Snowy December

Today is a good day.  Thanks to the fact that I only had a total 24 students this semester, compared to the up to 60 I can have in the semesters when I teach three courses, I was able to keep on top of my grading. I think this also was helped by the fact that I've become much more selective about the amount of work that I give my students, rejecting my "boot camp" approach of earlier, less experienced years when both I and the students were overwhelmed.

I've come to understand that, in teaching writing, process is much more important than product so rather than have students write an endless amount of papers, it's more important for them to draft and revise so they can see where they went wrong in the first place and feel how they've improved. This method has worked very well for my 100-level class and it keeps me sane and much more content, especially when, like today, I'm able to finish with all pending grades and am, officially, done with the semester. The deadline for posting grades is the 30th so I've actually finished more than a week ahead of time. Woo hoo for the unbeatable feeling of being better organized and more on top of things!

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, December has been the snowiest in memory with more than 15 inches having fallen in Ohio before today (when winter officially began). The usual number is 28 inches total, so we're already more than half way to the average for the entire season! Of course, today it's 59 degrees out there and the rain is falling as if Macondo wasn't in Latin America after all. My husband had to hook up the sump pump (unbelievable for December) just so we could keep this basement from becoming an underground pool.

Earlier this week, before this warm front blew in, the beautiful moon glittered in the cold, like an ice queen.

Today also marks the day when my beloved husband finished our kitchen remodeling project, which we began in April, when we first met with our contractor to discuss choices. Below is our 1980s kitchen, complete with warped formica counter tops and poorly functioning appliances: from the gas oven that heated things at 75 degrees over the setting to the broken dishwasher whose tray was always wanting to crash onto the tile floor when filled with dishes.

TA DA! This is what the new kitchen looks like today, thanks to my hubby's hard work (he painted in what we chose to be a light gray but what looks like a muted lilac). New discount stainless steel appliances and gorgeous black-gray granite countertops make a world of difference, even when we decided to keep the same cabinets (it cut the cost of the project way down, too!).

And, instead of paying $129 for a new hood over the stove, about $5 worth of spray paint did the trick to make it match the new, functioning gas stove that actually cooks at the temperature it says it's cooking. "It's the best $124 I've saved this year," my husband said.

I always have a lot of "stuff" that needs to go on shelves (yes, I'm a teacher, after all) so we had the contractor build this set of shelves with its accompanying bulletin board to repurpose that useless space in the kitchen. It's a great place for all my cookbooks!

The kitchen makeover makes me smile every time I walk into it, especially since it was principally funded by the blood, sweat, and tears shed from having worked two jobs over five weeks this past summer, something I hope not to do again for a long time. But it sure was worth it and, today, I can hear this old house softly singing with happiness that we're taking such good care of it.