First Week!!

 We made it through the first week of school! It might have only been one and one-half days, but it counts as the first week of school! Whew! We also had our first cross-country practice for Chandler on Monday, as well as parent/teacher meetings on Tuesday. Wednesday was our last day of teacher in-service, and school started on Thursday for the students. 

Chandler has decided to run cross-country as well as play on the soccer team, so he has some very busy weeks ahead of him! We met the cross-country team on Monday, and Chandler participated in the practice. There’s not a lot of time before their first cross-country meet as it’s actually tomorrow (Monday!). Chandler hadn’t run a 5k in a while prior to Monday’s practice, but I figured he would do okay. He’s kinda a natural runner as long as he eats enough healthy nutritional foods  before running. He did great in Mondays practice and ran a 5k in under 20 minutes. It’ll be interesting to see how the rest of the season progresses for him. It works out nicely that he wants to do both sports as cross-country practice will be directly after school and then soccer practice is from 4:30-6:00pm. It makes for some long days, but we are happy that the boys have the opportunity to be involved in these sports. We are excited for the boys, and they are going to be having a week full of activity with having a cross-country meet and two soccer games this upcoming week!

Roger had been planning on coming with me to the parent/teacher meetings on Tuesday, but he was needed for fire patrol. Fires have been relentless this summer as it was so hot and dry in July. Emma wanted to go with me to meet her teacher, but when she confound out that I was going to be meeting with all the kids teachers, she decided it would be too long! And it was kinda long! It was good to meet each of the boys home room teachers, but we know that school will be an adjustment for the boys as they will be rotating to different classrooms for each period. The boys had the opportunity to work for our neighbor and two boys stayed home with Emma. The teacher in-service days have had me away from home more than I would like, but we did make it through. Thank the Lord! I’ve also been working in the library, putting together bulletin boards, copying papers, organizing papers and whatever else needs doing as we prepped for the school year. 

On Wednesday we had our last day of teacher inservice and the pastor of the church brought the sessions for the staff/teachers/volunteers. It was a good time of discussion, interaction and getting to know many new faces. At the end of the in-service, they honored the school staff with a special luncheon. The administrator and pastor gave out gifts to the new staff which included a nice travel mug, a cookbook, a gift card, a gift of money and some pens. It was an unexpected and very sweet way of welcoming the new staff on-board. I wasn’t expecting to get a gift, but it was very nice. 

Generally, going back to school is one of the hottest weeks of the summer, but this summer in August has been unseasonably cool. I’m sure another heat wave is coming, but having the weather in the low 80s has been a change! 

Our first day of school was on Thursday, and thankfully, it was a half-day. Everyone was up early from nerves and excitement, and we were at school earlier than we needed to be. The high schoolers and middle schoolers are in a different building, so we walked over there to drop off the boys first. The boys were intimidated and nervous, but also excited and eager to start. After we dropped them off, Emma and I walked over to meet her teacher. Emma has been looking forward to meeting her teacher, and her teacher eagerly welcomed Emma to school. Due to the rising cases of covid, the students were greeted outside by the teachers. It made for some chaotic moments, but by 8:05am, the front of the school was empty and all the students were inside. I helped in a few classrooms with unpacking school supplies, handing out tissues, and showing students where the bathrooms were at. The morning flew by with lots of activities, and then around 11:00 am I got a phone call while working in the library. The middle/high schoolers were having an abbreviated schedule on Thursday so that they could at least meet the teachers of their classes except for 7th period. Garett’s schedule was a bit different than the other 10th graders, as he has a different math class and he’s in Spanish 1 because he can’t take Spanish II without taking the first class. Anyways, Garett got off track in the first period. His home room teacher is the one that is teaching Geometry, but Garett can’t take Geometry yet. Garett told me that he thought he was in the wrong class, but he didn’t know where he was supposed to be, so he just sat through geometry, which meant he missed the Physical Science class he was supposed to be. The morning just went downhill from there, and Chandler’s teacher was the one who called me around 11:00am asking if I knew where Garett was supposed to be at this time. Much of the confusion came about due to the fact that the administrator’s assistant had been sick the week before school started so the teachers hadn’t received Garett’s new schedule. When I followed the school secretary over to the building and found Garett, he still had a smile on his face but lots of confusion as well! Garett did make it to the last period for the correct class- hooray! We are thankful for the teachers who tried to help him, and for the teachers that made him feel welcome amidst the confusion. God is good and faithful! Thankfully, school was done at 11:30am, and there were no sports practices, so that was nice for all of us! Emma had a great first day, and while the other boys were overwhelmed by all the newness, they did very well. Travis is already nervous about falling behind in his subjects and not passing, so if you could ask the Lord to help Travis have calmness of heart, we would appreciate that greatly! 

Friday marked the second day of school, but also the last day of this first week! Garett did much better with the schedule, and he made it to all of his classes. He did have a rather disheartening experience in one of his classes, but we will hopefully be able to resolve that quickly. Perhaps I’ll write about that next week how God orchestrated that event to help Garett…we are still praying and waiting to see what the outcome will be. 

I spent the day on Friday helping out in various classrooms, hole-punching papers, cleaning, doing recess coverage, and working in the library. I’m not an experienced librarian so I have a lot to learn, but I know that I do love reading and books. Hopefully, I’ll do a good job at it and help the students learn to love reading also. It’s overwhelming, for sure, but as I often remind our children -it’s not my job to worry about it. It’s my job to do my very best. 

On Friday afternoon, we had multiple sports practices that were happening after school. Chandler had cross country practice and he quickly realized that he had not had enough nutrition during the day! He looked like jello while he was running, and it was clear to see that he didn’t have any energy. However, he did learn a valuable lesson, and he will probably be doing a better job at packing his lunch in the future! Roger was able to get off work a little early so he brought the boys home from soccer practice, and Emma and I were thankful for that! Wyatt came home from the second day of school with a terrible migraine, and he spent a lot of time on the couch that evening. Thankfully, he seemed to bounce back on Saturday. 

We re-visited a church today. It takes a little bit to figure out if a church is going to be a good fit. We’ve visited churches that we’ve known after the first visit that we wouldn’t be re-visiting, and then there’s some churches that take several visits, conversations, etc to decide if it’s what God has for us or not. We wanted to be involved, settle down, and build relationships, but we also know that we don’t want to rush into anything in haste. Every time we move, there are different factors that are involved in choosing a church. The last time we needed to make a church move our children were 9,8,7,6, and 3. It’s quite a bit different with the boys all being old enough to be involved in a teen group or assisting with various jobs around the church. Please continue to pray for us. The kids did all seem to like the church we re-visited today or are they just tired of looking?! We attended Sunday School today, and while the Sunday School lesson was okay, it wasn’t great. We’re not trying to be picky, but we also know that if something seems “off”, there’s a good possibility that it actually is “off”. 

Anyways, I often find myself becoming “weary in well-doing”, and it’s a reminder that God is still working on me. He is faithful even when I am not. He loves me even when I’m not lovely. He’s faithful even when I’m unfaithful. He’s the God of the impossible, and I can rest in that. 

We are thankful to have made it through the first week. The teachers seem to be excited about the school year, and we are praying for each of our children to “grow in grace and in the knowledge of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ.” Thank you for praying for us!