Fabulous is an adjective I use a lot. For instance, if someone says something like, "I bet it will be fun," I might say, "It'll be fabulous!"

If I like your shoes, I'll say they're fabulous.

If your haircut is nice, I'll say it's fabulous.

Fabulous photographs, fabulous house, fabulous time, fabulous food.

Sometimes I shorten it to "fab." You know. Whatever I feel like.

A few years ago, when I was saying fabulous about something, my brother in-law told me that fabulous is popular among GLBTQ people. Just now in honor of "F" day, I checked on Urban Dictionary, and sure enough! According to the website, "fabulous" is a the "ultimate compliment" in the gay community, and perhaps even a mating call.

Love it! Gay Pride! Fabulous!

On the way up here - I'm north of Brainerd, just over three hours from Minneapolis - I used the scan feature to find a good radio station. I didn't really find a GREAT station, but I did hear Faith Hill's "The Way You Love Me" three times within the span of 20 minutes. And I stopped scanning to listen to it EACH TIME!

Which brings me to the next part of my story. Eventually I did stop because a station was playing "Don't Stop Believin'," which was revitalized first by Bill Clinton's campaign and then later by Glee. Next that station played "For the Longest Time" by Billy Joel, which I LOVE.

Then they played three more songs I knew all the words to, including "Walkin' on Sunshine." So, I'm sure you guessed it by now, but that, my friends, was a LITE ROCK station. Exactly the format I used to ridicule my mother for choosing.

This is what getting old feels like? Oh, well. Here's Air Supply:



They make every tackle at the sound of the whistle and they make all the stadiums rock.

In a minute, I'm hopping in the car and driving up to Camp Foley, my old stomping ground.

My friends Alli and Marie let me do a bit of work up there in exchange for Shef's camp tuition. Isn't that so nice? I LOVE them! My job is to read and edit a bunch of stuff, which is obviously right up my alley. I'm looking forward to getting my hands on the drafts first thing tomorrow.

In addition to doing that editing work, I get to be part of the awesome camp community for a few days - singing, dancing, being silly, and not cooking or cleaning. I think we can all agree this situation is win-win.

*photo c/o Camp's website

When Shef was gone at camp, I painted his room and got him new, big-kid bedding. Instead of doing all the walls in that cheery green, I decided it would be cool to cover one big one in chalkboard paint.

It turned out really well, I think! I love the built-in murals! This one is a combo of "The Guy," care of Dan, some Harry Potter wands, brooms, and house decor that Shef did with Claire (our amazing babysitter), and whatever Shef's pal Charles did while he was over today.

Cool, right?!

Cool.

I spent the morning in my new classroom setting up the space. I did a bunch of stuff, but I was most excited about papering and bordering my bulletin boards. The reason I was so pumped is that I purchased three new exciting borders. I decided to use the leopard print border on the board closest to my desk. YES!

In between the bulletin boards, I fiddled around with my desks. My problem is that I feel like the room has more of a table vibe, and I'm not sure how to arrange the desks. I tried a semicircle and I tried rows, but neither of those arrangements seemed right. I'll probably try a few more things.

Awhile ago when the last blogging challenge ended at the end of June, Dan spent some time lamenting the lack of challenge.

"It's your turn to pose a challenge!" I told him.

Despite this advice, he chose not to pose a challenge. I think what he said was, "Hmmmm."

So then after a month of slow blogging on this site, I decided to pose my own challenge to myself on July 27th. My challenge was to blog every day until August 18th. I publicly declared this resolution so that I'd hold myself accountable.

But now, a month after my initial suggestion that Dan pose a challenge and AFTER I've already challenged myself, Dan has finally posed a challenge. I'm supposed to post something for every letter (a remix of the AKR challenge from July 2010 posed by Lee) and post an image (a nod to the April 2011 image challenge also posed by Lee).

So, fine. I'm in the challenge. I'm going to do it. And while I'm at it, why not also revisit the December 2009 and December 2010 challenges that both had new/multimedia aspects?

Actually, I already wanted to ask about this thing I've read about a few times online lately called Pinterest. Have you heard of it? It's like a social-bookmarking, collage-making, inspiration-boarding thing. Should we get some Pinterests? I'll admit, I requested an invite. Here's a screenshot (aka IMAGE):

This morning, I dropped Shef off at his art camp and walked down the hallway to my new classroom to start getting set up for the school year.

One of the best parts of my new job is that Shef and I now go to the same school. I just get to drop him off, and then go to work, and then pick him up... all with no driving!

So, this morning I was doing all the glamorous things that teachers do in August, like wiping down shelves and stacking books and deciding on bulletin board design; and then my door opened. It was Shef!

"Mom!" he said. "It's break time, so do you have those pretzels?" he asked.

And, yes, I had the pretzels! And then he just ran out the door back to his art class! It's hard to convey in blog format how happy this little interaction made me. It's so nice and easy to be in the same school space.

Probably we won't always be so thrilled to be in close proximity, but today it was pretty great. Who wouldn't want to be hanging with this guy?