penny wise and pound foolish

they cut 12.5 teaching positions, plus secretary and custodial positions and this is supposed to be the easier year between this year and next. Class sizes will near 40. My department has suffered a 50% loss over the past 3 years. And the instrumental program has been obliterated. Sad time to be in education

oh no

where did it go? summer that is. I feel really sad about the encroaching school year... I can't believe summer is about over. And I'm more than a bit anxious about this school year being split between the 2 buildings. I can't get my mojo to get ready and start.

I wanted to finish painting my room in the old building yesterday, but that wasn't in the cards. So it will have to come on Monday. At least I can stay until 4 that day.

On a knitterly knote (yes that spelling was intentional) yesterday I learned the Turkish cast on and knit baby booties (one at a time) on 2 circulars. I'm on my second pair and the more I do it the easier it is. This will open a whole new window in my sock knitting (once I buy some smaller number circs - like 1s and 2s - I'm thinking options silver and harmony would do nicely!)

Today I started spinning some targhee I won on ebay for a song. 4.5 ounces of kettle dyed for $3.10 plus shipping. There's a reason it was so inexpensive. There is quite a bit of VM in it and it's a bit felted IMO... so I'm spinning it low twist and kind of thick (and sometimes thinner) I was going to leave it as singles but I think I may 2 ply it (after I overdye one of the plies a darker blue) Right now it's bright berry blue (you know the Kool Aid shade) so some darkness thrown in could be good. Then it could be really nice mittens for DS2 :-)

Speaking of mittens, the ones on the cover of the Fall Vogue are simply stunning and not surprisingly designed by Jared Flood. He is amazing, his knitting, spinning, photography and design... and to think it's not his livelihood. That man has talent! First time I passed the mag by because of all the charts for the patterns I liked, but had second thoughts that maybe I should learn to read charts so in the end I coughed over the bucks to buy it.

DH took the kids to BounceU for open bounce this AM cuz we had free passes left from DS1's birthday party there. Then we went to Perkins for breakfast. Kind of a lazy day here at home. Trying to eek out the last few relaxing moments of the season.

Off to check out the moon scope. I thought about it early yesterday, but it was so cloudy. Turned out to be a beautiful night with a full moon. Should have gotten it out for the kids to see. Tonight I'll be better prepared and also ready to watch Phelps take his possible 8th gold... what excitement!

good in-service

isn't that an oxymoron? I learned about some great sites.

• animoto which allows you to make a short slide show set to music from pictures that you choose. It reminds me of a powerpoint but on a simpler scale
  
  
• stained glass collage. You guess it. You can make a stained glass rectangle of photos that you choose to put in. I made this from our vacation (most the pictures will be familiar if you read my blog)
  
  
  
  
• quizlet that you can make flash cards and a couple of games with the information that you input
  

These three are free and useful.

There was another site which charges a fee but is really great for educators (there is a 30 day free trial, though) It's called quia You can search for other peoples stuff or make up your own, into games like battleship, jeopardy, millionaire, etc (with different names) and the typical test type stuff like fill in the blank, matching, multiple choice, true or false.

I think this was the first in-service day in a long time that the time actually flew!
AND I got to knit and spin :-)

Stopped at my room in the old school and started to trim out... boy is pegboard a pain to paint. I wonder what posessed them to think it would soundproof the room. Anyway, it's gonna take at least 2 coats to cover that garish green.