Dog days of May

This blog has been on the tip top of my brain since I last posted. Imagine that! However I have had THE busiest work week in my 2.5 years at Fraser. Five school meetings (IEP, Kindergarten transition, etc.) for both Case Management clients and FACT clients, multiple Case Management meetings, and many first in-home meetings with families that I am now doing Direction of Behavioral Aide. The majority of these meetings have been off site so I have really racked up the miles thus far this week. The weather has been amazing so it really hasn't bothered me too much, save for being incredibly slow replying to some personal emails (sorry Melanie & Chelsea!) and having thoughts about this blog but not having a moment to breathe until now.

There is some soup cooking in the kitchen, a beef & vegetable soup, that should conveniently be done at about 10:15pm. I tend to start making dinner too late and most of what we eat is homemade so it tends to be time consuming. Tonight has proved to be wonderful for cooking as it's a refreshingly cool one! I wouldn't be surprised if you're slightly confused.. you most likely assume that it's cold here in Minnesota 365 days/year, 24 hours/day. Well my friend... you're wrong! Currently it is a refreshing 71 degrees outside. This is refreshing as the weather the past week or so has been in the 80s during the day, at least. We made it up to 97 at one point last week. The average for this time of year (a few days last week when I paid attention to the news) is 72. The current temp that day was 83 and the record (set last year in 2009) was 95! Woah! A coworker put it quite well on Monday afternoon, we just tell everyone that it's terrible and cold in MN so we don't get all kinds of weird people moving here. Not that I have much right to agree with something like that as I'm not a native Minnesotan...

While writing this I'm also updating the "news" portion of our neighborhood's website. If you haven't yet please check out UpperWHO.org! We're getting rather involved in the neighborhood here in North Minneapolis, which I love! And by we, I mostly mean me but also a little we. Tyler & I went to a meeting yesterday evening to review grant proposals for facade improvements on Broadway. It was really neat and felt great to be a part of the decision making process that will bring significant change and visual benefits to our neighborhood. :) The grants and being awarded via the West Broadway Coalition. You can learn more about them here. We met in the Northside Art's Collective space which you can learn more about here.

In conclusion, tonight we should be at a concert at The Cedar Cultural Center. I won tickets on twitter to see The Very Best. The two times that I have won tickets from vita.mn I have been extremely excited to go and very interested in the band/ensemble. However, we somehow fail to go each time. Something about it being free seems to a bit less motivating to rush through our typical routine. We were too slow when arriving home after work and I had this soup dinner scheduled so it just didn't work out. :( Yes, I had dinner scheduled. I plan our dinners weekly so there is no wondering and whining back and forth about what we should do for dinner every night. It also makes grocery shopping significantly easier and slightly more enjoyable. It also helps us stick to the budget.. sometimes. Occasionally I rush through the store and don't total it up as I go. I have recently vowed to contribute my "personal" money to the "family" money whenever I go over the allotted "food" money. We have entirely too many checking and savings accounts. :)

The end.