer tomorrow by 6 pm....which means, I'm not sleeping tonight! Ha! The anticipation and excitement of possibly owning our first home is enough of an adrenaline rush to keep me awake all night. However, for the sake of my students and fellow teachers who will have to look at my dark circles and baggy eyes tomorrow, I am going to try and get some sleep.

So, there you have it. My weekend in a nutshell! All of my readers can now re-add my blog to your computer bookmarks page and favorites list because I'M BACK :)