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The school year got kicked off on Sept. 1st with a neighborhood picnic. Andrew had to go to school on September 1 (holiday be damned!). He got to take his best friend, Sam, with him though...so he didn't mind.
On Tuesday, the rest of the kids headed back to school.
Amanda and her Schultuete 
Alex, Aidan and Zoe with their Schultuete. I couldn't leave Zoe out LOL! The kids were all excited to get back into their routines! I still can't believe that summer is over! For me, the warm days just flew by too fast.
So far, Andrew has amazed us by showing a new and very welcome interest in school. Every single day he comes home and does his homework. Though he has only been in school for 2 weeks, he has already had multiple quizzes and a test or....three. He has done well on all of them. Last week, while he was sitting on the sofa working on his Algebra II, he said "you know mom, I hope you don't think I'm a geek...but I think I like studying".
Woohoo...that's all I can say! LOL The difference to last year is striking and all of his teachers have noticed it and commented. I hope he is able to maintain this level of motivation. I just don't even know what to say about how impressed I am with him. I might be in shock!
Amanda seems to be happily adjusting to life back at the middle school. Though she complained bitterly about her year at the catholic school, it appears to have been very effective at letting some time and distance come between the girl wars that were erupting every week. She has had no problems with the girls who used to be mean to her and has made a few new friends. So far...so good. I'm crossing my fingers (and toes!).
Alex loves his new class. That came as no surprise to me, because he ended up with the same 4th grade teacher that Amanda had for 4th grade. She is a wonderful teacher who saw me when I entered the classroom for open house and ran over to hug me and see how I am...and how Zoe is...She also made a point of giving me a big hug when I left. She lived through that terrible year of chemo and stress. She is a wonderful, positive force, and Alex's comment after his first day of school was "I love Mrs. Adelman. She ROCKS!". Awesome. I love her too!
Aidan has been a little less excited about school starting. Each morning I am greeted by "I'm sick. I can't go to school!" sigh. I don't even think he wants to spend time at home with me. I think he is just tired and he wants to sleep in! LOL
I don't blame him, because...quite frankly, every single morning I am wishing that I could sleep in a little longer too!
My classes are well underway...and...though I find myself invigorated and enthusiastic, I am also exhausted and stressed out. It's a little early in the semester to feel burned out. I hope I'll be able to get through it all.
The problem is that it is so much work...and my time is so limited. Of course, I say that and here I am goofing around blogging instead of studying! The anatomy class has turned out to be a huge stress. My anatomy professor lectures on the history of Anatomy and the evolution of structures. He doesn't teach actual...anatomy. That would be ok (his lectures are really fascinating) except I know nothing about Anatomy. I feel like I am having to teach myself everything. His approach to lab over the past 2 weeks was to supply us with bones and basically say "good luck". Hmmm....2 dimensional pictures in a book, 3-dimensional bones....I kind of started freaking out because I don't know how to put it all together.
Last week was really up and down.
On Wed. I had a bit of a falling out with a group of girls that I get together with every week for coffee. They got upset because while they were sitting working on an outline for one of the girls' classes that she is taking, I excused myself and got up to say hello to someone who had just walked into the coffee shop. The disagreement happened because I didn't end up introducing them. I think it was a big misunderstanding, but I was absolutely shocked at how it all went down. I felt attacked as a person and it really upset me. Instead of just brushing it off, I addressed it...and it blew up in my face. It was really awkward and I felt really down on Thursday....just in time to bomb 2 pop quizzes in Anatomy.
Boohoo. The first quiz was in lecture. I had gone through all of my notes to prepare and instead of quizzing us over the 2 weeks of content, the professor had posted an extra article online and took the question from there. Oh well...I can't change it. Then I got to lab and he had bones laid out for a quiz. As luck would have it, most of the bones were from the arms, legs and pelvis...bones that my lab group had not yet had the opportunity to go over! We only were given the bones of the sternum, vertebrae and skull to that point. It was just bad luck...but so unfair...really.
It's hard to find a balance between reading, outlining, studying...and family. It's harder than I thought it would be, and Thomas has not provided me with much support. He feels resentful of the fact that when I get a free minute I sit down at the computer to go over my notes etc. I'm feeling right now like I'm not going to do very well. I hope I'm wrong, but...We have our first big anatomy test on Thursday and I just don't know how I can possibly learn all of the skeletal anatomy by then. On top of that, I have two quizzes in medical terminology...
and...
while I'm complaining...
I go in for an echo tomorrow morning, a CT on Wednesday and an Oncology appt. on Friday.
These are all new appointments made in the last couple of weeks. I'm sure that the end result of my week will be that everything is absolutely the way that it should be...but in lieu of some renewed symptoms and issues, we're doing the overly cautious "check-it-out" thing.
There is never a dull moment around here!