It's a compliment.

Hilarious, right? Some might view this as offensive. "What? They would name a DOG after you!", but I view it as a compliment. They love me so much that they would name something else after me. Too funny! Grading papers is NEVER dull especially when it's a free choice response. Love it!

On a daily basis, I get told the funniest things... "Can I adopt you?" "Can our class have 1/23rd of you so it would be fair?" "Can I put you in my pocket?" "Can I fail the 2nd grade on purpose?" "Come to 3rd grade with me!"

Best job in the world. Best job I tell ya.

Life lessons.

Wow, it has been a good while since I blogged. I send my apologies for those out there that actually care what I do from day to day. It has been SO busy with work recently.

Yesterday, I had a colleague confide in me with something... something that was probably really hard for her to say... something that not many people would have taken the chance to listen to... something that took courage due to her "situation" we will say... she said she does not feel comfortable with most, but she did with me... wow. Seriously, it really hit me. We never know a person until we actually give them a chance to prove us wrong. I cried the whole way home last night because I felt like a huge jerk for placing judgments. I heard a quote last week that kind of relates to this. It's easy for us to get caught up in trying to succeed and be the best at what we do, but in the end... let's just all for crying out loud be nice and respect one another! It is my prayer that this individual will come to me more if I am what she feels comfortable with :)

"It's nice to be important, but it's more important to be nice."

Raise the Roof!

View from the top of Runyon

Picture from Ellen's facebook album... one of many, but it's my fav! Ellen requested the old school "raise the roof" and boy did I raise it!

I made it!!

Today was fun! Mom and I went to Runyon to hike. They say this is a place to see celebs. The only celeb I saw was Vanessa Minnillo aka Nick Lachey's fiance. Doesn't she know he's in love with someone else by this point? Haha. I was so proud of mom. She made it to the top too! YAY! After hiking, we went to one of our favorite places in Beverly Hills for lunch then treated ourselves to Sprinkles cupcakes. In the process, I was getting updates from people in Georgia on our Ellen appearances. Thanks to everyone for keeping us updated! We love and appreciate you all! :) Then, we came home to watch ourselves. I think we counted 6 or 7 times total we saw ourselves. SO cool!

Tonight I went to dinner with two of my best friends out here... Carly and Stephanie. We went to get sushi and some bevs. It was a good time catching up yet again/saying goodbye! It's nice to know you can pick up right where you left off. Love them!!

Came home to my mom showing me Ellen's facebook page... I was in 3/13 pics total and this was my fav!

We go home tomorrow and I am oober sad. I just love California with all of my heart. I'm excited to see people from work though! They are my second fam! :)

I DancED (past tense) With Ellen!!

Ladies and Gentlemen... it happened. It officially happened! And it was A-MAZING!!! We got there around 10:30 to put our name down, ate lunch at Smoke House (apparently it's well known? never heard of it though), then sat and waited and waited and waited. It was WELL worth it because I was #4 in and my mom was #5 in! We were right... we got to see Carrie Underwood, Neve Campbell, and Joshua Kelly. It was fabulous..... let me just say this... Carrie is ridiculous TINY! Like to the point where you can barely see her when she turns to the side. For real.

So want to know where we sat? PRETTY AMAZING. K. If you are looking at the audience (say, you were Ellen)... we were on the 4th row on the right side. I am on aisle. I happen to be on the aisle she dances down so when she begins her dance she goes up past me to the top then back down again to my row. Since I was by her so much, I'd be shocked if I'm not on tv. I'm wondering though if I wish to not be on tv? I kind of blacked out. When you are in the situation and Ellen is RIGHT by you all you are thinking is "I hope she dances by me!" so I really don't know what my dance moves entailed. Hopefully I don't look too ridiculous. I could have easily touched her if I wanted to... but if I did I would have easily been escorted out. haha. I'm wearing a black shirt with a black cardigan, jeans, pearls, and black wedges. It airs on THURSDAY so look for us!

Ellen+Michelle+Wanda=BFF's. During a commercial break, my mom and I were waving at Ellen. She totally smiled and waved back. To make sure she was waving to us I quickly checked behind me. When I looked back at her said "yes, YOU!" and waved again. Ahhh, loveeeeeee her.

Did I mention we got Joshua Kelly's cd AND....... Princess Di's necklace (worth over 1400 bucks! EEEEKKKK).

Today was a day I will remember for a long, long time! LOVED every minute of it and I got to spend it with the best mama in the world!

I remember what you say....

Ellen's parking spot

Friends AND Full House were filmed here! The tour guide said that ER was across the street and during tours John Stamos would run over to the tours and tell fans that it should be called "Uncle Jesse's Studio". Bah.

We got to go on the coffee shop set. I was obsessed. Our tour guide said, "I'm not going to tell you what this is because I want to see who can get it first." I was of course the first one! I screamed it so fast that no one else even had a chance :)

Ellen's studio... basically a preview of Wednesday!!!!!!!!

Good morning folks..... I mentioned yesterday that we were trying to figure out what to do for the day. We eventually decided that we would do a trial run to Ellen to make sure that we knew where to go. We ended up going to Urth Caffe then we traveled on over to the Warner Brothers lot. We decided that we would go to the tour. Our tour guide mentioned at the beginning of the tour that he is always listening to what we say/like because that's how he conducts his tour. He took us to so many cool places.. a Friends set, Full House set, orphanage from Annie, Superman set, Heath Ledger's costumes/masks from Batman, and so much more. My favorite was.... the ELLEN studio!! He took us into the real studio, which was totally unexpected. When we walked in, they were working on the lights. Let me tell you something... the studio is SOOOO small. TV is amazing. It makes it look so large when in reality it's itty bitty. My goal is to be on the third row. We found out they made that row wider because that's the one that she dances down. Eeeeek. Seriously cannot wait!!!

We went to the beach, bought sunglasses (oops), and Pink Taco for dinner. Delish!

Today we're going to Malibu and Calabasas. :) Yay for more beach time!

Hope everyone is doing well!

Sunny (& windy) California :)

View from the Santa Monica Pier

Reeces French Toast from 26 Beach (my fav Venice restaurant!)

Just poppin' in to say hello... California has been fab. On Saturday night, we went to Bandera (amazing restaurant) for dinner with four of my girlfriends, my friend's mom, myself, and my mom. It was delish!! After that, I went out in Santa Monica with some of them and met up with more people. Overall, great night!

Unfortunately, I started my day off on Sunday on the wrong foot. I was straightening my hair when all of a sudden my face met the straightener... literally...... for a few seconds until I realized, "Wow, my face is burned!" I have an approximate centimeter wide/1 inch long wound on my cheek of my face. Talk about NOT planned/not cute. Lame. Other than that, Sunday was fun too. We went to the Santa Monica Pier, 26 Beach for lunch, In-N-Out, and we went shopping at the 3rd street promenade. We are set and ready to go for Ellen on Wednesday!

Today our plans are up in the air.... literally.... as I'm writing this my mom is asking me different things I want to do. So difficult to make decisions when there is SOOOOOOOO much to do!

I have pictures that I will upload when I get home. Talk to y'all soon!

Changes are good.

Welp, I finally did it. I chopped off my long hair. It was getting to the point of not manageable. There are only so many days that wearing a braid or throwing it up in a clip will be acceptable. I don't know how many inches it was, but it was definitely a lot. The girl told me it was the most she had cut off in a few weeks. It hit me when I saw them sweep it away... bittersweet. I also got a massage. Amazing, but sad part is I think I was asleep for most of it? Haha.

I babysat tonight, which ran a bit later than I expected... I was going to go see some friends for a birthday, but realized I should be packing instead. I leave for Los Angeles, California in the am and I have not packed yet. Yikes! Honestly can say, I am not looking forward to those airport lines tomorrow. The second we step off the plane we have dinner reservations with ALL of my LA buds plus one of my bffs moms. I couldn't be more stoked.

I am assuming my mom will be taking her laptop so I will definitely blog if that's the case. We're going to the Ellen show Wednesday, April 6th. We're thinking the show will be airing on Thursday, which is Carrie Underwood, Neve Campbell, and Joshua Kelley. If so, pretty cool. I've seen Carrie in concert and she rocks! I'll update on all of my news :)

Quote of the day: "Ms. Wexler, there's a leprechaun behind you!!! APRIL FOOLS!"
.... sad part is that I actually looked :)

Much love!