Kickin' it in Gear!

Guess what-school is starting.  SOON!!!  Arg, I'm not ready for it to start!  With summer school running through the end of June and all the professional development classes I've been taking, I barely feel like I've had summer break!!!  Starting it is though.  I go back to work officially in a week, though I will start back myself on Monday to get lesson plans started.  I spent today in my classroom and pretty much got it all set up and re-decorated; I actually got a ton accomplished and already have the first day of school all copied and mapped out.  My schedule is pretty much the same as last year, which is comforting-I can literally translate a lot of my plans from last year to this year without having to change too much in terms of time frames.  Its nice to know this year will be easier to plan than last year, for lots of reasons.  I probably won't have to get to school at 6 in the morning this year-heaven!

The kids are completely ready for school to start though.  They have not hit that bored-to-pieces stage yet.  Isn't that weird?  They've gotten a little bit more onery with doing chores and clearing, so we put ziplock money bags up on the fridge and we are rewarding them for certain chores/following certain rules with pennies, dimes, nickels, and the occasional quarter.  They love the idea, especially since it is so visual.  But other than that, they haven't gone stir crazy yet.  Regardless, Karianna and JD talk all the time about going to school.  Karianna already has her backpack packed and JD carries around his lunch box because he says he is practicing for school.  I found out today I can make their meet the teacher night, so that makes me feel a lot better since I can't send them off on the first day of school. 

All in all, we are in that mode:  getting ready to wrap up summer and dive into another school year!  Though I am feeling a bit antsy about committing to another school year (which means being away from the kids), I can comfort myself knowing it will be an easier year after all the effort I put into planning and creating last year.  I can also comfort myself knowing it will be a shorter year, and that I will have at least a few months with the kids after Christmas-driving them to school, going to parent teacher conferences, and handling the homework front right after school.  That's definitely excting and I'm encouraged to start the year off with a bang!  An early goodbye to summer-the official a mere 12 days away!