Just the Right Angle

Hey, Coach

aangle — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 18:46:54 +0000

Just before Christmas, Zach started coaching an Upward Basketball team through our church. His team is the Cheetahs and is made up of first and second grade boys (he told me he would like it if it was girls, because then they could call themselves the Cheetah Girls). He’s having a great time! The kids are adorable, and it’s a really neat ministry.

The Cheetahs had their first game last Saturday, and it was so much fun to cheer them on. There was a lot of traveling and several “what do I do now?” looks when kids got the ball- all adorable. In the spirit of fun and sportsmanship they don’t keep score, but if you ask me, the Cheetahs were looking pretty good out there. We’ve seen a few of the kids when we’ve been around town on errands, and it’s so cute to hear their little voices yelling, “Hey! That’s my coach!” I’m married to a celebrity, I tell you. We’re excited for a great season!

New Year, New Goals, New Blog

aangle — Mon, 04 Jan 2010 13:41:42 +0000

As we begin the new year, I’ve been setting a few goals for myself. One goal that I’ve decided to tackle is trying out a home design/craft blog and seeing how it goes. I’m not really sure if it will amount to anything (or if anyone will read it!) but I’m looking forward to giving it a try!

I’ve copied a few of the posts from this blog, and will be adding similar decorating and craft posts to:

http://justtherightangle.wordpress.com/

I’ll still be using this blog to chronicle general life adventures….but now I need to come up with a new name!

Come take a look! Hope you enjoy it!

Celebrations Times Four (parts three and four)

aangle — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 20:40:19 +0000

On Monday the 21st, we headed to Boone/Blowing Rock to visit Zach’s family. The weekend before, they had a huge snowstorm and got more snow than Zach’s parents have seen since they have lived there. We were happy to arrive and know we would have a white Christmas with the Angles!

The view from our room:

For the next few days, we enjoyed some welcome downtime playing games, catching up, and watching TV. We exchanged gifts on Tuesday night so everyone could be there. We were thrilled with the thoughtful gifts we got! On Wednesday night we had a pretend Christmas Eve and ate the traditional Angle Christmas Eve meal- a delicious appetizer dinner! We had such a fun time and are looking forward to seeing everyone again soon!

On Thursday, we traveled home and joined my dad for a great Christmas Eve service at our church. Then, we went home and watched The Nativity Story which I love! Of course, it should be taken with a grain of salt, but I love the way it helps me to remember that this was a real event that happened here on Earth! Pretty amazing.

On Friday we enjoyed opening presents and watching a Christmas movie. We were able to get my dad a much needed GPS. He gave me a gorgeous handmade bowl that we saw at a craft fair after Thanksgiving, and Zach and I both got generous gift cards to a store we’ve become quite familiar with-Lowes. We’re excited to make a few more improvements around the house!

We feel so blessed to have had so many wonderful celebrations with so many wonderful people. Most of all, we are thankful for:

A thrill of hope, a weary world rejoices/ For yonder breaks a new and glorious morn

Celebrations Times Four (part two)

aangle — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 20:13:30 +0000

In our opinions, one of the great things about being married is that we get to celebrate Christmas so many times! To kick things off, I had a fun day at school on Friday getting loads of sweet gifts. One thing that our school does that I HIGHLY recommend is this: One parent on each grade level sends out an e-mail letting the other parents know that they will be collecting donations. The money is then equally divided between the teachers and presented to us in a Visa gift card from the entire grade level. We love it!! Waaaay better than 64 apple ornaments. Of course, we still get our share of sugary treats, but we are so thankful for such a useful gift. We concluded the day with another Christmas gift- a one-hour early release due to threats of a snowstorm (which we didn’t get).

When I got home, Zach and I celebrated our Christmas by exchanging presents and watching a Christmas movie. Some people gave us a hard time for celebrating early, but we’ve done it this way for the past few years and really enjoy getting to kick off our Christmas break with something so exciting. We had each already gotten our big gifts as we had used Christmas money and other money we had saved up. Zach got a PS3 and I got a chair for our living room (from Craigslist, of course). I also got him two NC State flags for the house which I was super excited about. When I went to the campus bookstore to get him one, I was pleasantly surprised to find that the whole store was 40% off. There were no flags on the floor, but thanks to the help of a kind storeworker and a ladder, I was able to get the display models (since they were such a great price, I got both to make sure I got the one he would want). Zach got me a steam mop which I have been dorkily excited about since Thanksgiving (the middle schoolers think it’s hilarious that I asked for a mop for Christmas) and my drug of choice- Diet Dr. Pepper. That night, my dad and I celebrated an annual tradition by going to see Carolina Ballet’s The Nutcracker. The day was the perfect kickoff to Christmas break!

Celebrations Times Four (part one)

aangle — Fri, 01 Jan 2010 20:10:10 +0000

On the Thursday morning before Christmas break, we had a small Christmas party for our Bible study kids. Typically, I don’t equate the word “party” with 7:30am, but we made it work. I brought my little ballerina tree from home, and the kids put their gifts for our White Elephant gift exchange below it. I was happy to trade in the old iron a Christmas ornament that we got at our Sunday school Christmas party, and was pleasantly surprised to end up with a cute notebook and colorful pens. I had a hard time finding something to give the kids- we have loved watching the Bible study grow, it just makes it tricky to find something that we can afford to give them! I settled on burning them a CD of christian Christmas music. This year more than ever, I have been really disappointed with the absence of music that celebrates the true reason for the season on the radio, so I’m hoping that CDs made them think about more than mommy kissing Santa Claus. Our celebration was nothing fancy, but we had a great time celebrating with people that mean so much to us!

** Pictures courtesy of the kids that stole my camera within two minutes of us walking through the door.

Christmas Celebrations

aangle — Sat, 19 Dec 2009 14:46:02 +0000

Last week, we enjoyed a couple of Christmas celebrations with our Sunday school class. On Wednesday, the girls met at Amy’s house for a cookie swap. We each brought something to share. I brought graham cracker brittle- a recipe shared with me by a sweet youth leader growing up. It was fast, easy, and yummy! Amy had cute little Christmas tins ready for everyone to stuff their treats into, which was perfect for bringing our batch to school the next day. (the cookies were great, but as teachers we get enough sugar this time of year to send us into comas!) After we finished distributing everything, we went downstairs for pizza, conversation, and a Christmas movie. It was a great, low-key night!

On Saturday, we went to another couple in our class’ house for our official class Christmas party (the boys were invited this time). We shared a great meal, hung out, and played one of my favorite party games of all time: White Elephant. We brought Christmas mugs and originally ended up with a cute Crate and Barrel dish towel and Bath and Body Works soap- not a bad trade! Unfortunately, by the end of the night we ended up with a Christmas ornament and an old iron. Disappointing, but certainly the fun of the game! Other gifts included Father of the Groom golf balls, a Santa Mr. Potato Head, and, of course, a Snuggie. One of the gifts included a note that announced that our friends, Jason and Mary, are expecting their first baby in July! We had a great time celebrating with everyone!

Unfortunately, ALL of my pictures from the party are crazy blurry, but I couldn’t resist including this one of Zach and some of the class kids. I like this about him:

One Funny Date Night

aangle — Wed, 16 Dec 2009 01:05:12 +0000

I had a looong week last week. Nothing bad, just busy. We had a couple of special events at school (including a 6:30am web conference with a school in India), the kids were a bit bonkers (Christmas break is in sight!), and it seemed like my to-do list kept growing. Enter: my amazing husband. When I got home on Friday, I was surprised with flowers, the latest issue of Martha Stewart Living, Fresh Market dinner, and a Christmas movie. Pretty amazing.

To top things off, he had a hot bath waiting for me so I could drink hot chocolate and enjoy my magazine. He told me that it was supposed to be a bubble bath, but he couldn’t find any bubbles. When I suggested he look in the jar in our guest bathroom (we use it to store hotel soaps and shampoos in case guests need extra), he returned with a packet of bath powder given to us by the teachers from our Japanese partner school. We were given a rainbow of the packets- pink, blue, and yellow. The one that Zach happened to pick out was yellow. Thinking it would be some sort of flowery or lemony sent, I asked him to pour it in. Here’s what we got:

I don’t think I really need to explain what went through our minds. And yes, I did still take the bath. All in all it was a great- and pretty funny- date night.

It’s Beginning to Look a Lot Like…

aangle — Tue, 15 Dec 2009 01:13:39 +0000

We’ve been having fun sprucing things up around here! I’ve gotten pretty much all of our decorations at after Christmas sales, so it’s always fun to pull out the boxes and have fun new things to put up. I got the branches in the second set of pictures at the sale we went to over Thanksgiving. I saw online where someone used epsom salt for snow and, while I was skeptical at first (I’ve only ever used it for blistered ballet toes), I was pleasantly surprised by how real it looks! The cookbook in the last set of pictures was a gift from Zach’s mom over Thanksgiving. She complied family pictures (recognize the cutie in the blue?) and recipes into a cookbook and gave a copy to each of the kids. The thought and time she put into putting it together was so sweet. I love looking through ours and am excited to be able to make some of the delicious Angle recipes!

Why I Don’t Mind that He Sometimes Sleeps in on Fridays

aangle — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 22:19:30 +0000

As some of you know, as a PE teacher, Zach doesn’t work on Fridays. Although some weeks I really wish we could trade places, I’m also incredibly thankful for all of the things he gets done while I’m spending the day at school.

Take, for example, this past Friday. He asked me to pick up Hibachi for dinner (aka stall so I would come home when it was dark). This is what I came home to:

Yep. He’s great.

PS- Don’t you love how the lights make the porch all cozy and cute? It makes me want to leave them up forever.

Thanksgiving

aangle — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 22:31:42 +0000

For Thanksgiving, Zach and I traveled to Blowing Rock to spend time with the Angle family. We had a great time relaxing and catching up with family. I meant to take pictures but didn’t really follow through, so instead I’ll just give you a run-down of the trip.
Wednesday:
-          Arrived in Blowing Rock, enjoyed a low-key night with the family
Thursday:
-          Watched the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade
-          Ate a giant delicious meal and our first fried turkey, prepared by our brother-in-law Danny
-          Drew up a plan of attack for Black Friday
-          The girls watched TV on the projector downstairs while the boys watched football upstairs
Friday:
-          At midnight, the girls went to the outlets to catch the sales. None of us got anything earth-shattering, but there were a few good deals to be had, some snow falling, and fun memories made
-          Slept in Friday morning, then went to Wal-Mart (we got a printer for $25)
-          Went to an amazing sale that Zach’s brother, Robby found. The owner of a GIGANTIC house was selling everything. It was a crazy free-for-all, and Zach and I picked up a few fun things.
Saturday:
-          Watched an amazing NC State/ Carolina football game and celebrated the Wolfpack victory with much shouting and dancing around the living room.
-          Headed home
Sunday:
-          I went to a craft fair with my dad. We have been visiting this particular fair every year since we moved here, and it’s one of my favorite holiday traditions. I love seeing the things that the different vendors come up with and dreaming of having a booth of my own!

All in all, it was a great week. We are thankful for the time that we were able to spend with our familes and look forward to spending time with them at Christmas!