This week’s top ten.

Thankfulness abounds! Here are this week’s top ten!

1. Another year of life! Today is my birthday! Woot! And I don’t mind telling you that today I am 44. Double fours, baby. Proud to say it—wrinkles, bingo wings, stray hairs and all!

2. An afternoon this week to sit outside and work on writing, studying and breathing in the fresh air while Jacob is in his classes.

3. A rare moment of school celebration from Emma. She doesn’t get too stoked about things…compared to me, Miss I’m-so-excited-and-I-just-can’t-hide-it, anyway. She was very happy about success on a test in a class she is finding to be a challenge! I was happy for her!

4. I met the mom of the young man I wrote about recently who was bullied! I basically tackled her, er, grabbed her arm as she was leaving church last Sunday. I was not going to let another opportunity pass by without meeting her. I really enjoyed chatting with her and meeting Alex as well (who is such a cool kid!). I had another opportunity to visit with her this week and am glad to say I count her among my new friends. We share similar experiences with our boys, which is great, and finding people who share common ground is always so awesome.

5. My awesome parents have been blessed this week to be in Hawaii!!! Hawaii, y’all! Thanks to the generosity of some friends of theirs, they have been having some much needed time together, relaxing and having some fun. They deserve it!

6. Laughing with my family this week. One night this week the movie The Dark Knight was on TV. We were all watching it and fascinated, okay, weirded out, by Christian Bale’s voice. If you’ve seen it, then you know what I mean. If you haven’t then, consult the following example, starting about about the 3:05 mark:

 

What’s up with Batman’s voice??

 

Anyway, Emma said, “What is up with his voice?? It’s so weird!” Hubby and I heartily concurred. Jacob, in his deadpan way, said, “His dad fed him a bag of rocks every night for dinner.”

We all just cracked up.

7. Snail mail. Yes, people actually send cards and letters these days. I was so blessed by the sweet birthday cards I received this week. I am a big believer in Birth-weeks versus Birth-days. I am all about extending the celebration all week! I love when I get belated wishes…it just means I get to celebrate longer.

8. My students in my co-op classes. Classes started at our co-op last week and those kids are just so gosh darn adorable. They are so smart and funny…some are high energy, but, hey, I can handle it. They are so fun and make me smile. My elementary zoology class is learning about land animals and this week I had my students draw their favorite animal. One kid drew an elephant. Another drew a camel. Another a horse. Instead of drawing an animal, one kid wrote me a note about how she wanted to me to go watch the Coldplay Vevo video for Paradise on youtube, which, of course, I did. “It is not fanmade, I swear,” she said. She is very serious about her videos, apparently. Anyway, she is adorable. Here is the video for your enjoyment:

Coldplay–Paradise

 

9. New recipes that are a winner. I get tired of cooking the same stuff over and over and so occasionally I like to branch out and try something new. I tried a chicken recipe off the back of the Lipton soup mix box this week and everybody liked it. Score!

10. Phone calls with the fam. Had a lovely chat with both my younger brother and my sister-in-law (wife of the older bro) this past week. Our lives are busy and don’t lend themselves to lengthy phone chats very often. It is good to be able to catch up.

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On Saturdays I link up with the Ten Things of Thankful Blog Hop to celebrate all the things I am feeling especially thankful for this week. You can join in the gratitude at Lizzi’s blog—Considerings.