Semester Two...

Ok, a 40-something mommy who works full-time and is a PhD student, doesn't actually have TIME to blog...

Bummer news...I was diagnosed with high blood pressure in the Spring. I had preclampsia when I was pregnant with E, but the blood pressure went back to normal. It's been creeping up the last year or so. Now I'm on meds...what fun.

The end of the Spring 2007 semester went well. I received an A- in my first class, which I enjoyed very much.

The girlies and I had a wonderful summer - mostly of swimming at the beach and a neighbor's pool. I had very little actual work to do (related to my school-year job) this summer, so that was nice. K, E, knezdad and I spent a week in Seattle visiting my dad (my sister and her hubby came too). Recall in an earlier post that his wife passed away Christmas morning. We had a WONDERFUL time! knezdad and I thought we were smooth when we set up seating on the flights (two flights across country). Each parent would sit with a child on one flight, then the children/parent would swap. We sat behind one another so no kid-bickering (just the occasional E kicking the chair in front of her!). Well...once the kids were asleep, I had no one to talk to or snuggle up with (since I was in the middle seat - it's very confining). Everytime I would snuggle up to one of the girls, they pushed me off or woke up and whined. knezdad didn't like the set up either. Perhaps next time we'll deal with the whining.

Dr. P, my official mentor encouraged me to start an independent study (2 are required). I had already submitted research proposals to her and we had discussed which one might be the best one to start. So a lot of my summer was doing the literature review for my first research attempt. It was fun and made my summer busy all at the same time. However, it was really difficult to make a follow-up meeting appointment with Dr. P. All e-mails and phone calls were virtually ignored. Now, Dr. P told me that she would be available during the summer, but looking back, I don't think that was true. I wouldn't have been annoyed if she told the truth. Is that was tenure gives you? Anyway, we set up a meeting for sometime next month.

I'm taking a statistics course this semester and so far, I love it! I found out that there are undergrads, master's-level and PhD/EdD students in this class...so the course is being taught somewhere in the middle. That is okey-dokey with me. So it seems that so far I don't have a lot of work to do (recall that I am a geek? I also did read 4 book chapters of the stats book this summer). Speaking of the text book...thank god I got a brand new current edition version of the book for about $25 from e-bay. The students were buying for $137 at the bookstore! Then the prof (who might be 30) said we could pass the course without buying the book. It was helpful to have those first chapters read for the first two classes. But I won't kill myself if they're not read for future classes. So I'm using the "extra" time that I have to do more work on my independent study.It's a very popular class, with a very popular professor. 35 people showed up for a room that holds 33 (and a student cap of 25).

I nearly had a coronary about the travel to the class. It was originally schedule to be in the Ed building, which required my parking in the parking garage and taking a bus to class. It added about 30 minutes onto my commute (I left my home town at 2 pm, and ended up being slightly late for my 4 pm class). I knew I'd have to leave significantly earlier to get there on time (not good for the average working day). Because of the overcrowding issue, I received an e-mail around mid-afternoon before the second class (thank heavens for my Treo!) saying the class was rescheduled in the School of Management (WHERE?!?). I had already planned to leave super early to get there on time, so I stopped into the Visitor's Center to get a map. When I pulled the "old lady who doesn't know where anything is" routine, the nice undergrad was very helpful (I'm sure she would have been equally as helpful if I hadn't looked pathetic). When I asked where the building was, she pointed over her shoulder. When I asked if I could have a map to navigate between the parking garage and the building, she indicated that I could stay in the visitor's center parking lot (which happens to be cheaper than the garage). So I again lopped 30 minutes off my commute...whoo-hoo!

My girlies have their good friends S & J over for a sleep-over playdate. They're playing outside and enjoying each other's company. It's a beautiful day and I feel very blessed to have the family life that I have. Until next time...