Oh, just life!

So there's this commercial that came on during the SEC Championship game for Home Depot. It said "you've still got time to get your holiday shopping done!" and talked about "last minute deals." While I'm savvy enough to know this was a marketing ploy, it both upset and scared me. Because I'm not in Christmas mode at all and am not ready to be.

To me, Christmas season starts the week of semester exams for my kids. There's something about the excitement of changing up the schedule and the buzz of a promise of a break looming that gets me going. Maybe it reminds me of semester exams in college, which signaled I could make the journey homeward bound?

Anyway. Nonetheless, the marketing scheme worked because the next day, Jake and I hit the road to the mall to do some shopping.

The carousel at Wolfchase is always a pleasant sign of good times to come!

Stopped and visited a bit with my friend, Biebs.

After some scores at the mall, we crossed the street to TJ Maxx - got some goodies there too for some people and spied these awesome chairs. We got our Lane club chair recliner at TJ - seems they have even more fun chairs!

Then we came home and had to get ready for a new week of school...This week has been a lot of this:

 And this:

At least I have cute pets to help me out!

And then today, we got our SECOND snow of the season! Not enough to get out of school but still pretty. Memphis doesn't see this on our iPhones very much:

The view from my classroom:

 And this was my room, 5 minutes before the bell... I ended up missing about 5-7 per class, which actually is a lot less than expected.

Now, on to a little fun with good friends before bell choir:

In staying warm on cold, wet days,