Unpacking!

So wonderful to sleep in our own beds! The girls were in bed by 9 pm last night and blessed us with sleeping until after 8 am this morning! Of course, they may have been awake earlier, but if so they were being VERY quiet playing in their rooms. We got to sleep in too and needed it! The cat (Shakespeare) was so happy to see us and meowed for several hours, then slept right next to me all night. He's been following me around all day, I guess he really missed us!

Right now, the girls and Dave are out in the great room playing some golf video game (not on any system, just an interactive DVD game), Dave is teaching them how to do it. Wow, I sure wish we would have been able to secure a wii for them for Christmas. It's sweet! He sent the afternoon taking down the ornaments and all the Christmas things, while I unpacked, worked on laundry, and actually tackled straightening our closet out and reorganizing it. I also am in the midst of making a huge crock pot of turkey noodle soup for us to have over the next few days as it is supposed to be chilly and rainy. I have put on about 7 pounds since the end of marching season, of the 55 or so I lost, and must jump back on the wagon or else I will not fit in these clothes (or keep getting into smaller ones).

We have some errands to run, it was too rainy earlier to justify going out, but it has stopped for now. The girls will go back to church school tomorrow and I will sing at church. I start with the new church orchestra this coming week, should be interesting and HOPEFULLY end up a paying gig. I'd do it for free, but pay would be nice. I am very excited about this new opportunity though I will need to give up playing the hand bells at my own church.

It has been nice being home and just doing things around the house for a change. Usually, we spend the weekend grocery shopping, at meetings for church things, etc. This all starts back up very soon, but my schedule is FAR lighter than a year ago, which is very good!

I'm not looking forward to going back to work. Of course I will be glad to see my students, and it will be time to jump into working on contest music. I am hopeful it will be an uneventful next few months, with no grief from my principal. I am hesitant to go ahead and plan out things for next year, but I have to. It will take a week or so until all of the schedules are correct, because some students having to switch periods. Also, my front ensemble instructor is taking a leave of absence from college, so he will not be in this state to work with them this spring like planned. Hopefully I can find someone else. I'll be hiring a new color guard instructor as well.

My heart just is not into throwing myself into all of this part of my job right now, until I am for certain I am not going to be pushed out of my position. How convenient that my evaluation paperwork from last year was "lost" and this was to be my year to get tenure, but I now have to start over on the three year process, with no job security at all.

Well, I did not come here to commiserate about work lol. I am glad to be getting back, but a longer break would be nice too! Traveling to Ohio means very little down time here at home to de-stress,though I really did go for 2 weeks without much thinking of work...which wouldn't have happened if I were home the entire time!

I should probably go and see when that golf game will be over so we can leave and get our errands done. This evening is dedicated to me finishing my first semester grades (which are almost done) and finalizing the contest music for this coming semester. I think I also have an evaluation worksheet to complete as well to turn in Monday. My briefcase is SOMEWHERE in the office here haha.