Friday, June 14, 2013

Making Me a Priority? How???

The last couple of weeks have been crazy!  I have been going full steam with all the end of the school year activities.  This is always a busy time of year when you are a teacher.  The combination of wrapping up projects and units combined with trying to maintain order with a bunch of students who have already mentally started Summer Vacation.  Add to that, end of the year report cards, getting the room ready for summer so the custodians can clean floors and it is a bit chaotic.

Both of my oldest kids are in choir at their schools.  They both had end of the year concerts the last few weeks.  The one on May 30th was for all the choirs in Albany from the middle schools up to the community college.  My son sings in the community college choir and my oldest daughter sings in the high school choir.  The concert was called "Albany Sings" and it was amazing.  I was so impressed with the quality of singing from all the schools.  The middles schools sang beautifully in four part harmony and held their own with the big kids.  Our little town has some very dedicated and talented music teachers who are able to push the kids further than they probably realize.  My oldest daughter had a solo and was amazing.  I'm so proud of her.  Bri is in the choir robe on the left.  :-)


I then spend May 31-June 2 up at our camp site getting it ready for the summer and fullfilling our duties as camp host for the season.  It was a lot of work but it will be worth it later when we get to go up and camp.  I also did a lot of grading of papers trying to get caught up so that the kids would have one last shot at getting missing work in before the end of the year.  

The last full week of school was a busy one.  The students are all squirelly and have a hard time staying focused.  Many are not happy about school being out and their behavior gets worse and worse the closer we get to summer vacation.  Breaks my heart a little bit.  

My son had a concert on Thursday of that week and it was awesome.  He had a solo with his acapella group and looks so comfortable on stage.  I love watching both my kids perform because they just look like they are having a blast.  

Friday began the craziness of preparing for Bri's graduation party.  Shopping, food prep, cleaning, more food prep, more cleaning.  I was a busy lady!  I made two HUGE pork roasts for pulled pork and a variety of fruits and veggies to have out to nibble on.  



To say my refridgerator was full is an understatement!  The party was a ton of fun and the graduate had a good time.  She doesn't generally like being fussed over but does understand that sometimes other people who love her need to fuss over her a little.  So every once in awhile she lets us.  :-)

Monday was the 8th Grade field trip.  We took the students to Oregon State University.  The Memorial Union has a bowling alley and other activities in the basement.  We reserved the whole area and let them loose.  They had a blast.  Then we loaded up and went to a park and had pizza and let them play basketball, football, frisbee or just hang out.  The weather was perfect and they had fun there too.  I came home and took an hour and half nap.  I was pooped!

Tuesday was the graduation.  By the time I got home I had enough time to change my clothes, fix my hair and then take off.  Graduation started at 6:30 and we got done about 9:00.  Lots of speeches, the choir sang and then the kids crossed the stage to get their diplomas.  Bri got an honors diploma and was the second to the last to cross the stage.  One of the school board members is a friend of ours so he jumped up and made sure he was the one presenting her with her diploma and he gave her a hug instead of just of a handshake.  It was fun to watch!  Can't believe my little girl is out of high school.  It seems like she just started kindergarten.

Wednesday was the last day of school.  We had field day and then the kids signed yearbooks and t-shirts.  It was another amazing day.  I had several students come tell me that the loved my class.  It made me laugh because I was just sure that some of them hated me because I pushed them to do better all the time.  :-)  School was out at 1:30 and I spent the afternoon working on grades.  Then I went to dinner with a bunch of the teachers from school.  After dinner we went to the 8th Grade Promotion.  (No, it's NOT a graduation!)  They were so excited.  It was fun to be part of their special day.  What a great bunch of kids.  They are going to do great in high school.  By the time I got home it was almost 9:00 p.m.

Thursday was grading day.  I had a list of end of the year things to do in order to check out for the summer.  On top of that I had to pack up and move all my stuff into a new class room.  Luckily my youngest daughter came along and helped me out.  We got it all moved into the new classroom.  I will go in later and start organizing and putting things away in their new proper spot.  By the time we got done it was after two.  I took Meighan to lunch to thank her for helping me.  When we got home it was about 4:00 and I laid down on the couch and I was OUT!  I slept for over two hours.  I think I would have slept longer but my phone got a text and it woke me up.

Today I am leaving for Washington DC/New York City with fourteen 8th graders.  So I was getting ready for the trip all day.  I started with a massage.  Wow, did that feel good.  I was one tense lady and it felt so good to have all the kinks worked out.  Then I had to get a pedicure with the other teacher who runs the trip with me.  After that it is shopping, going to the bank (twice because I forgot to get cash for our lunch and dinner allotments for one of the days of the trip) and packing.  My hubby is getting ready to take me out to the school so we can get going on the trip.

I tell you all about my crazy couple of weeks because I want to know.  How do I make time to exercise when I have so much going on.  I get really frustrated when things are crazy like this because I feel like I have so much to do and a limited amount of time and energy to get it done.  Something has to give.


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