Long Blue Scarf

I am watching the movie Clue. During the opening credits, I happened to notice that one of the actor's name is Lee Ving. I found that quite amusing. If you don't get why it's funny, say it out loud a couple times.

The Scooter

After a warning during a safety inspection, Chris took it upon himself to replace the CV drive axle on the "scooter". We figured it would cost about the same amount for him to do it himself as it would cost to have it done, so he opted to gain some more experience and have an excuse to buy some cool new toys. One of his new toys was a jack:

The jack actually came as part of a set, which also included two jack stands, two tire blocks (or tire chocks, as the box says), and a creeper for laying down on underneath the car. For comparison sake, here is a picture of our old jack, just in case you can't tell how hefty the new jack is:
This is the new part Chris was putting in, as well as a picture of the old part coming out.











The adventure did turn out a bit more complicated than anticipated. The car did have one unfortunate accident...
















If you look closely, you can see the "accident" in process. It's gear oil, a rather important component in running a manual transmission (apparently). The spill continued to spread for the next day or so, and needless to say, I have been avoiding the garage since. Gear oil does not have the most pleasant aroma. Maybe that's only to pregnant women.

Chris was able to get the new part installed just fine, but there was a problem with getting a plug out in order to refill the gear oil and return the car to a driveable state. Luckily, our friends Brooke and Tim came over for games on Sunday night. Tim offered to come back to our house today, and between the two of them, Chris and Tim were able to fix it and the scooter is again up and running. Although the garage still smells bad.

Belly Picture

I've determined that no one likes pregnant pictures of themselves, but for the benefit of those who live far away and never see me, here is a picture of me two days shy of 17 weeks. My ultrasound is scheduled for May 20--hopefully then we'll find out the gender!

Teacher Appreciation Week

Every once in a while, I feel good about being a teacher and you get an idea that maybe you're getting through to a kid every now and again. This week is Teacher Appreciation week. Different parents came and decorated all the classroom doors in the school. Mine was fun because we just finished learning about electricity, and each of the lightning bolts has a note from one of the students. Some of my favorite comments:

"I like you because you're funny."

"You make school interesting."

"I like how you get off school subjects and talk about regular life."

"I like it when you tell us embirssing [embarrassing] stories and good jokes."

I didn't realize that I had a tendency to get off topic so much...hopefully I don't actually. They just notice those moments more. Hopefully.



One of my students also brought me flowers today. That was fun for me.




Random Cutes

While getting the pictures off the camera and onto the computer, I found a couple pictures that I wanted to show off. The first is a picture of Jane with her Grandpa Jeff (my dad) and her one and only cousin, Dalton.


This next one is a picture of Chris and Jane asleep on the couch. It was a while back, but I believe that Jane had been a bit sick and was rather cuddly. The downside, for Chris at least, is that Jane sweats rather profusely when she sleeps (that's a Phillips trait--thanks Dad). Chris woke up with a wet neck. Unpleasant, but worth the picture in my opinion.