Finally, finally, the long-awaited fall break arrived yesterday. I was super pumped to enjoy a Thursday and Friday off, mainly because it involved sleeping in! Have I mentioned that I LOVE to sleep? Well, I do. Unfortunately, the puppies had a different idea. Gearry spent the night at the resort on Wednesday evening due to an early Thursday morning meeting, so it was just me and dear little Bailey and Zoey woke me up to go to the bathroom at 2:30 a.m., again at 6:30 a.m., and were a bit restless until I finally relented and got up around 9:30 a.m. Sleep wasn't much better last night and this morning, as for some reason Bailey was convinced the best place to sleep was in between my legs and could not be convinced otherwise despite multiple attempts to move him, Gearry was a snoring MACHINE (worse than usual), and I'm pretty sure I tossed and turned more than I actually slept. However, I still probably got more sleep than usual and I can't really complain about that! The funny thing is that even though I'm grateful for the much-needed days off, I miss my kids! I look forward to seeing them again Monday, even though I am NOT looking forward to the planning for my reading, lit group, and Pridetime (math intervention) lessons that needs to happen before then. I could definitely be doing it now, instead of updating the blog and watching Ghost Adventures Live, but that would be far too logical and would not create enough stress for me on Sunday night ;)
Gearry is working, of course, so even though I had yesterday and today off it didn't mean getting to see him any more than usual, which bummed me out. He is a busy, busy boy, but his restaurant continues to do very well and get great reviews, so at least the hard work is paying off. There are some prices to pay for being the man in charge. Unfortunately, most of it involves precious time. I realize that I have friends and family with spouses overseas whom they must sometimes go months without seeing, and so I try to be optimistic and thankful that I do get to see my husband at least a couple times a week. I need to make sure I am taking full advantage of those moments.
Yesterday, I pretty much hung around the house all day, minus a trip to the dentist for a much-needed cleaning & check-up (3 cavities -- whoops -- means another trip to the dentist in December, darn it). Today I definitely needed to get out of the house a bit, so I was glad that I had made plans to have lunch with a few friends. Emily, Catherine, Karen, and a first-grade teacher friend of Emily and Catherine's (I'm horrible, I can't remember her name!) and I had lunch at Lennie's/Bloomington Brewing Company and then decided to head over to Columbus/Edinburgh to do some shopping. Catherine needed a nice dress for a couple upcoming weddings and the rest of us just like to shop :) I ended up doing mostly looking but came away with a couple new pairs of earrings, which is something I needed since my favorite stand-by, a pair of little pearls, broke recently. Given the weather -- windy, dreary, rainy -- shopping was a great plan for the day.
While everyone else is planning on some Halloween party fun tonight, I'm chilling here at home in anticipation of an early wake-up call and a trip right back to Columbus tomorrow morning for a 50-mile charity ride! Stebby is driving up from Louisville to meet me (she is in Louisville for a few weeks for clinicals) for what I really, really hope will be a dry and not too windy ride (the forecast keeps changing!). It is called Beer Ride, as it begins at the Power House Brewing Company in Columbus, and is a fundraiser for the Clifford Volunteer Fire Dept. After the ride, you can swap your wristband for a frosty drink :) It is a lot like the Hope Ride that we did back in September, as it is a fully-supported ride (technical assistance along the way, multiple stops with snacks, drinks, & entertainment), and I am pumped, despite the fact that I have ridden maybe, at most, 60 miles this entire month!!
Hopefully, if it is not raining, I will get some good pictures and be able to post those on here or on Facebook, with a link on here, later this weekend. Tomorrow evening, after the ride, I am heading down to Mitchell to spend the night with Mom & Dad and watch the Colts game with them on Sunday. I think they are more excited about the puppies coming to visit than me! Haha...
Oh yes, just remembered I put chocolate pancakes in the title of this post and, therefore, I should probably mention why. I made them tonight as sort of part of my dinner, sort of dessert, sort of an I-just-really-need-some-chocolate thing, and they were AWESOME. The taste of dark chocolate cake but not as sweet with the consistency of a pancake. The recipe ended up making about 8 small pancakes and I only ate two, so I put the rest in the fridge for tomorrow morning, as part of my pre-ride breakfast. Given that I burn about 600-700 calories an hour on the bike, a huge-mongous breakfast is a must! The recipe is super simple, so if you are interested let me know!
