Summa-time

I don't think I've mentioned this year how I'm now officially done with work for the entire summer!  Well, about 8 weeks.  This is one of the main reasons I remain employed by a school district over other options because, let's face it, it's pretty awesome to make a good salary and still have 8 weeks off in the summer.  Booyah.

So last week my wise Father asked me what my summer plans were.  Perhaps you are thinking the same thing.  So, let's chat about my summer plans.

1.  Grad school.  I was going to take 3 grad school classes, but I ended up making the decision on the side of sanity and dropped the reading specialist practicum.  So, I'm taking a "Frameworks of Learning" course along with "Teaching Math in Elementary/Middle School."  I'm trying to just do a number of classes left countdown to December graduation.  Right now the magic number is 5.

2.  Work.  Wait...didn't I say I was done with work?  Yes.  HOWEVER, somehow I became a co-chair for two committee at my job, and so I have projects to do over the summer.  Luckily my fellow co-chair is a good friend, so doing departmental PR videos and developing an internship program will be uber fun.  I'll keep telling myself that...

3.  Travel.  I'm going on a mega-sisters-across-Missouri trip this weekend to Kansas City with my sister Katie.  I'm a little bummed that the health department in CoMo put the nix on the cicada ice cream, because I wanted to seriously try it!  I have no idea what we're going to do, but we have free hotel and gasoline to burn.  After that, I'm doing a solo road trip to Florida.  I'm excited to visit my Aunt and Uncle  and spend my days at the beach doing absolutely nothing but reading and sunning.

4.  Purging.  No, not vomiting.  Getting rid of "stuff" in my house.  I have way too much "stuff," and I need to get rid of some.  Look out goodwill, my CR-V might be full.

5.  Gardening.  I have a wicked awesome container garden going on.  So far, my lettuce and snow peas were successful, and I see baby tomatoes growing.  I'm hoping to also harvest peppers, carrots, parsley, and zucchini.  I probably forgot something...there are lots and lots of containers out on my patio!!

6.  B90.  I'm doing the Bible in 90 days challenge with a group of ladies, so every day I'll be reading and blogging about Bible.

I know these 8 weeks will go by very, very quickly, but I'm happy to get in my less stressed and relaxed groove.  I have a feeling the upcoming year with work is going to be extra busy, and I want to be ready to light the fire when work starts up again in August!  Happy Summer!

Shiny

I am admittedly not the neatest person in the world. My home at the current moment is barely livable to me, and I'm going to attack that problem tomorrow. But I must say that there is nothing like having the cleanest, shiniest car in the parking lot. When I purchased my new car in October, part of the deal was free car washes for life at the dealership. My last car was rarely washed. It was silver and the dirt blended nicely with the paint job. Well, I now have a black car, and with the recent snow my black beauty was so dirty I could barely touch it and stay clean. I knew that if I went to the dealer on a Saturday there would be a wait for the car wash. When I pulled in, the nice, cute maintenance guy said it would take an hour and thirty minutes. It was a little longer than I anticipated, but I was prepared with a book to read. Thankfully, it only took an hour. I think I had forgotten how shiny and pretty the car looks when clean, and I felt so proud and happy with my newly clean car. Yay.

While I was waiting, I started reading my new book, "The Five Love Languages: Singles Edition." Most people have heard of the original book, but the new singles edition came out in paperback in 2009 so I broke down and purchased it. I have heard countless references to it and I thought it might be a good read.

Well, it's a fast read. I'm typically a slow reader, but in that hour at the car dealership I read 70 pages. And although I haven't read anything that put all this information linked together, so far everything is a review. I'm hoping to finish the book over this lovely three-day weekend so I can move on to something else before my classes begin on January 25th.

Speaking of classes, I'm hoping I'm not setting myself up for failure this semester. After registering last semester for 15 credit hours and 6 classes, I ended up dropping one class and fumbling through another. So in the fall I completed 12 hours, 5 classes. This semester I'm a little less ambitious with 4 classes and 11 credit hours. Keep in mind that this is while I'm working full time! Three of the classes are undergraduate teacher certification courses while one course is an upper 500 level course on assessment and achievement testing. But the upper level course doesn't mean it will be more work. I have recently decided that undergraduate classes require more "work" than graduate courses. I know, I know, that doesn't really make sense, right? It makes sense to me. Undergraduate classes require more "busywork." Do this, do that...blah. Graduate courses have assignments that are more thought provoking and usually have more real world value to me. Usually. I hope this course has enough new information for me that it holds my attention.

Other than that loveliness, I had a great evening of watching another girlie romantic comedy: "Music & Lyrics." I'm sorry, but I really love that movie! The music and romance...oh so cute.

I must get to sleep...lots of cleaning and crafting to be had tomorrow! Thank you, Lord, for a day of productive errands and relaxing, girlie movie time. My romantic dreamer was happy today.