Kunz Krazies

The week before Thanksgiving I went to Washington DC with my friends Paula and Kristen to attend the National Council of Teachers of English conference, along with the ALAN workshop, which focuses on young adult literature. We went a couple of days early so we could see some sites before our meetings. I had been to DC before, it there's so much to do there, I saw lots of stuff I hadn't had time to the first time. Washington DC was having a cold spell, so we were definitely feeling it as we walked from place to place. The first day we took a little trolley ride around town and then went to Arlington Cemetery and saw some of the sites.  After that we went to the Newseum, which was a super cool museum about the news. There were so many cool exhibits there talking about the history of journalism in our country and a lot of the issues around media. I could have spent a couple of days there. The next day Kristen and I went the Holocaust Museum and later met Paula at t...

I only have one photo to represent the mental stress and suffering I've been going through all semester.  This study has been my home as I've been on sabbatical all semester, preparing for my exams. The books along the top are some of the ninety books I read to prepare for the exams. A few weeks ago I received my exam questions and had 72 hours to complete three papers. Kory and the kids were great. On the night I got the questions they had a little cheering line for me to run through into the office and they cheered me on and gave me high fives. Then Kory took everyone out for the night so that I could have silence. I got outlines of two of the essays done that night.  The next day I received a beautiful bouqet from my friends Paula and Joelle, who are also working on their PhDs and feel my pain. I would have snapped a picture but I was having trouble with my camera. On the second day I wrote drafts of all the essays. One of them was pretty well-developed, the ...

We got in the spirit of Halloween by carving our pumpkins on the Monday before. Our awesome friends the cooks hosted us in their garage where they have all the carving tools, patterns, knives, and tables you need. They also fed us a dinner.  On Friday,  I was going to take Chloe trick or treating and she said, "Where is your costume?!" When I told her I didn't have one, she said only boring moms didn't dress up. Ouch! So, I grabbed my graduation robe and put on a Darth Vader mask. It lasted for about half a block and I was done, but at least I dressed up, right. Madi as a redneck Chloe as a Spider Princess Chloe and some of her friends Kory handing out candy Phoebe as the Scarecrow from Wizard of Oz Caleb as some sort of assassin from a video game I made it through one part of our development, then switch off with Kory. After that we got in the car and took the kids around to their cousins and grandparents. My par...