The kids went back to school on Wednesday, and my youngest started kindergarten! (sniff, sniff) I started today (I get kids tomorrow) so I was able to take my time with him at the beginning of the day yesterday, and I got to pick him up at the end of the morning, too. Starting school has barely been a blip on his radar screen so far, and things are going well for him as far as I can tell. I know the kindergarten teacher and her aide pretty well already, so I think I will hear if there are any problems. The other two boys have had a smooth start to the year as well, so far anyway. Let's hope it continues!

I had a day of meetings today at school, and found out that due to a mistake by my superintendent, I will be getting paid for a prep period, which will make my paycheck a little higher. I only teach three periods out of seven, and the policy used to be you had to teach four periods in order to also get paid for a prep period. So although I spent HOURS at school last year, I only got paid for the three periods I was actually teaching. Last year I had three different classes to prepare for, and this year, I only have two, (because 7th grade choir is split into two sections) so hopefully I will have an easier year AND get paid more. Gotta love that! My little school corporation has always had about 200 kids/grade, and as of last May, it looked like that trend would continue. However, as of today, there are 235 7th graders enrolled for this fall. That is quite an increase, percentage-wise.....in fact, we are 15 lockers short in our building! I have 86 kids signed up for 7th grade choir. Luckily, they are split into two sections, but the concerts (when they are together) will be interesting. I am anxious to meet all my kids tomorrow (I will know most of the 8th graders from last year) but it will be a long day. Today, during our meetings, the "chillers" on the air conditioning units in our building quit working. It stayed cool in the building at first, but immediately became humid, so it felt clammy. Then it gradually got warmer....yuck. I hope they were able to get it fixed or else tomorrow will be miserable.

DH and I are planning to go out tomorrow night for our anniversary, which was last Saturday. I am looking forward to it....we haven't had much time alone since June. His job and the kids keep us busy enough that it is hard to spend much time on our relationship these days, although obviously residency was harder. I guess the difference is now that we are BOTH busy, not just him. And I have always been the one to plan dates, etc., and now I don't have time to do it, either. It's time for DH to step up!

Sally[/QUOTE]