Memories of our 2005 Family Get Together

Due to a nasty ice storm, Shay and I enjoyed the day at home. The time could not have been better as I'm hosting my family tomorrow for Christmas. I'm really excited as I had not been up to doing something like this for many years. Yet, on the other hand, I feel guilty about being happy that we're all getting together because we're not ALL getting together, Christi will be missing. In this little video clip, she is singing away with Shelby - her prized Cousin, 2 1/2 years older than her. Christi's death has been terribly hard on her too. They were so close.

(PIC: NBC Studio Tour in NYC) Shayla had a pretty intense call back audition for the high school musical last night. When we walked into the school they said the kids would be on stage about an hour and a half and that parents should come back then. I was happy it would be a while since I noticed some of my 8th grade students were playing their basketball game so I got to watch them and got to chat with their parents. When Shayla was dismissed, her face and hands were actually "sunburned" from being under the hot lights. Amazing! She had a blast and told me that if she didn't make it, it was ok because she never had so much fun at an audition before. They had to cut half of the girls and from what I saw they were all darling! Soon after we got home, the phone rang. Thinking it was probably about the musical, I asked Shayla to get it. Well much to her surprise, it was "Dorothy" telling her that she was selected to be a Munchkin in this year's musical, "The Wizard of Oz". "Thank you, oh, thank you, oh thank you so much!" is what I heard from Shayla's end. It was precious! When Shayne came home he told her that last year's was postponed due to the blizzard and they nicknamed it "Snowklahoma", he asked if this year's would be the "Blizzard" of Oz.

Check out Christi's face. She was so frightened. I always thought when she'd look back at these pictures and learn that it was her own daddy dressing up as Santa Claus for her, she'd burst out with laughter. I would have loved to have seen that. Yet, I am glad she died believing in Santa! And I'm thankful Shayla believes too! (Not everyone should be told by their older sister when they're only five that there's not a Santa Claus, cough!) Can't wait to see you tomorrow, Tina! Drive safely! Love you!

And since I'm still BURSTING, I'll share my GLORIOUS news from this morning! While cleaning the oven this morning, I heard an email "beep" in. I glanced and saw it was from OSU's Office of Responsible Research Practices. I knew it was about my IRB proposal and my heart started pounding. The email informed me that they believe my study should be exempt from the IRB process because I am in no way harming any of my adult subjects. If my advisor (the principle investigator in the research investigation) agreed, then I needed to resubmit some forms. If I decided to go ahead and seek IRB approval (no way!) then there were more forms to complete and weeks to wait. With hands shaking at the incredible gift of news, I sent a text to my advisor asking her to read her email asap and to get back with me. Thankfully, I caught her and she got the wheels in motion to help me resubmit a few items. I called the college student I hired (a former student of mine actually, and a Christi Thomas Scholarship Winner) to help prepare my mailing and asked her if she could have what I needed ready by Friday, instead of in two weeks. Thankfully, she thought she could and I feel like I'm getting a huge jump start. I know there will be delays down the road, but today was tremendous news and a huge jump forward! It's not a done deal; we still need to hear back about the forms I resubmitted via email, but (fingers crossed) I think it's going to fly as exempt!

About a week ago, I called the "man in charge" about a few IRB questions I had and he asked me to tell him about my dissertation study. When I was finished he said, "I won't know until it's on my desk, but it sounds like your investigation could be exempt." I responded, "I thought the only research that was exempt was what was done with dead people." (I was trying to be funny, but that is what I was taught in one of my four research courses.) Well today I was proved wrong and I'm so happy about that! (Besides, I'm so excited about working with REAL teacher and learning from them, not trying to get dead ones to return surveys and volunteer for interviewing. hee hee!)