Hello?

Its been awhile...

Life has been crazy but not stressful. Work has been good and now that I'm used to the busyness of the kids, I'm able to work more on tidying the room, creating more curriculum, bugging the director for items to improve the classroom and basic collaboration with the other head teacher about how to help the children more. It keeps me busy and I feel like I need to put in more hours in order to stay on top of it all. Because Will and I carpool, I sometimes get to work a lot earlier than when my shift starts and I usually get right to work with the projects that seem to be getting stacked up but never finished.

I'm still in the process of getting my license though I've been approved by UVM to get it which is the key ingredient. I got an overall grade of 2.65 out of a possible 3. It has 26 sections that I get graded on a 0-3 rubric. Whole numbers are used only, and I got either a 2 or a 3 on all sections. I'm working on the paperwork now that goes along with getting my license and think that the first set of papers is ready to be sent off. Then I get some papers back to be filled out and have to go get fingerprinting done. A lot of running around to be done in order to get a piece of paper that says I'm smart enough to teach others. Luckily the daycare is paying for me to get my license : D I might be able to get a bonus after I get my license too. All good reasons for me to add onto the list of things to do.

We were lucky to have a few dates this past week on our vacation. Our plans got changed and we ended up staying up here in Vermont for a few days and then went down to Mass. for a few days to visit Will's mom and her boyfriend, George. While we do have dates often, we don't always have 3 dates in 1 week. We decided to use the time that we had on vacation to really enjoy ourselves and made sure to have fun activities for the kids and for us. Will's mom insisted that we go out on a date while we were there visiting and we could hardly say no to such a willing and eager babysitter. We decided to hang out with Will's sister, Sarah and her husband, Tim. It was great to have the chance to catch up and get to know them better. Usually we have the kids when we see them so the adult conversation has been somewhat limited in me getting to know them. We had a blast with them and didn't end up getting home until late (2:30). This was on top of staying up until 3 the night before chatting away with George. And then waking up at 7 the next morning for me. I had always mistakenly thought of vacation time as a time to catch up on sleep. Apparently I've been misinformed and now realize that vacation time WITHOUT kids is when you get to catch up sleep. WITH kids you just get deeper into the hole. The whole family had a great time this week, though Maple is paying the price of our (ok, ok...it was my decision solely) decision of switching dog food quickly. She IS however being free fed now which is huge from where she was just a few days ago. She is a smart dog and realizes that throwing up and having a belly ache isn't something to be desired and has seemed to learn that pigging out on food = throwing up and belly ache.

Also on our vacation we've discovered the local pool and have been enjoying the hot summer days that have finally arrived splashing in the cool outdoor pool water. My mission is to teach the kids how to swim this summer. William seems to be a more eager learner than Kayla. I'm still struggling to get her to put her face in the water but William has already dunked his head in and we're working on blowing bubbles in the water. It probably helps that the kids see me swimming laps too...or at least that was how William got interested in putting his face in the water, here I was, an adult, actually putting my face in the water FOR FUN!

Life is SOOO good and Will and I are really happy. We both feel lucky to have found each other and things are going more smoothly than anyone could have hoped, especially with the kids. The things that we've had to deal with involving them are things all children go through, regardless whether or not its a step-parent or not. We always present ourselves as a team though and I'm careful to follow the rules or discuss new rules with Will first and have us present them together. But even then the new rules are few and far between. Will has setup a smooth running household that I was able to smoothly and happily join. The one thing that we've had to work on is the fact that I am an adult and that Kayla needs to ask me if I want to do something rather than her asking Will for permission for me to do something with her. But at least she's consistent and does that with every other adult in her life ; )