11 in 11

Two of my favorite bloggers are having a party and we are all invited!  Thanks Kristin and Hadar for the invite!

I am a little nervous about this linky party because it may highlight to you all how dull and boring I am.  But I will gather up my courage and party anyway!

Camille's Eleven in 2011:

11. Favorite movie you watched:  

Hmmm ... I haven't seen any new movies (I told you I was boring!), but there is a Christmas movie that I watch every year because it has it all:  action, adventure, romance, Christmas music, humor plus it was my husband's favorite movie.  The movie (drumroll, please):  Die Hard.  Hey, since it takes place at Christmas, it qualifies as a Christmas movie, right?  Just don't let your children watch it!

10. Favorite TV series:

My all time favorite is Perry Mason.  In the summer it comes on at noon so I eat my lunch in front of the tv during the week.  (No Perry on weekends ... boo hoo!)  My new favorite is Drop Dead Diva.  I watched the first episode by accident and was hooked.  So, so, so funny plus so, so, so sweet.   I don't have cable so have to watch old episodes on Netflix.  

9. Favorite restaurant:

I love to eat and I love restaurants so there are many places I could name.  BUT of all the food in the world, I love Persian food the most.  So I would have to say the Persian restaurant two blocks from my house is my very favorite restaurant.  It is a small place with about four tables.  It is family run and the food is spectacular.  Plus it is located next to a tattoo parlor so my secret plan is when I am feeling wild and crazy, I can run next door and get my first tattoo.

8. Favorite new thing you tried:

Easy!!!!  My Smartboard!!!!!  I am in L.O.V.E.  We got them in just four days before vacation, but I started using it the moment it was installed.  I have so much to learn about using it, but know that it is going to be a powerful tool for teaching!  I already found a calendar and have it ready to go for next week.  (Oh,  my school got Smartboards because we won the Pepsi Challenge in the fall!  I thought it was such a longshot, but we came in first for the $25,000 grant.  Oh, yeah!!!!!)

7. Favorite gift you got:

An adorable living Christmas tree from the kinders in my class.  Too sweet!  They each made an ornament for the tree.  The parents told me that since the tree is living I would always have it to remember the kinders from this class.  How precious is that?!?

6. Favorite thing you pinned:

Well, it is not one item but how I finally got my Pinterest boards organized yesterday.  I originally had a board for each subject, but that wasn't working because my art board (and my math board and my science board and ...) was a disaster.  So I regrouped items into months.  That way I know I can find my items for Hundreds Day in February and my items for Thanksgiving in November.  Instead of having to look at each board every month to find appropriate pins, I only have to look at the board for that month.   (I still have some work to do on previous months, but I have the future months ready to go!)

5. Favorite blog post:

Kristin's Halloween post!!  It is a classic!  If academy awards were given for blog posts, this one would sweep every category!  If you haven't read it, you need to stop reading my drivel and RUN to her blog and read it.  Trust me! 

Now that you have read Kristen's Halloween post, I am supposed to name one of my own posts.  I am thinking it would be my Ocean in the Classroom post because it brings back great memories of the fun my class had studying the ocean last spring.  But it is not at all funny like Kristin's Halloween post.

4. Best accomplishment:

Does survival count?  (See number 3 to understand why survival was HUGE for me.)

3. Favorite picture:

So this is going to be deep (at least for me) and it ties in with survival.  This photo is of the Valentine's Day party that I hosted in 2011.  I invited about 15 women to my house for dinner on Valentine's Day.  (I am not posting pictures of the women since I don't have their permission.  You are stuck with a picture of some of the food.  Everyone had to bring a red food.  Sounds yucky, but it was great!)  This was my first Valentine's Day without my husband (he died in a biking accident on Labor Day 2010) and I wasn't sure I would survive the day.  So I invited other women who were "dateless" for a variety of reasons ( recently widowed, divorced, breakup).  You know how you always hear that a good way to fight depression is to help others?  Well, in this case it turned out to be true.  I am the WORST hostess in the world, I HATE having people over.  But I took a deep breath and invited everyone that I thought might be having a hard time being single on Valentine's Day and everyone that I invited came!!!  There were smiles and laughs filling my house.  (I was mostly quiet, but bringing joy to others brought me joy.)

2. Favorite memory:

Having Thanksgiving dinner with my dad and sister Colleen in Oregon.  We had not planned to be together because Colleen and I live in California and didn't have much time off.  Then my dad had a stroke 10 days before Thanksgiving and it was unclear if he would survive.  (Side note:  He survived and is thriving!!!)  So the three of us ate Thanksgiving dinner at a care facility where my dad was staying while he underwent rehab for his stroke.  It was definitely not the Thanksgiving setting of anyone's dreams and yet it was so wonderful because we were together and my dad was improving!!

I am going to cheat and add a photo of our Thanksgiving.  We all are looking a little grubby, but the joy on our faces is obvious!  (I am the one in the striped shirt that makes me look like I need to loose even more than 15 pounds!!!)

1. Goals for 2012:

*** personal ... to eat healthier, work out and lose 15 pounds  (This may sound lofty, but my dad's stroke and  rehab really made me think about being healthy)

*** professional ... to put the children's best interests first even if it means I ruffle a few feathers of other staff members (I am a total people pleaser so this is actually a harder goal than the personal one)

Whew!  I feel like I just finished an hour of therapy!  Writing all of this was very therapeutic for me - hopefully it was interesting / engaging / insightful for you.

Love to you all!

Camille