my job has a mental disorder

If jobs could be diagnosed with mental illnesses, mine would be manic-depressive. Monday I had 11 appointments, Tuesday I had 6 in the morning, and 2.5 hours of meetings in the afternoon. Two busy busy days.
Today - I was supposed to have a staff meeting, but that got canceled. Now I don't have anything until the freshman seminar class at 1:30 or so. And that's it. Nothing else today. I can work on other projects and things, but basically, I am sitting at my desk. Alone. Weird.

a whole week!

I've been neglecting my blog duties of late, and I apologize... it's mostly because there's not anything new to report, and it gets dull to type the same things over and over (and, I'm sure - to read the same things over and over).

At any rate - I'm excited because (although I have to work today) I have a long weekend coming up. And Thanksgiving is an awesome holiday. It's full of my absolute favorite things to eat, lots of family, focusing on good things that we're thankful for, and it's the kick-off to the Christmas season... from Thanksgiving until New Year's is pretty much my favorite time of year.

Tomorrow Christmas dinner is at Mark's mom's house - it will be overrun with family as always, I'm sure. On Friday, my parents and sister will arrive in MI, and on Saturday, my brother and sister-in-law will join us, and we'll have our own little family time. It's been over a year and a half since most of my family has been out to MI (Meg just visited a couple of weeks ago).

I'm praying for a great weekend - the weather should be gorgeous, and I know the logistics will work out fine and dandy. But I specifically am hoping for everyone to feel loved and blessed as a result of the time they spend with family and friends this weekend - that God would just reach into the middle of our time together and do His thing.

Happy Thanksgiving!

Top Ten Reasons I'm a Dork...

10. This week, I downloaded directions on how to draw a turkey - I wanted to have a turkey on the chalkboard in my office.
9. I color code my calendar - green for work, blue for YoungLife, orange for Mark, pink for me... you get the idea.
8. My dad, sister and I laughed for ten minutes last night about what it would be like if our butts had knuckles (all rooted in my dad coining the nickname "butt-knuckle" eons ago... in case you're wondering, a butt-knuckle is like a goofball, only more ornery)
7. My sister and I habitually buy at least one bottle of sparkling grape juice whenever we're together, and we finish the whole stinking thing. Fast. Then we burp a lot...
6. Driving home last night, I got real sad because I realized I'd left my copy of Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince at work (I've read the book at least 3 times already). Then I got real happy because my booksfree.com books arrived in the mail, so I had something to curl up and read anyway.
5. I separate all the silverware in my dishwasher. And everything has to point up, except the sharp knives (obviously!). I'll reach in an rearrange gooky silverware if someone else does it wrong.
4. I seriously look forward to watching Scrubs with Mark and Brooks at night - we all sing along with the theme song at the beginning, and mock the funny sound that wraps up the end of each episode.
3. I'm making myself a pair of flannel teddy-bear pajamas. Yes, I just had my 26th birthday last month. Teddy bears are for grown-ups too...
2. I have a folder on my computer designated for the spreadsheet I've created just for myself. There are currently 7 excel files in that folder. They are all color-coded also... of course.
1. Really, I'm a dork because I want to be. I like math problems, I re-read books over and over, I like going to matinee movies with my little sister, laughing with your dad about butts is always funny... is there really any other alternative to dorkhood?

What are the top ten reasons YOU'RE a dork?

i OwE yOu!

I feel like I owe you - (it's hard to write that out full-length, just FYI) :D - a little bit more than just pictures of what food the silly online quizzes say that I am. You're probably thinking - "What's the down-low on Katie's life? I want to get the skinny, I wanna know what's happs, gimme the dirt..."
Okay, you're thinking none of those things (although if you are, I think your slang vocabulary is totally rad. like, for sure.).
I had four lunch dates in four days at work - Monday was Pizza House with Jamie and Shannon (gals I worked with in the College of Social Science), Tuesday was lunch with Lauren (always fun, plus she decided she needed to know my "boy history" - her words, not mine - which makes for funny lunchtime conversation), Wednesday was lunch with the 8th graders at Mason MS, and yesterday I ate with Jane (I really miss working with her everyday - what a FUN lady...)
Work is A-OK - busy some days, not so busy other days.
WyldLife is going great - we had almost 50 kids show up on Monday, and one kid already signed up for winter camp in February (he turned in the form and money less than 48 hours after we handed it out... that's a record for a middle schooler!)
This weekend will be (I think) pretty low-key. Mark will be gone, and Brooks and I don't really have much going on. Probably wash/dry/fold lots of laundry, and read a book or two.

Nerdy thing I'm most excited about this week: The equivalent of NetFlix for books - booksfree.com. The name is deceiving because it's not actually free at all - but it's essentially an online library that keeps track of the books I want to read and sends them to me automatically. I figured it's worth a try - I could read some great new stuff, and not charge a bajillion dollars at Barnes & Noble and Amazon.com every month. I have a fairly expensive book habit. (ps - I know libraries are free, but I'm just too lazy for that. Plus, I have a habit of keeping things too long and paying late fees anyway - I'm pretty sure Mark and I are going to have to sell my car to pay the fee on an audiobook we've had for (literally) a couple of years.)

repeat?

So I know I just posted one of these, but I thought this one was funny too...

You Are Mashed Potatoes

Ordinary, comforting, and more than a little predictable You're the glue that holds everyone together

What Part of Thanksgiving Are You?

And accurate, because Thanksgiving without mashed potatoes is NOT Thanksgiving! :) Although I tend to come out as kind of bland, stable, ordinary, blah blah blah in these quizzes... should I be bothered by that?
(Can you tell I'm excited for the yummy food that's coming up in a couple of weeks?)

what kind of pie are you?

You Are Apple Pie

You're the perfect combo of comforting and traditional Those who like you crave security

What Kind of Pie Are You?

a little late...

Last weekend was a ton of fun - my friend Kristen and I met in Dorchester, Ontario (just outside of London) at a bed and breakfast called The Sycamore Tree - named after the Bible story where Zacchaeus climbs a sycamore tree to see Jesus, Jesus sees him and says "I will stay at your house today." I thought that was cool...

Anywho - we ate Hungarian and Japanese and Korean food, had massages/facials/haircuts, slept in, watched TV, read books, went shopping, ate gourmet 5-course breakfasts... it was a very fun, relaxing weekend. Kristen and her family (husband and two little boys) live near Rochester, NY, so we don't get to see them as often as we'd like. Plus it was great to have some girl time.

This weekend, my sister Megan is coming to visit me - I'm really excited about that. We always have a lot of silly fun when we're together - watching movies, eating a bunch of junk, and generally being weird the way you can only be weird with the people you've known since birth. Hopefully I'll have fun pictures to post from that.

how was YOUR Halloween?

The day began with a special message from Mark (yes, that's written in Halloween candy...)

After a very busy day at work (which involved a lovely chocolate cake that I did not get a picture of), I picked up Laura (my sister-in-law who officially became a Spartan this fall) and her boyfriend Mike - they wanted to help us hand out candy (for two VERY cold hours - we had 228 trick-or-treaters at our house. Yes, I'm a dork - I kept track)

Mark, Brooks and I got into full ninja gear (we had to use a special camera because ninjas don't usually resolve on film...)

Some of the boys that live nearby felt threatened by our ninja skills and decided to launch an attack (notice that Brooks is glowing with ninja power... or that's just his reflective running pants...)

All in all - a very fun Halloween. We handed out a TON of candy, still have a bunch leftover - we ate tacos, sat outside until our fingers and toes went numb, and watched an episode of Scrubs. Who could ask for more?