My Summer Begins in 24 Hours!!

I last wrote on the night of the half way mark of being at my parent's house - so it's only fitting that I write the night before I finally get to go home.

In approximately 24 hours, I will be on my way back to my own house - for good. And it feels FANTASTIC.

Things haven't exactly gone as smoothly as I thought they would go. While I've only been watching one extra child this past week - stuff around the house has been an issue. First, the toilet broke in the kids' bathroom. Nothing major - it's still usable, but will need to be fixed when they get back. Then, my son broke the ride-on lawnmower. My niece broke her glasses. One of the baby chickens died. And the kicker was, two days ago, one of the laptop screens just broke. For no rhyme or reason.

So, my parents are in for a few minor problems when they return.

It could be worse, though. At the end of the day, they did get someone to come and live in their house and take care of their foster kids while they were away. Not only that, but I also had farm animals to take care of, yard work to keep up with, and the rest of the household chores. Not exactly the scenario for how to spend the first month of my summer break - so they can't complain too much. I hope.

When push comes to shove, it could have really been a lot worse for me. While I have been stressed to the max with not being at home with Hubby, and having a lot more responsibility than I'm used to... I'm glad my parents got to take their vacation.

Once I get home, I'll have about 6 weeks left of my summer break before it's time for me to start working on my classroom and getting ready for my first school year as a 4th grade teacher. But, my work will begin WAY before that.

The first item on my to-do list is to inventory and box up all of my books that will go in to my classroom. Then I have to box up all of the other stuff I've collected. I feel like I have a ton of stuff at home - but I'm sure that once it's all in the classroom, it won't look like much.

My office will look bare once all of my school stuff is cleared out. It will feel very weird - but good weird. It will all finally be in the place I've been intending for it to be - in my very own classroom.

I honestly feel like once I go home, it will finally sink in that I got my job. I haven't had any time to celebrate or think about the journey that I've been on to get to this place...and now that I've reached the destination - I need to celebrate and let it soak in. Practically the minute I was offered the job, I had about 20 minutes to celebrate. Then, it was right back to taking care of the stuff for my parents.

I plan on making up for lost time. I have some stuff planned for the next couple of weekends - and I really hope that at some point between when my parents get back and when it's time for me to start work, my parents will babysit my kids for a few days so that Hubby and I can have some time to ourselves. I've missed him a lot. And I think it's only fair. They got a whole month of a dream vacation - I at least deserve a few days of not having any kids.

I'm just glad I made it to this day...and I'll be even more glad at this time tomorrow.

Bring on the new job celebration!!