and the newest hired teacher is...

(me and gools at barnes and noble being so excited to work on long term plans and for my exciting new job!)

me!! i am now an employee of woodlawn middle school in east baton rouge parish school district and i will be teaching two 7th grade english classes and one 8th grade english class. one of my mississippi students called me today and i told her i would be teaching 7th and 8th graders. she just laughed and said "that's going to be hard ma'am" agreed, tranquasia. agreed. i will not have my own classroom (i'll be jumping between three different rooms, on a cart no less) and im excited for the challenge. thank you to everyone (especially the amazing quadrilateral) for sending out so many positive vibes that i'm sure got me the job. i am working woman!

philosophy circles.

that post title is not deceptive at all...for the last few nights my front porch has been overrun by men who discuss important things in ways that i can't even begin to frame a conversation with any sort of authority. i have loved how the boys take over our adirondacks (and two actually brought their own chairs...people are settling in at tulip st.!) and us four ladies always end up in the kitchen dancing, talking, and always snacking. our conversations are filled with the real, not the hypothetical. they are full of emotion and passion and sadness and happiness and laughter. and although we don't happen to talk about the cyclical nature of the universe (in terms of the laws of thermodynamics) i would say that we have some pretty intelligent and moving conversation. im not sure who i'm convincing here...but as far as i'm concerned, both the men and women of tulip st. are equally impressive.

life has formed somewhat of a routine these days. it is incredibly fun to wake up to a houseful of my friends. i eat a bowl of cereal, whenever i decide to crawl out of my yellow and gray bedroom hours after my alarm has actually gone off, i drink a cold can of DC, i say my hellos, and i sit on the wood floor of my room and try to make myself look decent. i've decided its actually not even worth it to shower. 30 seconds after you get ready you are already a sweaty, damp mess. my hygiene has gone out of the window. like seriously. and, our shower drain has decided to not stay open while the shower is running, so our feet get to bathe whilst we are showering. so many people germs all over my feet. hopefully no one gets what lives in my red vans or plaid sperrys...tulip st. has become the place to be. ive gotten texts from people asking what the party is going on at our house, everyone just walks in and out, and we are becoming quite the hostesses. i absolutely love playing hostess. two days ago, we inaugurated leslie (my lime green kitchenaid) and made banana bread. without measuring cups. or a for sure recipe. how amazing are we? lets just say the bread was a hit, and there are more baked goods to come.

we kicked off "round zero" this week, which is all day training. i wrote my classroom vision and big goal. my 7th graders are going to be young professionals and know that education equals opportunity. i am so excited to get into the classroom and change the trajectory of lives. it sounds conceited, but im going to be as bold as to say that i will do everything in my power to give my students more. more academic success, more educational opportunities, and more well rounded-ness. basically, im (hopefully) going to do for them what i would have loved someone doing for me in the 7th grade. and ps, no one really believes that i didnt have friends in 7th grade. yep, pretty sure i read books at lunch in the library alone (and that lunch consisted of a hotdog, super pretzel, and dr.pepper) and then once i got to temecula prep, was never allowed to be written into the other girls story! i have come a long way....

i have so very much swirling around in my head at the moment. too much to decipher actually. i am trying to decide what my passion is, besides the very generalized "helping people" schtick. i have almost forgotten my absolute love for women's issues...i need to find a way to weave together everything that i want for my life. more on this to surface. im taking suggestions as to what people think my passion should or could be.

necessary shout outs: 1.) momma gools for being so incredibly amazing, especially when we all needed a mom a little bit:)
2.) brittany johnson: you can do it. you are incredible. dont forget that you are the kourtney to my khloe.
3.) my familia: thank you thank you thank you. love to all.
4.) the quadrilateral: you are my backbone. and you make it okay for me to fly my freak flag as high as it will go.

tonight, im riding high on our free couch we just got from a TFA alum and the fact that i have learned what it means to really love people. in this next week, i want to demonstrate that love, and make it visible to everyone around me. my idealism is slowly creeping its way back into my life and i love it. welcome back.

sigh of relief.

(this photo is me and my roommate/soulmate emma lurking at community coffee, stealing their internet after a long day of "round zero" training. i almost miss institute)

finally...a job interview!! it is for a 7th grade ELA (english language arts) position at Woodlawn Middle in East Baton Rouge Parish. wish me luck.

as of late, ive been living the life. absolutely lazy. kind of messy. my house looks like a homeless shelter, and i have to go to random coffee shops for internet. one of these days i'll be able to do a legitimate blog post, but until then, know that i am incredibly happy and excited to sleep in my adorable room later tonight (or dream of sleeping...its going to be a wild night i think...)

the promised pictures and more exciting information.

these past few days have been a joyous blur! i absolutely love living in rainy, hurricane season baton rouge and living with some amazing people. the only person that is hurting is my bank account...thank goodness for credit cards, right? i'll post more once i get internet at my home (currently at barnes and noble) but here are some pictures.

louisiana living.

we christened the new place last night, with our "freedom" party (don't worry blogosphere...pictures are sure to follow). let me preface everything i write with the statement- i am incredibly blessed. my life has become this fairy tale (fairy tale to me, i think) version of imperfect perfection. if you would have told me one year ago that i would be living in a gargantuan early 20th century home in the most beautiful area of the capital city of louisiana, i would have looked at you like you were a total crazy. if you would have continued speaking and told me that i would have spent my last 5 weeks of summer teaching a bunch of incredibly bright and vivacious 6th graders and enjoying it more than practically anything i've done in the last 3 years of college, i would have mocked you in disdain. then, if you just had to keep running your mouth and said something to the effect that i would probably never find fantastic friends to make my life lovely and exciting, i actually might have agreed with you. fate has twisted all of these situations into this amalgamation of the things ive needed most to grow as an individual. im acutely aware, more now than ever, of my relative imperfection and the long road that i have to travel in order to even be close to the person that i want to eventually become, but for the first time in a long time, i feel like im actually on the road that leads to that happy conclusion.
that sounded a bit cryptic. let me put my life in terms that are a little easier to understand. my last day of summer school was this friday. my students were unusually rowdy, as per the last day of school is. at least they got to walk into my classroom where Justin Bieber was blasting (i tried to get Chris breezy going, but youtube decided to stop working. my students LOVE the chris brown). we chatted about the big goal (more on that later) and we talked about where they wanted to be in 10 years. the lovely, ambitious things that came out of their mouths made me so happy. when i asked one special student where she wanted to be, she said she wanted to be a lawyer because they help people, and that she wanted to go to hale college. We all stopped and kindle asked her where that college was. after some prompting and a little correcting, this student realized she actually wanted to go to Yale. most of my students have these big dreams, and i must admit, i thought that they wouldnt have them. i was biased, and at least i can see that now. but practically every single one of them wanted to something big with their lives, and it always involved college. and not just any college, but ivy league colleges. because of the luck of my draw with the roster, i feel like i got the privilege of teaching the smartest kids going into 6th grade. every single one of them is so capable. all of my students made at least 10% improvement on their math scores (most made more like 20% increases, one student made an improvement of 34%!!) i just cant believe that there is a system in place that makes my genius students feel as though they aren't smart, or can't do grade level work. it just doesnt make any sense is all. but back to the last day. we listened to bieber, i gave a stirring college presentation (heavy on the sarcasm there) and then amy (my fellow teacher) gave hers. we then fielded questions about college, my favorite questions being "were you scared to go to college?" its funny how we become these fearless leaders in our classroom, we aren't people anymore, we are teachers. it was astute of our student to pick up on the fact that yes, we do in fact get scared (hello, i was scared almost every day walking into the classroom. the trick is not letting them smell the fear). after our college presentation, i let the students have mini donuts and juice that i had picked up from my favorite walmart on the way. (i had decided to drive to school again, simply to listen to taylor swift at full blast with my windows rolled down and the sun rising. and for the promise of a pre-school diet coke). then, we had our awards ceremony. we had printed little certificates for all of our students and we gave a little spiel about each student and then they heard their name and got to come shake our hands. not our best planned moment, but i think the kids liked it. i tried to describe each student accurately, but its hard to know how to say so many things you feel and think about students. one of our students LOVES to dance like Michael Jackson. so, i made him moonwalk up to get his certificate. one of the perks of teaching. then, we cleaned our room and walked to lunch in our straight and quiet line one last time. however, we were about 15 minutes early to lunch for some reason, so i had to round them up and corral them in the cafeteria. not an easy task. but i did get to sit at each table and talk to everyone a little bit. that was my favorite part of lunch duty, getting to talk to my real students, not just the ones that show up in our room everyday. they are such dorks. i always felt right at home.
the afternoon was supposed to be a "carnival" for all of the students with good behavior. it was more of a huge punishment for everyone involved because it was three outdoor games and it was hotter than the freakin surface of the sun. i kid you not. i thought i was going to spontaneously combust. my students commented on how red i looked. awesome. i got to run the "trashketball" game. basically, students ran to a point in the grass, crumpled a piece of paper, then tried to shoot it into a trashcan. hilarious. especially because the boys would get all into it and actually use basketball technique and talk a big game. they LOVE it. i have some funny anecdotes, ask me if you want to hear them. after that, it was the end of the day. i hugged my students and sent them on their way. and that was it. weird how it happens like that. they just walked down the hall like it wasnt the last time they would ever see me. i miss them. i hope with my whole heart that their next teacher helps them to realize their potential. i got my first phone call from a student yesterday. it was tranquasia. and that girl has some attitude. but i broke through. and it made me SO happy.

yesterday, we made the drive to BATON ROUGE. i am now, officially, a resident of this wonderfully humid place. i think that it may quite honestly be the most humid, disgusting weather place in the entire world. someone phrased it wonderfully yesterday, "the amazon has nothing on baton rouge". agreed. we to our house, and fell in love all over again. it is SO cute. and palacial. we got all our stuff moved in and then went to get our stuff out of storage. from storage, we went to sams club, where i now have a membership. so exciting. im really putting down roots! we got the essentials (toliet paper, paper towels, bread) and then drove back to our home in a torrential downpour. we ate subway sanwiches on our air mattresses, and our first houseguests came in. we have mr. huff, will, and joe living with us for the next few weeks. they are absolutely wonderful people, and already showed their appreciation for our hospitality by buying us some hugs (those nasty fruit juices we loved in elementary school) cheez its, and bagels for tomorrow morning. love those boys. i mean, men. after more errands (like buying our first piece of furniture- a table for a certain game played yesterday) we got ready in our freedom apparel (i was the only one who wore the visor) and had our first party!! not too many people came, but enough SLAers came to make it a good time. we danced, i drank way too much diet coke, and then, i went to bed around 2am. i woke up to a chorus of snores, and about 7 extra people sleeping in all random corners of my house. it was one of those moments that made me love my life too much.

then, got dolled up and went to church. it was small, but nice. the institute building is right on campus (and i LOVE campus) i walked in, said hello to the first people i met, and grabbed myself a seat. i didnt even fall asleep during sacrament meeting. and i really needed the sacrament and the meeting today. i kept staring at the picture of Christ on the wall and desiring to come to know Him better and to serve Him better. i came away with a new resolve to do better, but i guess i do that almost every sunday. one of the speakers talked about loving people like Jesus loves them. for some reason, i found this particularly profound today. i want to love people with open arms and let them know that i would do anything for them. i think that if people could describe me as someone who would do that for them, then life has been a success. the speaker read a quote that reminded me of how life without love is nothing. there is no point in anything we do if love is not the prompting factor. how absolutely profound. when it all boils down, it wont matter what i did, who i did it with, or the prestige attached to it if i didnt actually love those around me and develop those personal relationships. gah. my weakness needs to become my strength in this one...

so im still not hired. im going to start praying about it, maybe you should too. while sometimes out here i feel like an island unto myself, im incredibly happy for the most part. its all about enjoying the journey after all, right? (pictures will be up later tonight. be sure to check back...there are some gems)

i walked in memphis. and loved it.

its the end of another crazy week. I can't believe that my time at institute is coming to a close. it feels like we just got here, but it also feels like we've been here for 10 years. i have mixed feelings about the delta. i think there is a magnificent sort of beauty here. (not too many other agree, honestly) the farmland, the amazing sunrises and sunsets, and the clouds- omg it is like they are right on top of you! although i may sound like a total hippie for saying this, i could lie in the grass (with a ton of bug spray) and just look at the sky here for hours. this last week has had many highs and many lows. more lows than highs i would say, which is the unfortunate truth about having a bad attitude and being exhausted all the time. i love my students even more now. im coming to know them a little better and i just want to do right by them. i broke down in one of our training meetings the other day (yes i cried in front of about 30 other people. classy.) because i was so tired and i was incredibly frustrated that i wasn't doing more for my kids. and then, i realized, that i will always feel like this as long as i am a teacher, as long as i am a human being, i will never have done enough. thank goodness i do not have to be perfect. its hard to remember that simple but true fact in the grind of daily life.
i taught my kiddos a lot of things this week, most successfully i taught them how to identify whether a shape was congruent, similar, or neither. i made a powerpoint presentation (which they LOVED. they were so excited to have me turn off the lights. i was like, if you will listen better, ill turn the lights off every day!!) and we learned a little. i got observed this week, which was so nice and so necessary because i felt like a failure all week long. and there are a lot of positives in my classroom. i wrote my students little notes on colored construction paper just saying things like "keep up the good work" and "i know if you work hard you can achieve anything you want!" and they were so weirded out. i heard a lot of things like, "Ms. Sullivan, what are these for?" i wanted to scream to them that i care, and that i want them to excel. i internalize these things too much, especially because my job first and foremost is to actually teach. teaching and educating these children is my job and is what my focus should be. i think i get distracted by the little things as opposed to the big picture of real learning. its a problem im trying my hardest to fix. i start teaching reading next week and im kind of sweating bullets about it. i have the kids for 1:45 minutes for 4 days straight. that is a whole lotta time to fill! i am excited though- my lesson on monday involves me blaring the song "World's Greatest" by R. Kelly. then tuesday starts off with a bang, and "Man in the Mirror". i heard one of my students singing MJ the other day and i was like Boom. done. you sing it, we'll discuss it. i have a ton of prep work ahead of me tomorrow. but its all worth it. i do so much better at teaching when i practice beforehand. before i get off the school subject, yesterday one of my students said to me, "Ms. Sullivan, i'm not trying to be mean or nothing, but sometimes your breath smells like salad." how ironic is that considering a piece of salad hasn't crossed my lips ever. how embarrassing.
this friday was much needed. i feel bad looking forward to the weekends so much, but this was a tough week. it took a toll on me for some reason, and i think its just everything hits you at once and you just wish you could have 2 hours to do whatever it is you want. i cant wait to have my life back.
yesterday was a good night. i finally got chicken parm for dinner (over priced and just ok) and i felt sassy so i got a shirley temple to go with it. i felt like such a goober ordering that as we sat at the bar. the bartender didnt make me pay for it though, so yay free little girl drink!! we then went to the warehouse which is a charming restaurant/bar and practically all of TFA was there. im not gonna lie, it felt good to be social and to actually know people to be social with. i mean, i actually talked with multiple people who werent the quadrilateral (although we were together the entire night. last nights bit o fun was making up conversations for random groups of people in the bar). i knew people and it felt fantastic, especially because these particular people are awesome. im so impressed by everyone i meet here. hopefully they feel the same way about me. then after that, we dropped mady back at the dorm and me and emma and gools went out on the town, feeling sassy. we went to another local hotspot called backdraft that was absolutely the cutest thing ive ever seen. i do not know how cleveland manages to have these adorable restaurants. we lasted around 45 minutes and then headed back to the dorms exhausted. today, we decided to go to memphis! it is only about 2 hours away. i loved it. downtown memphis is beautiful, with a lot of old architecture that is incredibly well maintained, this cool old hotel/shopping center called the peabody, and of course, the crazy beale street. beale street is just a street full of bars and blues joints and i absolutely loved it. gibson guitars has their factory right there too. we walked around in the heat (it was killer) and tried to find something to do. there isnt much during the day when you are on foot. we walked into the peabody and there was a fountain with ducks in it. so of course, i had to go take pics with the ducks. and yes, a duck actually bit me. he thought i was too close and he didnt like it. how humiliating to be bitten by a duck. after wandering a little bit more (and taking in a diet coke break at the local subway) we went to Rendezvous for ribs. its a memphis establishment, apparently. its in this little back alley and its down these stairs. its really quaint and very southern. i got the ribs and i wasnt as impressed as i could have been, but it was certainly good. i think my frustration stemmed from the fact that i got a half order of ribs and it was not enough food. haha. but seriously. i eat like a man these days. any weight i may have lost, is now back and kickin. it felt really good to have some real memphis bbq. i forgot to mention how amazing the view coming into memphis is. you drive through icky town (looks like all of mississippi if that is any indication- except with bars on windows) and then, the road narrows, you begin to see old brick buildings and cute light posts, and then BAM the mississippi river is right in front of you with pretty green banks and this amazing bridge. it was at that moment i fell in absolute love with memphis. i have a feeling the south might have a pretty tight grip on me after 2 years of living here...my parents should start worrying! memphis got two thumbs up, especially because the culture seems so interesting and rich. on our drive home (we drove in stevie, emmas car) we planned our birthday party themes and our halloween costumes. i love my future roommates so much. they make it okay for me to be me. and i am a little kooky if im going to be honest with myself. im quiet most of the time, but if freaky is what you want, freaky is what you'll get. im so looking forward to the end of this week, and my journey back into real life and lousiana. hopefully ill get a job sometime soon. oh, and i told the person who is in charge of getting me hired (looking bleak. only 38 people hired out of 101) that i was very interested in teaching special ed. we will see what happens on that front.
i got some amazing news. my dear friend who has been battling cancer just let me know that a current scan revealed that she is cancer free. i am so grateful to my heavenly father for this miracle, and to her for being a real friend to me and my family. i am beyond happy for her and her family. love you, j.
wish me luck for this next crazy week. and if anyone know how to teach 6th graders how to understand the theme of a story, id be much obliged...

ive been meaning to upload these little gems for a few days now. yay for the 4th of july and red visors.

happy birthday america.

i dont know why, but the 4th of july brings out a lot of very conflicting emotions in me. its weird but true. i was gazing up at the fireworks, out in the field at statesmen's park, and i was feeling. i wish i could adequately explain it. it was one of those moments when you are happy, but sad; excited but nervous. opposites, opposites. but in the non-emo side of things, we had another amazing day. (not so great as the house finding day, but still up there). the city of cleveland through us a 4th of July bash, complete with barbecued pork (delicious), sodas, waters, ice cream, and a fireworks extravaganza. this city and this community have been so welcoming to us, i honestly dont know if we deserve the accolades and praise. it does feel real good though. we may have gone to wal mart beforehand and gotten red visors (and shirts for our freedom party that we are hosting in our new house in two weeks. more details on that extravaganza to come later. i dont have the strength to do so right at this moment). i felt so lucky to be in cleveland mississippi and live in our free country. happy 4th of july, a day late, but happy 4th nonetheless.
today was a long day. It was a necessary reprieve from the travail of teaching (im hating that i suck so bad at something every day, and that my kids suffer because of it. terrible feeling) but when i get time to think...man i think WAY too much. i did learn something incredibly important today though- exercise! it works wonders! i did some sprints, some abs, and i got to see the loveliest little neighborhood that is next to the campus. being outside and moving my body and actually seeing landscape and reality...does wonders for the psyche. tonight- im going to focus on not being so inside of myself. its so annoying to me and im sure its annoying to other people. and maybe ill hit up sonic yet again, its definitely one of those days.

the best day of my life yesterday.

best day of my life.

thursday! thursday! thursday!

first and foremost, i WILL start posting more interesting pictures here. well, once i start taking them at least.

Its been a long Thursday already, and im pretty sure I have at least 7 more hours until its over. Can I just publicly state how much I hate long division? I hate the fact that I had to teach it to kids who don’t even know their times tables, I hate the fact that im really dumb when it comes to make and I cant think of any good way to break it down for them, and I hate the fact that my kiddos are not mastering their objectives (or even getting to them for that matter). Long division, you totally ruined my day. If you couldn’t guess, I “taught” a lesson in two divisor long division. Teaching should not really be the term applied to what I did today. I tried to engage my students (and most of them were engaged, or just too frustrated to even act out) but the objective was just too hard. There are the 4 or 5 people who absolutely, 100% mastered the concept (they are my little superstars! And luckily I get to meet with them during academic intervention hour. Tomorrow, I am going to blow their minds with 4 digit quotients. They better be ready to dominate tomorrow!) It is incredible to see the wide range of abilities within my own classroom. I have a student who reads at a second grade level, but is doing math practically at grade level. I have students that don’t know their multiplication facts and I have students that could recite them to me in their sleep. Its incredible, especially because it seems that the current system has failed even the gifted children. I am so invested in my kids, my only complaint is about me, and how much more I need to be doing for them. I have one student (Anqwan) who is a little treasure. He regularly gets 100% on his assessments (class averages are in the low, low 70s usually) and has amazing behavior. He is stellar. And tomorrow, since he got 10 stamps in his “passport” (our behavior tracker- goes with our global theme) he will be the first person in our class to be a star on the wall, and get a cupcake. I think his mind is going to explode with happiness and pride. And that makes me feel fantastic. But anqwan deserves it. he wants it. and from what I’ve seen, he can do it. I am struggling with figuring out how to reach the students who don’t have the natural ability that he has. As a teacher, I am slowly realizing how absolutely frustrating students lives must be because they are forced to sit in a classroom (even one as cool as ours) and struggle. They struggle and struggle, and then, if they don’t get the attention and help they need, they act out. By some amazing grace, my kids don’t really act out, act out. But I know when they are absolutely disappointed in themselves. I asked one student how her math class had gone and she looked at me and said it was a bad day. And, in retrospect, I didn’t do enough to convince her that what she was doing was a huge step in the right direction, and that I was so proud of her. My time is stretched so thin that I feel that I can’t do much at all. And that is such a helpless feeling. And it gets worse for me because I am miss unobservant/totally unobservant and I focus on what I have to do and my peripheral vision gets shut off somehow. And that is no bueno as an educator. Im going to work on it in this next week, giving each kid what they need from me. Im going to be stretched a little thinner in the next short weeks. In other news (lets be honest- its all teacher news. My life does not exist outside of this program), I got to watch the bachelorette two nights ago, and in something a little more exciting and a little more cultural, I went to a BB King concert on campus. BB King is the proclaimed “king of the blues” and this style of music originated here in the Mississippi delta. King is 84 now, but still performs incredibly powerfully. His show last night was more of a communication rather than a mere performance. He seems like an amazing person. And ill admit it, I fell in love with the blues. There is so much emotion in every note, in every chord. I could feel it last night, practically tangibly. (when I was awake. I may have dozed off a couple times.) I am officially a blues fan and would love to play blues guitar. It felt so good to hear and feel real music like that, and to see a real legend. Oh and calling all celeb watchers- morgan freeman was totally there last night, and I saw him! Who would have thought that I would see a celeb in the delta? Loves it. yesterday afternoon was a real treat, because after a joke played by our administrators (they told us that we were going to have to move school sites because of a “problem” with no details) we were allowed to leave school early for a TFA day, Totally Free Afternoon day. But the ironic part is, they totally had a scheduled carnival with scheduled activities. Totally TFA and totally hilarious. It stressed me out that someone would schedule my free day, but regardless, it was so nice to see a Mississippi afternoon for once. i ended up working after about an hour and half of time wasting (story of my life methinks) and then had a meeting regarding my teaching observation that had happened earlier in the day. I was VIDEO TAPED teaching my students the "Division Chant" that i completely made up the night before. Here it is: "The number of steps in division are 4, let's practice them so we can master math more...First, Divide (hold up arm in a slash position) then Multiply (cross arms in front of you, like an X) Subtract (arm held out horizontally in front of you lengthwise), then Bring it down (index fingers pointing down and a little booty dance. the kids eat that part UP). my class behaved like ANGELS the entire time. silent, well behaved, i didnt even have to give any consequences whatsoever (although i probably should have, lets be honest.) yesterday, i was on top of the world. unfortunately, my assessment results were less than stellar, but another person that observed me told me that i had done some really beautiful things in my classroom and that i had created an amazing culture full of urgency about learning within my room. Ah! Gasp! happiness!
tonight has been better than today, ten fold! i got off the bus then went to hey joes for hamburgers (its my second one and its delicious! i ate lettuce, tomato and ONION on my burger. delicious) and then to walmart for our behavior prizes. i just got some mechanical pencils and a bag of sour gummy worms for anqwan. at the moment, im listening to daft punk and sitting in the lobby with some pretty chill peeps. i mean life is good. its hard, im exhausted, but its GOOD. so good. and tomorrow is friday, and that means getting squirrely. and then saturday, we are going to baton rouge in order to sign a lease for this house in the garden district. we are actually racing other guys in our corp to get to it before they do...i hope we get it because it has 5 bedrooms, and we need four to live in and then one extra for our smoking jackets. and cigarette holders with pixy sticks in them. and slippers with no backs. and overstuffed armchairs. and for some weird reason, i keep getting the vision of the March family attic from little women when i picture this 5th bedroom. i hope so much that we get it. im off to the printing lab...wish me luck! tired but HAPPY. and fulfilled.