Long weekend, long post

This was a much needed long weekend away from work. The beginning of school is hard, new, fun, but stressful. I'm happy with my cute new class of Kinders and 1st graders. I have some challenging little ones but, on the whole, they are a good group. This new position brings with it much more stress and less flexibility and fun. It's hard to be part of a new program and feel at least partially responsible for its success or failure. I think I'm still too young to feel that stress in my career right now, but I'm running with it and trying to make the best of it. It all comes down to the kids anyway. No matter what I teach, I am partially responsible for their success or failure. Just part of the job and I like that part. Tomorrow I start my new after school tutoring program for a group of five 2nd and 3rd graders in the dual language program. I'm a little nervous about that, but happy to have quit job #2 to be able to do this. Better money and I get to help out kids that really need it instead of kids whose parents can afford to pay $50/hour for a professional tutoring program. In other news...

I went riding with the group on Wednesday. New trail, new friends, great time. Almost decided to divorce Chris after the ride went well into the dark, but luckily I love him and quickly forgave him when he bought me tasty dinner afterwards. Got to meet and ride with Scott's new girlfriend, Melissa. It was refreshing to finally have a girl my speed to ride with and we had a great time. She was a lot of fun and definetely a keeper for Scott.

Me doing my ride/walk/complaining bit at the end...
Me looking a little happier at the beginning of the trail. Deep thoughts, hmmm...
Scott and Dave. Nice glasses Scott, I think those are meant for your eyeballs...

I've been working on some new knitting. Jenny at work graciously taught me how to purl and now I'm making a great ribbed scarf. It's requires much more thinking than a regular knitted scarf but it looks a lot cooler. We're even thinking about starting a monthly knitting group at Starbucks after work. The blurry picture isn't so good but shows the ribbing...


This weekend was relaxing and fun. I had a friend's bachelorette party here Saturday night. It was interesting and fun. I was happy that the stripper didn't show up because I was a little wary of some strange guy stripping in my house. Today we decided to go up to Boulder and ride the mountain bike trail that Chris took me on a few years ago as my first ride in 8 years. Back then, I cried and yelled and couldn't believe he took me on such a horrible trail. This year I had a blast and took some risks and went faster than usual. I thought I was going to eat dirt a few times but stayed up, so that was good. I cruised the 3.2 mile trail in 30 minutes and had a good Chris-and-Marni ride. It's been a while since it's just been the two of us on a trail that challenges me.


Off to another week of school. We have two upcoming weekends of weddings and a bunch of family coming into town in two weeks for my brother's wedding. I'm really looking forward to seeing everyone and getting to know my cousin's almost-hubby. Hopefully this week I'll feel less exhausted than I did the last two weeks or I'll be visiting the doctor to make sure there's nothing physically wrong. Hmmm...