Retail Therapy

Boy, I'm lame. I meant to do this awhile ago but got distracted. :) Anyway, I wanted to share my latest online window shopping therapy. When I need inspiration, I turn to etsy more often than not. Check these cool finds out...

I saw this purse and said, "Ooohhh..." I'm a purse freak. Sold by Charm Design

I always come back to this necklace when I'm browsing on etsy... made by Colleen Baran. She's got tons of beautiful pieces. I wouldn't mind something like this for Christmas :)

These go with my moods lately. Offered by the Lola Collection

These would be super cute for those cold days that I want to head out for photography. Posted by Aya Omura

Well, those are my picks for today! I'm going to go and teach myself how to do watercolor pencils now.

VOTE!!!

I've been featured on the famous Me Rah Koh blog! I entered a photo contest for the theme of pets and submitted Lindy's dog, Strider. He stayed with us for a few days while she took some time off work to visit with her family. Check out the website!


And by all means VOTE FOR ME!!! WHOOOOOO!!! I'm so excited! I love what Me Rah said about my photo!

For those of you following Jamie's story lately, here's some info as of today;

A very cool lady gave me the number of a woman that works with student services with White River School District. She says I can at least request an evaluation and see what the public schools can offer in terms of free help. Since I felt like Jamie is on the verge of losing his place with his current preschool, I went ahead and gave Mary a call.
I explained his current history with the preschools this year and his experience with kindergarten and Mary said she would definitely look into talking with his teachers and finding out where the problem seems to be. I returned her phone call this morning and she relayed that she spoke with Jamie's kindergarten teacher and she pretty much said exactly what I described. Mary wanted to get the ball rolling immediately in Jamie's case and suggested we meet tomorrow morning to go over the evaluation process and make an appointment for her to visit Jamie in preschool and observe.
Last Monday I had scheduled a pediatric appointment to see what a medical doctor might suggest. She made note of Jamie's very active behavior and informed me that it was still too early to determine if Jamie has ADD or ADHD. She wanted to make a referral for a psychiatric appointment as well as a psychologist. Both are scheduled late this month and early November.

On a related note, he's really tried my patience today while we were out and about to Borders and Target. His constant need for my attention and his constant chattiness has really worn me out. I'm feeling extremely tense right now. =/ But we've got a birthday party to attend to tonight so hopefully he'll get his energy out before we head out again.

I really hope that this is a step forward in the right direction and we can hopefully get our family the help we need to be better parents and a better, more well-behaved kid. *crossing my fingers!!*

What's your outlet?

It is definitely my intention to seek an outlet for my stress. How do you go from one stressful day and wake up the next day with a smile?
I've got a few ideas of my own that I'd like to try.

~ Drawing or Drawing classes
~ Yoga
~ Running

But I'm curious, what does everyone else do when the going gets tough? What eases you back to a state of bliss?

One more year...

I've made my final decision and Mike stands by it... We're going to wait another year before trying kindergarten again. I went back to Jamie's school today to inform the office and decided to pull him out of class as well. It was a difficult choice and it was really hard to watch the relieved expression on his teacher's face as she gathered his backpack and waved goodbye. But it is what it is... he's just not ready.
At least this gives us some direction as to what we need to work on for the year to make sure he's successful next year.

Thanks for everyone's encouragement :)

Update

I visited with Jamie's class today for a few hours and left at lunch time. He does have behavior issues but I think (and the teacher totally agrees) that they're immaturity based... he's the youngest in his class. I'm going to make an effort to visit his class every week until I see him improve.

So for now, he stays in full-day kindergarten. :) He did pretty well during my time spent there with occasional misbehaving. Mostly, he just doesnt want to sit there and he doesn't care for coloring. lol Looks like we'll have to do more coloring at home to get him used to it. If I remember correctly, I don't think you ever stop coloring in school... Even in 12th grade.

This week's been filled with its ups and downs on a dramatic scale. The down I'm sure, is very obvious... but on the flipside, work's going great! I had my first Paperchase offical visit from a couple of home office folks and they were very impressed with my entire shop, my backstock (or lack therof) and my sales. They took photographs of my displays and asked me questions about how I jumped in sales. While taking a look at my clean and nearly clear backstock, they were so impressed that they told me they wished they could see this in every backstock. They asked how I got everything out without it looking cluttered and crammed. My boss beamed at me the entire time! It felt pretty good to have something go right this week. I truly feel like I've finally found my niche as far as Borders goes. I know I get a lot of jokes about how cheap Paperchase is and how crappy the products are but... I still like working in it.

Anyhow, Today I'm going to try and visit with Jamie's principal and see if we can make school a more positive experience for him and us. I've got a few ideas but they're going to cost energy and time on the part of anyone involved in Jamie's life. We'll see how it goes.