Summer Lovin’

Oh, how a year changes everything.

Here’s how I felt about the last day of school last year.  (Hint---I wrote angst-filled poetry!)

And here it is in 2011.  And 2010 (I wrote poetry again…Whaaat?!). And finally…2009.

In 2010, my writing is pretty upbeat, but generally, the last day of school made me want to curl up in a fetal position.  But not this year.  Oh no, this year I AM ON VACATION PEOPLE!

I haven’t posted any pictures of my class for privacy sake, but since my blog is private I’m going to post one photo of my fifth graders:

I seriously loved this class.  I seriously hated to see them go. We had our graduation ceremony on the last day of school, and it was such a proud, bittersweet moment for me. 

On the other hand…I can sleep in now (yesterday I slept in ‘til 5:45 a.m. and today I made it to 6 a.m.), I have no lessons to plan or Reading Response Notebooks to read and correct and I get to spend quality time with the guinea pig,who’s experienced a major personality overhaul in my absence (I’m not kidding).

The good news is the teacher I replaced during her maternity leave has extended her leave through Christmas, so I’ll be back next fall!  The bad news is, none of those kids pictured up there flunked out so I’ll be getting a new class of students who will have to work pretty hard to meet my current expectations.

Ben graduated from 5th grade too!  I couldn’t go, but Dave took some pictures for me:

                                                      It’s almost like I’m really there!

                                                 

                       Ben and Mr. B.                                                                                       Jake, Ben, and Ethan (who did not plan their coordinating outfits).

Yesterday I started off my vacation by doing 5 loads of laundry, cleaning the kitchen, taking the kids to the library (and picking up Dan Brown’s new novel for myself), and changing the furniture around in Jack’s room.  Dave and I also joined the staff of my elementary school for a night out, which really topped my day quite nicely.  I never thought I’d be happy to do laundry, tote the kids places, and clean things up…but I am. 

When the kids were tiny, I remembered saying to Dave, “I never get a vacation!   I don’t even get weekends off!”  And that’s how it felt, those crazed little buggers sucking every waking minute from me, the laundry always needing to be done, the toys strewn about no matter how much I tried to keep things picked up (I didn’t actually try too hard), even my showers and sleep interrupted by someone always needing me.    Although the last five months have been a challenge to navigate, I’m ready for this new part of my life.  I appreciate my summer and weekends like I never have before.  I’m pinning a whole new category of things on Pinterest and I’m looking forward to meeting my new fifth graders in August.

Of course until then, I am going to savor every minute of this summer.