I can't feel my legs when I'm with you

I'd like to dedicate that title to the ice bath.  Last year I had no interest in such craziness but this year I'm full on embracing the whole thing.  I'm not really sure why, because I hate being cold, but my legs just feel so good afterwards.  Sadly, my back still hurts, so it wasn't a cure-all like I was hoping it would be.
Anyways, I had my box-a-thon fundraiser yesterday and with that I made it over the top of my donation goal.  I'd like to take this moment to thank everyone who donated something to my fund because every donation made an impact. Now that the hard part of fundraising and running 20 mile long runs is over, I can't wait for Patriot's Day to get here so I can go run the streets of Boston, FINALLY.  I've avoided training on the marathon route at all, so it will be new and exciting for the entire run.  That's about all I've got to say today, but  here are a few pictures to check out from the box-a-thon and my legs in an ice bath.

Best trainers on the planet.  They both gave up their Sunday morning to come help me out!

This photo is 100% staged.  I don't usually punch like that...or laugh while I'm boxing, I swear!

Grad school besties

BRRR

I got smart and wore socks this time though

And a long sleeve shirt, that helped

Oh yea, here's a homemade chicken kabob sub I made for dinner. It was bomb!

Post run stretch on Sunday

Finisher medal and the coolest bib number I've ever had. 

20 Miles

The Black Cat 10 and 20 miler was today and it was the perfect day for running.  It was around 40 degrees when we started, nice and sunny, with just the right amount of wind.  For the first time, I can actually say that this was a fairly easy 20 miles.  Murdock did the 10 miler, so we ran the first 10 together, sharing stories about our weeks, which really passed the time.  Then of course I had to do the second 10 alone, but they really weren't bad at all. Even with the blister that formed on the side of my foot around mile 12.  This is the first time I've ever gotten a blister there, so I don't know what happened.  I didn't make any changes to my shoes or my socks, so I'm a little surprised that it formed actually.  The race was fun though, and I even ran past someone else running for the Respite Center, so that was kind of neat.  In the end, I had a 3:05 finish time, which really isn't bad, considering we talked through the first 10.  I'm confident that I'm ready for Boston now.  A few more long runs will have to be sprinkled into the next few weeks, but I'm totally ready to rock and roll on Patriot's day.  Blisters and all.
Sadly, I don't think my bib chip registered across the timing mat for whatever reason, because I'm not showing up in any of the results.  It's not a big deal though because I wasn't winning any awards with my time.  After the race, I went outside to stretch because inside was too crowded.  There were other people stretching outside anyways, so I figured I'd just do my thing near them.  Of course, they left soon after, but I figured I'd keep stretching, because why not.  Except that I was in the middle of pigeon pose when some guy on a bike rode up behind me and said "Nice stretch! Niiiiiiiiiiiiiiiice stretch." BARF!!!! So that stretch ended quickly and I left.  But really guys, thanks for being creepy and disgusting and ruining other people's days.  Seriously, it's fantastic, we love it when you do things like that.
Since this run really was uneventful, I've got nothing else exciting to share tonight.  The box-a-thon is tomorrow and I'm at 93% of my goal so hopefully that helps push me to 100%.  And unrelated to that stuff, my phone is still rotating all of my pictures when I use my camera.  It doesn't do it in 3rd party apps, so I think it's an app problem, not the actual camera, but I don't know how to fix it.  The camera app is pre-installed on the phone, so I can't very well delete and reinstall it.  Plus, now half of the pictures I took today aren't showing up on this either.  Whatever, I'll figure it out later, right now it's bedtime, so enjoy the picture I can find.

Got a pair of super comfy flip flops to alleviate the blister situation. This is the only picture from today that's appearing in my photo roll right now, so this is all I have for you. Sorry.

You can find me in the club

Hanging posters for my fundraising.

 Bam! Surprise pictures right at the start.  Sometimes I just like to switch it up.  Plus, that opening line wouldn't have made sense without the picture evidence to back it up, so there you have it.  But, yup, that's my fundraising poster.  As you can see (or maybe not?), I made it extra easy for people to donate by adding a QR code, so that I wasn't relying on my cash jar at the front.  Of course, it hasn't made a difference at all yet, but, hey, you never know.  At least the poster ties me to the club and the marathon team, whereas before it was a picture of me, Ryan, and Morty, on wedding day.  That seemed to confuse people, so I made it real clear and simple.
Aside from my poster, I've contacted a paint bar and a cinema bar about fundraising nights.  We'll see how that plays out, but hopefully it will attract a crowd.  Really I'm not that far away, so if I did the cinema comedy night, I get $10 for each person, 100 people show up, that's $1000 right there.  Do I know 100 people? Maybe.  Do I think that many would show up? Probably not, but I like to dream big.
While we're on the topic, I actually got some running done this week too, which is impressive, I know.  I ran 6 on Tuesday and then 6 more last night.  Tuesday was a nice 50 degrees, so I had to get outside, even though I spent most of it dodging puddles and trying to ignore my soaking wet feet.  It's hard to dodge puddles when they take up the entire sidewalk.  Last night I joined Cynthia and Murdock for a lap around Wakefield and then did a second lap with them and the Mystic Running Club.  It was a bit colder than I expected it to be, but overall a good night for running.  Today I'm taking an off day and then tomorrow I might see if I can make it up into the double digits.  For a hot second I thought about driving down to Hyannis this weekend and hoping into the half, but that doesn't really seem like a good plan after all.
Alright, now that we've covered everything running related, we can move onto school vacation.  Sure it's almost over, and sure I'm extra bored today, but overall it is so nice to be able to have this week off.  I organized a closet, changed the shower curtain, cleaned the bathrooms and the kitchen properly, dusted the blinds, and finished my book.  Of course I also wrote lesson plans and got stuff together for next week, but that part isn't nearly as exciting.  I might even make it to L.L. Bean today and exchange my worn out boots for a pair that isn't all cracked and leaking.  While I'm on the topic of vacation, I guess I should start thinking about what to do this summer.  I'm not sure not working/not getting paid all summer again is a viable option.  I'd love it if I could just do the Title chalkboard once a month and get paid for that, but even if that was an option, it wouldn't be enough to live off of.  I wish there was a museum around here that I could work in. Not that there aren't museums around here, I just don't think I'd get a job at any of them.  Most places like that want a full time staffer, not a teacher who works part time for the summer.  Maybe I'll open my own museum.  I've read enough history books, I'm sure I could whip something up.  Ok, ok, that's obviously a joke, but seriously, let's start brainstorming here, what do I want to do this summer?
While you try to figure out my life for me, I'll make it a bit easier by adding the rest of the pictures to the end of this post, where they belong.

Bought this book to read on the flight to/from Louisiana last month. Didn't actually read it until now, but it was worth it.  A lot of old music suddenly has a new meaning that you may not have connected with before. 

Post run dinner.  Don't mind the dog, this is how every meal in the house goes.  If you're wondering what that is, it's turkey rolled up with a bit of mayo on the inside (we were out of bread) and homemade mac and cheese.  Usually I use milk, butter, and deli cheese singles, ripped up and melted together after the pasta is boiled. For this, I replaced the milk with Greek salad dressing to give it a bit of flavor and it was delicious.  If you make mac and cheese like this, you'll never go back to the boxed stuff, I promise.

Awaken the force within

Today was a productive day, aside from work.  I updated the chalkboard at Title Boxing Saugus and registered for the Boston Marathon.  So you know, exciting day all around.  And of course I bought a couple of PowerBall tickets, because why not? I know the odds are so astronomically against me winning that it's ridiculous, but I think deep down, everyone likes the chance to dream. Plus, then I could pay off my marathon fundraising.  Speaking of which... click right here to donate!!  You know you want to support that adorable little face, plus if you donate and show up on the marathon route, I'll high five you during the run, which is a huge incentive, I know.  Anyways, just getting in that short update.  Until next time, check out the board of the month this month.  May need a few more background characters, but it's a start for now.

Christmas, Christmas Time is Here

  I mean, sure, it's like, 60 degrees out, there's barely any lights around the neighborhood, and our tree is a little bit of a reject, but still, it's Christmastime.  That means it's almost Christmas vacation, which means it's almost time for the 20 miler.  Because what better use of vacation time than to run 20 miles.  There's not much else happening in the running world right now, but I do need to order more Tailwind stat.  Unrelated to anything happening here, I'm watching last weeks Saturday Night Live and I really have to say, Ryan Gosling is not a great live actor.  He's funny enough, but he can't keep it together very well.  But, more than I could do, so way to go you.  Plus, I suppose if you look like Ryan Gosling, you don't necessarily need to be good at what you're doing, you just have to look it.
Back to running now, I took a week off because I thought I had a broken toe.  Upon further review, it may have just been super bruised, but I don't really know.  It hurt for a while and was all purple but now it's just kind of red and doesn't hurt anymore.  So, back to running like nothing happened on that front.  I ran 5 today at an 8:04 pace and no water.  I clearly made a judgement error on that one, but it worked out fine.  I'd also like to take a moment to note how hard it is to keep a sentence flowing with Weekend Update on in the background.
Let's see, so aside from running, I've been sort of feeling a little bored of my workouts.  Here's the thing.  I'm Facebook friends with a lot of people that go to the boxing club and I constantly see updates about how hard the workout was.  Yet, I don't really feel like the workouts are that hard whenever I'm there.  Maybe it's because the workouts have to be beginner ready and I'm really past that stage.  Or maybe it's because I've spent so much time running that the short, hour long classes, just aren't enough.  Whatever the reason is, I figured that I needed to get some answers/results.  Doing what any good athlete would do, I went to the trainers and asked what I should be doing differently to get better results.  Smart move, really.  This was my answer: Climb the rope 3 times, run a fast mile before class, and add push-ups to the mountain climbers.  So, like any good athlete, I did that.  The rope climb was definitely the hardest, but I made it up.  Turns out that wasn't enough though.  Instead of doing a first round, I got bombarded by trainers and was told to do push-ups for 3 minutes instead of doing the actual round.  That was a lot of fun.  Until I couldn't do push-ups anymore and then still had to do them during the mountain climber active rest later in the class.  Today, after I ran 5 miles I was going to do uphill/sprint repeats on the treadmill.  Unfortunately, both treadmills were being utilized during the time I had, so I was instructed to do the row machine for 5 minutes instead.  Way harder than I thought it was.  Seriously, have you ever used a rowing machine and tried to keep it in the 2:00/500m range for 5 minutes? I have no idea what that means, but it was super hard.  I actually never got it down to 2:00, but I managed to hold it steady at 2:30, so I figured that was close enough.  Then I did a mile of uphills and was basically dead, so I wrapped it up and left.  But, I have to say, after all that, it was definitely worth it.  I actually feel like I did something again.  My legs are little tight, my arms are sore, and I have a giant blister on my left palm. A perfect ending.
In case you're wondering, I haven't run any new races lately, and probably won't run any before Louisiana, so you'll just have to put up with my mess of poorly flowing paragraphs and not very informative running information until then.  I'm sure I'll have a great update after Louisiana but sadly, probably not 26 selfies this time.  Don't be too disappointed, I just really want to get in under that 4:00 mark, and I don't think the selfies helped.  While you're waiting patiently for new running information though, enjoy some pictures from Winter Wonderland, the school's winter open house that held last night. It was a big hit.  And of course, I'm still taking donations for Morty.  As always, click here to donate

I was recruited to draw a Christmas theme at the Saugus Title.  For those of you reading this from out of state, or even out of the North Shore, there used to be a mini-golf course right down the street on Rt 1 that had a giant orange dinosaur visible to people driving by.  The orange dinosaur is well known around these parts, so if you're from here, it's kind of funny. If you're not, it probably doesn't make a lot of sense.  Don't worry, my January board will be better, if I'm still allowed to do it!

Got myself the Harry Potter coloring book and I love it.  Plus I made that little canvas, just because

Last weekend while I was babysitting I had to come up with a creative way to move the Elf on the Shelf.  Since the little girl I was watching wrote a letter to Santa, I made the elf a mail-box out of an empty Kleenex box. Of course I had to decorate the box to make it more Christmas friendly.

Boxing selfie with the other Ali and Brian.  

Santaaaaaa!

I feel like through this picture, you can really tell how well squats work. 

Our little Christmas tree.  The Nexus really does take good pictures for a phone.

Wake up, wake up, wake up, it's the first of the month

And I swear in 10 seconds I'm going to go make my math posters, which is what I came up here to do.  But first, an update! Nothing to do with running, since I haven't done any of that all week. I have either a) a cold or b) allergies, but whatever it is, it's preventing me from running properly, because my lungs/nose are all clogged up.  Apparently every time I long run now, I'm going to have to take a week off due to clogged airways.  It's really going to make my training so much better.  I guess it could help with lung capacity, so that's something to think about.  Since I have no running info for you, I thought I'd share my Halloween instead.  If you're super pumped to hear about how exciting it was, I hate to let you down, because it wasn't anything fancy.  We handed out candy for two hours on our front porch listening to Halloween tunes.  It was fun, but it wasn't a wild party.  I did upgrade my skeleton costume from last year.  This year I added skeleton feet shoes and a mask.  At first I was just going to go mask-less and face paint free, but then I found a plain white masquerade mask in our Halloween bins.  Since I had it, I figured I might as well add to it and make it a full on skull mask.  All in all, I think it came out fantastic.  It was super easy to make too.  I cut out a top half of a skull, taped that to the top of the eye holes, and then cut out a lower half.  It was a little tricky to get the teeth and the mandible right, but I managed to pull it off.  I taped that part to the bottom of the eye holes, colored in some excess areas black, and added some cracks.  Boom. Instant mask.  The top and bottom probably should have been glued on, but I was in a time crunch since I decided this super last minute, at 4 p.m. yesterday.  Aside from that, today we raked up all the leaves in the yard, filled seven lawn waste bags, and died a little bit because the trees still look like they have the majority of their leaves.  Then I went to Michael's on my way to the grocery store and found out that Fall decor was 80% off.  I bought a few items because I realized that our house is lacking in the Thanksgiving aspect of decorations.  We have tons of Halloween and Christmas, but for the month of November, we're really boring.  So I bought some things to make a wreath.  That's basically it for this weeks exciting adventures.  One more thing, I can't remember if I shared this already or not, on Tuesday Title Boxing Saugus was looking for a new design for their blank chalkboard wall, so I went over and drew a boxing Mickey.  It came out real nice, considering it was the first time I ever really worked with chalk, especially on a large scale.  Alright, that really is all for now, check out the pictures to see the mask, wreath, and boxing Mickey!

Full costume - all hand-painted!

Fall wreath

Hit it Hard

Fraction fiasco

As you might know, Common Core is taking over Massachusetts.  I'm okay with this, I like being able to have more than one way to learn a math problem.  But a lot of common core, and incidentally, MCAS, is fractions.  They start in the 1st grade and everything builds on that knowledge.   So you can probably imagine that if you don't get the foundation in 1st grade, you can't really build up in the higher grades.  For a first grader this year, that's not a huge problem.  We can catch those students who don't understand fractions and work to explain/show the concept in a way that makes sense.  Unfortunately, not all students are in 1st grade.  Many of these upper grades began school in the middle of the State Standards/Common Core crossover, and may have missed a key foundation in the lower grades that is now being built upon.  This is most glaringly obvious in the case of the fourth grade fraction fiasco.  I will say that most of the fourth graders have a basic understanding of what a fraction is and can at least use a fraction model, even if they are struggling to add and subtract the fractions.  But, most isn't all, as I discovered last Friday.  Seems I have a fourth grade student who has no concept of what a fraction is.  When I say no concept, I mean, seriously, no idea.  Couldn't tell a half from a fourth, doesn't even know how to recognize a half.  I'm not really sure how this has slipped past us for the past two years, but now that I know this gap exists, I'm doing everything I can to fill it.  Unfortunately for me, everything doesn't seem to be working.  We used fraction models, we made flip books, we cut, colored, and labeled pieces for the past three days.  Then, today, to see if the student was picking up on anything, I gave the 2nd grade end of the unit fraction test.  And, it was a failure.  I hate to say that, but it's the truth.  I'm talking every problem was wrong kind of failure.  No, you didn't read that wrong.  The student got every question wrong.  On a test that just asked to identify shapes with pieces colored in. You know, a basic fraction model.  So it looks like it's back to the drawing board for this one.  I can't have this student try to follow along with the new unit, which is multiplying fractions, if the student doesn't know what a fraction is.  I'm going to try a new approach to this whole situation tomorrow, but if anyone has any suggestions or ideas, I'm more than willing to try them at this point.  Anything to get this student to understand what a fraction is!

And now that my fraction fiasco is taken care of for the moment, onto running.  Yesterday it was a lovely 33 degrees, so I ran outside.  Ya, 33 = outdoor running now.  There was no wind so it felt super warm.  It was a nice run and I enjoyed almost all of it.  I'd say 3.98 miles were enjoyed. 0.02 were grossed out as I ran down the road and almost stepped on a disembodied deer leg, hoof and all.  Yes, in the middle of a fairly busy street, just lying around, was the lower half of a deer leg, muscle and bone sticking out of the top.  I have no idea what happened to the rest of the deer, but it's leg is hanging out in the middle of Sylvan St. Needless to say, I was completely grossed out for at least 2 seconds of my run.  Tomorrow it's supposed to be 56, but rainy.  However, I might just go out in the rain and run a little bit, because it will still be nicer than running on the treadmill. 

Track practice is going fine at this point.  Today I timed the girls on their miles, so now we at least have a starting point.  Since I know their general times, now we can work on getting faster.  That means more sprint and hill repeats.  If I can get a few of the girls to meet my mile time, I think we'll be in a good shape.  If I can get them past mine, that would be ideal. Besides the running, we do a lot of core and leg work.  The workout we have right now is ok, but I think tomorrow I'm going to add more stretching in after the mile warm-up, and another stretch at the end.  Some of the boxing trainers gave me some running specific ab workouts to do for core, so that's been helpful.  The girls seem to like the core more than the actual running, which makes me wonder if they're trying their hardest, but we'll work on that.  Our first meet is supposed to be in two weeks, so hopefully the snow is melted enough to make that actually happen.  I'm excited to see what the girls can do. Oh yea, and I registered for the Run to Remember today.  Ryan got a cool sticker in the mail and it made me super jealous that he was running and I wasn't, so I gave in and signed up. The only other two races I really want to do this year are the Lazy Lobster and the Seacoast Running Festival.  I'll definitely do the Lazy Lobster, because it's for Morty and it can be done as a virtual run.  I'll have to wait on the Festival for a bit and see how I feel about it come the summer.

Here's yesterday's run, and some extra pictures

It was so warm yesterday that I was able to run outside in this outfit! Minus the slippers of course.  

And I just really liked how cute Nala looked last night while she was sleeping.  Sometimes I wish I could just spend all day at home with my little buddy(ies).  *Stella not picture, obv

Oww

My triceps are dead.  Seriously. 100% gone off the deep end dead.  At least for today.  I first noticed it when I woke up at 2:30 a.m. with a serious pain in my right arm.  It hurt to move my arm in any direction, so I just lay there hoping to fall back asleep.  Which I did.  Then I woke up again at a normal hour just to find out that it still hurt almost as much as before.  It was a serious struggle to brush my teeth, get dressed, or really do anything conducive to my morning routine.  But I pushed through and made it through the day.  You would not believe how hard it is to write/teach when your dominate arm does not want to work.  Around noon both arms started to hurt, so that was extra miserable.  I finally managed to ice them when I got home for work, but the ice ran out far more quickly than I would have liked.  Now they're both super sore, but I think the worst has passed.
"How did this happen?", you may be asking.  Well, I started the week with my usual 12 rounds of boxing, not a problem.  Then on Monday I did my usual 8 rounds plus 3 miles on the treadmill.  Tuesday was generally the same, except one noticeable difference.  On Tuesday I finished my treadmill run  just a bit earlier than usual and I wanted to keep my muscles warm. So I asked one of the trainers to give me an exercise to do in the meantime.  The challenge was 100 push-ups in under 10 minutes. Me being me, of course I took that challenge.  The first 50 went ok and I was able to do them in 3 minutes.  Then I took a break because my arms were sore.  I manged to get in the next 50 in the next 5 minutes, so I totally won that challenge.  Unfortunately, then I went on to do 8 rounds of boxing.  Since I like to take Thursday as my off day, I go boxing on Wednesdays so I don't feel bad taking two days off in a row.  That was another 8 rounds.  Plus I ran outside because it was so nice out! Anyways, that's the reason my arms are dead today.  36 rounds of boxing and 100 push-ups in the past 4 days, plus all the warm-ups and ab workouts.  Which involve lifting medicine balls. Lesson learned there.  Ice is your friend.  If you're going to do all that, ice those muscles and ice them good. Otherwise suffer the wrath of angry arms. I'm going to attempt another round of ice in a few minutes just to see if I can get some relief before bed.  That's about all I've got for today. Oh yea, poor Stella has a toothache that needs to be taken care of, so in the meantime she's got a puffy face. She's very lopsided at the moment.

Ice arms

A Spring-like run surrounded by snow.

A puffy faced Stella

Punchies

Ahh vacation week.  Nothing like it when you've already had 7 days worth of snow days in the past two weeks.  All I've really accomplished so far is, baking brownies, making a lasagne, watching some old Disney animated classics, and eating a bunch of junk food.  Right now I'm catching up on Gotham and assuming that Jerome is going to be the future Joker. Because look at those lips. Chap city. 

But anyways, basically all the road races for the next month have been cancelled.  Hyannis is flat out done, not even a reschedule.  The Frozen Shamrock, which was supposed to be on February 22, is rescheduled for April 12.  Hopefully we'll be able to see the ground by then. I've been really great at NOT running, but I should probably get back on that treadmill.  I tried to add my 100 punches to last week and I've managed to achieve that.  What I've learned is that there are two ways to count punches. The REAL way, which follows the instructors combos and makes you work hard, and the fake way.  The fake way is when you stand in real close to the bag and just fire off punches without fully extending your arms and pulling them back.  Imagine a T-rex with boxing gloves on. That's the fake way.  Not that I didn't try both, but I didn't really find a huge difference in either way.  Other than that, it's been more and more snow.  FUN!

These are the punches from Monday, regular full punches following the combos and taking some breaks. 1378 and 1223 for a total of 2601

These are punches from Tuesday, using T-rex arms and no breaks from punching.  I'm also fairly certain that the left didn't record all punches, they should be much more even.   1612 and 1915 for a total of 3527. So almost 1000 more.  Fine, maybe there is a bit of a difference.

It's snowy and it's cold.  Welcome to Alaskachusetts.  -25 yesterday. :(

This is what my street looks like now. 

Disney Movie Day

Snow place like home

Whooooeee it has been a long week or two.  Honestly, the days have all but blended together with all the snowstorms and school cancellations.  February has never seemed shorter, and that's saying a lot, since it's already the shortest month!  Seriously though, if the snow could quit, I'd be a little bit happier.  There's pretty much no place left to walk, park, or drive if another car is coming at you.  It's getting out of hand.  Yet, we are intrepid, we carry on.  What else can you do, with all this snow around and talk of another storm or two heading this way? The good news is, it's almost February vacation.  The bad news is, it's almost February vacation.  I make this next statement with the knowledge that teachers in the state of Massachusetts will be calling for my head, but it's about time we did away with February vacation.  Let's be honest, we just got back from Winter Break, and with the SEVEN snow days we've had in the past 15 days, this vacation is a bit of a joke.  What the students could really use is 5 more days of work.  Besides, we're one of the only states that still has this vacation hanging about.  I say scrap it, start school earlier than the Wednesday before Labor Day, and use March for Spring break.  It would solve SO many problems. But, who am I to change things?  Alright, aside from the snow days, there's no where to run, so I've been spending a lot of quality time with the treadmill.  I don't love it.  Also due to the snow, I missed 4 days of being able to workout.  I know, that's insane! At this point though I've made it up and I feel like I'm back on track.  Wouldn't you know it, that means I'm getting a cold.  I can feel it coming on.  My nose is stuffy/runny, my eyes are itchy, and things hurt.  Fantastic.  Nothing like a good cold to start vacation. Since I don't have a new goal in the near future, I decided to work towards upping my punches at boxing.  I started low today with a total of just over 3000 punches. My goal is to try and add on at least 100 more punches each week.  I only need to track one day, but I might track all and just pick my best.  Except Sunday's because that's a 12 round class and that would feel like cheating.
Completely out of the realm of working out, but back on the snow day thing, I made one final pair of shoes a couple of weeks ago.  I went Little Mermaid themed, just to see how it worked out,  They came out alright, but I'm not sure I love them.  However, I did want to try and fix the paint chipping problem I had on the first pair.  The paint on the rubber part of the sole chipped off as they were worn around, so I wanted to try and fix that.  I saw a trick online that if you sand the rubber with fine grain sandpaper it makes the paint more likely to absorb into the rubber, so I tried that.  It looks like the paint held up a bit better, but still chipped off in places.  At this point, I'm beginning to think it's the sealant that's chipping it off, not the actual paint.  Anyways, I'll add a picture of those in a minute.  Finally, the students at my school are number one in the city for the math program we've been doing.  Yes, that's right, number one! We're third in the state, and in the top 100 in the nation! There are some days when I feel like I'm doing a real bad job teaching, but learning this made me feel like I must be doing something right.  I'm very proud of the school and I love being able to brag about the students.  Tomorrow they're getting a special award from the school committee, which is very exciting.  So, that's it, snow city in a nutshell. Enjoy the pictures!

Punch counters

Icicles and ice dams 

Way to go Tracy School!

Snow pile...it's gotten a lot bigger since this picture