How Did it Go?

Summer is rapidly approaching its end. Not, if you judge by the weather though as the temperatures are climbing close to, or above 90 degrees on most days.  If you look at the calendar, fall doesn’t start until closer to the end of September, on September 22^nd to be precise. Yet, summer is coming to its end.

Tomorrow afternoon we will figure out teachers, and for some school districts that happened already last week. For us, it will be at 4pm tomorrow. On Wednesday is the meet and greet, the time when we drag bags of stuff to the kids’ classrooms and take piles of forms in return. The meet and greet reminds me of, not the zoo even if it is a zoo out there, but more of a stadium concert. People trying to get in through those double doors as their lives were depending on it. Behind the doors are the classrooms, and the teachers. Our elementary school has just tad under 700 students. Even if we estimate that most students have at least one sibling at the school, that means there will still be somewhere between 350 to 450 parents on top of the almost 700 kids. In one building. Going through the same doors. At 11 am on Wednesday. Everyone will have driven there too, so we’ll have somewhere around 350 cars parked around too. I think the school parking lot holds maybe 50 cars, and it’s totally going to be the survival of the fittest.

This event is followed by curriculum night on both Wednesday and Thursday, depending on grade level. I get the honor of doing both Wednesday and Thursday. I also get the honor of trying to decide between the boy, which one should I attend. 2^nd grade for both boys but different teachers and classrooms. Last year I showed up an hour late, and missed the presentation for both boys equally. Not my finest moment.

So, the count down has begun, and school will officially start in a week.

We’ve had a great summer. I have been able to combine work and fun just perfectly, so that not once has it felt like the kids have just had to survive the day with both of us working. A couple of hours yes, but there have not been endless days on Xbox and/or iPad. My office staff, most of my colleagues, and some of my clients have gotten to know my children quite well though.

There have been daytrips around the area. We have been swimming at least weekly, most weeks twice or even thrice. They have played with friends old and new, and I have met with my friends. Our princess learned the backstroke as well as freestyle on top of the breast stroke that she mastered when she was five. The boys still have more enthusiasm than skill when it comes to swimming, but both learned how to ride their bikes and that new skill did come to good use this summer. Where I would ride 8 to 10 miles with the boys, the hubs would double that with my tomboy princess when out on our biking adventures. So, plenty of local fun outdoors.

I used to have anxiety attacks over the summer months. As both of us had to work, and my work wasn’t really all that flexible. The equation left us with endless summer camps that everyone hated, combined with days and days of Xbox time from early morning to nightfall. When the summer finally ended, everyone was exhausted, and as we were exhausted to begin with the wonderfulness of structure of school was quickly changed into weeks and weeks of sickness and negotiations on whom would have to stay at home with a sick child that day.

I have to admit that my new job fits our family perfectly. Yes, I work most random hours that often land on Saturdays or Sundays. I start my morning and end my day by checking my email and the MLS, but I have really only missed one meeting this summer, and that was due to dental surgery my youngest had to have. Could I have dragged him to the office that morning? Absolutely, but I did not have to, and that is a true blessing.

The question before summer was how the no summer camp summer would pan out. If we would be looking for boarding schools by beginning of August and would be starting the search for camps for the following summer as soon as we got them back to school. The honest answer is no. They all claim they had an awesome summer, and so did we, the two working grownups.