Life in Brevard

Hmmm… Where to start.  I know it has been several months (read, 8), since I have posted on here.  But something about life settling down into a routine and yet about to become hectic, has made me want to take up documenting the adventures of the Transue family.  First of all, Thomas continues to love his job.  It is certainly stressful at times, but it is a stress that is challenging, not defeating.  His coworkers are awesome, and I am super happy to call most of them my friends.  Some are even good friends.  The brewery is now operating at full capacity, and they just got two more fermenting tanks in this past week.  A new bright tank is on the way as well, as I understand it.  Thankfully, Thomas has gone from working about a 70 – 80 hour work week, and now is down to a modest 50 – 60 hour work week. 

As for Liam, he has started “school” at an in home child care facility called “Little Explorers”.  He has several friends there, including two babies, which he loves.  His teacher, Miss Nikki, does so much for the children with her curriculum, they are all learning fast!  I go every Friday, and teach the little kids French – I make posters for them, read them stories, and sometimes we sing songs.  They have a ball, and there is something so nice about a toddler’s willingness to try anything. 

I am continuing to plug along with grad school, and loving it.  Right now I’m taking a French poetry class, that challenges me, but I love it as well.  So far in my grad school career, the lowest grade I have received is a 92 (which is still an A!).  I do have a paper to finish up from last semester, that I got an extension on because of the chaos that was my life at that time.  In other news, I have FINALLY been approved by the Transylvania Board of Education to substitute, and I go on Tuesday (March 26) for orientation and to get put into the system.  I am super pumped.  I’m also trying (when I’m not horrifically sick) to go to Brevard High School once a week to work with their French teacher, just doing miscellaneous support things.  As the weather here in Brevard turns, my understanding is that the population of the town doubles.  Tourist season is big here, and I am really excited to watch the town come alive.  I’m also hoping that the population increase will mean that my favorite restaurant in town, HobNob, will need more servers for the summer.  I have a good friend that used to work there, and another that works there now and I’ve heard it’s an amazing place to serve.  Plus the owner is super nice, I’ve met her quite a few times. 

I have apparently decided, on top of all these other things, to become quite the “do-it-yourselfer”.  Just yesterday, I started several seeds to germ, which I’m going to plant around the beginning of April.  I am going to grow sunflowers, marigolds, morning glories, tomatoes, spinach, mustard greens and dill.  We will see how this works out, and you can be sure in the meantime I will be scouring The Smitten Kitchen’s website for fabulous recipes with mustard greens, tomatoes and dill, which I will then torment everyone with on FaceBook/this blog (assuming I actually keep up with it this time).  I also have decided to haul out my sewing machine to give sewing another try.  My first two projects are going to be making myself an apron (since I cook now!) and some napkins to go with these fabulous placemats that my Mother-In-Law gave me.  I’m also going to call the fabric store where she bought it (since it’s in Asheville) and see if they will still do my “free” sewing lesson, for having bought the machine there.  Otherwise I’m gonna pay for Charlotte Maxwell to come up for the weekend and teach me everything she knows in two days.  Oh, and of course, there will be knitting projects on top of all of this. 

I would love to post some pictures, but I am currently having an issue with my memory card reader.  I will do best to resolve this issue, and have pictures posted soon, of our new house, and some projects I am working on.  In the meantime, have a great week everyone!

Seperated, and none too pleased!

        This whole separation thing is for the birds.  I know it has been like a month since I updated this thing (even Laura Grace who has a brand new baby has been updating her blog - I really have no excuse!), but I'm gonna get back in the habit of making it part of my Sunday routine again, now that life has a routine nature about it again!  So, here's what has happened chez les Transues...

      First of all, my beautiful baby boy turned 3 on September 21st.  He went for an awesome ride on Thomas the train with Thomas, Grandma, Gary, and my grandmother (Mammaw) on his birthday.  Then Thomas, Liam, and I had dinner with Poppa (my dad), and the next day we had a "Thomas the Train" theme birthday party at Grandma's house.  There were tons of friends and family there, and it was awesome to see everybody.  The next day was the day Thomas left.  We went out for drinks Saturday night together, for one last date, and Sunday morning we were up and out of the house by 5:45 am to get him to the airport on time.  I was pretty pleased with myself, as I did not bawl all over my poor husband as he hugged and kissed me goodbye.  I waited till I got back to Rowan county for that - that's right, I held it together for 45 minutes!
        Little Liam and I returned to Chapel Hill that day, and we are currently living with the fabulous Gilgor family!  For those of you that do not know, Deborah Gilgor is Liam's preschool teacher.  She is awesome!  She watches the little man for me if I have to work late, or run errands, etc.  She has two kids living at home right now, and they love playing with/taking care of Liam!  It's been such an amazing help, that's for sure.  Liam and I are sharing a room at Miss Deborah's which is kinda fun - I love snuggling with my little guy at night, but I do not enjoy the numerous kicks to the kidneys that I recieve each morning between 2am and 7am.  Every now and then he manages to kick me in the face too, which I think is remarkable.  The best Liam update is that the little guy is pretty much fully potty trained!  He has taken to standing up and peeing in the big potty "because that's how daddy pee-pees".  Yesterday, we all went to the pumpkin patch together, and Liam had a blast!  We went for a hayride, picked a pumpkin from the pumpkin patch, played in a big pit of dried corn, went through a haystack maze, petted some goats, and even milked a (fake) cow!  We are having a blast with the  Gilgors!
         Teaching update.  Hmmm, where to start?  The first few weeks were rough, and I'm afraid that as of right now, I am not really seeing any improvement, which makes things frustrating for me.  I love teaching French, that I know.  I absolutely love planning my lessons, finding my French quote of the day, figuring out how to introduce new vocabulary, etc.  This at least inspires me because there is nothing more frustrating than realizing you hate something you thought you would love.  This is all I'm going to say on the teaching subject as of right now, I'm not comfortable divulging anymore of my frustrations in such a public forum.
        Thomas is having a blast in Colorado!  While I know he misses me and the little guy, he's having a great time!  He's working tons, but he loves what he's doing (managing the canning line and packaging of the product), and who he works with!  I couldn't be more pleased for him, or proud of him!  The weather there is a good bit different, as you can imagine... they even called for snow there yesterday!  I'm working on a scarf/hat/fingerless mittens set for my husband.  As of right now, I have finished the scarf, and started the hat, so I should be done soon (and don't worry, I'll post pictures of that too!).  He has booked his first trip home, and will be back to visit me and the little guy on the 26th of October.  I can't wait to see my handsome husband!!  

Here are some pictures from the pumpkin patch.  Look for another update next week!

Little Liam sitting on a giant bale of hay!

Finding his way through the hay maze!

Made it to the end!!

Playing in the corn pit!

This feels funny mommy!

Helping Sylvia milk the fake cow

Petting another fake cow

Carrying his little pumpkin back from the pumpkin patch!  He picked it himself!

On the hayride with mommy!

From One Job, to the Next!

 

This is a video of Thomas' speech from the Oktoberfest tasting, on his last day of work!

 

       What a week for Thomas!  He finished up his career at Carolina Brewery on Wednesday with an Oktoberfest tasting, and an epic pie-ing.  At the Brewery, on your last day, you get a pie for each year you have worked there... Thomas worked there for nine years (almost exactly).  There are, of course, pictures below.  Wednesday night celebrations were cut short, however, because he had to be at the airport by 5:30am Thursday to fly to Denver.  He arrived in Denver around 10:30 mountain time, and it turns out, went straight to work!  Jeremy, the production manager at Oskar Blues, picked Thomas up and they went to the facility in Longmont.  They took him to lunch, and then threw him on the canning line for a little while.  After touring all of their facilities and getting to know some folks, they went to dinner.  The next day, Thomas went on a mountain biking ride with a bunch of the guys that work there, then helped out brewing a batch of beer.  Long story short, he absolutely LOVED it, and they LOVED him.  They are emailing him the paperwork for his new position as Packaging Manager tomorrow, and he will fax it back!  They also want him back in Colorado ASAP to train there until the facility in Brevard will be ready to open up.  I'm so proud of him!  We'll have to live apart for a while, but that's okay, lots of people have to do that for a little while, and we'll get through it.  As the director of my Graduate Program said, "Sometimes the biggest changes in life happen all at once, and that's okay".  So we think he will probably be headed back to Colorado after Liam's birthday (which is September 21) on September 22nd.  Little Liam and I will probably go to Colorado for Thanksgiving when I have some time off from teaching. 
        There's not much happening with me.  I'm still not teaching, my first day of actual teaching isn't until September 11th.  I'm still doing some training, which kind of frustrates me, but I guess it's necessary.  Liam went to stay with Gramps and Cookie (Thomas' parents) while Thomas was in Colorado, since I was working all day Thursday and Friday, plus driving two hours.  He came home with new shoes and what seems to be a whole new wardrobe.  What a lucky little guy (perhaps I should go stay with Gramps and Cookie for a few days!). 
         I've not had much time for knitting, so I haven't any finished product pictures to put up.  I'm finishing up a project for Harrison Patrick Dean (who was born yesterday!), and I'll post pictures of that as soon as I get it to his mommy, Laura Grace.  I've also started a few projects for Thomas -he's going to be living in the mountains of Colorado for the fall, then the mountains of North Carolina for the winter... the man needs knitted clothing to keep him warm!  As soon as I finish that stuff I'll post pictures.  Anyhow, that's it for now... as things begin to change, I'm sure these posts will be much more interesting!

That's me, waiting with the first pie while Thomas' nieces mustard his head!

More mustarding!

As the wife, I thought it was only fair that I got to throw the first pie.

Two pies at once!

And another...

And after nine pies, I'm not sure who got the worst of it, Thomas or the parking lot...

I may have kissed him, even though he was covered in pie...

It's true, I kissed him...

Isn't he handsome?  

And this is the breakfast that was brought to me in bed this morning.  Love my husband!

What a week!

   Boy has this been a busy week!  This week was my first week of teacher workdays, so I was super duper busy, and to top it off I had to work Saturday night at the Inn.  I'm hoping to not have to do that for very long, but I need to keep insurance benefits for Liam and myself until Thomas gets a job, then we'll add ourselves to his insurance.  Anyhow, Monday was my first day at Western Guilford High School.  I had to be at work at 8am everyday, which required leaving the house by 6:45am to ensure that I made it through traffic and arrived with a little bit of time to spare.  So far, everyone that I have met at the school is super nice!  I am worried though, because the people I know, I know by first name, not last, so I'm sure that once school starts I'll blank on their last name and call them by their first name in front of the students.  Oh well.  My fourth and fifth period classes are French 2 level, and my 6th period class is French 1 level.  I'm really excited about all three classes, but the French 1 class especially.  I'm hoping that since they will be brand new students, it will be much easier to get them excited about what we are learning.  I can't wait to start teaching!  Unfortunately, I don't get to start teaching on the first day of school, I have to do ten days of lateral entry training before I can actually teach in the classroom.  This makes me really nervous as I'm none too optomistic about the idea of my students having a substitute for the first ten days of class.  I'm already having behavioral nightmares about what will happen when I come back.  But who knows, maybe the sub will lay the smack down.  We'll see.
    On to more interesting things.  Thomas' last day at the Brewery is Wednesday!!  There will be an Oktoberfest tasting in Chapel Hill that day, followed by a pie-ing after the tasting.  Please be sure to be there if you can.  While I am planning to document the pie-ing, I'm quite certain it will not be as awesome as actually witnessing it in person.  But never fear, pictures will be up next Sunday if you are unable to attend.  As I understand it, the cat is pretty much out of the bag about Thomas' job interview next week.  Thomas has had two previous interviews with Oskar Blues Brewing Company, and on Thursday morning, they are flying him to Colorado for a third interview.  The job is working at their new brewing/canning facility in Brevard, North Carolina.  It seems like a really promising opprotunity.  Perhaps he will come back with a job, wouldn't that be awesome!  More updates on that next Sunday as well.
    Little Liam has had a busy week too.  Since Mommy has been working late every night, he has been helping Daddy cook dinner.  He also got to have a sleepover Friday night with Miss Deborah's daughter Sylvia.  He has also started calling me "Mom" when I'm doing something he doesn't particularly care for, and he does it with what I can only describe as teenage enunciation (and since he is only three I'm terrified of the potential attitude I will get in 13 years).  For example, I was tickling him a few days ago, and he said "Stop Moooom".  What?
    I have finally finished my sweater that I have literally been working on for five months.  I have also, in spite of having to work weekends too, been cleaning and organizing up a storm.  We are going to have to move out of our house, and I think a goal is to be out by the beginning of October.  Where we will move to is TBD at this point until we find out more about Thomas' potential job.  We have lots of balls in the air right now, and I find myself in a constant state of mild panic.  I know that everything will work out perfectly, there is just a lot of open-ended change going on right now, and I like a little more stability myself!  Anyhow, that's the current status of the Transue household, thanks for reading! 

This is my filing cabinet that I have decorated with French months/days of the week!

This is one of my bulletin boards, this is the French focused bulletin board.  Forgive me, but because I took it with my phone, there is no way to rotate it.

Same problem here.  Unable to rotate this photo.  But this is posted on my door - it's a "collage" with a picture of me, one of Liam, and one of Thomas and Liam.  

This is the bulletin board with all the rules, mottos, and mission statement of the school.  I call it the administrative bulletin board.  

Again, sorry but I can't flip it around.  This statement says I CAN read, write, speak and understand French.

This is my door.  It's hard to really see everything on it, but I'm really proud of it.  There is the Madame Transue sign on it, that you saw earlier, as well as signs that say "Welcome to French class", "Smile and Enter", and "Come on, let's go" all in French.  

Liam and Daddy making pasta together!

More cooking!  Liam is great at stirring!

My poor husband, who has also had an exhausting week, fell asleep on the couch at 9pm Tuesday night.

My sweater!  This is the front!

                                                             And the back!

Out with the old, in with the new!

        There haven't been many exciting things that have happened around here really this week.  I finished up my last full time day at the Inn, and my first day of teaching is tomorrow!  I'm really excited, this next week is going to be all teacher workdays, and Wednesday night is our open house.  I went on Friday to a new teacher orientation, which was pretty informative and I got to see my classroom.  One of the things that the assistant principal told us was that there were over 61 nationalities represented in the school.  That is awesome!  It also kind of terrifies me a little bit, because now I'm afraid I'll end up with a native French speaker in one of my classes who is always out to correct me or look for any mistakes I might make (dude, I don't speak English perfectly, so my French is obviously not perfect either).  But, theoretically someone who is a native French speaker wouldn't be taking French, right?  I'm still a bit nervous, but now I'm mostly excited.  I went onto Pinterest and got lots of teaching ideas, I bought a roll/grade book, and a teacher planner book.  I spent four hours cleaning and organizing our house and all my classroom stuff... Thomas thought I was nesting and freaked out for about five minutes until I convinced him it was a different organizational disorder. 
         I've been knitting up a storm lately for all these friends of ours who keep reproducing.  I've made lots of little things, and I'm going to try and put up pictures of them on here when I finish them.  I know lots of the people who read my blog are fiber artists! 
       Thomas is really excited about having some free time coming up, that's for sure.  I'm getting together a list of things to have him do during September while he is unemployed/searching for work.  He will be painting our bedroom and Liam's, and organizing lots!  We will most likely at some point be moving - we can't afford the house we're renting if we only have one income (and it's a part time teacher's salary).  Hopefully there will be good news on the job front for Thomas in the next few weeks!
       Liam is beginning to show a few, a few signs of being ready for potty training, so we're hoping to do that soon.  However, if you ask him if he wants to poop in the potty, he says no.  Oh well.  He loves to help mommy make pudding, and that has become a regular weekend activity for us.  I've got a few pictures from the week that I want to put up, and I'll have lots more next week of my craftiness in my classroom! 

This is a little baby sweater I knitted for friends of ours (who will remain nameless as I haven't mailed it yet, and don't want to spoil the surprise)

Matching hat and booties!

                                          
                                                                      Pudding face!

And the bubble bath required to clean up the pudding face...

                                                                                  Celebrating Poppa's 52nd birthday with some cake!

Fun New Stuff

Since the Transue family is embarking on lots of new changes in life, I thought perhaps our friends and family would enjoy hearing updates about our lives!

    As many of you know, I (SB) got accepted to graduate school at Appalachian State University for Foreign Language teaching, and my concentration is French teaching for the Community College.  I went to Boone for the Summer Graduate Institute for three weeks in July, and man was it intense (but awesome at the same time).  I was in class for seven (yes, that's right, seven) hours a day, and I even lived in a dorm!  It was like I was eighteen again (except I could legally have beer in the dorm this time).  I was really worried I wouldn't have time to do all of my studying at night, but it had never occurred to me all the free time I would have.  Not having to chase around a two year old (or for that matter, a thirty four year old) definitely freed up my time.  Not to mention I didn't have any daily household responsibilities, like doing dishes, doing laundry, packing lunches, etc.  It also made me realize how busy my poor husband must have been, doing all these things by himself and chasing around the kid, too!  I am a very, VERY lucky woman to have such a caring, supportive, and amazing partner.  Okay, no more mushy... I promise!

    Once I finished at the institute I began applying for French teaching jobs on the K - 12 level, and I got several interviews!  I got one interview at Eastern Alamance High School, one at Western Guilford High School, and one at East Chapel Hill High School.  I got a job offer from Western Guilford High School last week, to teach French part time, and I accepted!  I am super excited!  My first class each day starts at 11:58am and my last class ends at 3:50.  I will only be working at the the Inn on Saturdays and Sundays for a little while, then will probably stop working there altogether.  I am super nervous, but super duper excited at the same time.  I'm sure I will have all kinds of interesting stories to post on here from my teaching adventures. 

   The other big news chez les Transues is that Thomas put in his 30 day notice at the Brewery on July 31st.  His last day working will be Friday, August 31st.  The Carolina Brewery has a tradition of pieing (in the face/head area) employees on their last day of work - generally speaking one pie for every year of employment.  For example I had been working there for five years when I left, so I got five pies.  Thomas has been working at the brewery for nine years.  You do the math.  Don't worry, I will post pictures and video of said pieing.  He is super excited to have a bit of time off.  He is going to take the month of September off to recharge his batteries and just relax (or try to) for a bit, then hopefully start working again sometime in October!

   Little Liam is growing and changing and learning new things all the time.  He will be three September 21st, and I just cannot believe how fast the time has gone.  His fabulous teacher at daycare, Deborah Gilgor, told us a few weeks ago, that Liam has grown eight inches since he started going to school there last August!  How crazy is that?  He talks all the time (mostly when you don't want him to), walks, runs, jumps, whines, and cops attitudes.  He is a bonafide little person and it's so cool and so scary at the same time!  He also does and says things that are hilarious.  A few days ago, he put a ball up his left shorts leg, and another ball up his right shorts leg, and says to me "Look at my big balls, Mommy!".  It was hilarious, however inappropriate it may have been...

  These are just a few updates chez les Transues... I hope to update it weekly, but depending on how crazy life is, that may or may not happen.  But you can be sure of one thing, the longer without an update, the funnier the next post will be!  As soon as I get an adapter for the memory stick for our camera, I'll upload some photos too!