tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-79685578785108691342012-02-16T03:29:16.675-06:00This is a weekly blog intended to keep our family and friends up to date on what's going on in our lives.Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.comBlogger331100tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-62891273126950733542008-10-01T18:32:00.006-05:002008-11-30T14:47:32.873-06:00

Please visit us at our new website. Here you will find photo albums, read a little about us, view a blog, and much more!www.TheNoormanFamily.com

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-87303493815318314432008-08-30T15:24:00.004-05:002008-08-30T15:51:55.489-05:00

I know it's been a couple of weeks since I last blogged, and I apologize for that. Things have been very crazy around here these last couple of weeks. As I mentioned in my last blog, we had a pretty big change take place about a week and a half ago. Lisa is no longer at Hillsboro School, which is a thirty-minute drive away from our house. She got a transfer to Chapman's Retreat Elementary

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-79625452423093504752008-08-15T20:34:00.005-05:002008-08-15T20:46:52.438-05:00

Today was the last day of the first week of school, and man, are we tired! Middle schoolers can sure take a lot out of you! I have three classes full of awesome sixth graders, and Lisa's quite busy with her eighth graders.I created a new video, this one of Grace opening a present. You can view it on the sidebar; it's really cute.There's nothing new going on, nothing other than a restful

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-26967350576778163422008-08-11T19:28:00.002-05:002008-08-11T19:42:07.807-05:00

Today was the first day of the 2008-2009 school year, and it went well for us both. We had a half-day, so that made it even better. We're not yet used to getting up that much earlier after sleeping in all summer, but that'll come along.I'm teaching language arts this year, which I believe I wrote before, but I'm just so happy to be doing so, I had to write it again! I taught math last year,

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-67271125183679325572008-07-21T21:10:00.004-05:002008-07-21T22:17:46.411-05:00

We had an awesome time in Canada and in Michigan on vacation, and we're home safely. Canada was very relaxing, as always, and we got to go to a couple of Tigers' games while we were there. My brother, Travis, and his girlfriend, Amy, drove out on Sunday morning to go to the game with us. It ended up being a very special event, as it marked the first victory by any Detroit teams that Travis has

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-79112711924839137242008-07-04T00:39:00.003-05:002008-07-04T00:50:43.894-05:00

We're off to Canada for vacation tomorrow morning. I'm thinking it's going to be about 14 hours total, so please pray for our safe travel along the way. Grace loves car rides, so she's usually a pretty good traveler. We've got Gertie (our GPS), the iPod, and snacks, so we're good to go! Thanks for your prayers.The Tigers won tonight, and gained another game on the White Sox (who lost), so

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-60641326841049750892008-06-27T13:22:00.003-05:002008-06-27T13:33:25.674-05:00

Today was Lisa's last day of summer classes for her master's program, so we're very excited to start actually spending the day together. We'll going to celebrate tonight by making pizza and watching the Tigers. I know, we go all-out in our celebrations!I don't remember if I wrote this already or not, but our fence is finally done, and we're very happy with it. Grace especially enjoys being

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-62956884869188670152008-06-21T11:27:00.004-05:002008-06-21T13:24:39.612-05:00

Okay, it's done. My project was a video project I was doing in a tribute to Dad. It's posted on YouTube, and on here, so you can view it. The song I chose to go along with the pictures is very important, so make sure your speakers are turned up. If you're reading this, and you knew Dad, you will need some tissue...that's your warning. Please leave comments if you would like.

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-43620471815872080142008-06-10T11:56:00.004-05:002008-06-10T11:59:57.770-05:00

Okay, so I like to blog about random things sometimes. This is one of those times. Lisa's at class right now, and Grace and I wanted something to eat for breakfast. Well, we decided to make it a brunch, and make french toast! I don't think I've made french toast since Lisa and I have been together, and I actually had to bust out The Joy of Cooking to make it. But it's made, it's eaten, and I

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-27735235797888832922008-06-10T11:22:00.003-05:002008-06-10T11:55:40.697-05:00

Here are a couple of prayer requests we hope you will consider.Many of you know Mike Hull. He is a very good friend of mine, and he stood up for me in our wedding. Mike's sister, Sara, had a baby boy, Zephan, not too long ago, and he was born with some complications, and we almost lost both Zephan and Sara during birth. Mike was down visiting about a month ago, and he said that despite this, they

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-79277010948891836082008-05-30T11:44:00.002-05:002008-05-30T11:53:32.385-05:00

Hey, everyone. There's not a lot going on this week. Lisa's folks drove down for a week's vacation, and they're taking off tomorrow morning. Please keep them in your prayers for safe travel.It's pretty humid today, but that's something we've got to get used to in Tennessee. It's not completely unbearable, but difficult to do a whole lot during the day that doesn't involve being near a body of

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-89668674469375200022008-05-23T17:50:00.015-05:002008-05-23T18:34:49.852-05:00

School's out! Yesterday was our last day of the 2007-2008 school year, and it ended with me being the recipient of not one, but two pranks. My colleagues are great, and I feel so loved! (I really do) If I find out who got me, I'm sure my friend Michael will help me plot against them.So here's what happened. The sixth grade went to Thompson's Station Park for a field trip. While we were gone, my

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-42339356928474491202008-05-06T13:33:00.002-05:002008-05-06T13:35:01.589-05:00

This is a copy of a letter I've sent to a few people. I just wanted to place it on here as well, in case I missed anyone.I’ve been wanting to do a little project in memory of Dad for a while now, but between moving, teaching, and everything else that is life, I’ve had little time to work on it. Summer break is only 13½ days (yes, I’m counting!) away, and we finally don’t have any big plans this

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-81307853057440676892008-05-06T12:36:00.002-05:002008-05-06T13:32:29.684-05:00

Lisa is working on her masters degree at Lipscomb University. It is a grueling program in which she'll complete 32 credit hours in just over a year. The first semester of the program has finished, and Lisa has complete 9 of those credit hours. Her grades were mailed here the other day, and she earned all A's for each of those those hours! I'm so proud of Lisa and the awesome things she's

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-56033993061052917232008-04-30T12:38:00.003-05:002008-04-30T12:54:36.701-05:00

15 and one-half days remain in the 2007-2008 school year! The kids are quite restless, as you can imagine, and their teachers are as anxious as they are for summer to begin! It's going to be a crazy three weeks, so please be praying for Lisa and me.We're still waiting on word from our Homeowners' Association on whether or not we can build our privacy fence where we want to. I wasn't aware of

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-9904965323775728512008-04-09T16:58:00.002-05:002008-04-09T17:05:27.606-05:00

Woo-hoo! It's TCAP time in Tennessee, and Lisa are I and all of our teaching colleagues are unbelievably excited! Please note the sarcasm. TCAP is like the MEAP in Michigan, and most teachers generally agree that this time of the year is one of the worst, and a time we don't look forward to. It's usually a very draining week, and I always feel bad for making kids take so many meaningless

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-49423347621998824742008-03-18T19:42:00.004-05:002008-03-18T19:58:25.773-05:00

So sorry for the length of time between our last post and this one. It's been pretty busy here, what with settling into our new house, getting over our sicknesses, and preparing our students for Spring Break, which is thankfully upon us now (the kids were going nuts!). Thank you all for your prayers for our well-being, and your notes of concern over not having updated this lately. We're fine!

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-39301506226332901692008-02-15T17:20:00.002-06:002008-02-15T18:13:35.540-06:00

As I write, Lisa and I are both pretty much on our death beds (don't freak out; I'm being melodramatic). I started showing symptoms of the flu on Tuesday night, and have had to get a sub for the last two days. I'm still not entirely well, but am feeling better than I have been. Unfortunately, thanks to me, Lisa's flu has just begun. So, we get to baby each other as much as our aching bodies

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-27760541351624240542008-02-06T21:16:00.000-06:002008-02-06T21:27:17.241-06:00

If you've followed the weather from around the country at all, you know that we went through a pretty tough spell of storms last night. Quite a few tornadoes ripped through the Nashville area, killing over 30 people, according to the news. We are safe where we live, but some families from Lisa's school were not so lucky.Though none of those people lost their lives, a few lost everything else.

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-17320395777956205942008-01-31T19:58:00.000-06:002008-02-02T14:52:27.826-06:00

Please keep a friend of mine in your prayers. Becky, with whom I teach, lost her baby yesterday morning. Needless to say, this isn't going to be an easy time for her or her husband, Jimmy, and they will need all of our prayers to help them through this impossibly tough time.We had our first snow day today. It started with a two-hour delay, and both Lisa and I reported to school to prepare for the

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-67482038554830734362008-01-27T16:31:00.000-06:002008-01-27T16:36:04.031-06:00

The day after we took possession of the house, we came over and started doing some work on it. We pulled out the stove, and there were all sorts of little brown objects behind it. I had to look behind the stove all over for a hole, because though I'd never seen it before, Lisa said it looked exactly like mouse poop. I was getting ready to call the previous owner and ask him what he did about

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-64681978177605301882008-01-14T16:57:00.000-06:002008-01-14T17:15:16.826-06:00

Steve, Tanya, Steven, and Sarah (our brother-in-law, sister, nephew, and niece) got us the Monopoly Electronic Banking edition for Christmas and so far, Lisa and I have played two games...she beat me both times (quite handily, I should add). It's so much fun, and the debit cards are much easier to use than the money. I'm tired of losing, though. I may challenge her again really soon, probably

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-89087304079699226352008-01-08T13:34:00.001-06:002008-01-08T13:51:11.406-06:00

Lisa got me the Apple Nike+ iPod Sport Package for Christmas, and it is so awesome! What you do is, you put a special chip in your shoe (in my case, in a little pouch that ties into my shoe), and plug the receiver into my iPod Nano. Then, as I'm running or walking, it keeps track of the distance I've gone, my speed, how many miles/hour I'm going, and how many calories I've burned. There's even a

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-61672345906326833892007-12-31T18:42:00.000-06:002007-12-31T21:27:42.911-06:00

I'm sitting here with all sorts of stuff tumbling about in my head: We spent some short, but high-quality, time with our families and got much more than we probably deserved (at least, I did); school starts back up in a week, and I have to start planning for our first week back; they say here that the weather is supposed to take a turn for the worse, but I'm guessing that to us it will be like

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-46471284826532581932007-12-29T09:13:00.000-06:002007-12-29T10:17:17.345-06:00

My plan was to send our Christmas cards, and then write our Christmas letter and post it here. Well, as you have figured out, I've not quite gotten around to writing the letter yet. But here's my thinking: It's a letter about 2007, so I still have two days in which to write it, so that's what I'm going to do.Here's an update to the poll you've read at the right: I beat Travis in bowling!

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-11616315081894344632007-12-18T17:51:00.000-06:002007-12-22T21:17:54.073-06:00

It's not "baby" big news, but the next best thing: we bought a house! We made an offer on a house last week, and yesterday the sellers accepted our offer. We close and take possession on the twenty-fourth of January, and we are so excited!!! God has blessed us so richly in so many different ways. Here's a picture of the front of our house.You can take a look at some pictures of our new house

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-45862799199586229012007-12-05T17:44:00.000-06:002007-12-05T17:57:20.487-06:00

Not one of my better titles, I know, but I'm lacking a certain creativity at the moment, so you'll have to forgive me. So let's see, what has happened this past week or so here in Tennessee?We had our first celebrity sighting the other night when we went to Macaroni Grill for our anniversary dinner (for those of you who sent us cards, phone calls, etc., thanks!). Actually, I'm not sure you'd

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-50553349333505539162007-11-27T19:22:00.000-06:002007-11-27T19:34:56.659-06:00

Lisa's folks came down for the week of Thanksgiving and did some Grace-sitting toward the end of the week while we took a day-trip to Chattanooga. We went to the Tennessee Aquarium, which was awesome! We took a bunch of pictures, some of which I'll try to post on here later. If you ever have a chance to visit the aquarium, please do! Anyway, the folks are back in Michigan now, back to the

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-63478875100700000952007-11-21T15:35:00.000-06:002007-11-21T15:53:44.325-06:00

Okay, so today was our first day of Thanksgiving break, and of course since we're not teaching and can get out to enjoy the weather...it's pouring! Ah well, what are you going to do? Grace is enjoying the rain, and Ron and Gail are enjoying that it's not snowing here.Lisa's folks were able to come down to spend the week with us for Thanksgiving and to do some Gracie-sitting while we go away for

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-41985203579539254372007-11-10T16:56:00.000-06:002007-11-10T17:11:50.445-06:00

Okay, it wasn't really all that lazy. I had a conference today, where I went to four different math workshops. They were awesome, and I'm looking forward to using some of the things I learned in the classroom. When I got home, we took Grace over to Longview Elementary and we played soccer in the courtyard and then on the playground. I think that's her favorite place to play around. Lisa put

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-31433070449769495752007-10-31T23:49:00.000-05:002007-10-31T23:58:12.627-05:00

Whether she looks like it or not, Gracie loves dressing up-especially for Halloween!

Lisahttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06440408105195998114noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-3586212441445292472007-10-30T10:14:00.000-05:002007-10-30T10:52:45.731-05:00

I'm reading Financial Peace by Dave Ramsey right now, and it is phenomenal. I highly recommend it to anyone, whether you're having financial difficulty or not. While we plan to apply all of the suggestions to our finances, right now we are concentrating on getting out of debt, and it's a fun ride! I enjoy seeing our debt dwindle every month, and there is such a feeling of relief and

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-7968557878510869134.post-80433703348934141372007-10-28T19:40:00.001-05:002007-10-28T19:54:24.694-05:00

We've been here in Spring Hill, Tennessee, about three months now, and life is good! We have a two-bedroom apartment about 10 minutes from Todd's school and about 30 minutes from Lisa's school. We've recently begun our house hunt (the very preliminary stages), and like the selection we're seeing!Grace likes it here a lot, even though she doesn't like us both being gone for very long. Todd

Toddhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/07854653542489295063noreply@blogger.com0