Busy Week

I have never been wiped out by surgery like this before. After my last doctors appointment I was very sick and weak for a week. I've never been squeamish before but every time I see the foot I get queasy. I've been improving steadily since then but it was only a couple of days ago that I really started to feel good. I'm still weak but I've been living on the couch for three weeks. Hopefully now that I'm feeling better I'll be able to do more each day and regain my strength. I'm certainly tired of lying here and watching movies!

Both Nikki and Twig are now a year older! I was unable to attend Nikki's party but John went and took pictures for me. She had a beautiful day and everyone had a great time.

While John was at the party my brother, who was visiting from Texas, came out to see me and we had a very nice visit. It's probably been 15 years or more since we visited, just the two of us.

Kids night resumed this week but the girls were unable to make it. The other four played outside with the neighbors and then invited them over for birthday cake. Twig loved being the center of attention.

On Thursday both Sprout's and Twig's schools had Mother's Day parties and since Bean could not be in two places at once, I got to go to Twig's. I was exhausted just getting to the car. This was the first time I tried the wheel chair that we borrowed and I was relieved we had it. The kids sang to us and then we all played Bingo. Here is Twig with the gift that he made for his Mom.

The woman who is covering my route and her husband are also friends and they stopped over after work yesterday. It was so nice to have company! She had made up a little booklet and passed it around the bus for all the kids to write their get well wishes to me. It is so sweet! I really miss the kids. I won't share any of the inside pages for their privacy but the things they wrote and pictures they drew really brightened my day.

I don't see the doctor again for another week. The only pain I'm having in the foot is from the blister so I'm hoping that I'll be able to start walking in the boot some then but I'm trying not to count on it. I was getting up from the couch wrong and managed to strain my shoulder and that is finally feeling better. I've had trouble with my other hip for years and that has been bothering me some but is also seems to be better today. I expected the swelling to be bad this morning after all I did yesterday but it really isn't too bad at all.

So all in all things are looking up!

A Red-runner First

So, I'm in town picking up at a house near the main intersection where there are three lanes. I'm in the far right lane, my red lights are flashing and both stop signs are deployed and flashing on the left side of the bus. There are a car and a pickup truck in the far, oncoming lane, stopped and waiting patiently.

I'm greeting the kids and just catch out of the corner of my eye in the mirror, a car flying up the middle, left turn lane. I grabbed the air horn cord and gave a long blast. The car never slowed and flew through the intersection making the left turn. Business as usual.

As soon as I canceled my lights the car in the other lane proceeded on his way. The pickup truck however suddenly made a U-turn or I should say attempted a U-turn in front of me. He had to back up a bit to make it and by the time he got straightened out the light was red so he was stuck. I hung back, not being sure what he was doing. As soon as the light changed again he hauled around the corner and took off in the direction my red runner had gone.

Did he forget something at home or was he chasing my red-runner? I had the impression the he was after the guy that ran my reds. What was his plan if he caught him!?

The kids and I continued on our way and were left wondering just what all that was about!

The view from my window is always interesting.

Bus Driver Makes the List

Bus Drivers came in 8th on this list of "Best Part Time Jobs for Full Time Moms". I was surprised to find it on the list because we work when the kids are at home. You either have to have your kids ride with you or find a sitter. They also show the average pay as $13.74 an hour. God bless anyone who is willing to take on that much responsibility for so little pay!

Safety Expo 2009

I woke up early and immediately checked the radar and the rain/ snow mix was knocking on our doorstep. By the time we started setting up the sun was out in full force, which was great because it was chilly!

Some people couldn't make it at the last minute but others jumped in and filled their slots. We had more kids than last year but I'm still a little disappointed that we didn't have many more.

My policy is not to share pictures of student's faces so my pictures may make it appear that we didn't have a crowd which is not the case, I just have lots of pictures I won't share here.

The first two expos were held at the elementary school. It was great to be able to host it this year at our new facility.

The safety team bus, ambulance company, ladder truck and State Police.

We are lucky that two different fire departments participate. One department brought their off road rescue vehicle which is popular with kids and dads both. Both departments bring hand outs for the kids and the kids get little plastic firemen's helmets.

I'm thinking I can get a couple of more vehicles in there next year. Who can I invite?

The safety team bus simulates what a bus would be like in a roll over.
The Trooper brought lots of stuff to hand out too.

We let the kids ride up and down on the wheel chair lift to see what it is like for kids that have this ride every day.

The smoke bus was just as popular as ever. A member of our staff is also a volunteer firefighter and he does a great job with this and lots of us like to work at this station.

Sparky the Fire Dog was very popular. I had to crop out many faces but picture a large crowd off to the right.

New this year was a bike rodeo and it very popular. That's Nikki taking a turn on the course.

And of course I have to give equal time to Liz.

Here are Alex and Mike playing are you Safer than a 5th grader. One of the mechanics hooked up some old red lights with buttons that make them light so the kids can try to ring in first.

Here are other kids playing the game. We roped off the shop for safety but wanted everyone to have a peek at our new state of the art facility.

We had inside safety displays too. We were lucky to get someone from the power company to volunteer her time and bring this display.

And there was lots of food and drink in our training center so everyone could get a break from the cold.

There were other displays that I don't have pictures of to share. We had one of the huge parking lot plows and the local police out on the loop. A driver and attendant taught safe crossing. We had a table full of health hand outs and one of the building nurses doing blood pressure checks. Transportation staff also manned tables displaying items you can't bring on the bus as well as the very popular face painting. Bean let us borrow her pop corn machine and it ran non-stop.

And as always we ended the day with a drawing for the bikes that had been donated.

This was by far our best year yet. I'll be working on thank-you notes next week and then planning will start for next year. If you have any ideas for displays or activities we could incorporate for next year I'd love to hear them!

Happy Exhaustion

The week before the Safety Expo is always stressful for me as the event coordinator and this week has been no exception. BUT this year instead of having a few key helpers and feeling overwhelmed with all that has to be done I've had more help than I know what to do with.

The last two days I just wanted to hide. Every time I walked in the building several people all needed just a moment of my time - to make suggestions, to ask how they could help, or to worry over details I hadn't quite worked out. A totally different type of overwhelming than I'm used to! (And being sick all week didn't help.)

Knowing that Mom had physical therapy today and that I'd be unable to stay on my mid-day break I spent some time yesterday making diagrams of what had to go where and then I created a long list of jobs that needed to be done. A few of us planned to set up as much as we could today after work. The head driver made a pot of clam chowder and I put the diagrams and to-do list on the bulletin board in case anyone finished earlier than I and wanted to get started.

I left Mom's a few minutes early so I'd have a few minutes to get something done before my afternoon shift. I walked into the break-room and there were people spread out already working on a couple of the jobs on the list. I had been worried that we wouldn't have enough candy and was told right away that the donations had been counted and we have considerably more than the number I was figuring on. I answered a couple of quick questions and had time to sit and relax!

I went out on my route, the kids were great and I finished a bit early and headed back in to work on finishing up the rest of my long list. Just as I expected several people started talking to me at once but it soon became clear that they were DONE WITH THE LIST and what else needed to be done? And come look at what we did with this. And does this look ok or should we put it over there? On a Friday afternoon more than a dozen people stayed to help and by the time I got in there was very little left to do. We moved things around and got some things done I just didn't think we'd have time for. People trickled out and the few of us that were left sat down and chatted over dinner.

We got so much done that I told everyone to sleep in and show up a half hour before the event. More than half of them plan to be there early, just in case they're needed.

Yes, I am certainly overwhelmed! And excited about tomorrow. They say three times is the charm and our event tomorrow is going to be great. All we still need is for lots and lots of kids to show up. (Oh, and please no rain or snow!)

Check list

Final meeting this morning........

Two fire trucks - check
Ambulance - check
State Trooper - check
Three buses - check
10 bikes & helmets - have 7 the other 3 will turn up
Snow plow - check
health hand outs - check
Volunteers - 30!!!! Holy cow - Whoo hoo
3,200 pieces of candy - unh-oh, need to keep working on that
Baked goods - 80% promised, need to buy an extra brownie mix
One popcorn machine on site, one more promised
Signs placed - check
Fliers handed out - check
Hay bales and pumpkins - check

Still lots to do but this years Safety expo is going to be better than last years!!

Just Another Catch Up Post

I have been neglecting this blog as usual. One of the resent topics for the Carnival of Genealogy was to write an obituary for our blog. If I'd done that little writing assignment here I suspect you'd have all believed it!

The past month has been busy, busy, busy! Just after school started we began working on our plans for our 3rd annual Safety Expo. Some key people dropped out and I was a bit overwhelmed for a couple of days but was very pleasantly shocked when several others stepped up and volunteered! With only a week to go we're in great shape with more displays and volunteers than ever before. Now we begin praying to the weather gods. Also at work, driver training has started. We have a lot of new people this year which is great. I don't know why supervising someone else driving wears me out but I've been coming how exhausted and cranky. The kids are tired of sub-drivers too and haven't been behaving as well as I know they can. Another week or two and that will be done for another year.

Mom has kept me on my toes. It turns out she is not shrinking, at least not at the rate she thought she was. The problem is that she is loosing range of motion in her good arm. I took her to the doctor yesterday and she has to go to physical therapy on Monday.

Kids night has resumed and I grab Twig once in while while Sprout is in school.

Hopefully I'll get back in the habit of writing here soon.

Bus Notes

So many of my HS kids are in sports that I only have a half full bus in the afternoon. I explained to those kids that they could no longer sit in the very back seats so if we got hit from behind no one would be there. So Mike pipes up:

"Mrs Apple, you already hate me so I think I should sit back there. Then if we get hit by a truck and I die you won't be upset."

No Mike I do not hate you. I actually like you. I do not like it when you break the rules and I will enforce the rules. I like you so much that you can stay up front with me.

Back to Work

The school year got off to a very rocky start for me. Last week you'd have thought I was a newbie at this. I missed kids and had to go around the block. They gave me kids that belonged on the next route over so I drove around the block. I drove in so many circles I was dizzy. The radio is always very busy the first week with parents calling in looking for their kids. I was getting calls and I hadn't left the school yet! After I left the school other drivers were getting calls and half the kids they were looking for were with me! We changed all of the routes this year to fill up the buses and save money. Everyone got to where they were supposed to be safely.

A big problem for me was all of the kids that were driven to school in the morning (or rode in on a different bus) and I had to figure out who was who to get them home. One little boy, Matthew, got on and was not on my list but his bus tag had my number. I asked him where he lived and he shocked me by giving me an address. An address at least five miles further out than I go. But he followed that up with, "But you're taking me to grandma's!" He didn't know where grandma lived. After a few calls back and forth to the school and I had an address. In getting the kids seated I missed the call to his morning bus looking for him. The other driver got on his PA and asked if Matthew was on and a little hand went up so he radioed back that he had him. They told him to keep him on the bus because he should have been on my bus. They called him back with the address that I had just gotten from the very confused school secretary, and asked if he could get him there at the end of his route. I heard this call and responded that Matthew was on my bus and I would be at Grandma's in five minutes. Now everyone was confused but Matthew got to where he needed to go with a smile on his face. I was so relieved to have Matthew straightened out that I drove right past the house of the next student, whom I had last year too. Around the block we went.

I have just a high school route and an elementary route - no middle school. Middle school age is not my group, so I'm happy. I have two boys on the HS route that are determined to push my buttons and I'm just as determined not to let them get to me. I have 50% new to me kids on that route too. The first couple of days the two groups segregated themselves but now they are all mixed together and seem to be getting along. What a great group of kids and what a pleasure to not have to yell sit down, leave them alone or get out of the aisle for an hour!

Today everything went like clockwork. The kindergartners are still taking a long time to get seated and get up and off at their stops but that's to be expected. Parents were thrilled when I arrived a half hour earlier today than I did last Wednesday. My fourth graders can't seem to get along and I've never had so much trouble with hitting. But over all the little ones are a great group too. With so many new kids it took me the first week but I think I've learned everyone's names. There was a little girl that didn't want to go today and I asked her to tell me her name again. I was certain she said Erin and I so I kept talking to her and using her name to try and reassure her. Finally one of the older kids that got on with her had had enough and yelled at me, "Her name is Ariel!" I'll keep working on those names........

Mixed News

I guess I'll start with the bad news. My Uncle Bill passed away Monday. His death was expected but that doesn't make it any easier for Mom. I wrote a little about him already so I won't repeat that here.

One of my nieces just moved home with her parents to continue her education. Another niece just let us know that she will be moving half way across the country. I'm happy for her and her family but we seem to be scattering further and further away. I am finding that on Facebook I can keep up with the younger generations comings and goings.

Sprout got to meet with her pre-K teacher and she loved it! I think being in the elementary school will be great for her.

Mom is actually using her new walker! We're planning to do some major furniture rearranging at her house this weekend to make it easier for her to get around with it.

I have finally started on painting the office. I've been at it a week now. There have been several interruptions but I can't seem to work as long as I did 5 years ago when we bought the place. I'll do a whole post with the before and after - assuming I ever finish ;-?

A small woodchuck has burrowed under the house, behind the back steps. I'm not one to kill a critter just because it annoys me but he has got to go. He sees my garden as his own personal smorgasbord. I guess I need to buy a trap unless someone has another suggestion. I'd be happy if he'd just move out to the woods where he belongs. Heck, if he needs a roof over his head he can move under the shed.

I stopped at work yesterday to pick up my mail and they were starting to pave the employee lot. Yeah! No more nails in my tires.

The mail I picked up was my score from the Roadeo back in July. I was pleasantly surprised considering that I felt I totally blew it. I finished 22nd out of 41 so not good but not in the bottom third where I thought I'd be either. :-)

Roadeo

Saturday was the NYAPT Big Three Roadeo in Albany and I want to give a Big Thank You!! to all of the judges that came down to the conference early so that we could compete. I'm not certain but I think it takes almost as many judges as there are contestants to put on this event. Not only were there volunteers out on the course, the seven team leaders, there were the folks that administered the tests, others that played the part of student, several were runners, others were stuck in a little room all day tallying score sheets, and undoubtedly many more that I haven't mentioned. Everyone was pleasant and worked hard to make sure that the contestants had a great day.

I drove down on Friday afternoon and had dinner with some of the other people there from the CNYAPT chapter. After dinner I spent the evening battling the butterflies in my stomach by studying.

The Roadeo is an all day event with registration starting at 7:00 am. There we were given our t-shirts and contestant number. My registration had gone in late so I was expecting a very high number and was thrilled when they handed me #39! The first event of the day was a written, general knowledge exam and it was tough. I'm always worried that some of the questions are "trick" questions and I over think things. This cost me on at least a couple of questions :( There was also a written pre-trip test that we took later in the day.

We were then divided into "teams" and I was pleasantly surprised that there was someone I knew on my team and I quickly got to know others. Our team leader, Dave aka "Tangerine Man" was great!

Crowd near the announcer's table

I was quite worried about the surprise event, certain that I would have to do some type of backing skill so I was happy when it turned out to be a railroad question. We had to simply sit in the drivers seat and decide whether or not we had room to to cross the tracks and have a 15' cushion behind us before we got to the stop line represented by the cone. I decided that I wouldn't try it and I wish that they had told us what the correct answer was later in the day, when everyone was done.

Surprise Event

One of the activities between events was a smoke bus demonstration. Some of the pictures they used of a burning bus were ones I had taken at the Mass Casualty Incident Drill. How cool was that!

Smoke Bus

Straight Line

Serpentine

Offset Alley

Offset Alley

Parallel Parking

Traffic Jam

Diminishing Clearance

End of the road!

So how did I do? My #39 that I was so happy about turned out to be the 2nd to last number on the course because my class went last. I don't think that really affected me too much but let's just say that I have never had a worse trip around a roadeo course. I was waived off of both of the backing events and I struggled with the events that I normally sail through. Thank you Helen, for being friendly and helping me relax before I drove. I'm sorry your last ride of the day was such an awful one. Thank you to everyone from CNY that hung around to the end to give me moral support! If you guys hadn't been there for me I'm certain I would have dissolved into tears.

I didn't have a good score this year but it was the most fun I have ever had at a Roadeo!

Another week has flown by!

Work kept me very busy this week. We are starting now to work on our Safety Expo for next October. I'm hoping that by starting earlier we'll be able to really expand and that I'll be more organized in the fall! A couple of people volunteered to take charge of sub-committees but I still have to cajole at least a couple more.

We went to Mom's a couple of times and I had to go for another test. On my one free day during the week I had a very pleasant morning visiting the gardens of two friends and they came all the way out here to see mine.



Yesterday was the first Epilepsy Walk held in this area. Not really knowing what to expect I took just Mike and Nikki and we headed out to support a friend. For a first time event it went very well. Most of the kids there were younger than Nikki so next year we'll make it a family event. They had games and crafts for the kids, raffles, food and music. I was worried that I'd have a hard time making it all the way around the loop that we walked but I took it slow and wasn't too sore when I finished :-) The kids were way ahead of me but I could see them so I let them do their own thing. It was actually nice having just the two of them as they got along well and I didn't have to deal with the bickering that happens here at the house. After the walk we went to the dairy for ice cream cones and then went to see Jae's new apartment.


I have a couple of dozen chores that need doing but the dust isn't going anywhere so I think I'll just head out and play in the garden.

Garden Path

I won't go into details of the week past. Instead I'll just say that I was busy all week and felt like I got nothing done. There are three more weeks of school left but the kids and I are all ready for vacation to begin. Some of my older elementary kids that know they'll be on a different bus next year are really testing my patience.

John did manage to get the screen room put back together. The weather was just perfect yesterday and I could have spent the entire day there reading a good book.


We haven't had much nice weather when I've had free time lately so instead of relaxing with a book I decided to take on my "Nightmare Bed." It doesn't look very scary in this picture, does it? I love the mass of ox-eyed daisies and the lupines have really done well out here while the ones by the house are looking sad. The lemon lilies look happy but there's a ton of grass to be pulled in with them.


Here's a longer view from the far side. I had originally laid out a nice path that the weeds and some of the self-sown plants obliterated. Even in this picture you can see that I'm winning the latest battle but with the type of weeds out there I imagine the war will rage on for years.


I had chores in other parts of the garden but the majority of the day was spent digging weeds and putting in a new path on the left side and under the new arch. Maybe I can work on the path to the right during the week. Right now it's mostly grass but there area few plants that will need to be moved.


We decided to try a vegetable garden this year. We've planted tomatoes, cucumbers, squash, peppers and watermelon so far plus we have a row of strawberries. We're killing the grass on both ends to have more room next year. We covered the plants when there was frost expected but we must have had a bit of frost on other nights as there is some damage but the plants look like they'll recover.


Despite the frost it won't be long until we have our first berries!